The final countdown!

Less than nine hours until blast-off.  We were going to post about all the little differences we noticed while we were away, all the best and worst of the countries we visited.  But I think we'll leave it for now and share all that with you when we get back.  We are really looking forward to coming home.  See you soon.

PS. Is there anyone left in Australia?  Cause it seems like every second person here in Munich is an Aussie.

3 days and counting

I've uploaded all these photos out of order, just so you know...

We spent a lot of time on the underground and trains in Berlin. It sounds a bit strange but I enjoy remembering how confusing we found public transport when we first arrived in Europe.

Sarah also joined us in Berlin, and we will be flying back to Aus together.

We've done a lot of sight seeing whilst being here...we went to the Sachsenhausen concentration camp, did a 3hr 'Third Reich' walking tour, saw the major buildings, visited the Turkish markets, went shopping etc. One of the guides on our tour mentioned that Berlin as a city manufactures very little, and that most of its income comes from cultural stuff. It means there are hundreds and hundreds of pubs, resturants, cafes and clubs so we've been able to enjoy that side of it a bit too =)

Some of the paintings done on the longest remaining stretch of the Berlin wall, some of it was awesome and some just a bit disturbing.

This is back in Gronigen, Simon and I had a great time here. We basically spent our time walking around the city, drinking coffee, visiting the daily markets, and indulging in all the different foods we loved before we left NL for the last time (at least for a while)

Simon took this photo just because we thought it was the best name for a coffee shop =)

From the vismarkt in Gronigen. This was one of the spice shops. We loved this town, it was small enough to walk everywhere but it was so busy and there was always stuff going on. Plus I think the average age was about 25...

Will update soon, we've compiled our own list of the 'little differences' (see previous post) according to us plus a 'best and worst of europe' list. 3 days left for us.

The little differences.

On our trip we listened to a lot of music while we pushed the clock to 17,000km.  Over that time the Pulp Fiction soundtrack became one of our most played.  The following video provided us with much laughter and enjoyment over the weeks, so I thought I'd share it with you all.  (Note: Keep in mind that this clip contains a bit of colourful language.)

Sweden, Denmark, Germany, and the Netherlands!

We've made it back to the motherland.  It was a three day drive that tested our patience, so we were happy to hand the car back.  We caught the train up to Groningen where we've already been enjoying seeing some more young people around.  And all those bikes.  We'd forgotten just how many bikes there are here!  It's going to be great to be car free for the next 11 days.

Before we left Sweden we took a look around Stockholm with Ben as our guide.  The city is quite pretty, lots of nice colourful buildings and the waterways dividing each part of the city from the rest.  We went out for dinner one night to sample some traditional Swedish food.  We had pickled herring, salted pork and reindeer stew.  It was all really good.  We also went to Skansen, an outdoor museum with native animals and a semi-working village.  The four days went by quickly even though it rained for two of them.

Everyone we talk to says that the summer in northern Europe has been pretty average.  Lots of rain and not very hot.  We seem to have avoided the bad weather pretty well though, until the last two weeks anyway.  It's worked out well.  Bring on summer at home.

11 days.

Sweden

Just a quick note to say we've arrived in Sweden and are staying with Ben and Anna for a few days.  We visited IKEA Stockholm today, supposedly the largest Ikea in the world.  But apart from the size of the shop, Ikea is Ikea, the same (insert your own adjective here) furniture that you can get anywhere.  But we did get to try some genuine Swedish food there, meatballs with mashed potatoes and gravy.  Delicious.

We'll see a bit more of the city tomorrow and hopefully take some more photos to share here.  It's also nice to see that Tassie is enjoying a mini heatwave at the moment (at least that's what bom tells me).  Hopefully that continues through the summer!  That's all for now, more in a couple of days.

PS. 18 days to go!

Germany

We have been in Germany nearly two weeks now, we came with no plan other than to move in a northerly direction, because after Germany we intend on driving (about 1000km) to Stockholm, to visit Simon's brother Ben and his girlfriend Anna.

We haven't done very much. Aside from some overnight downpours and a couple of cloudy mornings the weather has remained warm and sunny. We have been driving and staying in small (incredibly lovely/neat/pretty) towns like Selb, Freidrichroda, Uslar, Hermannsberg etc.

A day in life of Simon and I in Germany goes something like this...wake up around 8 o'clock and doze or read until around 9. Simon gets up and makes coffee and breakfast, I then get out and another hour and a half of reading begins. I eventually tidy away the dishes and pack a small bag. We then walk into town to a bakery and buy fresh bread for lunch, and a quick trip to the info centre gets us a map showing the dozen walks which surround every small German town. Then a good 10km walk and a picnic lunch begins. The afternoon can include some incredibly competitive games of cards or 'take two' (home-made on the back of cut up cereal boxes) and invariably some more reading. Late afternoon is usually another wander into the town to taste a local beverage (and hopefully secure another coaster to add to our collection). Around 7 – 7:30 I make curry...etc etc

It has been very relaxing but I have to say I am looking forward to some more variety and excitement soon =)

One Sunday, our first in Germany, we were driving around for a while hoping to find a grocery store to do our weekly shopping (and get some lunch) as our cupboards were bare. Finally yeilding to the realisation that every shop in Germany was closed we eventually (at about 3:30) hit on a tiny pub that was advertising some sort of pork and chips. It was a bit awkward because the place was deserted except for the owner (whom we later found out was from the Czech Republic and had only recently bought the place), however he was so incredibly friendly and helpful that we stayed. He asked us if we would like him to suggest some food. We agreed. He served us a 3 course meal, cooked by himself. It was awesome, entree was some sort of goulash soup (so good I nearly died), we then had a massive salad, and mains was delicious stirfry pork with pickles/mustard/onion stuff. I don't know why I'm telling you but it was just a nice moment.

We also visited the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp (also used as a Polish POW facility before that). I don't think that anything we had studied at school or Uni really prepared us or made us understand the brutality and horror of what happened in those camps. The information and exhibitions set up there were really well done but they didn't spare you any details. I can hardly believe that only a lifetime ago such things actually happened. Its the kind of thing that makes me want to respond somehow, to do something, but there isn't anything to do except know about it. This is a strange thing to put in a blog but I've thought about it a lot since we visited, and also realised how little my generation has had to suffer though anything, or struggle against anyone or want for anything.

What else can I say...Simon grew the most massive beard because we've been staying in unpowered sites for two weeks and I (for reasons we wont go into) was forced to shove my arm down a sewage drain in the pouring rain. The joys of travel!

Czech-one-two...

(Yes I know.)

Since Dubrovnik we've been on the road for a bit over a week and have covered a bit of ground. Because of time constraints, as serious as they are for a 19 week trip, we decided to do Austria and the Czech Republic in a week.. So it was Vienna and Prague. But first we rounded out our time in Croatia with three more nights at the same camping spot we spent our first two nights. It was that good. It could only have been better if we'd had a boat and some rods. See for yourselves.

Austria was...I'm not sure what Austria was. Vienna didn't do much for us, but then that probably had a bit to do with not seeing one tourist information centre at all while we were there. That made the public transport difficult, though we figured it out in the end with a bit of help from an old lady waiting for the tram.

We did, however, find a nice place to stay outside Vienna. It was a winery/restaurant with a vineyard behind. They parked us out the back with the tractors, and fixed up the bill by going inside for a glass of wine and some pork crackling. Bloody good.

To slow the pace a bit we spent a couple of nights out in the sticks, in a little town called Eggenburg, a walled medieval town. It was lovely to get back to a small town like the ones we enjoyed so much in Belgium. The photos below are from the neighbouring town, Stoizendorf, a 45 minute walk away. It's an old wine producing area. One street was lined on both sides with cellars dug into the banks and vineyards in the fields behind. A great spot.

Prague, where we were today, was really nice. One of the first things we noticed was that even the tourists seemed a bit more relaxed. We didn't have to spend half our time fighting our way through the crowds. There were lots more old buildings, Prague is a nice looking city, lots more nick-nack vendors, and all the stuff other cities have. We did check out the Communism Museum which was recommended to us by some friendly young dutchies at our campsite. It was, of course, specifically about communism in the Czech Republic (then Czechoslovakia) and it was really well put together. Those years must have been horrendous for the people who lived through it.

We did also see some happy things. There was an old man playing jazz on a corner in the city. He had a cd playing and soloed to it on sax and trombone. Every now and then he'd stop playing and just sing along. It was excellent, plus he was at least 80 wearing suspenders over his white shirt. The real deal.

So that's it so far. Tomorrow we head to Germany which should be a nice relaxing time, hopefully seeing a bit of their national parks. Till next time.

Into Croatia

Italy as a whole was frustrating for me. It seemed to build me up with beautiful rivers along which perched tiny wooden cottages who's owners spread nets, like spider webs, over the expanse of the river, BUT then delivered such strange road signs that we would end up driving through the Hobart mall of seaside towns. However before we left we visited Venice, I didn't have high expectations to be honest. People told us that it would be really dirty, but I actually really loved it! We wandered around for about 6 hours. The narrow alleyways and canals were beautiful, and it was definitely the cleanest city in Italy! We got there via a ferry and enjoyed some delicious pizza, pasta and gelato whilst we were there.

The day after we drove out of Italy and toward Croatia. To get there we went through Slovenia, and in the half hour we drove through Slovenia we saw about 7 spit roast pigs on the go... the smell, well it made be glad not to be vegetarian.

Then on to Croatia...we've pretty much driven the length of it now and it is certainly a land of contrasts. It seems to be a place mostly consisting of solid rock and craggy mountains and hills, its very dramatic. However in all its valleys and along the river mouths people have gone agriculturally mad, and its beautiful. Add to that the perfectly clear, blue ocean along the coast. Its awesome and I love it.

We found this tiny camper place our first day and got a spot on the waters edge, literally 3-4 meters away from the water. And it was quiet, so beautifully and perfectly and wonderfully quiet...so we slept and swam and sunbaked and read, and wished we had snorkels and fishing rods and boats etc.

A couple days later we made to Dubrovnik, certainly a tourist town, but very cool. They understand camping here so we've been very comfortable. We walked the old town walls in 35 degree heat, had some lunch and a giant beer and then went swimming. Life is simple but good.

Where do we start with Italy? So far we've been here for a bit over a week and we are yet to be won over by this country. There are some great things about it, but also some terrible things. But more on that in a minute.

We drove into Italy from Switzerland, which I guess is going to provide any traveller with a bit of a culture-shock. Coming from the amazingly rugged, colourful, beautiful and organized place that is Switzerland into Italy was bizarre. We hadn't got more than an hour into the country before the landscape became dry, almost barren looking. And what we saw of the west coast down to Naples was all like that. There were still farms growing lush, green corn but they were islands amongst the dust.

The east coast has been much greener and far more picturesque so far. We spent a couple of days sunning ourselves on a beach at Marina de San Salvo. A small tourist town, with lots of Italians on holidays taking their tanning very seriously indeed. Very seriously. (We found oursleves completely out of step with the Italians' daily routines though. The beach is packed in the morning, everyone is there. We trundle off to lunch at about 12.30 and when we return they're all leaving for their lunch. 3 or 4 hours later some of the keen ones return for some more sun shortly before we head off for dinner. Later we're trying to sleep while the whole town rouses to drive past our van repeatedly.)

Rome was not what I expected. I somehow thought it would be a bit more glamourous and a bit fuller. The ruins take up a lot of space very close to the centre of the city so my first impression was of the place being unfinished or under construction. The ruins were magnificent though. The Colosseum was something to behold as were the Palatine hill, the Palaces and the Forum. It was great to see it all up close in person after studying it throughout school and at uni.

And then Pompeii. Not impressive in the same way as the Colosseum but astounding because of how intact it is. The sheds full of unbroken pottery, petrified people and animals. The bakeries with original flour mills and ovens ready to use. It was amazing and good fun to wander around the streets of a 2000 year old town.

Something else that is amazing and good fun is driving a largish vehicle here. One afternoon after a lovely swim at Sorrento, where the water was ridiculously warm, we took a little drive further around the peninsular to find a place to stop for the night. Indulge me by trying to imagine this. Coastal road. High up – basically cliff edge. Low stone wall between car and the edge. Narrow road. Two large vehicles (eg, bus and camper) passing each other is tight – bus driver obliges by yelling something at us that did not get lost in translation. Blind hairpin corners. Italians parking wherever they feel like. Mel likened that 2 hours of driving to one of those puzzles that have one free space for you to slide all the pieces around. That is just what it was like.

Italians' driving is something to behold. We've driven though the centre of many towns, even Naples, and it doesn't matter where they are, if they feel like doing something, they just do it. They'll stop in the middle of the road to chat with a friend who is walking past, they'll double park, turn their hazard lights on and then walk away from their car (apparently if your put your hazard lights on then you can do anything), they do not let people merge and they definitely don't stop for pedestrians if they can help it. Certainly makes things interesting.

Italy has provided us with plenty of little stories, like the cop who stopped us on the highway and told me that Mel is “a very beautiful lady,” in the classic, slightly sleazy Italian way. But the biggest impression it's made on us is not a good one. There is just so much rubbish. Some of the big cities around Europe have been full of buildings going grey and dirty from pollution, but nowhere has it been like this. I have never seen so much rubbish outside a tip, ever. It is absolutely disgraceful. It's all over the roadsides, in the streets, at the beach (to a lesser extent). We went to a lake outside Rome, where the Pope has his summer residence, to have a swim. There was a grassy, gravelly area at the waters edge where people could spread out a towel and sit. But the whole area was strewn with rubbish. It was a really beautiful spot but not at all inviting.

But then there is the food.  The guide that took us through Palatine hill and the palaces gave us directions to a strip of restaurants/delis in a town outside of Rome.  We sat and ate our way through a delicious antipasto platter in about 2 hours.  It was huge and so very good. 

I'm not sure if we'll be able to come to a final decision about Italy, but it sure has been interesting.

Nice, Mt Blanc, Switzerland and more!

A quick update before I explain the photos...we decided that instead of going straight on to Italy from France we would head up to Switzerland so save us extra driving later on...

We continued up the French coast for a few more days and stayed here in Nice for two nights. It was great. Shopping, eating out and swimming. We explored the harbour and the 'old town' which was a maze of narrow alleyways filled with cafes, icecream shops and everything you can imagine. We also got to wander through a night time market and 10 Salamancas worth of resturants. There wasn't enough time to try all the food!

We stopped at Mt Blanc on the way to Switzerland. When the lady sold us our tickets to go up the mountain she said 'the visibility isn't perfect' what she meant was 'there is no visibility whatsoever'. We were a bit disappointed.

The next day dawned and it was so sunny and clear that we went up again, still a little cloudy up the top but mind blowingly beautiful.

We then went on to Switzerland. We don't have many photos because it was pretty grey for a few days. We have however visited the lovely medieval town of Gruyeres...famous for its cheese. We got to see it being made and then that night (thanks to a conversation with Monica) we went out and had proper gruyeres cheese fondue - about a kilo of it! Delicious!

This is Interlaken, we camped here on the side of lake after visiting Bern (which I'm pretty sure is the capital). It was a cool place, I wish we had had more time there and that it hadn't rained all day. At Interlaken we also visited the caves of st Beatus, an Irish missionary monk who was rumoured to have slain the dragon living in the caves. We did a tour 2km into the caves, it was pretty cool but the best bit was when all the lights went out...we had to get the emergency torches out to make our way back.

Camping in Switzerland is very expensive (45-55 swiss franks per night) so we have done a lot of roughing it...this was the view from our car park in Weggis on lake Lucerne. Small towns in Swizerland are great, they put on heaps of stuff for tourists. The first night we were here we went to a 'folklore evening', we couldn't understand anything but the yodeling and little kids dances were fun =)

The next day we caught the cable car from weggis up to the top of Mt Rigi and did some walking. The views were spectacular. That and the constant sound of cow bells in the background made me think of the Sound of Music and Heidi a lot

Were now in Arbon near St Gallen which were visiting to see an ancient library made by monks. Last night we went to an out door cinema to see 'Black Swan' assuming it would be subtitled. After waiting an hour and a half for the movie to start we found that the whole thing was done with German voice over, oops! However the atmosphere was lovely, the cinema on the edge of the harbour and other towns along the lakes edge were setting off lots of fireworks so we had a good time anyway.

Miss you all.

France

As hard as it may be to believe, driving everyday, finding a place to stay, and big days of sightseeing are remarkably tiring. So it's been very nice to spend a bit more time in one place just relaxing. It's also been fantastic to have some good weather. Of the 7 days we've been in France only a couple have been below 30 degrees – a nice change from England.

From the train we drove to St Leu d'Esserent, a small town north of Paris, where we stayed at a superb caravan/camping park. One of the reasons it was superb was the pool and another was the weather. We spent our anniversary lounging by the pool, reading, swimming in the pool, eating baguettes with brie, olives and dips, reading by the pool, drinking French wine, and just generally having a great time.

Paris was over in a whirlwind of a day. We took in some of the sights – the Louvre (we bought tickets at the train station which allowed us to skip the 400m line up!), walked up the Champs Elysees, and climbed the Eiffel Tower (a shirtload of steps). Plus as a bit of a bonus we got to see peak hour traffic from the luxury of a bus, and then experience a 45 minute delay with the train. It was a lovely day though.

The next day we drove into Versailles. We thought we'd stop for a couple of hours to check out the palace and then be on our way... We were there for about 5 hours and could easily have stayed longer to check out more of the gardens. It is not possible to describe the grandeur and opulence of the place. Of all the things we've seen so far Versailles has blown me away the most. However I try to describe it, I can't do it justice.

 The back garden...

Louis XIV chapel

Right now we're in a town called le Lavandou on the south coast where we've been swimming everyday in the beautifully clear water of the Mediterranean. Tomorrow we'll head east to spend some more time somewhere else on the south coast of France before crossing another border and confronting another indecipherable language.   

Oh, and I just checked the weather for Hobart...there's definitely something to be said for skipping the winter.  Enjoy!

Week 3 in the UK

After we left Sarah and Chris in England we traveled up toward the lake district, and also planned to visit Edinburgh...of course the weather meant we had to change our plans and visit Scotland first. Here are the photos

The Lakes:

The lake district 'striding edge' walk...we actually walked a very narrow edge, fall off either side and I reckon you'd die. It was awesome! And sunny!

We felt a bit awkward when eating our lunch with all the other walkers at the top because everyone was kitted out in waterproof everythings; gaters, million dollar walking shoes, compasses, ordinance survey maps and whistles. We sat quietly in our jeans and sneakers and then left soon after.

Traditional tourist pose at the top of the walk =)

In the lake district we camped in an area called Langdale. It was absolutely stunning, but only when sunny. I finally decided that I thought that the English were crazy because on the day we left it was absolutely bucketing down and all the English were huddled under the boot doors of their cars eating breakfast or setting off for a walks...

In Scotland:

There were 5-6 lochs (not sure about the spelling) at Loch Ness and we got to watch them open one after the other to let all the sailing boats down. It took about 2 hours.

We ended up doing and extra day trip in Scotland because the weather was still too bad to go to the lake district. It was the best decision. We really couldn't capture it in photos but the scenery was awesome in the real sense of the word. Big, majestic and just incredible.

Our day in Edinburgh was great, it poured all day but by that stage we understood what all the English were telling us...'if you don't go out when its raining you wont go out at all'

The photo above is at a pub called Brew Dog. Nick, Simon's brother told us about it. Beer in the UK was ok but this stuff was so good. Its now up there with some of my absolute favorites. We even bought a T-Shirt!

The other thing we did in Edinburgh was go on the 'Total Whiskey Experience'. I don't really rate whiskey as a rule but the tour was great. I enjoyed learning how to appreciate whiskey better and can now even tell the difference between types. Plus it kept us out of the rain...

Simon will post soon about France so far...I just want to say how incredibly sunny and warm its been.