Brindisi

When we got on the train to Brindisi, we thought we had a compartment to ourselves. So we quickly pulled out the seats to have a bed. We soon realized that this was an illusion. We had to give up all of our extra seats. Some people even had to sleep over in the aisle. Space was something we didn’t have that night. I don’t even remember if I had slept at all. It seemed impossible. We finally made it to Brindisi. The landscape had changed completely.

People go to Brindisi to take the ferries to Greece. That’s what we were there for. The ferries from Brindisi to Patras were included in our interrail ticket. We just had to pay the harbour fee. However, our ferry was not going to leave before late in the afternoon. That meant we had to stay there the whole day. We had used up almost all our Italian money and we didn’t want to get new money from the bank because we wouldn’t need it in Greece. In addition, the Brindisi banks looked scary with the armed security guards in the front wearing bullet proof vests. Using up our last change, we bought the cheapest we could get: 1kg of dry cookies (if you gave me one of these cookies now, I’m sure I’d pass out). Before we opened the package, we tried to cook at the waterfront. It was too windy so our stove didn’t work properly and the garlic sort of stayed raw. A heavy garlic breath in our mouth, we went to the ferry waiting area where we started our cookies. We met some Germans there that told us stories about Vancouver and Seattle (I was so excited to hear that). We didn’t have any Italian money left, nor did we have any Greek money so we had to eat all of the cookies in order to make it through the night. One kilogram!

After a long day of waiting, the ferry was finally about to leave. It was very exciting in the beginning as there were so many people like us. We got to know a few very nice people that gave us some tips for Greece. The ferry went so slow that it took us a whole night to get to Greece. That night was funny. It was so stormy on the ferry that we had to tie our shoes to a bench and disappear completely in our sleeping bags to avoid catching a cold.

The next day we were in Greece! New country, new game! Our trip here would start in Patras.