T+03 Days: A Verrrry Long Travel Day Via Rail

Finally... here in Modena in the heart of the Tuscany region.

What a long day!

Started out normal enough 0630 wake-up.  After showering Conor was good enough to go out to the street vendor we patronized yesterday to buy Dad a double espresso and both of us, croissants and OJ.  He also bought some very weird and sweet looking pastry covered in tiny sugar rocks that we could not name, took a bite, declared it to be unfit for our consumption and, promptly threw those away.  :-)  The croissants were fine.

Headed over to the train station to begin the longest travel day of our adventure.  In summary:

- Boarded the train for Monaco at 0753
- Arrived Monaco at ~0830

Train station Ventimiglia, Italy, on the Spanish Riviera

- Boarded the train for Ventimiglia, Italy, at ~0855
- Arrived Ventimiglia at ~0945.  Went directly to la biglietteria (the ticketing office) and butchered my way via Italian into due (2) one-way tickets to Modena via Genova (as in Al and Roxanne Genova) and then Milan - where we would need to change trains for Modena.

Now that's a slice in Ventimiglia train station

We had about 1+15 to kill in Ventimiglia so, feeling a bit peckish, we went into the cafe in the station and bought 2 slices of margherita pizza (they were huge slices - 1/4 of a pizza and quite tasty), devoured them and then left the station to stroll down mainstreet - which you were on coming right out of la stazione - down to their beach.  Not far at all... maybe 3/4 of a mile, 1 1/2 miles round trip.  Very pretty seaside city.  Took a bunch of photos - I know, no surprise there - and went down to the water to sit & sun and people watch.  As in Nice, the beaches in Ventimiglia were rocky and not sandy.  Beautiful, hot/sticky, day.

A side note:  We take many things for granted in the US like, for instance, public restrooms.  In Ventimiglia's train station men's room, you have your basic standing urinals and behind the closed doors - when you're looking for some quality time between trains - you walk in and discover there's no commode!!  Just a porcelain hole in the ground with 2 bigfoot shaped footrests to truly 'cop a squat' on...  should have taken a picture.  :-)

Rocks not sand at the beach

A view to Ventimiglia

- Got back to the train station to board the 1058 train, Treno 139 to Milan - a ~4 hr trip.  Fortunately, even though we could only get 2nd class passage, I was able to reserve seats which turned out to be a great idea particularly when the train started filling up.  Another stroke of luck: our traveling partners for the 2 1/2 hr ride to Genova on the coast were 2 very nice young ladies from Texas, Morgan and Casey, and made for good traveling conversation.  Both of them had already been in Europe for 12 days and they had 11 more to go.  Casey was a 1st grade teacher and Morgan was graduating from Texas Tech as an accountant.

Proof of visitation!

- They jumped off at Genova and we continued on to Milan - another 1+30 ride.  The train emptied alot in Genova and we had no traveling partners except for a mother of 3 across the isle from us returning to Switzerland after a 7day holiday on the French Riviera.  Her kids, 1 girl and 2 boys, were 9, 7, 5 and very well behaved.  God Bless our moms who do so much for us with no complaint - just a ton of patience and love.

Bullet train from Milan to Modena

- Arrived Milan at ~ 1455 and we had a 30min layover before boarding our next train, Treno 9819 (one of the fast Italian bullet trains), for the last leg of our trip to Modena.  Milan's quite the large, historic city and would love to tour it someday in the future.  Da Vinci's Last Supper is in Milan!  I was able to get la prima classe (1st class) seats for the last leg - not too shabby, large seats, good service - although on the "could have been better side", the seats did not recline. :-(
- Departed Milan at ~ 1535 for Modena.  Even at the incredible speeds we were getting up to on this train, still took us about 1+45 to get to our destination.
- Arrived Modena at ~1720.
- Total distance traveled on this day:  315miles - the train is the way to go!!! :-)
- Still, really wears you out.

Our 'upscale' hostel in Modena - nicest one we stayed in.

Tried booking our next couple of train rides but, we were tired and the line was moving way too slowly so, we stumbled out of the station and meandered our way to the albergo (hotel); Hotel Europe - well, actually, even though it's the nicest place we've stayed at so far, it's still just a classy hostel with much better WIFI bandwidth for my blogging!!  Took us 10mins to walk there.

Good A/C, 2 twin beds, they do serve food/meals, an extra pillow for Dad and, is located in the midst of Modena.  The Ferrarri factory/museum is about 20km south of here.  We'll bus there tomorrow.  Tonight we're going to chill in Modena.

Our room & Conor on-line

OK, tired of typing for now.  Will see what else I can add later and some photos.

I'm back.
At 1930, went down for la cena (evening meal) at the small restaurant they have in the lobby of Hotel Europa and partook in their 18Euro/person dinner - which included bread to snack on, a prima plate, a secondo plate, dolce (sweets) and after dinner drinks. Conor and I both had pasta and red sauce first followed by a pleasant veggie and 2 meat plate - kinda like beef tips but in this case had pork and beef tips - based in a nice brown sauce.  We enjoyed that, had due bottiglia di acqua (2 bottles of non-gas water) with dinner, skipped the desserts and enjoyed a couple of caffes (which = espressos). A bit strong for Conor but, as I've said before, I enjoy the drink quite a bit.

One of many historic buildings undergoing renovation

Afterwards, we spent an hour walking/touring the very quiet city centre and some adjoining areas. There were pockets of life but, overall, Modena feels empty - we thought it a bit odd for a Tuesday but then, what do we know??  First time here and no real clue!  :-)

We were both disappointed by the overall state of disarray and decay throughout the city and some of it's major structures are under some type of renovation - but, not enough of them.  Made us feel a bit sad for Modena - a city with a ton of history and at least 1 beloved son who passed away not too long ago: Luciano Pavarotti. Not sure if we'd have stopped here to visit if not for the Ferrarri factory and museum 20km south of here in the town of Maranello.

Got back to Hotel Europa at ~2115, still light. Will be another good day tomorrow (they've all been good in fact :-) ) as we stumble our way down to Maranello via autobus.

Buona notte (good night), my friends!