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Another 4 hours sleep was last night’s count. I must be acclimatised to it now though as I don’t even feel that bad, it could prove to be a useful skill. The average man sleeps for 194,821 hours during his lifetime Not me, you can skim a cool 84 thousand off of that.

I’m just on my way to Ljubljana now. I’ve a feeling it’s going to be a long day. It’s supposed to take 6 hours with 1 change which would get me in at about half 9 tonight but there’s a murmur of potential delays due to problems between Graz and Maribor. If so I’ll miss my connection which would mean an extra change needed and another couple of hours on my journey.

Now I’m solo travelling again I’m going to try and be good and take it easy, as much for my budget as my health. This last week has been way over what my daily spends should be. It’s easier said than done to be a hermit in the hostel environment though.

The one I’m in tonight should help though, it’s in a bit of a remote location I think. It’s a 50 minute walk or somet through a forest to get to the city. Crikey.

I take the sleep thing back. Ruddy knackered now.

I’m not sure what part of Austria I’m in but it’s a very large, green and pretty valley that I’m going through. I think I’m on the edge of the Alps.

I just went past a Lindt factory, umm, how nice is Lindt chocolate.

I must have drifted off while listening to the Filmspotting podcast which is no reflection on that show as it’s excellent. A mere 10 minutes later and I was awoken in a dazed state (maybe there was even a bit of dribble on the go) in Graz by the conductor tapping me on the shoulder and banging on in German and a bit of English about something to do with a bus. I got the gist and then had to leg it to take my cramped place on the awaiting bus outside.

It didn’t start very well as the driver managed to stall the veichle straight away in an extremely violent fashion. If I was back in Blighty I’d have a whiplash compo claim in before you can say Iggy Pop is a sell out. I think the paper work might be a bit tricky round these parts though.

All this for the none too cheap rate of 65 Euros.

The good news is that the bus made it in time for the connection. The bad news is that the conductor just stung me for €3 for a reservation fee. What’s having a ticket for the train if it’s not a reservation? I don’t trust these sneaky Slovenians already.

I’ve been doing a little route planning and here is a very very rough order of future destinations to take me as far as Italy:

Ljubljana-Zagreb-Sarajevo-Belgrade-Bucharest-Istanbul-Sofia-Skopje-Tirana-Athens.

Then from Greece I would look to get a ferry to the south-west of Italy.

All that would probably take around a month. Then I would still want to do Italy, Switzerland, Spain, Portugal, Morocco (possibly) and France after that. So maybe another 6-8 weeks for that which would take me up to around the end of November. Then a few weeks in Manchester to sort stuff out and if I could afford it, a few more in Cuba on route to New Zealand where I’ll be looking for graft.

I’ve pretty much ruled the Central America expedition out now as it’s not financially viable, so a much bigger than first planned European campaign could be a good compromise.

All this is just speculating though, it all just depends on how the money is holding up so I’ll just play it by ear.

It’s 22:09 and I’m in a Smacky D’s in Ljubjlana. I’d rather not have fast food but it’s late, I’m famished and tired and I don’t fancy wandering the streets looking for a gaff serving cheap pasta (I could murder some pasta).

It’s not a very good one though. They say I can’t upgrade my coke to a milkshake if I pay the difference, outrageous as that is a standard request I have granted often. The beauty of McDonalds is their consitency the world over. When you take that away, well then you’re heading down the Wimpy route.

It’s now midnight and I’m finally at the hostel after an hour waiting for a bus. Phew. Not impressed is my first impression though, no Wi-Fi!!!

That’s just reminded me, someone asked me the other day what Wi-Fi stands for and I wasn’t sure (because after checking, it doesn’t actuallly stand for anything). Geoff voiced his own guess though, Wireless Fuc*ing Internet.

I’m not too sure what today’s photo is of readers. It was in the Natural History Museum in Vienna. My best guess would be a mobile Nazi casino.