I can't believe it's nearly been two months since I went on my travels! To simply sum up the trip it consisted of an Irish wan (me), a Scotsman and a South African travelling around Europe for 2 weeks, me flying solo for a while in Italy, and then my best friend from Ireland surprising me last minute by accompanying me for the final week of the trip...The trip finally became reality when we booked our global passes on InterRail.eu back in March. I chose a '22 days continuous' ticket whereas the lads got a '10 days within 22' days pass because they were only traveling to 6 cities within 2 weeks. The continuous pass was slightly more expensive but seeing as I was going to be a lone traveler for a while I decided it best to have the freedom of a continuous pass. We booked all the hostels (HostelWorld) and reserved all the trains (Voyages SNCF) for the first two weeks in advance. Once the lads left, I was left to my own devices and musings, choosing to 'wing it' and book hostels as I went.
Before booking the passes, there were discussions/beer sessions to choose our route... It proved such a difficult task to decide where to go, where to miss out on, and even more so for everyone to agree! After extensive research, I discovered that the best solution was to plan the route in somewhat of a circle as is much more cost and time effective. However, ours ended up looking like a diamond shaped route with the last leg of my trip down in Italy.
The trip kicked off with a solid 23 hour bus journey at 7am from Aberdeen to Paris - just for the craic like! It was as cheap as chips so worth it in that respect, but the repercussions of the outrageously budget-friendly decision cost us hours of deprived sleep, restless legs, and sore arses. Surprisingly we didn't rip each others' throats out once, which was a success in its own right!
We generally stayed in cities for two nights before jogging onto the next city - no rest for the wicked! However, I found myself spending longer in Italian cities. My journey started off in the fashion capital of Paris and coincidentally finished up in another top fashion destination, Milan. Unfortunately, not many luxurious stores were visited during the trek due to the lack of packed stylish and sophisticated attire. However, I did find myself wandering into Chanel on L'Avenue Montaigne and offered water. Sure, who could refuse Chanel!?
I have decided that the only effective way to blog about my travels is to divide the trip into three sections; The first two weeks with the lads, Italy by myself, and Italy with my friend. Stay tuned for Inter-railing part 1 for all the goss and shenanigans...
raebelle
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