Greece

Woke up at sea and saw Patras coming into view, we got off here then boarded a 3 hour train to Athens, the scenery was just incredible and the train was scary too! It clanked and clattered across the tracks and flew around the corners, I fell asleep part of the way through but woke up in time to see some amazing scenery.

A view of the ferries going to Greece

Arrived in Athens and were immediately solicited for a hotel room by Alex, an American from Michigan working in a hotel, and George, who I thought owned the hotel (he didn't). The hotel is a little dodgy but for 12 euros a night (about $15) you can't go wrong.

The streets of Athens on our way to the hotel

When we arrived we were told to meet George in the bar, he immediately had to give us our "welcome drink" of Ouzo, which is like clear Jagermeister, yuck! George was fun for a night but he was just an alcoholic and I hear from Kirsty he was about to get sacked...

- posted by mark @ 1:38 PM (0) comments

 

// Milan Cont'd //

Spent a few more days in Milan and went to an art expidition that Flora setup at Frida, the bar/art gallery where she works. Went out again and had fun (again) at a local italian place where I tried the local beer named after the patron saint of Milan??

Anyways, the next day I get to meet Fabiana, Flora's sister who doesn't speak much English but she seems to be a great girl. She seems to think that I have a resemblance with Brad Pitt so she started calling me that and I of course started blushing. She made us a really nice pasta from a Sicilian recipe and we had strawberries and cream for dessert, mmmmhhh.... belissama!

Fabiana & Flora's dinner table, good memories and good cappacino

Genova & the Italian Riviera

The next morning Flora and I headed for the port town of Genova after saying goodbye to Fabiana who responded with a "Ciao Brad Pitt" and a laugh, what a flatterer!

We hit up the train and were in Genova in a few hours, it was so nice to have a native Italian speaker with you! I felt kind of guilty with Flora doing all the work asking for directions and what not but she was definately more qualified to do that than me. Here are some pics from Genova...

Streets of Genova

some pirate ship from a low budget movie and Flora

The next day it was stormy and cool so Flora was kind of bummed since she wanted to take me to Portofino, a little tourist village on the coast. We had a coffee and decided that we were going to try anyways. It was actually an awesome walk, about 5 kilometers to Portofino and it was so beautiful! The sea is a kind of aqua-marine blue and the villas of the rich people who live here have to be seen to be believed, here are some pics to prove it :)

On the way to Portofino, the Italian Riviera

Italian Riviera Again

Looking back at Genova

Portofino is a little town in a little harbor where all the really rich Italian people moor their yachts and stuff. It was a beautiful walk to the place and I was kind of glad it was rainy and cool as it kind of gave everything an ambience that wouldn't have been there on a sunny day. Here are some pics of Portofino...

The entrance to the harbor

Some boats in the harbor, not the huge fancy ones next door but these seemed more photogenic for some reason.

I had been nagging Flox about my "traditional italian meal" that I wanted so we went to a nice restaurant called "lupo" which means "wolf" in latin. We had an awesome dinner, clams for an appetizer and then I had the seafood spaghetti while she had the pesto pasta. We topped it off with a bottle of red from Liguria, we had several courses and were never rushed by the waiter which is something you never get in the States.

The next morning we just hung out in Genova and walked around the market, I bought a "large" italian shirt and found out later that a "large" italian man must be about the size of my little sister because the shirt didn't even fit around my arm! I ended up giving it to Kirstie, this girl from Australia that we met in Greece but I'll get to that...

Flora (Flox) happy now that the sun had come back out.

Almost missed the train to Rome to meet Dave and Kirsten, had to say goodbye to Flora again, I kissed her on the forehead and watched her through the train window fade in the distance, so sad.... I didn't realize how much I had missed her until I spent those last few days with her, she's a great girl and if Tobin and her are happy together all I can do it wish them the best.

// Recent Additions from Flora //

Here are some pics that Flora sent me (thanks Flox!)

Flora and I in front of a neat little church in Genova

At the docks in Genova...

// Rome //

Day 1: Getting there and the Booger on the Wall

We stayed in the official cockroach motel in Rome, Dave emailed me and told me to "bring my bb-gun so we could play rat hunt in the alley." Our balcony looked out over a huge pile of garbage and Dave said he saw a rat that he mistook for a cat at first glance rummaging below in the trash. Not to mention that there was a booger on the wall that someone had circled with pen and signed "my booger" and the walls hadn't been painted in at least 10 years, it was quite the place!

Rome was nice but I missed most of it, Dave and Kirsten took me on a crash course tour when I got there at 7 of the Roman Forum and some of the sights. The Spanish Steps, the Pantheon, and several more. Rome is a very cultural and lively city but I couldn't stay there for more than a few days. Here's the pics from my whirlwind tour...

The Roman Forum, the heart of ancient Rome

Roman graffiti with the Coliseum in the background.

The Coliseum, a bit smaller than it looks in "Gladiator" but still impressive.

Dave and Kirsten waiting for my slow ass to take pictures

Trekking to the Metro Station

The streets of Rome

The Pantheon, best preserved ancient building in Rome. Invaders tried to pull it down with elephants but they couldn't, you can still see the grooves in the stone from the ropes, cool.

The Spanish Steps, where artists would take their pick from male and female models who would congregate here.

The next day we took the train to Naples, were were originally going to spend two nights here but found it crowded and dirty and decided to leave right away for Bari to catch the ferry to Greece. Ended up sharing a taxi with a guy named Andrew, he has kind of attached himself to our group which I'm not sure how I feel about that, he's alright but he is now going with us to Santorini.

The ferry ride over was interesting, our eurail passes got us cheap seats on the ferry which was huge. We ended up meeting a bunch of Architecture students from NDSU on the boat. We had quite a crazy night with them and duty-free wine and ended up going to the disco which was on the ship, I ended up sleeping on a plastic bench, then in a hallway to keep warm, which was fine until morning came and the door hit me in the head when the conductor opened it. It was miserable but fun at the same time...
- posted by mark @ 1:01 PM (0) comments

 

// Italy //

Arrived in Venice in nice weather but it quickly turned rainy and cold. Venice is beautiful...when the sun shines, we were not overly impressed with the place so we decided the leave after one day. It's the most expensive place in Italy but worth seeing since it's gonna sink in about 100 years. Later on in the evening the sun came out and the gloom lifted and we liked Venice better all of the sudden, too bad though because by then we had decided to go to Milan. Here are some pics from Venice...

The alleyway to our hotel

Our $100 plus dollar a night hotel room, complete with leaky shower and sewer fragrance

A view from the Grand Canal

St. Mark's Square and my attempt at a non-cliche picture

St. Mark's Cathedral, the line was really long so we unfortunately didn't go in.

Me getting attached by pigeons (self inflicted, we were holding the feed)

Kirsten getting attached by pigeons (self inflicted)

I feel so welcome all of the sudden...can't argue with them though

The train station, last thing we saw of Venice

On the way to Milan we broke up the travel time by stopping in Verona which is about halfway between Venice and Milan, it was a great little city and had lots of Roman ruins. We went to the ampitheatre, (where I saved a whole $1 on admission!) which is still in use today, in fact it was being setup for a Sting concert and they had these cool props in front of it...

Props for the Sting Concert

In your face prop

Arrived in Milano Centrale an hour earlier than I had setup with Flora but she was there anyways and it turned out that she had misunderstood me on the phone, I guess these things have a way of working out. I botched the traditional Italian greeting (the kisses) and just hugged her (doh!) Milan was great, not that great of a city but great for me because I got to spend time with Flora, my ex-girlfriend who lives there. It's been 4 years and was a little weird at first because our lives have both changed so much since we last saw each other but we quickly adjusted and had a great time.

We went out and had a few drinks with her and her new boyfriend Tobin who was a great guy and his ex-girlfriend Nicola. Tobin is a painter and you can visit his website to look at his work at www.flozbox.it How's that for weird? two ex's in the same city at the same time, one from the US and one from England, I didn't want to look like a dumb tourist so I didn't take any photos this night.

I'm going to break Italy into a few posts to make it more readable...
- posted by mark @ 12:47 PM (0) comments

 

// Germany //

It's been a while since I've been able to find an internet cafe, this one is at my former girlfriends house in Milano (Italy) and has a new keyboard to learn, so pardon the typos.

Took a night train from Paris to Munich Germany and met this guy on the train, he was cool and I had fun talking to him for awhile.

Herr Goofball

A view of the train corrider as we were coming into Munich

The German guy was really cool and recommended that we go the the Chinese Tower Biergarten, as usual we were the dumb americans who only spoke English but as usual the Europeans spoke passable English as well.

It was quite embarassing to hear a lady answer the German guy in English when he asked what language she preferred and she said "English, French, German, whatever", I just sat in the corner and wished I could make just one coherent sentence in one of those languages. Another way to look at it (convenient for us) is that English is the universal language and were lucky that it is our native tongue, I guess that works but the Europeans still make me feel stupid.

It was fun conversing with him for awhile and we learned a few things about getting around in Munich. The countryside was beautiful and it was a beautiful day as well so I was up when the sun came up and looking out the window as you can see from this pic (I can't find the pic! maybe I never took it?)

Day 1: Raj, and the city of Munich, biergartens, plus the Nudist Colony

In Germany we were again saved by a cool guy named Raj from Boston who was selling bike tours, he showed us to the youth hostel where we got a room for 23 euros a night (about $30) we then went walking through a huge park and went to the SeeHaus, which is one of Munichàs famous biergartens. We actually ran into him 4 times during our stay which was a bit weird, twice by the youth hostel, once in Marionplatz Square, and again at the Hofbrauhaus.

At the SeeHaus it was very expensive (3 biers and two plates of food would have cost us like 55 euros (about $65), we couldn't afford the bier, so we got some chicken but the guy at the counter asked where we were from, when we replied "America" he decided to give us 3 beers for the price of one and only charged us for half the food, I guess somebody still likes us after all! It was beautiful sitting by the lake with our rotisserie chicken and huge steins of beer and made the 5 mile walk to the biergarten worth it.

We then walked back and saw a nudist colony in the park, tried to keep our distance but the footpath went right by it. It was really weird, a bunch of eccentric old men walking around naked, according to our guidebook there is an infamous individual codename "Tripod" who is quite the local attraction there but we (thankfully) did not see him. Dave and I walked by the nudist colony with our heads turned the other way but Kirsten, being the curious type, went for a look and reported that all their was to see was "wrinkles".

The park, home of the nudist colony, Is that "Tripod" hiding behind the tree?

Our next day in Munich was a brewery tour of the breweries there, we learned how beer (bier in German) was invented, about the famous german purity law, and lots of other stuff. Went to several breweries, tried the beer, ate some malt (what the brew the beer from) and learned even more from our Australian guide Will, who was a riot.

Met some interesting people from New York and Colorado here as well, forgot their names but we had some interesting conversations about the terrorist attacks of 9/11 and what it was like in New York, about one kidàs experience at Anne Arbor, etc. I didn't bring my camera because I didn't want to be a dork so sorry no pictures. Finished off the tour at the Hofbrahaus which is the most famous bier garten in Germany, and actually where Hitler gave his first speech about Nazism and where that awful movement was spawned.

Day 2: Fussen and Schloss Neutschwanstein

We took a train to Fussen and saw the Bavarian Countryside by train which is quite beautiful.

on the way to Fussen...
Arrived in Fussen and stumbled our way onto the bus stop (right around the corner) which took us up the the castle.

It was supposed to be a 45 minute walk up the the castle but they must have timed it with an old lady with a walker because we made the trip in 20 minutes and were thus way early for our tour time. It was alright though as we got to wander around the grounds and see the georgeous scenery of the gorge, first met Nolan here (more about him later) as we asked him to take our picture.

The tour was short but sweet, apparently "Mad King Ludwig" wanted the best castle in Europe so he spared no expense (with the German Peopleàs money, how nice of him). The castle is not that big but very ornate, it took 14 woodcarvers 4 years to carve his bedroom if that gives you an idea. If your interested in what it looks like on the inside you can view this website www.neutchswanstein.com we weren't allowed to take pictures in the castle so I have none to show you, here are some from the grounds though.

that's one tall castle...

looks just like the postcard, I should try to sell this!

somebody apparently died here, it's right next to a big cliff, either the fell or they jumped...sad

After the tour we climbed the hill behind the castle and took some more pictures from there, did a little mountaineering off the trail and saw this cross (tba) where someone either jumped or fell off from what I can gather) We had a really nice lunch on top of the hill overlooking Neutschwanstein. We saw Nolan on top of this hill again (again, more on him later)

After we were done with Neutschwanstein we walked down the trail (easier to do going down) and it started to rain. Met Nolan at the bus stop and started to talk to him, ended up taking a train back to Munich with him as he was traveling alone and needed someone to talk to.

Embarassing Moment

On the way back to Munich I sat with Nolan and we talked about everything for about an hour, his job, his college, his ex-girlfriend, etc. He was an interesting character, but when we ran out of things to say I suddenly felt very tired and promptly fell asleep. Apparently, I fell asleep with my head down and started to drool on myself! the worst part...DAVE TAPED IT so now it is going to go down in infamy as the drooling scene on the DVD we are going to make when we get home.

I played it back and it's pretty embarassing, just me with my head nodding and then a closeup shot of me drooling on myself, oh well, I told Dave that I probably would have done the same thing to him so we all laughed about it and moved on.

We then got back to Munich in time for me to do my laundry in time to catch the night train to Venice, Italy

random pics...

on the way to the castle...

the gang

the streets of Fussen...
- posted by mark @ 9:57 AM (0) comments