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Published: October 3rd 2008
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Oupia
Our digs in the south of France for the past 2 weeks. Shane Summary:
Left England & went to Paris for 3 nights & met up with Andrea & her family, Bern 1 night, Venice 3 nights, Florence 3 nights Y& now in Oupia, south of France for 2 weeks. Saw lots of old stuff & drank red wine - lots.
The Full Monty:
It's bloody hard to bother yourself with doing a blog when you're kicking back in the south of France enjoying the products of the local vigneron's, but here goes.
Well since our last post I believe I have been proved right when I predicted Geelong were right for the picking. Pity I thought it was against St.Kilda in the 1st week of the finals. Macca's happy but Longy & Rod Wilson will be pretty annoyed, besides, Hawthorn have had enough of a good thing in the 80's & 90's. Macca doesn't rate Clarkson as a good coach, so how good will Hawthorn be when they get a decent coach!
Back to reality, we spent a couple of weeks in Eastbourne which was enjoyable. Decided to meet up with Andrea & her family in Paris so jumped on the EuroStar train
Bern
Interesting statue from London St.Pancras to Paris Gare (station) De Nord. Great train trip that takes just over 2 1/2 hours.
We toured around Paris for a few days enjoying some good weather & the sites. Caught the train to Bern & overnighted there (worth a longer look if you get the chance) saw some interesting statues.
Caught the train to Brigg to meet up with the Milan train & then onto Venice. The whole idea was to stay at Bern to catch the train to Milan, but didn't realise the train to Milan doesn't go through Bern. Had to catch a local train from Bern to Brigg which left at 8:40 am. We got there early & got the earlier train to Brigg, only problem was it took a different route & got to Brigg 5 minutes after our Milan train!!!
Anyway, 1 1/2 hours & a few Swiss Franks later we got the train to Milan & onto Venice.
Arrived in Venice to more rain (they'd borrowed some from Ireland) but that was okay as it was still a novelty for us. Great place Venice but all the roads were
Italy
View from the train near Swiss border flooded & they had to use boats to get around!! Must have been the rain!! One of the party ordered a margarita pizza with french fries and yep - you guessed it - the chips were on the pizza. Different.
After 3 days in Venice we trained to Florence. Great place. Was he Capital of Italy from 1868 to 1873 (some more useless info for you). Had great digs in both places but in Florence we were directly opposite the Baptistery at the Il Duomo. Fantastic!
After Florence it was off to the south of France by train with a night in Nice. This turned out to be a highlight as Chris, Mitch (brother-in-law) & I went out for a late night walk and discovered the best kebabs (Gyros) in the free world!!! The bread they were in was not as thick as a pita & were finished off in the sandwich toaster as opposed to being put on the hot plate. The mixture of traditional sauce with chili sauce had to be experienced to be believed along with the absence of having had a kebab for about 12 months!! Exaltations were heard being
Venice
High tide in Piazza San Marco expressed in Australian accents for some time after both meals were devoured. A similar experience with kebabs in Nice as to pizzas in Venice. If you order one with frites (hips) the frites are actually in the kebab!
Arrived in Oupia on20th September and have been pretending to be a local for the past 2 weeks. Yet to have a bad or average red. They're all good to great! As the weather has been!!
It's Thursday 2nd October as I type & we've had our 1st bit of rain since the day we arrived in Venice. Have been catching up with friends Christine & Frank McKeowen (Frank & Westy) who are living here for the next 2 years with their children. Also Sue & Bruce Walters & their son Lucas. Christine & Westy went to Uni with Sue & her and Bruce have lived here for the past 17 years odd years working in various occupations. So it has been a very social time.
Dot's going strong and is enjoying the country side and all the delights whilst also managing to fit in the odd novel or
Venice
Concreters getting a delivery on site. 6!
The next blog may go into greater detail about the local French - depending on the response of you - the subscriber. Then again knowing what the response will be I'll just do it anyway. Topics I hope to cover next issue:
Markets, the local food, driving in France, villages, trains, day trip to Spain, the accommodation. Heart hasn't been in this blog so sorry if it's boring you.
Whilst here we have had a reunion with Lauren & Claire. It was great to catch up with them both, but, particularly Claire who had left for China in early February. We drove up to Toulouse to collect them just after midnight on 25th August. Lauren shot off to Paris a few days ago & we'll catch up with her again this weekend.
Also had a reunion of sorts with Tim. He rang us at 4:30 am on Grand Final morning (our time. 3:30 am England time)! He'd just finished work & was filling in time before going down stairs to watch the GF at the pub he's
Venice
Team photo outside our flat. working at. Was still good to catch him!
We on the road again this Saturday when we head to Paris for 2 nights. Then we fly to Malta after which we fly to Barcelona for 24 hrs stop over & then fly to Poland followed by a flying visit to Exerted to meet up with Tim. Lauren & Claire then stay on in England after which we return to La Redorte (south of France) for about 5 weeks.
See you all. Will blog again soon.
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