Category Archives: Italy

Patras,Greece to Bari, Italy Ferry

Marsha and I took a cab to the bus station and Stephanie took the subway to the airport, so we said goodbye at the hotel. Our bus ride to Patras was approx 2 1/2 hours but it took longer because there was a horrific accident on the highway. We reached the port and got our tickets. The ferry looked nice – see pic. We were only able to get “deck” tickets which means grab a seat and that’s where you sleep. See pic of salon we were in. I then took a pic of a bridge as we were leaving port and also of another ferry. We had dinner on the ferry which was salads, but we had a great view. Then it was time for bed – see Marsha in our luxurious accommodations. I know I have been saying how hot it Is here, but the ferry is like a freezer. It seems there is no happy medium – either too hot or too cold. About 1am the crew woke us because we stopped in a port. To our surprise we think about a thousand people got on. We found out this is a usual occurrence and must be since people brought queen size air mattresses with them. There were people sleeping everywhere! I am writing this while we are about an hour from the Italian port of Bari. Will let you know what happens next and send when I have wifi.

Milan – continued

We got up early and went to see the “Last Supper”. Only 25 people are allowed in at a time and at 15 minute intervals. Of course no pics. Then we went to see the Sforza Castle. Very pretty outside but not much on the inside. Then we walked to the Duoma (church) and toured the inside. They were very strict about dress code here/ no shorts or bare shoulders. It is almost as large as Notre Dame but the ceiling has to be higher. We also toured La Scala. That was really neat. We were able to see the theater and not just the museum. It reminded me of the Academy of Music in Phila. The museum was really interesting! We were only allowed to take pictures in a certain section and that was of costumes in various opera productions. The pictures are from Aida. By this time we had seen most of Milan’s hot spots so we went to the hotel to pick up our luggage and headed for the train station. We are now on a train to Zurich (54 track train station) where we will change trains to go to Dresden. We get on the train at approx 8pm in Zurich and arrive at 8am in Dresden.
We are now on the overnight train to Dresden. We bought some wine in Milan, but since our train from Milan was an hour late getting to Zurich and we really thought we were gong to miss the train to Dresden we are going to have some on the train. Oh, I forgot to mention we made the Dresden train with a minute to spare! Now the language is back to German. Just when we can figure out what they are saying on the TV we change countries not channels. Not many pictures because we weren’t allowed to take them in a lot of places.

Milan

We left for the train station about 9:30 so we could catch our connecting train at 3 pm. The trains from Nice heading east have really been a problem lately. We wound up spending approx 5 hours in the train station waiting for our connecting train. There were no seats except in the cafeteria and we had to order something so we could sit there. See pic. It was the cheapest items on the menu. We finally got to our hotel about 7:30pm and went to check out how long it would take us to get to the place that houses “The Last Supper”. We have tickets to see the painting at 8:45 am. We ate at a tourist restaurant by the Dome(church)- the only pic I took was of the bruschetta. There are pics of the church and the La Scala opera house. It is now after 11 and we leave Milan tomorrow afternoon.