Day 11- Florence – Lucerne

Wake up early, again. I really dont feel like getting ready since Im a tad hungover again so I wear my pajamas on the bus and put clothes in my bookbag. We are all downstairs waiting for Chris and Ryan (they stayed at a different hotel since the room reservations were messed up) We must have waited about 20-30 min my luggage becomes my couch, I never did find out what the hold up was . Me and V-Mac do our daily get to the front of the line so Noff doesn't steal our seat. They boys pull up, and while we are standing there some old lady thinks our bus is for her...? or something and gets on our bus. She finally gets it and leaves. I had told the girls that we should sit up front around the time we get into Paris and Chris and Ryan said they wanted us to, so I believe we decided to make the move that day. Everyone was beginning to come sit in the back with me and laying down back there with Brenton and Annika and whoever else was gettin crowded. So me and V-Mac take the 2 front seats, V-lo behind us. And wouldnt you know the back of the bus crew all start movin up to the front.We kept ourselves occupied, did the rest stop thing again. I go in with pink plaid pants on I so dont care. Pass Lake Como where George Cloony lives... so amazing looking. V-Mac yells for someone to get the pic (since she barely takes any the whole trip so this was a daily occurrence :) Get into Switzerland, all you see is blue and green, its soooooo pretty. Ryan gives us our daily history lesson, this country is so interesting to me. Doctors make as much as janitors?? Get to our stop to take a ride up Mt. Strateshorn. I go change my clothes and we get in this thing and ride up to the cable car ride. Hop on that, and take a scary ride up to the top. My God this town is so beautiful. Get to the top and we have time to wander the trails up or down. Again, thanks to the night before I can barely make it up any of the trails and find a bench to hang out on.








Go back to the observation deck, do a YMCA with our fill-in Annika.




Ride back down is scarier, get back on the bus and drive to where our hotel is. We have to go to the Swiss Army Knife store, maybe there was another demo I dont know. I already have a pink swiss army knife and I tell V-Lo about this and she buys the same one with her name on it! I go hang out outside, mostly alot of the stores are closing and its still early. We have some free time so I have to find some swiss chocolate for my mom, I promised her. I bought A TON. Hang out outside, and a bunch of us decide we have to go find the Chapel Bridege. We only have like 20-30 minutes so we high tail it to the bridge, do another YMCA with our fill in Nick, and he is SO excited! Its so cute. This area is quite possible the most beautiful thing Ive ever seen. Swans are swimming in the lake/river whatever it is. Mountains in the background, the building architecture is awesome. Time to meet back at the bus.








This is another "pack an overnight bag cuz there is a short walk and no elevators at the hotel" day. I could have packed one when we parked, but I really didnt want to be without all my stuff and I needed to clean up all my stuff, so I take the whole thing with me (many did). The hotel is a converted jail, so there is a code to get into the room, the are bars on the windows, the beds are like cots. A lot of people were freaked out about this and a lot did not like that. I already knew about all of this and honestly I thought it was really cool. Very clean, rooms were small, nothing but 2 beds, a chair in between those and a bathroom. Thats it. Lugging our luggage up 2 fights of stair did in fact, completely suck tho.









Take a shower, get ready for dinner, which was the most odd thing ever. Rice and chicken curry something?? After dinner Ryan says we have to wait a little bit for a walk up to the Lion Monument. The back of the bus crew was ready and we didnt feel like waiting, so we decide we have a map we will go find it and hang out there and wait for the rest of them. So we make our ways there, the town is so clean and quite and really nice. The walk was fun and then we finally make it to the monument. We throw money in, talk about throwing Nick in the water, sit on the ledge and Rina is teaching people games or something. Ryan makes it there with the rest of the group and we basically hang out and talk.








He takes us on another walk thru the town, down to the Chapel Bridge. Its a quite night, just chilling out and standing around. I call home and tell my mom Im not coming home, Im gonna stay in London for an extra week :) (It didnt happen) She noticed that I can barely talk anymore, thanks to my Australian cold I am losing my voice. Also my dam cameras battery dies which sucks because i have no pics from that fun night! So all the following pics are stolen from my buddies.







Brenton is super classy

SInce its a quite night,the back of the bus crew decide to go to a grocery store, buy some booze and hang out somewhere to drink. Get our stuff, and walk back to the hotel. Run into some of our friends at the bar next to our hotel (gay bar??) and since we really have no place to go and cant take our drinks into the bar, we decide to sit in front of the hotel in the street and drink. Me and V-Mac split the rest of her vodka and some vitamin juice... yum.




Laying in the street works for a little bit until some gay drunk guys come and harass us, are yelling stuff, his friends say sorry cuz the guy is plastered and being so loud. People who worked at the hotel come out and yell at us and we try to tell him its not even us. He agrees to let us come inside and drink in the front room, so we do. Someone came up with the brilliant idea of re-writing our Contiki day song, so everybody pitches in and starts coming up with lyrics, all based on the happenings of our entire trip. Im falling asleep but I stayed for the whole re-write.



The re-write starts