Saturday, September 24, 2011

Day 216 - Travelling with the drunks ....

Barcelona to Puerto De La Cruz (Tenerife) - Best Semiramis Hotel

We had to get to Barcelona airport pretty early this Saturday morning, so even though there were no "regular" travellers, we had to contend with groups of drunks fresh from the opening of La Merce as we made our way into town to get the airport bus. Unfortunately one of our last memories of Barcelona is loud drunks and the smell of urine ..... lovely!

We arrived in Tenerife just before lunch, took another bus to Puerto De La Cruz on the north side of the island, and spent the rest of the afternoon relaxing in our room with it's great view of the town, followed by a little bit of exploring.

Friday, September 23, 2011

Day 211 to Day 215 - Back to school

Barcelona - Cocoon Apartments

Day 211 - K had signed up for a Spanish course this week in Barcelona, so we had an early start as K had to sit a test at 8am. The class times are 9am to 1pm each day, which works well as it leaves us the afternoons to do some sightseeing. This afternoon we walked down to the port and marina which aren't far from where we are staying, and up Los Ramblas, the "main street" where all of the tourist shops are, as well as human statues (which in Barcelona are much better than the crappy ones we've seen back home and elsewhere), and lots of pickpockets (we've been told).

Day 212 - Today after K's classes we headed to Sagradia Familia, a unfinished but still impressive church. This church is expected to be completed in 2026, 100 years after the death of the church's designer, Anton Gaudi. It is very unusual as it combines so many different architectual styles. We continued on to Park Guell to see more of Gaudi's famous creations.

Day 213 - Today we had a quiet afternoon, we had to do some more planning for our travels after Barcerlona. Our original intentions have changed quite significantly, we would have liked to have stayed on in Barcelona so K can continue her course here, but instead we will move on to Tenerife so K can pick up a course there. This meant we have had to spend a bit of time on the internet checking out plane fares, hotels, etc, fortunately there are some budget airlines so the costs aren't too bad.

Day 214 - Today is the first day of the annual La Merce Festival, which is a really big deal here. The opening ceremony was only a few minutes walk from our flat, so of course we went along. The square was packed with people, who all waited through the boring speeches (worse for us because we couldn't understand them), before the main show commenced. Papier mache giants in various forms - kings, queens, fire breathing dragons, lions "danced" around the centre of the square, accompanied by traditional music played by a large band on a stage. After each of the giants had done their little dance, there was a small fireworks display. The main parade is on Saturday night, unfortunately we will have left Barcelona by then.

Day 215 - The last day of K's course and time to get packed up and move on once again, we have a very early start in the morning to get the plane to Tenerife. Because we feel we have been working so hard lately, we are heading off to the Canary Islands for a holiday (actually K continues with her Spanish course).

Sunday, September 18, 2011

Day 210 - Flying into a protest

Rome (Italy) to Barcelona (Spain) - Cocoon Apartments

The problem with flying is that although the flying time is short it always takes the entire day. The queues at Rome airport for security were longer than usual, the plane was late, etc - so even though we left our hotel in Rome around 11am, we didn't get to our studio apartment in Barcelona until after 7pm.

We headed out for a quick explore and some dinner to find ourselves in the middle of a huge political demonstration, we suspect it was related to Spain's debt crisis and the austerity measures that were in place. It was a peaceful protest though, lots of singing and dancing in the street, we even joined it for about 20 seconds (while we crossed from one side of the street to the other).

Saturday, September 17, 2011

Day 209 - Ancient speed bumps

Rome - Candia Residences

An early train trip to Pompei today (via Naples), three trains and three and a half hours later we arrived, with the still active Mt Vesuvius in the background.

It was a little difficult to negotiate as they had run out of maps and it is very poorly signposted. We wandered around aimlessly for a while, finding some interesting mosaics in a very quiet area, before following the crowds and getting back to the main areas. We then managed to see most of the major sights, including the famous mummified bodies from the eruption. The streets are interesting as the cobblestones are heavily grooved from the carts and have speed bumps on them ... speed bumps have been around for a long time!

We had originally hoped that after Pompei we could go up to Vesuvius (it would have been easy as there were plenty of people outside the station offering their services), but we didn't have enough time, instead we headed back to Naples to have a look around. The vicinity around the railway station seemed a little seedy, but as we had to get our train back to Rome we didn't have a chance to go any further afield.

Friday, September 16, 2011

Day 208 - Worst tour operator ever?

Rome - Candia Residences

We joined the unbelievably long queue to see St Paul's Basilica, which fortunately moved pretty quickly. Once inside we joined another long queue to go the cupola. It was a steep walk up very narrow winding staircases - we're pretty sure the Pope hasn't been up here for a long time. After the cupola it was back into the basilica at ground level, and once we'd had our fill of dead popes and more artwork, we headed into town to visit the Pantheon and the Spanish Steps.

For the afternoon we had booked a tour to Tivoli to visit Hadrian's Villa, something K has wanted to see for a  long time. We had decided on a tour as it isn't easy to get to using public transport, and the temperature in Rome had been very hot. First stop in Tivoli was Villa Este, which had lovely terraced gardens on the side of the mountain, with many huge fountains including one that played an organ.

We finally arrived at Hadrians Villa to K's excitement only to be told it was closed!!! Unbelievable, "on strike" was the explanation given, apparently it's very common in Italy! We had heard that there were riots the night before outside parliament so we're not sure if this was part of the reason. Very disappointing, a waste of money and time. There was no offer of compensation from the company but a group of us did go back to the office and we were given €10 back per person, the company was happy to keep the entry fee for the site from everyone else on the tour!

Thursday, September 15, 2011

Day 207 - The real roman ruins

Rome - Candia Residences

We had ordered our tickets for the Vatican Museums online, so we were able to skip the very long queue. As it was quite early we decided to make a beeline for the Sistine Chapel, hoping that the bulk of the crowds hadn't reached it yet. As we eventually found out though, there was no chance of avoiding the crowds. The chapel itself is worth visiting, K would like the job of the person who "shushes" everyone (you are meant to be silent, but almost noone is), she thinks she would be very good at it. We then wandered back to the beginning of the museums and visited all of the other fabulous rooms with all sorts of artwork, having to visit the Sistine Chapel a second time so we could exit.

We then went to the ancient Roman part of the city to visit the Colosseum, Palatine Hill and the Forum. We've seen a number of Roman ruins on our travels, we finally made it to the "real" Roman ruins! This took up most of the rest of the day, though we did manage to fit in the Tivoli Fountain on the way back to the hotel.

Wednesday, September 14, 2011

Day 206 - On strike, but only for you

Florence to Rome - Candia Residences

We left Florence for Rome, but with a side trip to Pisa on the way. We had researched that it was possible to leave our luggage at the station in Pisa while we visited the famous tower, but when we arrived at Pisa station a man outside the left luggage office told us they were on strike because they hadn't been paid!

In the end we took a taxi to the Leaning Tower and took turns looking after the luggage while the other looked around. The tower and accompanying buildings were quite interesting, as was the number of people setting up the trick photo where someone is "holding up" the tower - we didn't try that though. We shared the taxi back to the station with another couple who had been able to leave their luggage at the station, apparently the strike was over less than an hour after we had left!

Our hotel in Rome was very close to the Vatican so we walked up to St. Peter's Square, and were surprised to find it relatively quiet, and that St. Paul's Basilica was still open. We tried to enter but K was turned away because of her shorts and top - knees and shoulders have to be covered.

M then decided we should complete our walk around the outside of the Vatican, K wasn't that keen, but at least we can now say we have walked around the borders of an entire country in only an hour or so.

Tuesday, September 13, 2011

Day 205 - Art overload

Florence - Locanda de Firenze

We were a little surprised to get to the piazza and see the huge queues for the Basilica, as the previous evening it had been much quieter. We decided to wait until later to see if the crowds would subside.

We had booked our tickets for the Accademia and Ufizzi galleries online, which ended up saving us so much time waiting in queues. First up was the Accademia, the highlight of course being Michaelangelo's David. After finishing there we went back to the Basilica and climbed to the top of the dome, followed by a quick look from the inside at ground level as well. Then a walk over the Ponte Vecchio, before heading to the Uffizi gallery.

Our Uffizi entry was scheduled for 5:30pm, but we managed to get in an hour earlier. There were some amazing artworks in there, by Da Vinci, Boticelli, Raphael. Carravaggio and many more, but it was a little difficult at times to get a good view because of the number of people - way too crowded for our liking. On this trip now we've seen so many works of art that we think we are suffering from art overload, but the really extraordinary and famous works are still great to see.

Monday, September 12, 2011

Day 204 - Next time buy the tickets earlier

Venice to Florence - Locanda de Firenze

We headed straight to the train station to catch a train to Florence but stupidly hadn't thought to buy the ticket the day before, so as the train was booked out we had to wait two hours for the next one. We used the morning for one last walk around Venice, taking special care not to get lost this time.

Eventually we made it to Florence and checked into our hotel where the girl behind the desk said "you must be here visiting relatives" - she recognised M's surname as being from a nearby area.

It was still very hot, so waited until the early evening to do some exploration, wandering into an old church along the way and also visiting some of the piazzas.

Sunday, September 11, 2011

Day 203 - A day on the canals and in the Piazza

Venice - Hotel Florida

We bought a whole day pass for the vaporetto (water bus) and travelled to Piazza San Marco, it's a nice cheap way to travel the Grand Canal and see some of the beautiful sites. Nice square, but once again ruined by advertising - must be an Italian thing. We visited the museum in St. Mark's Basilica and climbed out onto the balcony into the hot sun (Italy has been very hot so far), we saved our visit to inside the Basilica for later in the day as it was closed in the morning.

Back on the ferry for a trip to Lido (not much there), then back to the Piazza for the Doges Palace and the Basilica proper. As part of the Doges Palace visit we walked across the Bridge of Sighs, unfortunately there wasn't much to be seen from the outside later on - ruined by advertising again! We walked back to the hotel via the Rialto Bridge and Market - K decided that souvenir shopping was in order, M decided that he'd rather relax and eat some gelati.

In the evening we headed back to the Piazza for the entertainment - there were a number of groups of musicians with piano and strings playing classical music - nice if you like that sort of thing, and it was certainly a lot quieter then earlier in the day, no hordes of tourists to contend with, and the evening trip on the vaporetto gave us great views of the buildings lit up along the canal.

Saturday, September 10, 2011

Day 202 - Where did all these relatives come from?

Milan to Venice - Hotel Florida

Today was the day for our visit to M's Dad's home town of Piazzola Sul Brenta, not far from Padua, and of course to meet even more relatives. We set off early for the three hour trip, with Uncle Pietro driving us, doing a great job in the hectic Milan traffic for an 82 year old!

When we reached Piazzola Sul Brenta we first stopped by Villa Contorini, an impressive old "villa veneto", before heading to the house. M's plan was to stop by, meet a few relatives, take some pics and leave again. How naive we were, one glance at the length of the table set up in the garden and we knew this wasn't going to be a small affair! Unfortunately not many people spoke English but many people did their best to try and talk to us anyway.

One thing of special interest to us, when we were at Dakar concentration camp in Munich, M found a reference to a man who had died there with the same surname and home town as M's dad. One elderly auntie at the lunch remembered him, he was a great uncle of M's (i.e. M's dad's uncle) who went to Germany to work and then was imprisoned when Italy "changed sides" during WW2 - a piece of family history saved by chance.

After a traditional Italian lunch in the beautiful outdoor setting, photos were taken and many kisses were given to take back to Australia. We were then driven to the train station in Padua to catch the train to Venice, less than an hour away.

We arrived in Venice and exited the station right on the Grand Canal to find the place swarming with tourists. They say that something every visitor should do in Venice is to get lost - K has an excellent sense of direction so we rarely have a problem in this area. However when we headed off for an evening walk after dinner, it didn't take us long to get hopelessly lost - so it seems K's sense of  direction doesn't work in Venice!

Friday, September 9, 2011

Day 201 - Planning and shopping

Milan - M's Uncle Pietro's apartment

Apartment block in Milan
Our original plan for the day was to visit either Lake Como or Lake Maggiore north of Milan, but we needed to spend some time on the internet planning travel and accommodation for the rest of our Italy visit. Our next stop was Venice, but because of the Venice Film Festival reasonably priced accommodation was difficult to find, and we also needed to sort out Florence and Rome.

By the time we'd done this the morning had gone, so we headed back into the centre of Milan for lunch and to do some gift shopping. That evening we went out to a local restaurant with Marilu, Stefano and some of Stefano's relatives for more authentic Italian food (but M thinks the home cooked meals were much better!).

Thursday, September 8, 2011

Day 200 - Best cathedral yet, but ......

Milan - M's Uncle Pietro's apartment

Marilu's English has improved a lot since she visited Australia, as she has taken it upon herself to study with her children when they have homework, she managed to be a great tour guide of Milan for the day. Too bad our Italian skills are pretty much non-existent.

We arrived from the underground into the Piazza Del Duomo in the centre of Milan with its amazing gothic cathedral, the largest in Italy (and fourth largest in the world). Apart from its sheer size we were struck by how clean it was, many of the others we've seen in Europe have generally been in various shades of black. On the downside though there were huge fashion advertisements on the side of the cathedral .... it may have been the beginning of the fashion season, but it did seem a little strange to us.

We walked to the Galleria where you are meant to grind your heel into testicles of the ceramic picture of the bull on the floor for good luck - we watched other tourists do it but decided to give it a skip ourselves, of course there are no testicles left, just a depression a few centimetres deep! After that was the museum at La Scala, where we managed to catch the tail end of an orchestra rehearsal.

We returned to the cathedral for a closer look at the inside, then after lunch we first walked along Via Monte Napoleon (where they were setting up for Fashion Week) to look in the windows of the fashion shops that we could never afford, then headed to the Castello and the nearby gardens, before returning back home.

That evening we were treated to homemade gnocchi (made by Pietro), along with more relatives that had come to visit. After dinner we headed back into town with Stefano for a walk along the canals (designed by Leonardo Da Vinci), and a pleasant drink at one of the many bars.

Wednesday, September 7, 2011

Day 199 - Exit from Germany

Freiburg Im Breisgau (Germany) to Milan (Italy) - M's Uncle Pietro's apartment

Time to move on from Germany, we've ended up spending much more time there than we had originally planned - but that's the beauty of an open itinerary. Our train trip went via Zurich, and then through the Alps and into Italy. The scenery as we headed through the Alps was beautiful, it would be nice to visit again someday when there's some snow.

We were met at Milan Centrale station by M's first cousin Marilu. Luckily she remembered us from her visit to Australia three years ago - after such a long time travelling it was so nice to have someone waiting for us when we arrived.

We caught the metro to her apartment block in the Milan suburbs where she lives with her husband Stefano and their three daughters. We enjoyed a lovely home cooked Italian meal with the family, then retired to M's Uncle Pietro's apartment in the same block. Unfortunately neither of us speak Italian and Pietro doesn't speak English, but we still managed to communicate OK.

Tuesday, September 6, 2011

Day 197 to Day 198 - Carless again

Freiburg Im Breisgau - Freiburger Hostel

Day 197 - Time to return our rented car, so after dropping it off we then walked into the centre of Freiburg and did the walking tour based on the map from the tourist information centre. Another nice day, another interesting city. After the tour it was back to our apartment, who ever thought you could enjoy having a lounge room and a bit of room to move so much.

Day 198 - We took advantage of our nice lodging by sleeping in and having a very lazy day. Nothing wrong with that - we are on holidays after all!

Sunday, September 4, 2011

Day 196 - Look away, look away

Stuhlingen to Freiburg Im Breisgau - Freiburger Hostel

We arrived in Frieburg around 12pm to check into our next place, what a lovely surprise. After months of falling over each other in tiny hotel rooms we have a lovely modern one bedroom unit, much nicer and cheaper than the tiny room we had in Switzerland.

We drove to Baden-Baden to partake in the number one activity for which this town is known - the Friedrichsbad Roman-Irish Baths. These are the only baths in the world that are still naturally heated. We were told to allow 3 and a half hours to follow the bathing routine through the 17 rooms - the one hitch being that clothing is not allowed!

After checking our clothes into a locker we finished off the 17 stages (including a massage) in about 2 hours - maybe we are not as good at naked relaxing with complete strangers as other couples? After getting over the fact that we were naked, it was quite an interesting experience. In each room there were instructions on how long to spend e.g. shower 3 minutes, 15 minute sauna at 54C, 5 minute sauna at 68C, etc. The strangest room though was the one near the end where we lay down in a silent, dark room and were wrapped in sheets and blankets by the attendants. We were meant to stay there for 30 minutes - we lasted about ten, and the snoring coming from the other side of the room didn't help!

We decided to drive back via France (through Strasbourg), however it started pouring rain so we didn't get to see very much at all through the drizzle, by the time it stopped we were back in Germany again.

Saturday, September 3, 2011

Day 195 - Tarts!

Stuhlingen - Gasthof Hotel Krone

We travelled back into Switzerland today to visit Basel, another picturesque city, that had a bakery with wonderful raspberry tarts (according to M) - why don't all tarts contain this much jam? It was also kind of weird (in a nice way) - first we saw some strange performance going on in a cafe where people were walking around singing to themselves, then while we were trying to figure out what was going on, two scantily clad girls walked past done up completely in black skin paint (we had no idea what they were selling).

It was also a very nice day, not what we would think was swimming weather, but to the citizens of Basel it was a perfect day to float down the swiflty flowing river.

We headed back over the border into Germany for a drive through the Black Forest, along with hundreds of motorcyclists - the area is obviously a favourite for motorbikes. The scenery was beautiful, some of the towns and houses were quite pretty, and we finished up back in Stuhlingen for a second night.

Friday, September 2, 2011

Day 194 - Not exactly Vic Falls, but still worth a visit

Rothrist (Switzerland) to Stuhlingen (Germany) - Gasthof Hotel Krone

Today we drove to Zurich, and went for a short walk around town, including a stroll up and down Bahnhoffstrasse, supposedly a great street for shopping, though we didn't notice anything special. Sometimes you have heard of a city so much you think you have to visit but when you get there it is just another big city!

We drove from there on to the Rhine Falls (Rheinfall), the largest waterfall in Europe. Obviously after seeing Victoria Falls we are not going to be easily impressed. What the Rhine Falls lose in size is made up for by the way the platforms are built around the falls, giving you a closeup experience as you are very close to the water rushing past.

We spent the night at a lovely little guest house in Stuhlingen, a few minutes over the border in Germany, where we gladly opened up our wallets to eat in a restaurant again!

Thursday, September 1, 2011

Day 193 - Three bears and a genius

Rothrist - Ibis Hotel

We have decided that we can't really afford to spend much more time in Switzerland - where we are staying in Rothrist is the cheapest hotel we could find, at $130 a night. It's seems to be in the middle of nowhere, but it's actually well based for day trips to Swiss towns.

We headed off for a big day of sightseeing in the south of the country. First was the Swiss capital of Bern. After parking the car we walked to the end of the street to find an enclosure with 3 bears wandering around - these were the remnants of the old bear pits, though the bears have a lot more space now than they used to. We then headed up the main street, visit Einstein's old house along the way, before walking around town and back to the car.

We then drove to Montreux on the shores of Lake Geneva, apparently one of the richest holidays area in the world. After a short stroll along the waterfront we drove to Château de Chillon, a small castle on an island just a few metres off the shore. Next stop after this was Lausanne, where we quickly toured the city centre (cathedrals, etc .... you know the drill).

On the way back to Rothrist we did some shopping, and tonight we "dined" in our hotel room on potato chips and biscuits, unwilling to open our wallets in a country where a Big Mac costs $10 (not that either of us has ever eaten one).