so leaving verbier, nic and i went to Chateau Chillon(may 1st), and then Vevey for lunch, was nice to see other parts of swissland. i took her to the airport and she was off back to england.

i stayed at Lillianne’s which was a nice place over the lake in Lutry. she has some very nice wine, with her name on the bottle!

then i set off on the friday morning for Florence, got a flat tyre before i left Switzerland, with all shops closed for the holiday weekend!

so it was the first time for me to stay in a hostel. called Bigallo al Spedale it was out of town, a village called Bagno a Ripoli in the olive groves on a hill over looking the city located in a 13th century hospice/pilgrimage place. the guy wrking on the desk seemed surprised that i didn’t want to go out partying, but i had just driven about 800km.

i went to sit outside and read my book, and a girl offered me wine, turns out she worked there as the night shift and had her school friends down for the weekend from Milan and Rome, so we drank wine, she cooked pasta, and we had a great night chatting.

so saturday i spent in florence. which is very pretty, wonderful architecture, and lots of scooters, and art(at least a 4 hour queue for the museum di Uffizi(Office Museum) which needs to be booked 3-4 months in advance to avoid the queues). but it is woo touristy, there is little escape from the hoards. i spent the morning walking around viewing the sights. then had a lunch, some lovely food. by the time that was done it was too hot to be in the sun. unfortunately i was changing lenses on my camera and one slipped and the fitting got bent, which is sad. so i went to Palazzo Putti, due to reading that it was the place to go for modern art. their idea of modern art being at least 500 years old! but at the back is the Bobolino gardens which was a nice place to walk around and relax after walking the city to extensively. what was great is that it was half price as i am under 26!

i wondered some more, and waited until the sun was setting to photograph the bridge with the sunset behind it, and got some great photos, but that will have to wait to be shown until i have time.

i ended up walking back to the hostel, being picked up by a nice old couple staying there, 2km from the hostel. there was a bit of a party going on, and many more people staying there that night, so bbq, and wine outside was great, along with chatting to other travellers.

in the morning an american girl (23) was fretting so much about her camera not working, i tried to help her find a disposable, but being sunday nowhere is open, and we ended up rushing everywhere for an hour before she gave up and i could get on my way to paris.

yet again i was lucked with the busiest traffic due to the end of the holiday weekend, and found the auto strada barely moving at times, but i did see the Mediterranean which made me feel like i need to go and be by the sea. it was the longest distance i have ever driven 1200km, and took 12 hours, with a stop in Chamonix for pizza.

it’s got to that time of year that i have to stop to clean the bugs off the wind screen more often than i stop for fuel.

oh and it’s practically impossible to park in central Paris, there are no spaces!

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