To Pisa

Who knew 30 lbs weighed so much? I was unable to lift my large bag into the overhead, however a cute young guy (whose iPhone cover made it look like a cassette tape) lifted it up for me.

We were on a regional train (slow speeds for Europe) and multiple stops. We stopped at La Spezia, where I'd been before when going to Cinque Terre, but skirted the 5-T villages.  Pisa was about one hour away and was a VERY SMALL stop... maybe 6 platforms.... maybe more but not much.

I had recently had a guest at my home Giovanna, who lives nearby Pisa. I wanted to send a quick "I'm in the neighborhood" message, but there was no wifi to be had -- and my power was very low besides.

I made friends with a tall, young guy Ahmit (maybe 25) who turned out to be Egyptian though he was living in Paris and visiting Italy. We spoke my very bad francais and his very bad inglese. After I boarded and went to my assigned seat for the leg to Genoa, he came and sat with me (which made me somewhat uncomfortable, since we are supposed to have assigned seating [jeesh, maybe I AM German??!!!]). He left to go for cafe and I didn't see him again.

After the requisite 2 hours was up I turned on the phone, and discovered I needed to enter a PIN. :-o .... No one said anything about a PIN. I assumed it was a phone pin which had been set at the factory. I attempted with "1111".... no cigar. One down... and two left. After much thought I attempted continued my assumption that it was a factory set flipphone PIN, so I tried "9999". No Cigar. One attempt left before the phone was locked.

So I stopped until I can do more analysis.