Granted we were on the other side of the fence... but behold, same spot same boat! Friday, July 15, 2011
Top Gear Episode 2!
Granted we were on the other side of the fence... but behold, same spot same boat! 
Filling some gaps!
++++++++++Best to read the below post first! I should have posted them the other way around! Read this after Jess's below!!+++++++++++++++
As we are huge slackers on blogging and only post once in a while (trying to get better i swear!) there are just so many gaps in the things that we have posted and done. I figured having just posted Jess's write up from a few days ago I would try to go with that momentum and write another post. To add some context, we are now in Innsbruck, and rented an apartment off of airbnb.com (thanks to Rymay!). For less than a hotel price, and much nicer than a "zimmer" or "pension" or whatever they call them here, we got our own 1 bdrm apartment with a kitchen, washing machine, living room etc. The problem though, is the internet comes from the apartment across the hall, so im sitting with my back against the front door on the floor in the hallway for the best connection. See the dedication!!!
Seme the past month that I could fill in about our experiences would be:
- Meteora definitely was cool. The place itself was over run with 60 year old cruise ship type group travellers, which is always annoying, but by getting the book jess mentioned we definitely spiced things up a bit. The town we stayed in had like 500 people in it, and was mainly there just to serve as a hotel stop for people who didnt want to do just a day trip to the monastaries. Im very very glad we did it the way we did though, because having dinner at the family run place, staying at a hotel where the owners literally livein the hotel, and watching the sunsets in the evening completed the experience more than just hoping on a bus to and from athens. A must do for greece travels for sure!
-Croatia was very nice. Zagreb was only for 1 night so I couldnt say much about that, but Split and Dubronik were definitely all they are cracked up to be. The lack of commercial tourism in Split was a bit shocking at first, as trying to get from Split to Bol beach on Brac island was literally impossible save 1 ferry at 4pm each day (with no return). I almost felt like I should move there and start a tourist company! What a life eh?! Diocletians palace in the middle of Split was right in line with old town San Sebastian, inside the city walls of Dubrovnik, Venice streets etc. Walking around in 4 story stone wall streets 1-2 meters wide with no cars is always fun no matter what you are doing. Throw in some cool shops, cafes and bars, and you have a recipe for a fun evening! They had live music every night in the center, which we went to twice, and the food was the best we had seen in quite a while.
- Germany was a shock as well, but for the crappy weather, not the lack of tourism. The amount of historical walking tours, bus tours, bike tours, segway tours, skateboard tours, piggy back tours, etc in Berlin was ridiculous. Luckily our good friend trip advisor saved the day again and we went on two tours (one overview, one cold war) with Mike from Insider Tours. He was a kiwi turned German who enjoyed his job more than anyone I have ever met in my life. His father in law was a soldier and border guard in east germany, and his mother in law was an engineer in the government, allowing him to pass on some inside stories that you oculd just never hear from normal tour guides. His inlaws bothed longed for the 'good old days' of communism, and balked at capitalism's unemployment, crime, and poverty. Not like when there was no crime, no poverty, and no unemployment in east berlin.................... Berlin had a lot of great museums that were entertaining even to Jess and I, mainly I think because we could relate to it so much more. Its so frustrating standing in the parthenon with 8000 cruise ship old people when you know its rebuilt, recleaned, remodeled etc versus walking through a museum full of escapes from East germany that you know happened 20-50 years ago. The people who dreamt and built amazing contraptions (which they have on display and are real) to go over or under the wall, and the schemes to go through the borders are so impressive. Plus the people who did it are still alive to tell about it! Its so much better documented. I guess that is obvious, but still, Athens I still feel was a scam better left to books and imagination versus paying to 'see it', and Berlin and Germany is right there in your face realism. We both really enjoyed it.
-Finally, the Nurburgring was a really awesome day. I wish I could have gone longer and for more days. The problem with the ring is its very insiders club. Its open to tourists most days, but lots of them for only 2 hours. For these 2 hours there is everything from race cars to motorbikes to men in work vans driving around. Hence why I paid extra to go on a track day when it was only purpose built cars on the track, no bikes and no vans. The best time to go though is when its 'closed\. We went in the off hours and there were stunning Bentley's, Audi R8s, and ferraris racing around by themselves. I have no idea how or why they got on, but I wish I was in that club. The track day there was about 150 cars in total, and I had the worst car out of everyone for sure. As there is no insurance, I was surprised and impressed with how many people were willing to take their 200k Porsche GT3's, Audi R8's, and Ferrari F430 Scuderia's on the track. I was able to get my car up to 197km/h on the straigh stretch, but people were blowing by me constantly. Its one thing to see an Audi R8 on the side of the road, or accelerating from a stop light, but I had never heard the noises I heard when one drives by you at 300km/h. So powerful and loud, and so refreshing to see people actually race race cars. Granted I would NEVER take my car on the ring anytime soon, as its so scary I would quite likely die, but after years of practice, I could see it for sure. We also saw the Sauber F1 team show up for next weeks race there.
One last thing, for anyone who watches top gear. Episode 2 Monaco filming missed us by 1 day. It's probably the closest I will ever get to JC in my entire life. We walked the track the day before it was closed for practice, and they drove the course that next day after practice was over. When they have the scene where James and Hammond are on those yachts (and they show one that has a glass pool on the back), we were standing in that same spot 24 hours earlier! So timely, and so close to actually seeing them! Too bad...
View through wall one to wall two. In between being the 'death strip' where they would have shot you if you tried to enter. Small price to pay for no unemployment, no poverty and no crime though!!
Something I liked about Berlin. When they rebuilt a lot of stuff they didnt clean it. They used as much of the old building as possible, and then just patched in new stuff. This building is charred and full of bullet holes, but what better way to remember? Also that is Mike being his usual passionate self.
Wall 1 with guard tower. If you make it over that they shoot you.
As we are huge slackers on blogging and only post once in a while (trying to get better i swear!) there are just so many gaps in the things that we have posted and done. I figured having just posted Jess's write up from a few days ago I would try to go with that momentum and write another post. To add some context, we are now in Innsbruck, and rented an apartment off of airbnb.com (thanks to Rymay!). For less than a hotel price, and much nicer than a "zimmer" or "pension" or whatever they call them here, we got our own 1 bdrm apartment with a kitchen, washing machine, living room etc. The problem though, is the internet comes from the apartment across the hall, so im sitting with my back against the front door on the floor in the hallway for the best connection. See the dedication!!!
Seme the past month that I could fill in about our experiences would be:
- Meteora definitely was cool. The place itself was over run with 60 year old cruise ship type group travellers, which is always annoying, but by getting the book jess mentioned we definitely spiced things up a bit. The town we stayed in had like 500 people in it, and was mainly there just to serve as a hotel stop for people who didnt want to do just a day trip to the monastaries. Im very very glad we did it the way we did though, because having dinner at the family run place, staying at a hotel where the owners literally livein the hotel, and watching the sunsets in the evening completed the experience more than just hoping on a bus to and from athens. A must do for greece travels for sure!
-Croatia was very nice. Zagreb was only for 1 night so I couldnt say much about that, but Split and Dubronik were definitely all they are cracked up to be. The lack of commercial tourism in Split was a bit shocking at first, as trying to get from Split to Bol beach on Brac island was literally impossible save 1 ferry at 4pm each day (with no return). I almost felt like I should move there and start a tourist company! What a life eh?! Diocletians palace in the middle of Split was right in line with old town San Sebastian, inside the city walls of Dubrovnik, Venice streets etc. Walking around in 4 story stone wall streets 1-2 meters wide with no cars is always fun no matter what you are doing. Throw in some cool shops, cafes and bars, and you have a recipe for a fun evening! They had live music every night in the center, which we went to twice, and the food was the best we had seen in quite a while.
- Germany was a shock as well, but for the crappy weather, not the lack of tourism. The amount of historical walking tours, bus tours, bike tours, segway tours, skateboard tours, piggy back tours, etc in Berlin was ridiculous. Luckily our good friend trip advisor saved the day again and we went on two tours (one overview, one cold war) with Mike from Insider Tours. He was a kiwi turned German who enjoyed his job more than anyone I have ever met in my life. His father in law was a soldier and border guard in east germany, and his mother in law was an engineer in the government, allowing him to pass on some inside stories that you oculd just never hear from normal tour guides. His inlaws bothed longed for the 'good old days' of communism, and balked at capitalism's unemployment, crime, and poverty. Not like when there was no crime, no poverty, and no unemployment in east berlin.................... Berlin had a lot of great museums that were entertaining even to Jess and I, mainly I think because we could relate to it so much more. Its so frustrating standing in the parthenon with 8000 cruise ship old people when you know its rebuilt, recleaned, remodeled etc versus walking through a museum full of escapes from East germany that you know happened 20-50 years ago. The people who dreamt and built amazing contraptions (which they have on display and are real) to go over or under the wall, and the schemes to go through the borders are so impressive. Plus the people who did it are still alive to tell about it! Its so much better documented. I guess that is obvious, but still, Athens I still feel was a scam better left to books and imagination versus paying to 'see it', and Berlin and Germany is right there in your face realism. We both really enjoyed it.
-Finally, the Nurburgring was a really awesome day. I wish I could have gone longer and for more days. The problem with the ring is its very insiders club. Its open to tourists most days, but lots of them for only 2 hours. For these 2 hours there is everything from race cars to motorbikes to men in work vans driving around. Hence why I paid extra to go on a track day when it was only purpose built cars on the track, no bikes and no vans. The best time to go though is when its 'closed\. We went in the off hours and there were stunning Bentley's, Audi R8s, and ferraris racing around by themselves. I have no idea how or why they got on, but I wish I was in that club. The track day there was about 150 cars in total, and I had the worst car out of everyone for sure. As there is no insurance, I was surprised and impressed with how many people were willing to take their 200k Porsche GT3's, Audi R8's, and Ferrari F430 Scuderia's on the track. I was able to get my car up to 197km/h on the straigh stretch, but people were blowing by me constantly. Its one thing to see an Audi R8 on the side of the road, or accelerating from a stop light, but I had never heard the noises I heard when one drives by you at 300km/h. So powerful and loud, and so refreshing to see people actually race race cars. Granted I would NEVER take my car on the ring anytime soon, as its so scary I would quite likely die, but after years of practice, I could see it for sure. We also saw the Sauber F1 team show up for next weeks race there.
One last thing, for anyone who watches top gear. Episode 2 Monaco filming missed us by 1 day. It's probably the closest I will ever get to JC in my entire life. We walked the track the day before it was closed for practice, and they drove the course that next day after practice was over. When they have the scene where James and Hammond are on those yachts (and they show one that has a glass pool on the back), we were standing in that same spot 24 hours earlier! So timely, and so close to actually seeing them! Too bad...
View through wall one to wall two. In between being the 'death strip' where they would have shot you if you tried to enter. Small price to pay for no unemployment, no poverty and no crime though!!
Something I liked about Berlin. When they rebuilt a lot of stuff they didnt clean it. They used as much of the old building as possible, and then just patched in new stuff. This building is charred and full of bullet holes, but what better way to remember? Also that is Mike being his usual passionate self.
Wall 1 with guard tower. If you make it over that they shoot you.
Update
Posted a few days late just FYI so it sounds a bit odd at first!
This is an overdue blog post for anyone who hasn't gotten tired of checking to see if there are updates.
We are currently in Adenau Germany for three days so that Owen can tick something off of his bucket list. As I write this blog post from the restaurant above the Nurburgring, Owen is out on the track having the time of his life. We started the day at 7:00am for breakfast in our hotel (the first place to serve what we would call bacon since we left home) and we drove our rented VW golf to RSR to pick up Owen`s Clio Cup 200 for the day. After a cautionary breifing from the team he set off to the track for the opening at 8:00am. I drove our car to get some pictures of his first laps which proved to be very difficult. As I approached the ring all you can hear is a car whipping by you and then the smell of tires takes over. My two attempts at getting a picture of Owen on the track were unsuccesful. I settled for a shot of him coming off the track which I`ll attach. It`s been almost 5 hours now and he has just headed out with car 141 for his last two laps. There was one accident so far where a BMW hit the guard rail and lost the front of his car - they had to close the track down and Owen must have been the last person to bring his car in. I was pacing so much in the restaurant one of the instructors went down and checked what kind of car had been in the accident. He reported back that it was a BMW and that only one car was involved but, 5/10/15 mintues later nearly everyone was off the track except Owen and the car that had crashed. After a painful amount of time he pulled in and it turned out the red flags went up right as he was passing the exit so, he had to do another slow lap and pass the accident etc. I'll let him tell his side of it in his next blog post though!
As for the trip, prior to here we have been in Dusseldorf, Hamburg and Berlin. We only had last Saturday night in Dusseldorf and despite everyone from Hamburg rolling their eyes at us for visiting there it was a really good time. The "longest bar in the world" seemed to be accurate... We headed out at 5pm to walk around and the streets were already full of bachelor/bachelorette parties as well as tourists and locals. We managed to get a spot at one of the brewery's that was recommended and drank little 1.80 beers standing up in the street. After we had 10 or so pencil
strikes on our coaster and a small snack we moved on to the next brewery for the exact same thing. We stood beside a nice couple from Dusseldorf who we chatted with for a few more beers and watched the street party continue. We stayed out and enjoyed the streets for a few more hours but, a 5pm start made it hard to go too late. We arrived in Dusseldorf by train from Hamburg which was also a very cool place to visit. We were really lucky to arrive on a Wednesday when the Reeperbahn had a cool street market running. We stopped and got a cheese plate, tumblers of wine and some bread and sat outside for under 15 Euros. There was a couple bands playing and it was a cool environment. It takes some getting use to walking on a street full of sex shops, peep shows and strip clubs but, everyone seemed to think it was normal..lol. We took a walking tour in Hamburg as well where it's free and you basically pay the guide what you think the tour was worth. We had previously done two walking tours in Berlin which were amazing (mostly due to our very enthusiastic guide) Berlin was 3 days full of sightseeing and rain. It was the first time we had experienced bad weather since we left home. At first when we arrived on the plane we were happy to feel rain but, it didn't last long. I had two pairs of shoes that were drenched after the first day so, I was happy to see sunshine on our third day. We visited the Berlin Zoo on our last day and it was definatley the best zoo I have ever been too. We got to see giraffes, gorillas, elephants, lions, bears, a rhino and tons more animals. The only things we didn't get to see where the hippo and the kangaroos..I guess they had gone to bed.
Prior to Berlin we had spent time in Croatia. I could have spent a month in the places we visited. We had one stopover night in Zagreb and then took a train to Split where we spent four days. The highlight had to be our day trip to Plitvice Lakes National Park. We rented a car and drove the 2.5hrs to get to one of the most beautiful places I'd ever been. The water was unbelievable. I can't even count how many times I turned to Owen to say "I just can't believe the colour of the water!"
We chose to do the 6 hr suggested walk which included a tram ride and an electric ferry ride across one of the lakes. Our camera doesn't do it justice but, a picture is attached so you can see! We also did a day trip to Brela - the beach was named the best beach in Europe and the 6th best beach in the world according to a Forbes list. Unfortuatnely, it turned out to be a bit of a disappointment. It was definately beautiful but, it wasn't really that great for a swim/lounge. It's all rocks so you pretty much need to bring a chair or rent one (we only had our towels so, we just laid on the rocks) and the water was probably the coldest water I've ever tried to swim in. It was like ice jaggers hitting you as you entered. Owen and
I both did give it a go but, you couldn't stay in longer than 10 seconds and you also couldn't put your head in. I was expecting better given that we were in Croatia but, sadly it hadn't warmed up yet I guess. We did get to do a little bit
of swimming in Dubrovnik. The water was slightly warmer and we went for a couple short swims on one of our beach days. Dubrovnik was such a cool city! We got to stay inside the old city walls for our last two night and it was tons of fun. I'm attaching a pictures of the 3L beer tower we took down at Exit Bar on our night out. The place would have been amazing except for the sign outside encouraged smoking... Instead of the red circle with the line through the cigarette, there was a green circle around the cigarette. The music was great, the beer was hilarious but, the smoke was unbearable. I have a photo of me breathing into my sweater because it was so strong it made you sick. Sadly, we had to leave the good music as soon as we were done our tower because of it. The place was full of bars, pubs, restaurants etc to hang out at and we really liked it. The second picture is of a walk around the city walls which was also really cool.
I'll do one more little blurb thinking back to June 21st. We took two days after Athens to visit Meteora in Kastraki. Our train arrived in Kalambaka Greece in the afternoon and right away you can look around and know you are somewhere special.
The mountains are very memorable. They look smooth from far away (even though they are quite coarse up close) and they come to funny points high above the little towns. The impressive part of these mountains (and the reason we came) are the monestaries. Monks had previously built their monastaries on the tips of these mountains. Today there are still some you can visit and we did just that.
We had read a review about a book called "the foothills of meteora" and went into town the first night to look for it. We found it at in a shop window and decided that we were going to skip the tour buses and rental cars and visit them by foot. BAD IDEA! Our journey had to start as early as possible because the heat got unbearable during the day so, we set off before 8am (by the way, that is
early for us now..lol) The book was extremely detailed but, it did caution that no one in Greece walks anywhere so the paths are overgrown and may be hard to find. We made it to the first site no problem but, on the way to the second we were
making our way through an overgrown field beside one of the mountains to visit the monks prison and we heard a weird snorting noise and a saw some trees moving in the distance and decided we should head back to the road. We did end up getting to two more using the book and the paths but, after a ridiculous amount of bugs, a fallen wasps net, a scare from what turned out to be a goat and the crazy heat we decided to call it quits. I'll attach a couple photos - I had to carry around a long skirt for the day because when you enter the monastaries women have to have full skirts on (the reason I have a big skirt over my lulus in the pics)
We are headed to Innsbruck & Salzburg next, hopefully it won't be a month before the next update!
Friday, June 17, 2011
Tummys, eyes, and dubai, oh my!!!
Well unfortunatly I have left this way too long there is no way I can write about what is going on in the trip accurately, so ill try to summarize a few things and update what has happened the last few days.
Jess I guess wrote about Capri and a small blurb or Malta. Malta was very cool, and less touristy than a lot of the places we have been. The prices were also much better there... it still stuns me how a beer can fluctuate by 300% in a 5 block radius. Highlights were the fact that we stayed at a cheap hotel that was connected to an expensive hotel, and we got to use the expensive hotels rooftop infiniti pool for 2 days. It was funny because when the guy said they had an outdoor pool at the front desk, and we checked into our crap room, we expected a dirty bathtub on the roof, but man were we ever in for a surprise!! The last day I had no clothes left and we had I had to be shirtless or wear one of jess's shirts when we went out to eat. We took our laundry to a service that charged 10 euros a load, which we figured we had 1 load, maybe 2 if they were trying to screw us, and they made it 3 loads for 30eur! It was the most expensive thing we did all of the time there... Luckily it smelled great.
We stayed in the athens airport at the awesome sofitel there the night after we left malta and before we got to Santorini. We arrived very early in the morning, and bummed around in town with a girl from our flight before taking the bus up to Oia to where we were staying. We had no car and our place was at least a 15 minute walk uphill in blistering heat, but luckily the housekeeper had some english and was at the place with her ATV, so she called her friend after meeting us and we got a free ride. We later rented a Nissan Micra (which I love I want to buy one) and picked up my brother at 6pm! It was great seeing him for the next 7 days, but it should have been 10 (read below)
Shockingly Santorini lived up to the hype I had heard, and was quite reasonable priced. There is no sign of Greece turmoil there, its just typical island life. Our place was a little strange at first being that we have western expectations, but once we realized that a clay shower with no door or curtain, no internet (which the ad lied about), no TV, strange overpowering laundry smells, and lots of bugs (hate bugs) was just the norm there, the place really grew on us. By the end of the four days I think all 3 of us loved it. We did 2 active tourist things, 1 by walking from Oia to Fira in 2 hours, and one by driving up and then climbing around Ancient Thira town. It is incredible that people ever lived up there, its ridiculously windy, there is no food, you have to trap your own water, and I have no idea where they got the stone to build things from. Crazy place for sure.
After Santorini we went to Crete, which ill gloss over cause it was nothing special compared to Santorini. They highlights were me puking on the 2 hour ride over on a catamaran (which cost 50 euros, WTF), and me getting 20 mosquito bites because we were had a drink late at night on the deck and I couldnt feel them... Brutal welts still (have I mentioned how much I hate insects?) Also Jess got what we think is Blephitis (sounds cooler than saying dry eyes), because she has a crazy eye itch sand in her eyes problem. We just got eye drops for her today about 6 days later, hopefully it goes away soon.
Now we are in Bahrain against our will (more on this in a second), and at this point I could also add that my stomach hurts again for some reason like it did in Nice... Not nearly as bad but some really nice Saudi guy gave us 11 beers when he left this hotel (because he cant take them over the border) and we cant drink them because I dont want to mess up my stomach. But dont worry everyone we havent been drinking that much! I swear! I just wanted to mention that tidbit!!
So that brings me to Dubai and why we are in Bahrain. Because Canada is retarded, and Dubai doesnt seem to care about Canada, we are basically in a feud I found out. Apparently the turning point was whe Emirates airline wanted to land more planes in Toronto from europe. Canada said no because they didnt think that many canadians were on the flights (and I think, although I dont know, they want to protect stupid Air Canada), so Dubai said F you, now your citizens cant get free visas. To get one now, you have to pay between $62 if you fly Emirates airline into dubai (how ironic is that) $250 for a tourist one, or up to $900 if you want to stay more than 1 month. You have to put in your application 2 weeks before you get there, and it takes at least a few days to process. We trusted this guy my brother was referred to who ran a touring company and does his GF's companies work visas to process them for him. Long story short the guy must have been retarded because not only did he not do it in time, he led us on for days that it was fine and they would be done. We spend hours in the airport twice waiting to figure out what was going on and trying to change flights, lost 2 flights after spending tons of money just to get to bahrain, spend money on a hotel near the airport, and lost 3 days of our trip. I cant type it all out accurately enough because it would take hours, but basically nothing oculd have gone any worse at any point, and we lost so much time, money, and jess cried at least twice... see what im saying!!
I guess thats it for now, sorry I didnt really proofread this hopefully it makes sense.
Back to Athens tomorrow for mass protests and strikes wooO! Also, we are staying at Meteora June 21-23 which is going to be a massive highlight, cant wait for that.
Finally, for the record, I am surprised not at all by the riot in vancouver, but by the police and everyone involved in admin that they couldnt see that coming. I mean come on, 100,000 revved up canuck fans? We all know how quickly 90% of canucks fans jump on and off the bandwagon, so give me a break.. My hope is a lot of them that were caught on camera and video are fined and penalized. ugh!
Owen
Jess I guess wrote about Capri and a small blurb or Malta. Malta was very cool, and less touristy than a lot of the places we have been. The prices were also much better there... it still stuns me how a beer can fluctuate by 300% in a 5 block radius. Highlights were the fact that we stayed at a cheap hotel that was connected to an expensive hotel, and we got to use the expensive hotels rooftop infiniti pool for 2 days. It was funny because when the guy said they had an outdoor pool at the front desk, and we checked into our crap room, we expected a dirty bathtub on the roof, but man were we ever in for a surprise!! The last day I had no clothes left and we had I had to be shirtless or wear one of jess's shirts when we went out to eat. We took our laundry to a service that charged 10 euros a load, which we figured we had 1 load, maybe 2 if they were trying to screw us, and they made it 3 loads for 30eur! It was the most expensive thing we did all of the time there... Luckily it smelled great.
We stayed in the athens airport at the awesome sofitel there the night after we left malta and before we got to Santorini. We arrived very early in the morning, and bummed around in town with a girl from our flight before taking the bus up to Oia to where we were staying. We had no car and our place was at least a 15 minute walk uphill in blistering heat, but luckily the housekeeper had some english and was at the place with her ATV, so she called her friend after meeting us and we got a free ride. We later rented a Nissan Micra (which I love I want to buy one) and picked up my brother at 6pm! It was great seeing him for the next 7 days, but it should have been 10 (read below)
Shockingly Santorini lived up to the hype I had heard, and was quite reasonable priced. There is no sign of Greece turmoil there, its just typical island life. Our place was a little strange at first being that we have western expectations, but once we realized that a clay shower with no door or curtain, no internet (which the ad lied about), no TV, strange overpowering laundry smells, and lots of bugs (hate bugs) was just the norm there, the place really grew on us. By the end of the four days I think all 3 of us loved it. We did 2 active tourist things, 1 by walking from Oia to Fira in 2 hours, and one by driving up and then climbing around Ancient Thira town. It is incredible that people ever lived up there, its ridiculously windy, there is no food, you have to trap your own water, and I have no idea where they got the stone to build things from. Crazy place for sure.
After Santorini we went to Crete, which ill gloss over cause it was nothing special compared to Santorini. They highlights were me puking on the 2 hour ride over on a catamaran (which cost 50 euros, WTF), and me getting 20 mosquito bites because we were had a drink late at night on the deck and I couldnt feel them... Brutal welts still (have I mentioned how much I hate insects?) Also Jess got what we think is Blephitis (sounds cooler than saying dry eyes), because she has a crazy eye itch sand in her eyes problem. We just got eye drops for her today about 6 days later, hopefully it goes away soon.
Now we are in Bahrain against our will (more on this in a second), and at this point I could also add that my stomach hurts again for some reason like it did in Nice... Not nearly as bad but some really nice Saudi guy gave us 11 beers when he left this hotel (because he cant take them over the border) and we cant drink them because I dont want to mess up my stomach. But dont worry everyone we havent been drinking that much! I swear! I just wanted to mention that tidbit!!
So that brings me to Dubai and why we are in Bahrain. Because Canada is retarded, and Dubai doesnt seem to care about Canada, we are basically in a feud I found out. Apparently the turning point was whe Emirates airline wanted to land more planes in Toronto from europe. Canada said no because they didnt think that many canadians were on the flights (and I think, although I dont know, they want to protect stupid Air Canada), so Dubai said F you, now your citizens cant get free visas. To get one now, you have to pay between $62 if you fly Emirates airline into dubai (how ironic is that) $250 for a tourist one, or up to $900 if you want to stay more than 1 month. You have to put in your application 2 weeks before you get there, and it takes at least a few days to process. We trusted this guy my brother was referred to who ran a touring company and does his GF's companies work visas to process them for him. Long story short the guy must have been retarded because not only did he not do it in time, he led us on for days that it was fine and they would be done. We spend hours in the airport twice waiting to figure out what was going on and trying to change flights, lost 2 flights after spending tons of money just to get to bahrain, spend money on a hotel near the airport, and lost 3 days of our trip. I cant type it all out accurately enough because it would take hours, but basically nothing oculd have gone any worse at any point, and we lost so much time, money, and jess cried at least twice... see what im saying!!
I guess thats it for now, sorry I didnt really proofread this hopefully it makes sense.
Back to Athens tomorrow for mass protests and strikes wooO! Also, we are staying at Meteora June 21-23 which is going to be a massive highlight, cant wait for that.
Finally, for the record, I am surprised not at all by the riot in vancouver, but by the police and everyone involved in admin that they couldnt see that coming. I mean come on, 100,000 revved up canuck fans? We all know how quickly 90% of canucks fans jump on and off the bandwagon, so give me a break.. My hope is a lot of them that were caught on camera and video are fined and penalized. ugh!
Owen
Monday, June 6, 2011
Ok - So far I have a big FAIL on keeping the blog updated! I blame it partially on ridiculously priced internet (example: 25 Euros a day in both Rome and Malta) and partially on the sunshine. Since we left I don`t think we`ve endured temperatures under 22 or so - It has been some of the nicest weather I`ve ever had the pleasure of enjoying. I`m happy to say neither of us have had sun burns since San Sebastian and I`m getting a solid tan line from my bathing suit.
We arrived in Malta on Saturday the 4th and are really enjoying it! Everything is so cheap here which is a huge change from our recent stay in Capri. Capri was gorgeous but, now that I`ve seen Malta I would probably choose 1.50 euro beers and 8.00 euro ocean side lido`s over 135.00 euro dinners (probably the biggest shock ever) and 6.50 euro bottles of beer. We were totally shocked to find out that in Capri a 15% service charge as well as a cover charge of 3-6 euros
per person is automatically added onto your bill. We did find one deal on the island thanks to trip advisor (of course!) We decided to rent a boat with another couple that takes you all the way around the island with a guide. We met a super nice couple that I spotted on the tram and luckilky they were going to do the blue grotto and changed their plans to come with us. Both Owen and I were super happy to have new friends to talk to - I don't think we really noticed how little we have to talk to eachother about after spending a month one on one so, it was great to hear new stories and share our experiences with someone else...lol. We ended up enjoying a really nice dinner with Erik and Kelly as well at a really cute wine bar we found in the square the same night. Capri was amazing and I'm definately happy we went but, I am super happy for trip advisor for finding us the deals :)
After Capri we took the ferry back to Naples and then made our way to Rome. Quick note about Naples - YUCK! I won't go on too much about it but, I was pretty sure we were going to be robbed or murdered on our walk from the train station to our hotel. The streets were covered with garbage and there were so many sketchy people everywhere! I don't think anyone had cleaned up the garbage for months. It was just accumulating in huge piles on the sides of the streets. I thought maybe it was just near the train station but, when we took a cab to the port it was like that everywhere. I'm glad we skipped it and opted for Capri instead.
We had four days in Rome and it was full of walking and sightseeing. I actually can't believe how much we have walked around. We always take the transit (which has been amazing everywhere) but, somehow we end up walking until our knees, ankles and feet can't take anymore. We did the usual stuff so, I guess I won't go into detail.. pictures attached.
On to Malta! I LOVE it here. Like I said before - everything is super cheap with the exception of laundry (Owen picked up our clothes today and it was 30 EUROS!) We flew from Rome to Malta & got a hotel for three nights for something like 530.00 dollars. Our hotel is pretty basic but, it's attached to another hotel called the Palace which has an infinity pool on the roof, sauna's, steamrooms and sundeck so, I'm obviously in heaven. We layed by the pool all day today which was super nice. The wind picks up pretty quickly here and there is an odd haze but, other than that it's been really nice. We didn't realize this but, everything is closed on Sundays so, yesterday we walked around Valletta and took the local bus (see picutre) to a market that is held on Sundays about 30 mins away. Our flight to Athens is tomorrow at 2:00pm so, hopefully we will have internet and I can finish the update there!
Jess
We arrived in Malta on Saturday the 4th and are really enjoying it! Everything is so cheap here which is a huge change from our recent stay in Capri. Capri was gorgeous but, now that I`ve seen Malta I would probably choose 1.50 euro beers and 8.00 euro ocean side lido`s over 135.00 euro dinners (probably the biggest shock ever) and 6.50 euro bottles of beer. We were totally shocked to find out that in Capri a 15% service charge as well as a cover charge of 3-6 euros
per person is automatically added onto your bill. We did find one deal on the island thanks to trip advisor (of course!) We decided to rent a boat with another couple that takes you all the way around the island with a guide. We met a super nice couple that I spotted on the tram and luckilky they were going to do the blue grotto and changed their plans to come with us. Both Owen and I were super happy to have new friends to talk to - I don't think we really noticed how little we have to talk to eachother about after spending a month one on one so, it was great to hear new stories and share our experiences with someone else...lol. We ended up enjoying a really nice dinner with Erik and Kelly as well at a really cute wine bar we found in the square the same night. Capri was amazing and I'm definately happy we went but, I am super happy for trip advisor for finding us the deals :)
After Capri we took the ferry back to Naples and then made our way to Rome. Quick note about Naples - YUCK! I won't go on too much about it but, I was pretty sure we were going to be robbed or murdered on our walk from the train station to our hotel. The streets were covered with garbage and there were so many sketchy people everywhere! I don't think anyone had cleaned up the garbage for months. It was just accumulating in huge piles on the sides of the streets. I thought maybe it was just near the train station but, when we took a cab to the port it was like that everywhere. I'm glad we skipped it and opted for Capri instead.
We had four days in Rome and it was full of walking and sightseeing. I actually can't believe how much we have walked around. We always take the transit (which has been amazing everywhere) but, somehow we end up walking until our knees, ankles and feet can't take anymore. We did the usual stuff so, I guess I won't go into detail.. pictures attached.
On to Malta! I LOVE it here. Like I said before - everything is super cheap with the exception of laundry (Owen picked up our clothes today and it was 30 EUROS!) We flew from Rome to Malta & got a hotel for three nights for something like 530.00 dollars. Our hotel is pretty basic but, it's attached to another hotel called the Palace which has an infinity pool on the roof, sauna's, steamrooms and sundeck so, I'm obviously in heaven. We layed by the pool all day today which was super nice. The wind picks up pretty quickly here and there is an odd haze but, other than that it's been really nice. We didn't realize this but, everything is closed on Sundays so, yesterday we walked around Valletta and took the local bus (see picutre) to a market that is held on Sundays about 30 mins away. Our flight to Athens is tomorrow at 2:00pm so, hopefully we will have internet and I can finish the update there!
Jess
Monday, May 30, 2011
Tourist trap avoidance fails
This one is a poolside update as I consider the events of the last few days.
I think now after just short of a month on the trip, I can start to reflect a bit on how to make better decisions when traveling. And by better decisions I mean getting the most out of each day for the least amount of money... the key quite obviously is avoiding the tourist traps and eating where the locals eat, but a lot of the time this is easier said than done. Lately we have been screwed just once, but it hurts when it happens. Places on capri are the worst I have ever seen in my life. The place we went to charged 3eur cover each, 15% service, 5eur waters, on top of already overpriced meals. Why did we go there? Same reason you buy milk at the gas station the odd time, or buy beers at canucks games. The have the convenience of being in the right place at the right time with the things you want. Contrast that to last night and both our meals in venice...put in the time to get recommendations and our best friend trip advisor's opinion, and boom! Half the price, and as good or better food.
Same thing today. Read about how much of a rip off the blue grotto was, so we seeked out the #1 boat tour and got a private 2 hour tour with another couple for 30 compared to sardining for an hour with 30 others for 25 each...do the research if you have the time is the (my own to myself) moral.
Anyways, I'm sweating and need to get in the pool!
Ciao!
Wednesday, May 25, 2011
Nice not nice, Venice value vacant
Before I write anything, a final note to my last post. Even on TGV's the crazy smoking people exist, but they are so nicotine addicted they dont even wait for the stops! I guess there are no smoke alarms in the bathrooms, so the lady sitting in front of us actually went in, lit a smoke (after a 5 minute fidgit attack), and huffed away before coming to sit back down. What a retard. Plus no one actually is staffed on trains so everyone just ignores it and deals with her issues and stench.
That is a common theme in all of europe so far. Cleanliness, pleasent odor, fixing broken items in your commercial establishment... all not part of the culture. Sure, they will carry around an LV purse and wear a D&G belt with Ray-Bans, but pee in the streets, soil up a bathroom, actually have soap in the soap dispenser? non issues.... crazy people!!!!
The problem with Nice though was my stomach attack. It was on full evac after a few big (and really really good) meals in Lyon. We had one of our most fun times with 2 British men on an eating and drinking tour of France for 17 days. So nice to speak english to some people for once in France! They booked their whole trip all based on trip advisor ratings, and we were eating at the #1 rated place in Lyon (le Musee). Was an awesome meal, and even Jess liked it, which is saying something.
In Nice though the first night I just slept, and could barely go outside even to see the water. The next day I still wasnt feeling good, so we went down to the beach and rented comfy loungue chairs on the beach, which conveniently had their own private bathrooms... thank god. We met some crazy aussies that sat beside us, and jess had a lot of fun, but I wish I wasnt sick so i could have partaken. It was a fun night even for me, as we went out with a lot of really nice people from all over. I was sleeping by 12. I bet the aussies were out till 4.
Next day we went to monaco, which was worth it. They were setting up for F1 which has quite an infectious atmosphere. The amount of money involved is just astonishing. You see guys in Canada dress up their 'big rigs' with Chrome or whatever, and you see people with fancy paint jobs on their trailers or whatever, but in F1 they have the biggest, most expensive, nicest painted, cleanest and shiniest semi trucks I have ever seen in my life. And they have 12 of them. Plus youve probably seen rock concerts with speaker boxes and such. Maybe a few truck loads. In F1 they have 12 of them, and there is probably 10 teams, and each box is brand new, and each guy is wearing a fancy brand new team shirt, and on and on and on. Really neat. I was hoping to see some of the cars but they build these special little boxes in the pits around them so you cant see them. I did see a ton of Rolls, lambo, maybach, ferrari, and other in Monaco though. I also am proud to say I got a blackjack in the casino! Pretty big let down though, it was empty and awkwardly quiet. No music, no service unless you ask, and very very small. Maybe at night in my tuxedo it would have been different. Still, I was happy we went and played BJ with carved shirtless children and saintly looking oil painted women watching the action.
Now we are in Venice and its pretty neat! No cars obviously, just lots of walking. Its the first nice hotel we have stayed in though, so its so nice just to relax in a nice place. I'll have to write more about that later!
Ciao!
PS Jess never wrote a post, and in Lyon, at the Parc, they have an African Plain of animals! It was awesome.
That is a common theme in all of europe so far. Cleanliness, pleasent odor, fixing broken items in your commercial establishment... all not part of the culture. Sure, they will carry around an LV purse and wear a D&G belt with Ray-Bans, but pee in the streets, soil up a bathroom, actually have soap in the soap dispenser? non issues.... crazy people!!!!
The problem with Nice though was my stomach attack. It was on full evac after a few big (and really really good) meals in Lyon. We had one of our most fun times with 2 British men on an eating and drinking tour of France for 17 days. So nice to speak english to some people for once in France! They booked their whole trip all based on trip advisor ratings, and we were eating at the #1 rated place in Lyon (le Musee). Was an awesome meal, and even Jess liked it, which is saying something.
In Nice though the first night I just slept, and could barely go outside even to see the water. The next day I still wasnt feeling good, so we went down to the beach and rented comfy loungue chairs on the beach, which conveniently had their own private bathrooms... thank god. We met some crazy aussies that sat beside us, and jess had a lot of fun, but I wish I wasnt sick so i could have partaken. It was a fun night even for me, as we went out with a lot of really nice people from all over. I was sleeping by 12. I bet the aussies were out till 4.
Next day we went to monaco, which was worth it. They were setting up for F1 which has quite an infectious atmosphere. The amount of money involved is just astonishing. You see guys in Canada dress up their 'big rigs' with Chrome or whatever, and you see people with fancy paint jobs on their trailers or whatever, but in F1 they have the biggest, most expensive, nicest painted, cleanest and shiniest semi trucks I have ever seen in my life. And they have 12 of them. Plus youve probably seen rock concerts with speaker boxes and such. Maybe a few truck loads. In F1 they have 12 of them, and there is probably 10 teams, and each box is brand new, and each guy is wearing a fancy brand new team shirt, and on and on and on. Really neat. I was hoping to see some of the cars but they build these special little boxes in the pits around them so you cant see them. I did see a ton of Rolls, lambo, maybach, ferrari, and other in Monaco though. I also am proud to say I got a blackjack in the casino! Pretty big let down though, it was empty and awkwardly quiet. No music, no service unless you ask, and very very small. Maybe at night in my tuxedo it would have been different. Still, I was happy we went and played BJ with carved shirtless children and saintly looking oil painted women watching the action.
Now we are in Venice and its pretty neat! No cars obviously, just lots of walking. Its the first nice hotel we have stayed in though, so its so nice just to relax in a nice place. I'll have to write more about that later!
Ciao!
PS Jess never wrote a post, and in Lyon, at the Parc, they have an African Plain of animals! It was awesome.
Friday, May 20, 2011
Internet people
I must say after a couple weeks of travel, I have really gained respect for people who can create content I actually want to read or watch on blogs, youtube etc. We are both finding it so hard to find the time to actually sit down and write something out, either email or blog or facebook. And, when you do find the time, if you actualy want to upload pictures or format things nicely on a crappy internet connection, it takes like 30 minutes to properly write out a few paragraphs of what we did! The nice thing though, is that ranting aimlessly (like this) gets down a lot of text very quickly...
Some things I have learned I wish I knew before I came:
1. In France, the train car you are in barely matters, and the seat you are in doesnt matter at all. People just sit in your seat, or sit in any seat they want, and then go "Oh, it doesnt matter its all the same" when you show them your tickets. Now when we get on, we just go near where our seats are and take the best ones.
2. French regional trains are germ infested disease ridden cattle car hot boxes. Instead of TGV to Paris and then down to Lyon from Bordeaux (2.5 ish hours, wait, then 4 ish hours) we took a direct train 'first class' straight accross (7 hours). HUGE MISTAKE. Jess and I both lost years off our lives, and caught at least 4 serious diseases. Everyone was coughing, it smelled like urine and poo, everyone is so close together, and its 34 degrees in there. Plus there is no drink or food car. Do not do this, be warned!
3. Do not expect peoples directions to be correct. Saying something is on Grande Rue de la Croix-Rousse, apparently means "some where in that neighbourhood of 25 blocks)". We spent over an hour walking around yestserday for a laundromat, only to walk back to the hotel and ask the lady again where it was and she revised her previously very specific directions to "this street or this one or this one, between here and here". Idiot!
All in all though everything is going great still. Everything has been a lot of discovering and figuring stuff out, but transit is just so good, and signage is clear through any language barrier. Today in Lyon its our last full day so we are giong to take the tram up above old Lyon and visit the cathedrals, and then have dinner at the #1 rated trip advisor restaurant... I'm super pumped for both! French food has been really good, and we have been keeping really busy seeing the sights. Parc de la tete d'or was very nice good, but ill let Jess share her excitement over that. If you google it, i think it should be fairly obvious what we spend at least 20 minutes staring at.
Hope everyone is well... Train tomorrow to Nice/Monaco for 3 days then Venice, if I can buck up and pay the hotel rates (holy crap!)
Owen
Some things I have learned I wish I knew before I came:
1. In France, the train car you are in barely matters, and the seat you are in doesnt matter at all. People just sit in your seat, or sit in any seat they want, and then go "Oh, it doesnt matter its all the same" when you show them your tickets. Now when we get on, we just go near where our seats are and take the best ones.
2. French regional trains are germ infested disease ridden cattle car hot boxes. Instead of TGV to Paris and then down to Lyon from Bordeaux (2.5 ish hours, wait, then 4 ish hours) we took a direct train 'first class' straight accross (7 hours). HUGE MISTAKE. Jess and I both lost years off our lives, and caught at least 4 serious diseases. Everyone was coughing, it smelled like urine and poo, everyone is so close together, and its 34 degrees in there. Plus there is no drink or food car. Do not do this, be warned!
3. Do not expect peoples directions to be correct. Saying something is on Grande Rue de la Croix-Rousse, apparently means "some where in that neighbourhood of 25 blocks)". We spent over an hour walking around yestserday for a laundromat, only to walk back to the hotel and ask the lady again where it was and she revised her previously very specific directions to "this street or this one or this one, between here and here". Idiot!
All in all though everything is going great still. Everything has been a lot of discovering and figuring stuff out, but transit is just so good, and signage is clear through any language barrier. Today in Lyon its our last full day so we are giong to take the tram up above old Lyon and visit the cathedrals, and then have dinner at the #1 rated trip advisor restaurant... I'm super pumped for both! French food has been really good, and we have been keeping really busy seeing the sights. Parc de la tete d'or was very nice good, but ill let Jess share her excitement over that. If you google it, i think it should be fairly obvious what we spend at least 20 minutes staring at.
Hope everyone is well... Train tomorrow to Nice/Monaco for 3 days then Venice, if I can buck up and pay the hotel rates (holy crap!)
Owen
Tuesday, May 17, 2011
Madrid, San Sebastian & Bordeaux OH MY!
Hey hey!
So, we finally have an internet connection in our room. Not a ton of time as it is 11:20pm and we have to be up early for a train to Lyon but, I will post a few pics of the last week!
Here is a photo of a Park in Madrid that we visited! I loved the people lounging in their boats :)
We found out from Misha that this park use to be closed to the public and was only open to Royals.
Madrid was amazing. It was so nice staying with friends and having help around the city... We have a ton of photos but, in trying to keep it short I will move on. We took a train a few days later to San Sebastian (which by the way is my favorite place so far). We arrived to a sunny day and blue skies...ahh... The highlight was probably our huge hike! It took us a solid amount of time to make it to this picturesque spot! P.S. The first day we got massive sun burns and welcomed the clouds for our hike...lol.
We had an amazing few days in San Sebastian and caught a train to Bordeaux! I'll post a picture from the wine tour we did today.. Bordeaux is all about eating, drinking and shopping. Well, we can't shop - we have no where to put anything and I can only eat so much.... and it feels weird drinking at off times of the day so, we were happy to have our whole second day taken up by a wine tour. We visited 4 Chateaux's and got a history of wine making..
We had an amazing few days in San Sebastian and caught a train to Bordeaux! I'll post a picture from the wine tour we did today.. Bordeaux is all about eating, drinking and shopping. Well, we can't shop - we have no where to put anything and I can only eat so much.... and it feels weird drinking at off times of the day so, we were happy to have our whole second day taken up by a wine tour. We visited 4 Chateaux's and got a history of wine making..
(blogger isn't letting me load any more pics so, I will try again tomorrow)
Jess
Tuesday, May 10, 2011
Videos From the Trip
Granted there are probably better videos of all of these things on Youtube already, but I wanted to share some of the videos we took ourselves. These just dont do it justice.
We had amazing first row tickets to the 4-0 win over Getafe FC. Ronaldo had 3 goals in the blowout. Amazing to think in Camp Nou, you can fit all of this stadium, plus another Canucks sell out inside it. Funny note: we paid 90 euros for front row Real Madrid, and 150 euros for nose bleed goodyear blimp tickets to FC Barca.
Trying to show just how many people are around when you try to get your tickets at the pick up window.
This is the opening theme to FC Barca from out TERRIBLE seats. It was super awesome to see an arena of 100k fans, and the staduim was so steep the seats werent actually that bad. We saw a 2-0 win againds RCD Espanyol.
Tried to get a decent video of the Sagrada Familia. All the towers are over 100meters in size... wow! And, what a nice day outside!
We had amazing first row tickets to the 4-0 win over Getafe FC. Ronaldo had 3 goals in the blowout. Amazing to think in Camp Nou, you can fit all of this stadium, plus another Canucks sell out inside it. Funny note: we paid 90 euros for front row Real Madrid, and 150 euros for nose bleed goodyear blimp tickets to FC Barca.
Trying to show just how many people are around when you try to get your tickets at the pick up window.
This is the opening theme to FC Barca from out TERRIBLE seats. It was super awesome to see an arena of 100k fans, and the staduim was so steep the seats werent actually that bad. We saw a 2-0 win againds RCD Espanyol.
Tried to get a decent video of the Sagrada Familia. All the towers are over 100meters in size... wow! And, what a nice day outside!
Monday, May 9, 2011
Catch up!
Well, it's my first time with access to a computer to finally update the blog with some pictures off of our camera. So far Owen has only had his cell phone and the photo's on there to post. I've got a few pics from London including Buckingham Palace, the London Eye and a couple randoms.
Owen mentioned this earlier but, London felt like home to me (with the exception of the hostel)... I slept the best in St. James' park on the loungers they put out in the sun. The hostel we stayed at had the most uncomfortable bed I've ever been in and we were right beside the showers and the bathrooms so it was loud pretty much all the time except between 5am and 7am which I assume is when all of the 19 year olds finally pass out. I've included a picture of how I slept (doing my best not to touch the sheets at the hostel)
Aside from the hostel, we had a great time wandering around London being tourists. The London Eye was exciting on the way up but, you are on it for 30 minutes so, by the time you get to the top you have pretty much seen everything there is to see. I especially enjoyed the 4D show we got to see afterwards...
The flight from London Gatwick to Barcelona was quick and easy! We decided to head to Gatwick a little early and enjoy the Yotel! We only have a video (haven't figured out how to get it on here yet) but, basically it was a tiny hotel room at the airport. You get a bed, TV, (hot) shower and a toilet... After three days in our hostel with cold showers we were REALLY looking forward to a warm one! The only other thing to point out was that our Easyjet flight was seat yourself... I'd never been on a plane without assigned seating but, everyone seemed to figure it out :)
Barcelona was amazing! Our hostel was MUCH better (I didn't even sleep in my mummy bag!) and we were lucky enough to have friends come and visit us for the last couple days. Owen and I were super happy to have someone who spoke the language.... We hadn't really got up the confidence to wander in somewhere for food unless they had pictures because we had no idea what we were ordering... We had our first night out on the town with Misha and Darlin and obviously as per Owen's earlier post that will be the last one for a while. I'm not use to eating dinner at 10pm and then staying out until 6am so, the next day was a bit iffy ;) Owen's already posted a lot of pics so, I'll just do a couple more from the Barcelona game we attended and be done for now... We've only just got to Madrid but, we have activated our Eurorail passes and are LOVING staying with Misha and Darlin.... it's nice to stay at someone's house! I can't wait to sleep without doors slamming every 5 minutes...
Posted by Jess
Sunday, May 8, 2011
Bucket list tickoff!
Woke up today at 1215pm thanks to staying out last night till spanish closing time... 6am. Not the greatest idea in hindsight as today was supposed to be our sightseeing day. We ended up cabbing to the sagrada familia to save time, and I'm glad we did. The guy who designed it was obviously on drugs. Why they decided to build it is beyond me (maybe that's in the walking tour, it was closed today), but wow what a structure. The highlight though had to be jess throwing up in front of hundreds of people in a public trash can...lol.
Once we finished there we met misha and went to camp nou. After much walking and sweating we bought tickets off a scalper for 3x face :( I wasn't sure if public scalping was illegal because there were so few people doing it, but it turns out it just really is that popular. It was incredible being in a stadium of 90000 people all chanting and singing at the sametime, and an unexpected bonus was the great views of the barca hills from our ' as bad as you could possibly get' nosebleed seats. Hope the pics do it some justice.
Tomorow it's off to barcelona sants to activate our eurail tickets and head to madrid. Happy mothers day! I think there is something in the mail!
Saturday, May 7, 2011
Barca
UhLate nght in barca. Saw misha, went out for A great dinner and late (late night) clubbing. Its funny how dre 2001 and notorious big are still the standard for classic dance music no mattet what language... Really drumk but a great night. See y'all tomorow to post tjerice I pay for barca tickets!
Pic is gum on my shoe. Wtf oops!
Barcelona waterfront
We stopped at the waterfront for a break and a beer. Every single tourist took a pic of the curved mirrored building like this...lol...here is ours!
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