So that's where pesto genovese comes from!

We spent a day and a half in Rome, a drastically insufficient amount of time to hope to get the feel of the historic city. Having both been there before we decided on a short visit to allow more time checking out other, stranger locales. We strolled the city streets, stumbling upon famous ancient structures and beautiful art and architecture. We lingered at the Trevi Fountain with ten thousand other people and caught unexpected glimpses of the Colosseum down side streets. We hoped to find some decent food for dinner but fell into the trap of a tourist restaurant (first language on the menu: English; we should have known) and after some very mediocre pasta made a pact to only eat in restaurants where Italian was being spoken by the customers. The Lonely Planet guide led us to a superb restaurant the following night, worth an hours wait outside.

We queued for the Vatican museums and found that they contained many many beautiful works of art, most of which we could see easily despite the thousands of other tourists flouting the no flash photography rule (they were, not us; I think I forgot the camera again). The Vatican obviously has an ambivalent attitude to modern art, having awkwardly crammed their 20th century collection between the magnificent Raphael rooms and the Sistine Chapel, so that already exhausted visitors simply rushed through this area. There was some lovely stuff in there but I was afflicted with the rushing virus and will have to visit again (yes, along with the countless other amazing sights and sites that I have rushed by already). The Sistine Chapel was certainly amazing but perhaps too full? Of art, not people, although it was extremely full of people as well. Perhaps this fabled place couldn't live up to expectations because we already knew it was...well, fabled. Having ticked that box we strolled some more before finding the aforementioned restaurant and all was well.

The following day we caught a train to Genoa, home of a friend of Mel's with whom we would be staying for a few days. About half an hour before our scheduled arrival the train stopped and announcements were made in Italian. Our compartment colleagues translated, there was a delay. The delay lasted some time, so much time in fact that people started getting off. We were not near a platform as far as we knew, but a huge number of people went past our rearward position on their way off the train, chattering excitedly. Our compartment colleagues discussed the situation with other passengers and gave us the story: there had been an accident on the tracks and a woman had passed away, so the train would not be moving for some time. Buses had apparently been arranged ("arranged" having a slightly different and less arranged definition in Italian) and everyone was getting off here. We gathered our bags and filed back with the last of the passengers, alighting from the rear end of the train onto the end of a platform at one of Genoa's minor stations. Contrary to our assumptions the woman had not died up the line. She had been hit by our train, and there she was, about 40 yards back, about five yards from the stairwell we were to take to the exit, covered clumsily with a white sheet of plastic. It was hard to look and hard not to, but one horrible detail drew my eye: from an uncovered mangled shoe protruded a foot, an appalling unnatural orange colour. People were standing around, not all obviously officials, and we all just filed off and walked past her, most grumbling about the delay. Couldn't something more have been done to protect this woman's dignity? Did we pay her enough respect? Any respect?

We made it safely into the care of Mel's friend, who was required to stay with another friend who had been having some health problems and wanted company while her husband was away. Thus we had the run of a one bedroom apartment in a picture postcard location on the Genoan coast. This last comment is literal, the building being clearly visible on one of Genoa's most common postcards, an image that takes in the best of Italy: a beach, a coffee shop, and a gelati bar. No further comment is required to describe our mornings and evenings in Genoa. In between this sloth and avarice we strolled through the slinky little streets of the old city of Genoa and between the gorgeous cliff-edge towns of the Cinque Terre. And sometimes we did nothing and just enjoyed not being in a hotel room. I dragged Mel's friends and some others to a bar to watch the disastrous Australia vs Germany World Cup match and spent another (much more enjoyable) evening watching Spain vs Paraguay projected onto a wall on the roof of an apartment building. We left Genoa rested and ready for the final frantic sight-hopping stage of our trip.

The first sight was: beautiful Venice. I had been there before but Mel had not, and we slipped deliciously into two days of languid strolling and turning to each other excitedly as some other cute canal or gorgeous building appeared before our eyes. We were only allowed without paying into the lower section of the magnificent Basilica de San Marco and I mentally agreed with an old English lady outside who complained loudly to her friend "shame, pretty soon you'll have to pay for the whole lot of it, it was free last time I was here". I don't think we had anything else in common. We checked out the Gallerie d'Academia and concluded that it is dire need of a renovation, and also enjoyed the Peggy Guggenheim museum. The latter was in a lovely part of the city, lovely because it was the only place where hardly anyone else was. Having said that, Venice is still superb even with every tourist currently on the continent visiting at once. For the second time, I didn't take a gondola ride. This terribly unromantic omission was endorsed by Mel, and we resolved to spend that 80€ on a Melbourne Football Club membership or something else mutually rewarding. By the time we left we had already spent a fair whack of it on Aperol spritzers.

From Venice we boarded an overnight train to Linz, Austria, home of a former school friend of mine. Our carriage was administered by a nervous Austrian who spoke quite good English but understood none. He was not suited to his position, being slightly socially awkward and timid but massively over-compensating for this when wielding his authority by speaking very loudly and aggressively. His exchange with the American who shared our compartment was pretty amusing (American: do you need to take my Eurail pass as well as my ticket?; Conductor: YES! I MUST HAVE IT! I WILL GIVE IT BACK IN THE MORNING!!!!!!; American: silent, dumbstruck and cowed, whispering complaimts to his wife long after the conductor has left). After this minor entertainment I thought it appropriate to close our door and insert ear plugs upon hearing the following exchange shouted through the corridor in American accents:
Someone (presumably to someone quite close by): Did you see those orange drinks everyone was having? Spritz or something?
Unsolicited voice from far away: OH.MY.GOD! DID YOU TRY THAT!? WORST.DRINK.EVER!!!
Me: zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz