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Today started with the alarm going off at 0630, way too early. We were out the door at 0715 and went to the train station office to see about reservations to Slovenia. Turns out the one train to Ljubljana that we could take was not running, we were forced to buy reservations through Villach, Austria, instead of the direct train. Oh well. 68 CHF later, we boarded the train with just a few minutes to spare. The ride down to Visp was uneventful and I could barely keep my eyes open despite the scenery. There was a tight connection in Visp, just enough time to go to the W/C and burn some leftover CHF’s in a vending machine. We found our seats with no problem, although there were some German-speaking guys in them originally. We sat next to two women from Malaysia who were on a business trip to Switzerland and were taking a day trip to Milan. We talked to them for a good part of the trip, comparing Switzerland, the US, and Malaysia. While stopped at the Italian border town of Domodosolla, a guy behind us came up and said ‘my ears perked up when I heard you were from North Carolina!’. He used to live in Mooresville after living in Raleigh for nine years, and had moved to St Niklaus, Switzerland to stay with his company. It was an interesting conversation. The next train from Milan to Florence was on the adjacent platform that made that connection brainless. The ride to Florence was very fast and uneventful, but signal problems delayed our last train to Siena for half an hour. We finally made it to Siena around 1730 or so and bought bus tickets to get up into town. Finding the bus stop there was a mess because the bus stop was two levels below the surface of the square outside of the station. During our search, we ran into two young women from Turin who were in the same boat. They asked in Italian where to catch the bus but I could only plead ‘parla englesi’. Fortunately we were able to communicate enough in English to figure it out and get a bus to the hotel. The hotel, Albergo Cannon d’Oro, was originally a palace built some time before 1260. Not much about the place was straight and our room was no different. It was interesting though, there were arches embedded in one wall, presumably from the original construction. After a short stop, we headed down to the amazing Piazza del Campo and had dinner at one of the many restaurants around the edge of the shell-shaped piazza. I had grilled chicken with prosciutto ham and tomato sauce, and B had penne pasta with bacon chunks, and a side of spinach. Afterwards we got some gelato and sat on the slope of the piazza at dusk, marveling at the history and watching other people. We both called home from the piazza to catch up. It was a nice finish to B’s birthday otherwise entirely spent on trains!
The Song of Serendipity 