Rome to Marseille via Milan, Genoa and Nice. Quite a journey as it turns out.

We foolishly were unaware that it was a long weekend because of all-saints day on Friday. As a consequence the trains were all quite full and hard to book. We changed trains in Milan and then headed to Genoa for the night.

While we were waiting for the next train there was a band rehearsing in front of one of their nice new regional trains.

This was entertaining, he was singing S.O.S. by Abba. Somewhat unexpected for such a young feller.

We liked this statue at the station in Genoa.

“Genoa (Genova) is a port city and the capital of northwest Italy’s Liguria region. It’s known for its central role in maritime trade over many centuries. In the old town stands the Romanesque Cathedral of San Lorenzo, with its black-and-white-striped facade and frescoed interior. Narrow lanes open onto monumental squares like Piazza de Ferrari, site of an iconic bronze fountain and Teatro Carlo Felice opera house.” – from some guy on the internet.

We checked in to our rather nice hotel, B&B Hotel Genova, Pauline had a bit of a rest and I wandered down through the old part of town to the port.

I’m not sure if this is the iconic bronze fountain but it is a fountain.

People would queue to get into this gondola and then it was hoisted up so you got a good view.

Too much queueing so it didn’t appeal to me but good idea.

On the way back the fountain was lit up.

The architecture is impressive. It was a very wealthy trading city.

The view from our hotel the next morning.

There are offices and apartments in the arches of this bridge.

The next morning Pauline and I took a taxi to the central station and then walked back down to the port and through the streets of the old town and then jumped on a train to Marseille via Ventimiglia and Nice. The wheels fell off a bit when the train came to a halt about an hour from Ventimiglia due to someone being hit by a train on the track ahead of us. This was extremely unfortunate for the person obviously but a bit also for us. We sat there for about forty minutes or so and then they told us to all get off our train and get on the one on the next track across. However when we got to the platform we were told not to get on that train. All in Italian. Eventually another train came along and we all got on that one. It tootled along for about 20 minutes and then we were told to get off at a little place called Andora, and get on a bus. When we got to the bus it was a smallish taxi van and there were hundreds of passengers. A certain amount of arm waving ensued. Some people got in the van and it drove off leaving the rest of us wondering what to do. Eventually the police turned up probably because the single train crew member left to look after us was getting a bit nervous. The policeman said there would be a navette (small bus) every 15 minutes. This wasn’t going to work since it was still about 30 minutes to Ventimiglia from Andora and there were hundreds of us. While we were all mulling over what to do next the railway crew person suddenly announced that a train was now on the way to pick us up and could we all go back to the station. Cue cheers and clapping. Eventually we made it as far as Nice and stayed there the night. Too late to go any further.

I feel sorry for the person who presumably jumped in front of a train, but as it turned out Nice is a good place to get stuck unexpectedly.