We finally got onto that train and our compartment was dark and the curtain was pulled across. We opened it anyway and found a family (mom, dad and little girl) and a guy called MARIO all stretched out across the seats. We were a little dismayed but glad that we actually had seats. So we sat in the seats closest to the door and tried to nap. We basically had a terrible night's sleep- the Italian family was obnoxious. The mom called someone on the phone and talked really loudly for a long time. The little girl was kinda cute- she didn't like me tho. I made faces at her and she just stared at me! Tough crowd. The dad and Mario kind of talked a little and got up every now and then to go smoke. And of course when they came back they stunk up the compartment. The mom put the little girl on her lap and stretched her feet out... all the way into my side. Those pointy boots are not fun when they are poking the liver. She also got up every now and then to yell out of the compartment door asking where we were stopped. And she didn't mind knocking into Sarah's legs either while she yelled.
A few minutes after we finally pulled out of Roma, these two guys from South America sat down in the aisle next to our door (there were flip down seats along the wall). They had a couple of huge backpacks filled with random crap, some strapped to the back- a sample of their luggage: a broom, a unicycle, plunger, bowling pin things to juggle... it was strange. They spoke about 3 different languages and apparently, they juggled as well!
We attempted to sleep as best we could- this is where the ipods came in handy! At 3 am, we stopped at a place called Bologna or something like that and the family got off (whew!). Mario, Sarah and I immediately stretched out and actually fell asleep!
When I woke up, I needed to find a working toilet w/tp (it took about 4 tries) and discovered that we were the second to last carriage, which meant I could see out of the back! It was pretty cool- I took some pictures when we were still in Italy:
After a little while we went into a big tunnel, so I sat back down. A few minutes later... we popped out and were surrounded by huge mountains! The view was pretty spectacular
a crazy bridge:
We had to switch trains at Innsbruck, but thankfully we didn't have to wait long- a train was already waiting to go to Salzberg and left within 5 minutes. The ride was about 2 hours and at one point, Sarah and I were both napping with our feet up on the seat. The ticket guy opened our door and began speaking rapid German to us. I tapped Sarah's feet to put them down while I hurriedly got the tickets out. He checked them, then left! I guess he got upset about our feet on the seats...
We arrived in Salzburg about 2 and got a free city map then headed to our #1 hostel pick. We were disorientated for some reason, but managed to find which direction to go eventually. About halfway there, out of nowhere it started raining! It was crazy- there were blue skies on either side of us, but overhead was a dark gray cloud with lots of rain and some lightning too. Sarah and I huddled under a tree for a few minutes, then got out rain gear and decided to just keep going. We made it to a little overhang thing where about 5 other people were waiting as well and then... the sun came back out. (Title of photo: Welcome to Salzburg!)We shrugged, then found the hostel and got a room, easy as pie. Speaking of food, we didn't really have anything to eat on the train ([snacks] * no meal cart that we knew of + 14 hours on a train = really hungry people ) so we headed to a little shack thing that sold food, got some food, ate the food then headed over (the long way, we found out later) to the old part of the city.
It was a really nice day (since there were no clouds anymore) and a nice temperature. The city was nice as well, tho not much going on since it was Saturday and a lot was closed. But we did end up watching a kids race (we clapped for the kids the whole time they were running by) eating a giant, chocolate-covered pretzel and having a raddler (same drink as Munich... half beer, half Sprite). The old city was nice; we wandered around the streets and checked out a few shops. And bonus- it was all pedestrian, so no need to watch out for or dodge crazy drivers.We decided to find a cheap internet cafe (which we did) and then I had all types of problems including my computer freezing up, the printer not working, the owners being mean and I was 10 cents short of printing a receipt for my Scotland tour. After way too much stress, I finally got the 10 cents I needed to print my paper (some very nice man window shopping nearby gave me the 10 cents!) and we went back to the hostel, took much needed showers then fell right asleep.
