30 hours on a train from beach front property to moutainside accomodations

On the 17th we checked out of our Lisbon Hostel and went to the train station to lock our bags and reserve a night train for the following night from Barcelona to Bern Switzerland. It turns out that this train didn’t not exist, but it couldn’t be booked even if we had wanted to take 40 euro per person seats on a 18 hour train ride, because there was a strike in Spain… and one prescheduled for two days later in France, so Vicor, the kind English speaking Portugese train reservation man helped us make new plans. We would not take the train that evening to Madrid, but instead take one 2 hours later at 4pm and embark upon a 30 hour ordeal to arrive in Switzerland one days earlier than we’d made our reservations. And so it began. A rather long night train took us to somewhere on the South West Coast of France where we picked up a 5 hour train to Paris and rode the metro to a different Paris train station to take another 5 hour train to a station in Switzerland where we would take a 45 minute train arriving in Interlaken around 11pm. And it wasn’t the worst train ride ever. It wasn’t fun exactly but it was doable. Now we’ve enjoyed a snowy day here in Switzerland which included lots of hot chocolate and snowman making. Tomorrow night we leave for Florence on yet another night train and then travel to the Cinque Terre or five towns on the Italian Riviera that I’ve heard equated to Paradise. And that is the plan for now. 🙂