Em and I departed France in grand style and at rapid speed thanks to the express TGV train that we had decided to catch to Milan, Italy. The TGV maxes out at about 200 mph (very fast indeed), I am glad to say that I have sat on one, although in truth the experience wasn't all that much different to any vline train you might catch back in Australia, just the view outside is more blurred.

We were catching a train to Milan on way to Eastern Europe. We plan to head east across the north of Italy, via Milan and Trieste, to Slovenia. Italy is, in a sense, our gateway into our Eastern Europe leg of our round the world journey.

Milan was a stylish way for us to rediscover our independent backpacking legs. Milan exudes it style and class as it is renowned for. Stazione Centrale di Milano (Milan's central train station) for instance is such a grand old building and truly massive and such an impressive entrance into an ancient city that is full of history. If it wasn't for the large scale restorative (100 million euros worth apparently) work that is underway in the collosal old building it would be worthy of a visit to Milan in itself just to taste the buildings immense presence. Beyond the train station there are also the cars, both of the classic and new varieties, a classic old Aston Martion DB5 and numerous classic Alpha Romeos share the road with brand spanking new Maseratis and Ferraris just off the showroom floor. Throw the fashion and designers into the mix and you have enough style for a years worth of episodes of Queer Eye for the Straight Guy. Plus, the Italian women in Milan are stunning. All of this equals a city that reeks of class and money, and then there is Emily and I, like a black smudge on a Van Gogh classic.

Despite the fact that we were in "havies", shorts and t-shirts, we loved our couple of days in Milan, forget the distinct lack of class or money. Our hotel, which was pleasantly modern and swank even had a flat screen TV for us to watch the Beijing opening ceremony. Emily and I had a great couple of evenings indulging the Italian staples of sparkling prosecco, espresso, pasta, pizza and gelati. We meandered by foot our way around a relatively empty Milan, everyone had gone to the coast for August apparently, and saw their incredible Duomo Cathedral and window shopped through the world's first shopping mall Galleria Vittorio Emmanuele (it is in a different world of class to other malls frequented in Alex's life such as Bourke Street, Melbourne or Maude Street, Shepparton). Unfortunately even in this mall, in the worlds capital for design and fashion, McDonalds managed to hold one of the central pillar stores in this beautiful old shopping thoroughfare, right next to shops of the ilk of Prada and Louis Vuitton (you'd shoot that property manager if you had the chance).

From Milan we pushed onto Trieste, which is further east across the north of Italy and near the border of Italy, Croatia and Slovenia. We arrived in Trieste later after buying the cheapest Eurail ticket possible, which took us seven hours to do a three hour journey. After our late arrival we were greated by the warmth of the Italian summer and the refreshing cool of the sea breeze off the Adriatic Sea.

That was were the joys ended for the evening though. As we hadn't booked a hotel we were left wandering ammesly, without any idea where the cities hotels might be (no lonely planet to rescue us), looking for a reasonably priced room for the evening. Two hours later, tired from the aimless trekking with backpacks weighing heavily we stumbled into a hotel that could only be described as decrepit and agreed to pay the 45 euros for a bed each.

We awoke the next morning and explored the seaside city of Trieste. From the number of people around in Trieste I can only assume that all the missing residents from Milan had apparently headed to Trieste, it was a hot and busy city at this time of the year. We meandered around and found a beautiful little tree lined promenade full of restaurants and indulged in our last of Italy's greatest cuisine, coffee and pizza.

Em and I were to head to Bled in Slovenia after our brief stay in Italy. The plan is to train from Trieste to Goriza on the Italian side of the border and walk to Nova Goricia on the Slovenian side of the border and train from here to Bled.

More from Slovenia soon.