Well, this is where it begins. We're packed (mostly) and just about ready to enter the southern hemisphere for the first time. Well. Nearly. After Heathrow. And a long flight. And a couple of probably very confused days in Bangkok. And another flight. But anyway... we're ready... bring it on! Hopefully, we will get a chance to post stuff here during our journey, but I won't make any promises... it's gonna depend on how often we find ourselves connected and so forth. But you never know. Now, time for another beer... [View Full Entry]

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Continued from Part 1…. Upon our arrival in Amsterdam, we grabbed a Taxi and headed to our beautiful hotel, the Ambassade Hotel, on one of the main Canals within the city center. This hotel was the combination of about 10 Canal Houses and was quite unique. Our room was beautiful with a really high ceiling and exquisite decorations. I have to say, after my many hostels, I was impressed with our choices of hotels in Paris and Amsterdam. I had made reservations for us at the Mexican Restaurant, Los Pilones, which I had eaten at with Megan and Brooke back in [View Full Entry]

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I have sorely been neglecting my blog! How tragic! Amsterdam was forever ago but I will try to update on everything since then, maybe just with some photos bc honestly I think that’s all anyone looks at anyway. I loved Amsterdam so much that I decided to spend osme more time in the Netherlands. First we went to Haarlem which is about 20 minutes away from Amsterdam. It was much quieter but just as beautiful. Emily and I just walked around and admired the scenery. We stopped for lunch at a little café and an American man was eating at the [View Full Entry]

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Today we woke up to a wonderful, bright, sunny day. We decided that it was the perfect day for a walk on the beach. We didn't arrive at the beach in the typical Dutch way (via bicycle) instead we drove. I'm convinced that it took slightly longer to drive the 15 minutes to the beach (with parking and the traffic delays). The Dutch certainly passed us in droves on their bikes. Once we arrived we were surprised to see the Dunes Guido and Carole had raved about looked very different from the dunes we see in the states. These are protected [View Full Entry]

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We arrived in Amsterdam on Thursday morning with just a few catnaps on the plane. We were already ready for bed, but forced ourselves to stay awake until the evening. Guido picked us up from the airport and brought us to his home in the center of Haarlem. Haarlem is a nice town 30 minutes outside Amsterdam which is known for shopping. Their house is just inside the walking zone with cobbled streets and easy access to shopping. It's close to the train station so you can easily reach Amsterdam for work or play. Their house, what we Americans would call [View Full Entry]

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Well we're almost home - just one weekend to go. We're drinking coffee in Haarlem (Netherlands not New York). We didn't make it to any internet cafeswhen we were in Italy, but we were busy. The day we arrived at Roger's flat in Barga had been a lomg drive - mostly mad Italian motorways including the Milan ring road - think M25, but crazier, with more unindicated lane changing.The last hour or so, only about 40 miles was on a twisty turny up and downy road, a bit like New Zealand, but with traffic and little villages everywhere. When we got [View Full Entry]

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so decided to continue where I left off. Meant to say before that Barga has big connections with the north of England and Scotland. It has a kind of hall of fame showing photos of Italians from Barga outside their restaurants in the Uk - the Nardinis and Luccas, the Gabrellis from Linlithgow and Bruccianis in Morceambe - I guess they moved to Preston later. Enough diversion - back to Holland. We tried to get into the fantastic Kasteel Bloemendaal in Vaals near the German border: we stayed there before on a late-booking special internet deal. It's a chateau and as [View Full Entry]

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It wasn't a feeling of disgust, fear, or curiousity. It was a sense of complete unbelonging, an opressive moral numbness that rejected me and everything I care about. Amsterdam doesn't like me and I don't like it; I couldn't leave fast enough. I knew, on a surface level, what I'd find, but I expected to be able to handle it - I've seen a lot in two months after all - but instead, I just felt like crying. Germany is a nice place to re-adjust to western society, but Amsterdam is a good place to make me, at least, want to [View Full Entry]

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Tolerance July 4, 2007 Happy 4th of July friends and relatives!! We hope everyone is having a safe and fun holiday! We are in Holland still and I celebrated with Justin shopping in the Waterlooplein flea market and visiting the Van Gogh museum. It was rainy but otherwise, a nice peaceful day! No fireworks however so different from our past 4th of July holiday celebrations. Come to think of it….I can’t recall one in the rain either. (lots in the fog…but none in the rain) We have been in the Netherlands three days so far. We have made Haarlem our [View Full Entry]

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July 1, 2007 My Beautiful Launderette We left England and took a long uneventful ferry ride across the Channel to Belgium. Thank goodness none of us had any motion sickness. It was rough out there and the bathrooms were line-up with people getting sick. We arrived in Belgium and to the lovely town of Brugge. We spent two uneventful days in Brugge eating chocolate, climbing clock towers, and gliding down the beautiful canals in lovely little boats. It was definitely bad for the diet…really bad. The chocolate was to die for. Will had a Belgium waffle with hot chocolate sauce [View Full Entry]

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