Blogs from Europe - page 10059

After cycling again in Italy, I got bored and took several trains from Florence to Aix-en-Provence, while someone else took my camera. Merde. Bad news is the vomiting monster shape I saw on the road outside Siena will now never appear in my photo album; good news is I've done unfeasibly huge cyclings in a big circle up Mont Ventoux, through gorges, up into the Provencal Alps, lots of rain, lightning, thunder (though not la tonnerre de la derriere), really enjoying it again, while waiting for replacement camera to come in the post. Which it now has. All the photogenic stuff happened before, so for now it's just a table footballer with a couple of snails. 8,685 kilometres on the clock. Lumme! ... read more

Everything went accourding to plan, which of course worried the hell out of me. The woman at the station sold me a ticket for 8 euro, which is a insanely low price. so i thought i was getting busted with that whole reservation nonsense again. but here i am in florence. and holy crap.what a city. this is an absolute must stop on any trip to europe. the place im staying isnt a hostel but rather a campsite. i slept in a tent last night and it rained like the dickens. but its cheap, though im discovering that the price of a bed isnt always the end price. take this camp. its 15 euro for a bed, but no free internet, and no free breakfast, which if taken at the minimum would cost 8 euro. so ... read more

ITALY: Rome, Florence, Pisa, Tuscany, Venice... March, 2008... Bella Italia! Italy is a place that most people yearn to visit at some time in their lives, and although Bill and I had visited Rome and Venice before, we eagerly accompanied our friends Ed and Charlotte on their first visit to this rich, exuberant culture. We wanted to travel with a spirit of adventure instead of having everything be structured, controlled, and predictable, so we consulted with a company called Italy Source to help us plan our independent travel. They helped us custom-design our trip and arranged museum reservations, train travel, hotels, and much more, according to our desires. Our overnight flight from Houston had a connection in Paris before arriving in the Eternal City of Rome the evening of March 8, 2008. We enjoyed a beautiful ... read more

Last night was pretty fun. We were doing shots of whisky and playing dice poker with Ludo before dinner. Then, once again I broke my 2.5 year vegetarianism. Ria and Ludo made this cheese, ham, and whitloof dish, a typical Flemish dish. That was the most meat I've eaten in a long time. During the day, we went to my Pit's old house and the birthtown of my Uncle Al, Vrasene I think it was called. Then we went to Ria's aunt's house deep in the country, actually in Holland. It was really pretty there. I'll try to get some pictures uploaded soon. Ria's aunt could hardly speak a lick of English, but still insisted on having a conversation. I understood she met my mother before. Then she brought out some beer. I looked at my ... read more

Hello all. Let me start by saying, there's no way to fit visiting everything you want to see in Europe in a month (and this is only after the first 10 days!). We'll add more pics later, but we've just come back from seeing Mouling Rouge in Paris. It was amazing! Did we mention that we could have gone to the Manchester soccer game (had we spent the rest of our honeymoon money!)...too bad. Otherwise, we're off to Amsterdam tomorrow to go visit a coffee shop. Berlin is next after that! Love and miss you all! D'Arcy and Ivan :)... read more