Tickets, please!

So the big trip is getting closer now and I can almost reach out my fingers, wiggle them a little, and grasp my last day at work. And while I still have work-related tasks to finish before my exit, I can see the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel.


The next holiday-related project for me and AB is to finalise a way around France and Italy (and other places?) in the six-week hiatus we have between arriving in France, and getting to Turkey for ANZAC Day at Gallipoli. What to do - where to go?


A train journey around France and Italy seems to be the 'given' at this stage, but we need to consult a map (see yesterday's posting for how successful that might be) and then plan a route to maximise our viewing pleasure, and keep us out of the poorhouse so early in the trip.

One thing I will never forget is to validate my ticket, particularly in France. I've heard stories about the French people being less than accommodating to tourists, and this is largely accurate at train stations. The ticket validating machines at train stations are actually positioned around the station, before you get onto the platform. They are orange letterbox-shaped plastic machines with a slot at the front where you slide your ticket in, and it gets hole-punched. That's it - so easy, even kids can operate them. But they're not labelled, for that would just be too easy. If you don't instinctively know what these bright orange boxes are for, you can be thrown in the Bastille. Well not really, but an unvalidated ticket can get you a pretty decent talking-to by the onboard conductor, ably demonstrating that not all the Nazis cleared out of France after WW2.