6/30/14 - Trains!

Bucky, Walter, and I left Florence at 09:00 and began our journey to Chamonix.  We decided to take trains the whole way which, unfortunately, involved six transfers through three countries.  You may not think that is a big deal, but when you are carrying two large packs that weigh about 70 lbs each, a smaller 20 lb pack, and a bag of food and water, you might not enjoy running through stations trying to catch trains either.  The most annoying part of the journey was that we had transfers in Italy, Switzerland, and France.  This meant that we couldn't buy our tickets all the way through in Italy, but had to buy tickets in each country.  Luckily the Swiss still let us pay in Euros, but because we didn't have time to buy our tickets at the station we had to pay almost double for each ticket.  The French, luckily, were not so anal and let us pay the standard fare.  Upon arriving in Chamonix we met our landlady for the next week and she took us to the apartment.  The apartment is tiny!  It has three twin beds, two are bunked in a hallway across from the bathroom while the other is against the wall in the combined kitchen, dining room, bedroom, living room.  Irina, the landlady, made special points about how the floors were very nice for Chamonix and we were to take special care of them, how we were not to jump on the couch because it had a weak frame, and how she needed pictures of all of our passports.  Lastly Irina told us that if we talked with any of the neighbors to tell them we were her friends visiting from Colorado because she technically was not allowed to sub-let the place and she didn't want to get kicked out.  She also says she rents it out for two weeks a month and that pays for the whole months rent.  We are not sure where she lives for the two weeks she rents out her apartment, but wherever it is, it works for her.