Frankfurt to Florence

The Zen retreat (in Aschaffenburg, near Frankfurt) is the usual mix of difficult work and unbounded joy, and worth the hitching oddesy to get there. The few days previous in Frankfurt also provided a few surprises, with a trade fair drawing multitudes to the banks of the Maim, and a thriving red light district right next to the bank which controls the Euro. Bad idea to go to the zoo though.

I miss my early train to Zurich (cheap online tickets have their drawbacks) but hitchwiki.org comes through again with a perfect hitching spot in the middle of Frankfurt and a gruff Turkish German provides me with a ride to Heidlberg, a hard house soundtrack and a salami the size of my arm.



I stay in Zurich (picturesque, smells of fondue) and get a train the next morning through the Alps to Firenze (Florence) The scenes are, as you would expect, incredible. But I also feel like it's a sort of overdose of scenery. It is, as Jerry Seinfeld put it once, as if somehow it is all happening on TV. I miss the bike, slow as it is. Even when hopping from petrol station to petrol station along the autobahn, I feel a closer connection to the landscape. Maybe it's the sense of danger of the hitching that keeps my eyes open.