Knowing that we wanted to head out to France the next day, our first priority that morning was to figure out how we could stop by Pisa long enough to see the Tower and end up in southern France early enough to find a room. So, after our large breakfast with very strange, very rich hot chocolate (kind of like drinking melted chocolate chips), we headed for the train station. We first went the wrong way and somehow ended up at the Accademia. Yep, the line sure was longer now. But I think it was a subconscious mistake, because I had been thinking all yesterday at how much I wanted to have a David poster, even though I hadn't figured out how to get it home. But since we accidentally ended up there, I figured it was meant to be, and bought a poster[42], as well as a hilarious postcard for my dad[43]. The same nice Italian guy was there, and he said "Ehh..." again as he waved off the cost for the postcard and wrapped up my poster in a very sturdy way. Well, maybe not everybody in Italy is incompetent.

We finally found the station, though, and located the information booth. Unlike the ones in Germany and Austria that had one line for each clerk, this had a seemingly advanced number system: you went to a ticket vending machine and selected what type of information you wanted, and it spewed out a number for the next available pertinent clerk[44]. We had number 329 and I think they were barely into the 200s, so we sat on the floor for some time, me mostly catching up in my little green notebook about our adventures in Venice and Florence those past two days.

When our number was finally displayed and the clerk called it out, we went up to him and were very happy that he spoke English[45]. Gesturing to what I had written in my notebook in case his English wasn't that great, we explained to him that we wanted to leave Florence at about 10 am, get to Pisa at about 11 am, and then leave Pisa at about noon and arrive as soon as possible in Arles, France or Lyon, France (though that was far less preferable). He immediately said this would be absolutely impossible, but I thought that it was strange for him to say that, because he hadn't even typed it into the computer yet.

Then I realized there was no computer.

He said something to the effect that even a 7 am train for Pisa would require us to backtrack so much that we wouldn't get to Arles until some 5 am the next morning. Well, I guessed that seeing the Leaning Tower wasn't meant to be on this trip, so we asked him what would be the best way to just plain get there.

Maybe there would be a computer in the back somewhere.

There wasn't.

He pulled out a huge stack of books and just started going through them. I thought this was supposed to be a civilized country. Oh man, this was going to take a long time.

It did.

I think we stood there for at least a half-hour, watching him leaf through book after book and jogging his own memory for additional information until he plotted out the most complicated (yet somehow it was the easiest and fastest?) train schedule I have ever seen. Here it was in a nutshell: Leave Florence at 6:01 (yes, that early), take the train to Genoa PP and arrive at 9:12. "Get a little croissant" he says, then leave at 10:20 for Ventigmilia, a little Italian town on the border with France that apparently gets a great deal of connections. Arrive at Ventigmilia at 13:05 and have enough time to change tracks for the 13:23 train to Nice. In Nice, though, there is only the ten minutes between 14:10 and 14:20 to change to the Marsailles train, though that should really be enough time. That train would then arrive at 16:45, and we'd have another twenty minutes until the 17:05 train to Arles would leave. We'd then arrive at our final destination at 17:51, ten total hours on trains and 12 hours after leaving Florence. Major suckage. But it would have to do. Our train time was limited, and we needed to get there in one day if we would ever have enough train days left to go to Spain[46].

A 3-D Doug in front of 3-D baptistery doors

I guess Doug thinks I took too many pictures in FLorence

We first braved the pizza place M. Barbieri had recommended when she saw that we had "wasted" our money at Kenny's Pizza. "This is locals' pizza" she said, and boy was she right. When we walked in we noticed two rooms in the same restaurant--the first one with a cement brick oven and bar stools, the second with tablecloths and chairs. Something told us that eating in the second room would cost more, and we were right. But since there was no surcharge to eat at the bar, and it looked far more interesting anyway, we claimed the two stools right in front of the oven. Trying our best to decipher the menu, we ordered a pizza[47], 1/4 liter of wine, a coke, and a salad[48], the salad somehow being the most expensive part. We also got to watch as the cook made our pizza--I was cursing myself for not bringing my camera[49], because watching an unkempt Italian making a authentic pizza in front of a brick oven with one hand, his beer in the other hand, and a cigarette dangling from his mouth was a photo opportunity of a lifetime. Oh well, at least it is burned in my memory. We took our time at that meal, chatting with a man from Denmark and his English wife. Doug drank his $1.35 carafe of wine...as well as stealing the half carafe that was left at the seat next to him. "The alcohol would kill any of the germs!" he justified. He lived through it, so I guess he was right.

After our lunch, we marched further down the road to the Boboli Gardens. No, they don't make tasteless, dry, overpriced, sorry-excuse-for-a-pizza-crust there. But it was one of the most tasteless, driest, overpriced, sorriest-excuse-for-an-arboretum that we'd ever seen. Maybe its me, but I thought that a lemon grove was supposed to have lemon trees in it--perhaps a case of mis-translation, but more likely a case of neglect! Well, at least it was peaceful. We meandered through the weed and pebbled-covered pathways, stretching out occasionally on the lawns to soak in the soothing sun (and tons of irritating, blood-thirsty bugs), and laughing at how they had let the statues here simply go to hell. Completely decrepit, pigeon-excrement-soaked, chipped away mounds of rock. Forget Venus de Milo, these were Venus de Nothing. And to think that Michelangelo had once said that the giant fountain in the middle of the park was a huge waste of marble even when it was intact! Well, at least we got the occasional nice view from the high parts of the gardens.

The rest of that day is a bit foggy to me...I know we went back to Vivoli's for more gelato, and that we found a place to change over just enough money to get the 8% discount M. Barbieri gave for cash. Funny, though, how all I really remember is the funky food. We must have lost our heads, because for our 8 pm dinner we were dense enough to go down to Kenny's Pizza again for a simple snack of two burgers and a shake. It was here that we realized just what the level of Italian disorganization and incompetence could be...even in a high-budget, conglomerate, fast-food chain. The prices posted on the outside rarely matched those on the inside, and no, they weren't always lower! The prices on the tray placemat often didn't match either one of those, and neither did the menu for that matter. Where was the gelato they claimed to have? How come they didn't have their fish and veggie sandwiches on the menu? Is the chicken sandwich L6,000 or L11,000--there were an equal number of sources for both prices, and its a big difference between $4 and $8! Since when is a `salad bar' a $4 dish with a large piece of lettuce and one slice of tomato? And what is on a hamburger--lettuce and tomato, or cheese and onion...do they not know what they put on their own sandwiches unless they have a special song[50] to get it straight? And I guess they don't have the shakes on the menu because they really aren't that--they were supposed to be made of Florence's wonderful gelato, but they tasted even blander and thinner than ice milk! We concluded that they should rename it "Clueless Pizza".

We went to sleep very early that night in anticipation of our 5:00 am alarm for our Travel Day from Hell. Who says lightning doesn't strike twice[51]?