Florence

Now I had got the directions to our hostel in Florence off the internet and had them on my iPod - sorted!! That was until I found out that when I turned off my iPod at night it had wiped the temporary memory so that the webpage I had up with the instructions on had dissapeared arghhh!!

So once we got to florence we had to find out where we had to go as I had not written anything down - sometimes it's better to have a hard copy rather then relying on technology, I will learn.

Matt sat with the bags while I went off to find either a wireless hotspot where I cound get on the internet or an internet cafe. I had no luck with the hotspot but did manage to find an internet cafe so I went back to get some money as I had left my wallet in my bag. When I returned to the internet place I was then told a new Italian law meant I had to show my passport which was also in my bag. So after another trip back I finally got on the computer and wrote down the directions on a piece of paper.

It was a good walk to the hostel and we were baking in the heat, we stopped off to check the directions as where I thought it should be was a brick wall. As it happens we literally stopped off outside the hostel it just wasn't that obvious. When we got inside we were greeted by the woman who ran the hostel called Sylvia who had the biggest smile ever and was so enthusiastic about everything it was a pleasant change from most of the places we have stayed at. Better still this hostel was amazing, everything was nice and clean and spacious.

We had lockers in our rooms which was kool, though after accidently opening the wrong locker I realised that my key opened all the lockers on my row haha! That didn't exactly put my mind at ease but I was hoping that no one would bother trying a different locker with their key unless they forgot which locker was theirs like myself. After the essential shower we went off to have a look around and get something to eat! We found a really nice place called Za Za and stuffed ourselves until we struggles to get our of our seats, Infact I couldnt finish everything I was served it was huge. It was then off to look around the city, have a beer and chill out on the bridge listening to some street performances.

The day after we made sure we squeezed in all the sights and a few museums before having to get our train to Rome at 4pm which gave us plenty of time to give Florence the once over.