Reset search
Interrail ItalienInterrail Italien
SatelliteEdit route
A 8-day adventure by Lisa Read more
  • 8footprints
  • 1countries
  • 8days
  • 78photos
  • 9videos
  • 1.5kkilometers
Follow Calendar Share Bucket list
Date ascending
  • TravelerInterrail Italien
    Day 1

    Day 1 & Arrival in freezing Milano

    April 7, 2023 in Italy ⋅ ☁️ 15 °C

    Friday morning, 05:00, the alarm rang, I woke up and for once I was actually excited to get out of bed. Our journey to Italy was about to start and I couldnt wait. Im still surprised by how we got onto the train at Zurich main station, closed our eyes and opened them up to see the city of Milano in front of us. I hadn‘t had coffee that morning so by the time we stepped out of the Milano Centrale Central station I was starving. We went to the ostello bello to leave our baggage and walked to the city center. On our way I finally got my coffee at the official illy store - you can tell I was happy:) On our walk Kai held his first siesta and we grabbed a glutenfree Gipfeli (my first in almost a year!!!) We visited the Duomo and bought tickets for the following day. We weren‘t sure what we bought exactly but we figured it out eventually;). We went to the „quartiere di Brera“ and walked around until we found a shop where Kai spotted a Gould painting and ran right in. We ended up talking to the shopowner, a very nice old italian lady who showed Kai her whole Gould collection. Im sure she would have adopted him if she could. We went for lunch where Kai had pizza Diavola and I had polipo su un insalatina di patate tiepida - yummm.
    After lunch we went to the Castello Sforzesco. I dont know if thats just me but I always thought Italy was always warm and sunny. Well I was wrong. It started getting quite cold and we were happy to go into the museum of the castel. After we walkted through the endless corridors and got out we realized we had missed Leonardo Da Vinci‘s famous fresco. So i told Kai to ask somebody about it in italian.. Unfortunately Kai didnt remember how the hall where the fresco was located was called, and he asked for the wood-hall, whoch was definitely wrong. The poor man was super confused but in the end we found the place and even bumped into Michelangelo‘s Pietá;) What a coincidence! We walked back all the way to the hostel and „froze our asses off“ (excuse my english;))
    Before we went for dinner to an italian restaurant close to the hostel we drank (alcoholfree) gin tonics on our rooftop, which unfortunately weren‘t close as good as real ones.. but hey at least we tried.
    After having walked 27’000 steps we went to sleep quite early in order to be in shape for the following day!
    Good night:)    Read more

  • TravelerInterrail Italien
    1
    Day 2

    Victoria Secret Angel & Versace Adonis

    April 8, 2023 in Italy ⋅ ☀️ 7 °C

    (Short information for everybody reading this blog. This is a summary of all my thoughts and experiences, which I usually write down (quite tired) at the end of each day, without paying attention to any grammatical rules nor spelling, so please dont be surprised if suddenly the tense changes or letters are missing:))

    Turns out Italy did not disappoint us. When we woke up at 7:30 the sun was shining and it was warm enough to walk around without an anorak, gloves and scarf. We went to the Officina Zero, which is a 100% glutenfree bakery, to start of our day with some Croissants, coffee and a freshly squeezed orange juice. We headed to the metro station close by and took a train to the Duomo. Finally we realized what the tickets we had bought really were for. They brought us to the terraces on the rooftop of the building. It was absolutely insane, we didnt even realize it was possible to get up there. We were really happy and decided to stay there for a while and enjoy the sun. Later on we visited the inside and the archaeological area of the cathedral. Our visit made us hungry, therefore we walked over to Amorino (still the very best gelato ever) and grabbed an ice cream. First Kai only wanted to get chocolate but then I convinced him to try different flavours since he was at such a good gelateria, and even though he didnt admit it, I‘m quite sure he thanked me later. Although, what he didn’t appreciate for sure was the „short“ stop at Victoria Secret… well I just had to. What is a trip to Milan without some „serious“ shopping? I returned Kai the favour and spent at least an hour in shoe stores with him, because he couldnt decide whether to buy red, yes red, special edition vans or not. He bought them in the end and was happy, so it was worth the wait:).
    We strolled along the street, went to a supermarket, bought some drinks and snacks and sat down in a park next to the Basilica San Lorenzo. However, the park wasnt as nice as we thought, there were some really weird emo- teenies, walking around, smoking and drinking, which lead Kai and I to have an extended conversation about education which almost lasted throughout the rest of the day. Anyways, we walked on and found a very pretty bar outside, so we sat down and ordered two analcoholic cocktails. Felt quite fancy;))
    We stayed there for a while and enjoyed the sunrays tickeling on our faces.
    On our way to the restaurant „Bistró“, I had found on a „glutenfree guide“ website earlier, we walked past a canal with bars, cute little shops and art galleries. We hadnt seen such a charming part of the city before and I was glad we had come cross it.
    After a couple of minutes we found ourselves walking through a less touristic part of the city and saw an old man carrying boxes of wine out of his car. Kai stepped over to him and offered to help. The man was very surprised at first but accepted Kai‘s offer. They went inside the house while I looked after his cute dog. For a moment I was a bit worried because they took a while to get back. But then they came back and the man thanked us a thousant times. We talked for a bit and he offered to invite us to his house for a glass of wine, but when he looked for his keys to open up the gate he realised he had left them inside, so we waited for about 20 minues until he had called all his contacts and had finally found somebody who could open up the gate for him. Before we left he invited us again but we declined, saying we had a reservation, so he gave us one of his wine bottles and wished us all the best.
    Although I must admit the day was over all incredibly aweosme, my highlight was dinner. The Ristorante Bistró is a 100% glutenfree place where they offer all types of Lasagne, fresh homemade pasta, delicious burgers with soft buns and honestly everything somebody could wish for. I felt like I was in heaven. I can’t remember the last time I had such good bread it was just exquisite. I was more than full but I just couldnt say no to dessert, so we ordered a Tiramisú scomposto. Kai doesnt even like coffee, but he knew that for me this Tiramisu was just a „to die for“ so he shared it with me!
    We gave the girl a good tip and „rolled“ (at least I did) to the next metro station and drove home, packed all our stuff and went to bed where I am now currently reflecting on our awesome day and writing this blog!
    Good night to switzerland:)    Read more

  • TravelerInterrail Italien
    Day 3

    Fake David and sunbathing

    April 9, 2023 in Italy ⋅ ⛅ 16 °C

    We woke up in the Ostello bello early and tried not to wake up the other 3 people in our room. Considering that they were snoring I think we managed to let them sleep. We had breakfast at the ostello and left for the train station. We hadnt been able to reserve our seats so we had already imagined possible scenarios of a conducteur asking for our tickets and us acting like confused swiss passengers. However at the Milano Centrale Station we went to the biglietteria and asked for seat reservations and it was way easier than expected. A couple of minutes later we were sitting on the train to Florence.
    When we arrived we headed to the Hotel Ginori al Duomo. We couldnt find it at first but we passed a very fancy looking hotel, where we both agreed that if we were going to come back 20 years later with more money, we would definitely stay at that place. The strange thing was that we weren‘t able to find the hotel we had booked and it took us some time to realize that what we had booked was actually the super fancy one we had passed by right before. We went in a bit confused and went to the lobby to ask for our room. The receptionist told us our rooms were ready by 3 pm and took our baggage. Before we left the hotel, we changed our clothes, made sure we looked a bit less like swiss backpackers and more like real „fiorentini“.
    We walked right to the Cathedral and passed all the important monuments of the city until we got to the river and passed the Ponte Vecchio. There were so many tourists on the bridge and Kai and I (mostly I) started to get really annoyed because of the amount of people and everybody pushing around and us getting squeezed. At some point we just wanted to get out of there, so we grabbed an ice cream and walked away from the crowd. We ended up in some cute little streets above the actual city center and walked up there. It was very peaceful and I could have „strolled“ along those streets forever. We went to the Giardino Boboli and mainly sunbathed on the grass with a beautiful view of the city. (Kai just said these were the best 20 mins lf the trip so far - hope that was a bit exhagerated)
    In the evening we went to our hotel room which was right in the attic. Whereas the narrow hotel hallways had carpeted floor, ours was wooden. We had a big modern private bathroom and a skylight. The bed was huge and super comfy. We drank the last bit of Gin Tonic and celebrated Pascua in our room. BIG SURPRISE: Kai‘s parents had bought glutenfree chocolate easter bunnies for us and Kai made me look for mine all over the room:) Finally I found it on the rooftop!!
    We had dinner at Quinoa, a 100% glutenfree restaurant in the city center, where I had delicious Ravioli.
    We walked back home & went to bed.
    Goodnight:)    Read more

  • TravelerInterrail Italien
    Day 4

    Fotto on Giotto

    April 10, 2023 in Italy ⋅ ☀️ 13 °C

    Today was the day Apollo and Aphrodite took a Fotto on Giotto. We woke up and had breakfast at our amazing hotel. Kai ate for a family of at least 10 people so it took us a while but when we finished, we were ready to burn all those calories on our way up the Giotto tower, where, as the title of today‘s blog already says, we took a (hundred) photo(s). What we saw from up there was astonishing, we could see the Dome from a perfect perspective and the view over the old city houses was beautiful. We agreed that Florence was way prettier than Milan and that if it werent for the annoying tourist crowds, we would stay here.
    By the way while we were standing in line for the tower, we started writing our own CV‘s vice versa and had a really good time just standing there in the sun, laughing and waiting for us to get closer to the entrance.
    After climbing the 87.4 metres high Campanile di Giotto and admiring the view, we went to the Cathedral Museum. For lunch we had Glutenfree Focaccia. Mine was really good, but unfortunately they gave Kai the wrong one. He got proschutto, which he doesnt like, instead of salami & arugula. So in the end he only had the focaccia bread and wasnt too happy about it. In the afternoon we visited the Uffizi art museum. We managed to see all the 7 „must see“ paintings we had read about. After learning so many new things about art our poor brains needed some calories, so we „diffused“ to the famous Gelateria Santa Trinita where Kai probably had the biggest ice cream in the world. We ate it by the river and stayed there for hours and hours having the best conversations. We figured out that if my man wasnt going to surprise me with a weekend in florence I wouldnt want him, talked a lot about people walking past us, our spirit animals and decided to set a one year goal for both of us. Our original plan was to walk back to the hotel but then we spontanously bought to-go gin tonics, yes non-alcoholic, and toasted to our wonderful afternoon.
    We diffused to the restaurant „Sgrano“, again 100% gf and had wayy to much pasta there. Since they had Cantucci on the menu we ordered some but instead of getting them with wine as recommended by the restaurant I ordered them with an espresso and got laughed at by the entire staff. (At this point I have to admit, life without alcohol is hard) We had arrived at the restaurant as two people but left as a trio. Our foodbaby Leonardo accompanied us home. On our way back we meandered thorugh the streets and eventually got to our hotel still laughing pretty hard, where the receptionist eyed us suspiciously.
    Funny ending of a hilarious day.    Read more

  • TravelerInterrail Italien
    Day 5

    Waiting for David and finding the sea

    April 11, 2023 in Italy ⋅ ☁️ 12 °C

    Today was mainly walking around, eating and waiting for our time slot at the Academia to finally get to see the real David. After we woke up Kai went downstairs to attack the breakfast buffet while I showered and packed my backpack. By the time I got down he was at the pancakes with nutella AND butter. (I dared to tell him that nutella was already made of butter but he didnt really want to hear it)
    We still had our 3 day pass Tickets for the Dome so before the checkout we went to the Piazza to see if we could get in. The dome only opened at 10 so we went to a shop to buy some postcards and headed back to the hotel for the check-out. At 10 we entered the Dome and were almost the first ones in. We were very impressed by the size and height of the Cathedral. The Cupola with its paintings was breathtaking. Before leaving for the archaeological area, Kai and I both lighted candles for our loved ones.
    When we went outside we went to a juicebar where Kai had his second breakfast and I had a smoothie with a banana bread. From there on we didnt really have a plan, we walked around for a long time and eventually found a nice café where we ordered coffee and wrote our postcards. We wanted to see the national library which unfortunately wasnt open for tourists, so we went to the Via dei Neri where I got Focaccia and Kai pizza. Then it was finally 15:15 and we went to the Academia. We were a bit worried when we saw the humongous line in front of the building. Soon we figured out that since we had bought the tickets in advance we could just jump the line and go directly to the entrance, which we did, and it worked perfectly. A few moments later we were standing in front of the huge statue of David. We both have to admit this guy was absolutely good looking, and crazy hot. We admired this piece of art for a couple of minutes but then left quite fast, since we had to catch out train half an hour later. The train to Pisa was very crowded, therefore I had to squeeze myself between the window and our backpacks. In Pisa we noticed that we could take another train than we had planned and we would be way faster. We ran to the biglietteria, made the seat reservations like Speedy Gonzales, got on the platform and jumped on the train.
    The journey to cinque terre was very nice, we passed pretty landscapes and sceneries until we arrived at the sea. We were both so hyped when we saw the waves crashing on the cliffs, the cute pictoresque village with houses of different colours and the green hills surrounding it all. Our hotel la Stella della Marina did not only meet our expectations, it exceeded them by far. The owner Gabriel, was really friendly and showed us a map of Monterosso, the village, gave us recommendations on restaurants and showed us all the nice hiking trails of the area. The room he gave us had a private bathroom and a even small balcony. I was so incredibly happy. After we had unpacked our stuff and settled down for a moment we went to the village and looked for a restaurant. We walked around for a bit but most of the restaurants that looked nice were already full so we decided to get Pizza. It was a good decision, the Pizza was really good. Poor me had to pay Kai‘s dinner too because I had lost a stupid bet earlier. Kai even wanted to get a Nutella-Chocolate-Calzone for two people as dessert and I am so so thankful he didnt. We went back to the hotel and went to sleep:)
    Excited for the hike tomorrow!    Read more

  • TravelerInterrail Italien
    Day 6

    Highspeed hike and french invasion

    April 12, 2023 in Italy ⋅ ☁️ 15 °C

    Turns out backpacking got us quite exhausted, so today we slept in until 8, which is already pretty late for both of us.
    We had breakfast at our Beautiful hostel and it was wonderful. Gabriele had prepared homemade cakes, spinach tartes and had put fresh strabwerries, kiwis and bananas, nature yogurt and a cheese selection on the buffet for us. There were even Glutenfree Crackers, Müesli, Bread and Cookies. Once again, Bingo! After brekkie we got dressed, left the hotel and went to the beach. It was raining a bit but the atmosphere and the scenery were so breathtaking that the weather didnt bother us at all. We walked from Monterosso to Vernazza, stopped there for a bit, I bought earrings (Mami li vedi nella foto sul balcone;)) and walked on to Corniglia. It took us about 2 hours and 10 minutes for both tracks. We didn’t run but we walked quite fast, at least compared to the people aound us. Kai counted about 167 people, we passed. Again on our hike we had great conversations. I love how I can just simply say everything that comes to my mind without having to overthink even a word, knowing that Kai would accept it or if not, we would have an interesting discussion about it. Another funny thing was that most people we passed or crossed were french, so Kai and I pretended to be french from time to time. Oui, certainement, baguette.
    In Corniglia, after enjoying an ice cream with basil, honey and pistacchio flavour, we jumped on a train, which brought us back to Monterosso, where we took extended showers and sat down on our small balcony. Eventually the sun came out, WOW, so we took our wine glasses from our room and…. filled them with fanta and toasted to us, our amazing holidays and our hike.
    (Little update on Kai‘s italian: I always let him ask for everything, tell him how to spell certain words and teach him how to, you know, „act“ italian;) and even though sometimes he gets people a bit confused because he mixes up the order of words in a sentence or the letters, he‘s making great progress!!)
    Gabriele had recommended us to go to Ristorante da Eraldo and the food was really good. Kai had Pappardelle alla Carbonara and I had Calamarata con verdura grigliata.
    The day had gotten us really tired, when we were home at around 8pm we went straight to bed and after reading a bit we fell asleep.
    (Yes we sound like an old married couple in their 80ies, but we were tired so please dont judge:)    Read more

  • TravelerInterrail Italien
    1
    Day 7

    Grande Finale

    April 13, 2023 in Italy ⋅ ☁️ 11 °C

    As for the grande Finale Kai and I will write the following post together: brace yourselves
    Even though we went to bed early yesterday, we slept in again. After breakfast we noticed a huge, somewhat obscene and grotesque misspelling in the former blog-post which has been duly removed after a short mental breakdown and a trmendous amount of embarassement on Lisas part. Great start of the day!
    We took the train to Corniglia and walked up to the village from the train station, where we debated as to which path would lead us to Volastra.
    Lisa set the pace to our hike by racing up the rather steep slope. We stopped counting the „fellow civilians“ after 40+ (after 15 minutes) and covered 350 vertical meters within a half hour. Drenched in sweat, we collapsed at the top and fortified our position our position with a selfie. A flat stretch through forests and vineyards followed, accompanied by discussions on the lack of magic in today‘s world, evil gnomes and bears ( Lisa is still traumatized by Mordu [see ‚Brave‘] ) and the ether of the universe. Upon arriving in Volastra, our brave heroes turned in at the local focacceria to still their stomachs. A steep descent down to Manarola ensued, where Lisa‘s right knee almost disociated from the Lisa Leg complex.

    We stopped for a drink and were greatly overcharged in a colorful indian bistro with italian staff and a goof balcony with a nice view. We fled from the tourists crowding the town‘s main street by taking any flight of stairs which led in the right direction. Back on the path to Riomaggiore we started playing „nationality guess“, it wasnt that difficult though because most of them were either american or french. The climb was easy for us because we‘re „schwizer Berggeisse“ but the others were struggeling like hell. We wanted to go back with the boat but the waves were too big so we had to take the train one more time. Back in Monterosso, Kai had the most exotic ice cream of the week - 3 scoops of extra dark chocolate, whereas Lisa opted for boring old Pistacchio, Chocolate and Maracuja. At the hotel we started writing the blog in the afternoon sunshine, but ended up dancing to 2000s Pop songs. A Nonna opened her window to applaud us from across the street. After the sun disappeared, our night began…

    Stay tuned for our late night post!    Read more

  • TravelerInterrail Italien
    1
    Day 7

    Ultima serata, bagno freddo e fuoco

    April 13, 2023 in Italy ⋅ ☁️ 11 °C

    After our dance session we came down from the top balcony and bumped into Gabriele who provided us with breakfast for tomorrow. He gave us yogurt, fruit, muesli, bisquits and more. We then headed down to the lobby, did the check out and went out for dinner to l‘Osteria where Kai commited blasphemy against one of the central pillars of italian cuisine by putting parmigiano (which was meant for the pasta) on the focaccia with olive oil and salt. Lisa was not amused and one of the waitors even rolled his eyes.
    Dinner was „spettacolare“. Kai composed a list of things one should know when travelling with lisa upon her request. The list got very long - you‘re seeing a short excerpt.
    Back at the hotel we bade a long and sincere goodbye to Gabriele and told him about lisas marriage plans (you‘ll probably get to see that one day) - the hotel‘s booked already. Then we went to our room and unwrapped our lampion which we had bought in Florence. We snuck out of the hotel because we had already said bye to Gabriele and thought it was weird to say bye again and went to the beach. We tried to light the little thingy in the bottom of the paper lamp but set the whole thing on fire. It drifted vertically for three metres before falling into the sea. Kai could barely fish it out again and when he did it looked like an abused elephant condom. (Oh god we‘re having so much fun writing this). Then we had the best idea of the entire week and decided to go swimming. Kai surprisingly was already wearing his bathing suit, Lisa had her underclothes. The water wasnt as cold as expected but the wind was. We dodged the street lights as we walked the 100 metres back to the hotel, said goodnight one last time to Gabriele, made sure not to get too much sand in the hotel but Kai still spilled some „beach“ all over our bathroom floor. After we had both showered, we warmed ourselved up with the hairdrier and wrapped ourselved in our blankets.
    What an evening - and we still have to pack.    Read more

  • 2024© FindPenguins
  • Home
  • About us
  • Blog
  • Group Tracking
  • Press
  • Terms
  • Privacy Policy & Cookies
  • Support
  • Legal notice
  • English