From Lucerne to Albania. Or: A battery on the seaground
Its now one month since Sarah and I started our journey next to Lucerne's highway leading to Italy. But one month sounds so short for all the things we experienced during the time.. shouldn't it be much longer? All the people we met during our time. Thanks for the unforgettable times we had.
First of all i need to thank the man from Altdorf who drove us right to a rest area beford the long Gotthard tunnel. We almost gave up on hitchhiking.. but, just around the corner he almost seemed to be waiting for us. Then with some young couple we drove in a surfer bus to a rest area in Parma, and from there we were with two Thurgauer in 1,5 hours traffic where we couldnt move one centimeter. But just Before bologna they again left us at the rest area.
What can I say about our experiences in Italy? Well.. Italians don't like hitchhikers for sure. We struggled to find people to take us with them to Bologna. Whenever we asked them they looked at us with an open mouth or looked away as if they were scared. One guy, about 26 year old, told us why: `Italians are bastards! So they don't trust! `But to our surprise he then offered: `Okay, come with me, but i have to go to the bathroom.` Happily we waited for him just in front of the bathroom door. After some minutes he turned up again, very stressed, and explained to us, that in the bathroom, his mother called and that he really had to hurry to pick her up. Of course we were fine with that.. but we laughed a little at us, the two swiss bastards!.. well.. asking again for a driver, instead we met a Romanian guy who was driving the other way, sharing our feelings about the Italians, and insisted on giving us his own handmade magnets, which are his hobby. (They are so beautiful! Thank you again, where ever you are!) But eventually we found a nice old Italian man from Bologna, who even drove us to a cheap hostel inside town, guided by his navigator in his symapthic Opel.
..Arriving there at around nine o`clock we found out that the hostel was full, and it was outside town. So were we alittle helpless? No.. cus who knows why, but the next and last bus from the hostel into town was driving just in about 5 minutes. Inside Bologna we experienced true rejection... Every single hotel or hostel was booked out.. And the guy at the hotel reception almost threw us out after using his WiFi for 20 minutes. Bologna didn't like us and we didn't like Bologna. So we took the night train from Bologna to Ancona, where we could sleep for the first time during our trip for at least 5 hours. What a long way in only one day!
Oh.. Ancona. We liked you! Drinking wine and eating superb spaghetti pomodoro in front of the old church of santo francesco. We didn't spend much time in Italy, but we got the true taste of it!
Not knowing where we should get a ticket for the ferry to Ancona, we asked people for it. Our informant, an Iranian truck driver, was probably the nicest truck driver we were going to meet! Communicating with hand and feet he walked with us to the Information desk, then he drove us with the truck to the other part of the port where we could buy the ticket. Luckily he accepted our offer to buy him a beer afterwards.. haha.. little did we know that we could have been really glad about his acceptation.. what we would experience about giving and getting in Albania was even more extreme.
Extreme was also the ferry from Ancona to Durres. Why?
- it took us 24 hours
- nonstop-gazing and whistling truck drivers all around - but that's probably just truck drivers. must be lonely. but at least the smile-exchange with an albanian mama made me feel alittle more comfortable.
- beauuutiful stars
- beauuutiful sunset and dolphins
- very beauuutifully my phone fell from the top deck out of my bag and onto the the prohibited area of the ship. so that the captain himself went searching for my phone aswell as the battery. unfortunately the latter is now probably lost in the adria.
First of all i need to thank the man from Altdorf who drove us right to a rest area beford the long Gotthard tunnel. We almost gave up on hitchhiking.. but, just around the corner he almost seemed to be waiting for us. Then with some young couple we drove in a surfer bus to a rest area in Parma, and from there we were with two Thurgauer in 1,5 hours traffic where we couldnt move one centimeter. But just Before bologna they again left us at the rest area.
What can I say about our experiences in Italy? Well.. Italians don't like hitchhikers for sure. We struggled to find people to take us with them to Bologna. Whenever we asked them they looked at us with an open mouth or looked away as if they were scared. One guy, about 26 year old, told us why: `Italians are bastards! So they don't trust! `But to our surprise he then offered: `Okay, come with me, but i have to go to the bathroom.` Happily we waited for him just in front of the bathroom door. After some minutes he turned up again, very stressed, and explained to us, that in the bathroom, his mother called and that he really had to hurry to pick her up. Of course we were fine with that.. but we laughed a little at us, the two swiss bastards!.. well.. asking again for a driver, instead we met a Romanian guy who was driving the other way, sharing our feelings about the Italians, and insisted on giving us his own handmade magnets, which are his hobby. (They are so beautiful! Thank you again, where ever you are!) But eventually we found a nice old Italian man from Bologna, who even drove us to a cheap hostel inside town, guided by his navigator in his symapthic Opel.
..Arriving there at around nine o`clock we found out that the hostel was full, and it was outside town. So were we alittle helpless? No.. cus who knows why, but the next and last bus from the hostel into town was driving just in about 5 minutes. Inside Bologna we experienced true rejection... Every single hotel or hostel was booked out.. And the guy at the hotel reception almost threw us out after using his WiFi for 20 minutes. Bologna didn't like us and we didn't like Bologna. So we took the night train from Bologna to Ancona, where we could sleep for the first time during our trip for at least 5 hours. What a long way in only one day!
Oh.. Ancona. We liked you! Drinking wine and eating superb spaghetti pomodoro in front of the old church of santo francesco. We didn't spend much time in Italy, but we got the true taste of it!
Not knowing where we should get a ticket for the ferry to Ancona, we asked people for it. Our informant, an Iranian truck driver, was probably the nicest truck driver we were going to meet! Communicating with hand and feet he walked with us to the Information desk, then he drove us with the truck to the other part of the port where we could buy the ticket. Luckily he accepted our offer to buy him a beer afterwards.. haha.. little did we know that we could have been really glad about his acceptation.. what we would experience about giving and getting in Albania was even more extreme.
Extreme was also the ferry from Ancona to Durres. Why?
- it took us 24 hours
- nonstop-gazing and whistling truck drivers all around - but that's probably just truck drivers. must be lonely. but at least the smile-exchange with an albanian mama made me feel alittle more comfortable.
- beauuutiful stars
- beauuutiful sunset and dolphins
- very beauuutifully my phone fell from the top deck out of my bag and onto the the prohibited area of the ship. so that the captain himself went searching for my phone aswell as the battery. unfortunately the latter is now probably lost in the adria.
nweti - 20. Oct, 00:03
