We're on the list

So, before we write a blog about our adventures in Vienna, Austria as a whole, we thought we should dedicate a whole blog to this one event.

Our friend, Tina, invited us out to a club called U4. It has a special event on Tuesdays and even though people in most countries normally don't leave to go to a club until after 11 or 12, if you aren't there before 11, you won't get in because it is too full. Fortunately for us, we were on the list.

When we got there, we walked up past some 150-200 people waiting in line to get in, and it was 10:30. Tina went straight up to another line (and by line we mean 3 people) and stated her name to the guy holding the list. At this point we felt like we were in the movies as he waved us on. Tina informed us that he was new since he checked our ID's and asked for Tina's name, which normally wouldn't have happened because everyone knows her there. In the VIP line, they were handing out free shots as we walked in.

Once we got inside, Tina was greeted by the owner of the club, Thomas, who then invited us for drinks downstairs. We went downstairs and found that the club was split into two areas, both with different types of music, so you could walk between them or hang out in the room of your favorite dance music all night. Tina knew everyone, and we mean everyone. She went up behind the DJ bar to say hi to the DJ and the lights man with the typical kisses on the cheek that reminded us once again of those VIP people in hollywood films.

Thomas returned to us later, presenting John with two beers, just for himself, and brought us behind the bar, had us fill a bunch of glasses with ice, and then walk over to the roped off VIP section. We hung out there for most of the night, John happy out with his beers, and me with vodka and red bull. Oh, did I mention we didn't pay a dime?

The music was great, the place was packed and we all had a blast! Now, John probably wants to tell you his impressions so I'll hand the keyboard to him:

Now we all dream about being treated like we are important when we go out, however the reality is it never happens, well to me anyway, probably has something to do with me not being a pretty girl...possibly. So when something like that happens it is AWESOME. Tina was incredibly kind for getting us in ahead of everyone else, as most people know this only happens me normally when I SKIP the line. I kind of thought that was it in terms of the nights perks but it got better and better. When we went in we meet the club owner who was a sound guy, we got chatting later on, you know yourself, trying to make connections for the next time we are back in Vienna. I'm pretty sure Tina said hi to the entire staff of the club. We then spent the night sipping on free beer and vodka, just hanging in the VIP area, it was Frecking Awesome. Thank you Tina.

Our Big Fat GRΣΣK Holiday!

So we arrived in Athens at half 11 at night on Sunday and it was 37 degrees Celsius (or 99 degrees Fahrenheit) which for me(John) was not good, by my quick calculations that meant it was going to be a generous 40 plus during the day which meant Chelsea topped on her tan and I was going to get burnt or die or both.

Rising from our slumber we hit Athens seeing the sites. There are beautiful sights to be seen around the city but you can see them all in about 2 or 3 days. We were lucky enough to be staying in Plaka which is the city centre area where everything happening. The people who work in the restaurants are always trying to get you to come in to eat and me being easily led by my stomach succumbed, the food was very good in fairness to them. It is a beautiful city and would recommend it for a weekend away.

After Athens, we went island-hopping. The first island was Mykonos. It has a great beach, beautiful sand and sun. We went into the Mykonos town for a few hours, the white washed houses with their blue shutters were beautiful. We were staying in party central in the hostel but after travelling for as long as we had it was not the greatest piece of brilliance ever. The clubs started at 3pm which was really not what we wanted to hear while we were chilling out on the beach. We also made friends with a Michael Buble look-a-like Greek barman who we decided to rename Mikhail Bubliov because he looked Russian.

Next island we stopped by Santorini. The beautiful black sand beaches are gorgeous. We were able to rent a Quad bike/ATV for 24 hours for 15 euros which we fully utiliztred. We drove around the entire island and saw Fira and Ioa which are other beautiful towns on the island. It was a wonderfully relaxing break. The other amazing thing was that they were still in off-season so the prices was half price,which was fantantasic. The place we were staying was a family run hotel, 2 second walk from the beach, with a pool and a lovely family. And yes I finally got burnt to a crisp in Santorini, all day driving the Quad I was tomato red by the evening.

A Roman Holiday

So once again, we were on our own when we arrived in the beautiful, but dodgy city of Roma.
The hotel we stayed in was gorgeous, located right near the train station and, oh yeah, Lonely Planet mentioned the area as one of the most dangerous areas you could hang around at night! Lucky us.

Our first day we decided to hit up ancient Rome, you know, the Collosseum and the like. We were bothered by people the whole time, asking us to take tours with them to skip the line on the entire trip. In front of the Collosseum, we finally said yes, and for anyone that goes there, you should too. For an extra €8, you get to skip the line and you get a guided tour of not only the Collosseum but also of the Roman Forum and Palatine Hill, and it lasts for about 3 hours. We had the most entertaining guide, a jovial soft-spoken little man from Scotland named Richard. (we kept his number and contact info if anyone wants a guide anywhere around Rome)

We then of course visited famous sights like the Trevi Fountain and the Spanish Steps, which were lovely, despite John almost falling into the Trevi Fountain while throwing his coin in!

The following day we spent at the Vatican. Unfortunately the museums are closed on Sundays, but on some Sundays, if the Pope is in town, he'll come out and bless the people in the square. And it just so happened that he was! We were able to see the Pope himself, even if we didn't see the Sistine Chapel! Afterwords, we stood towards the front of a very long line for Saint Peter's Basilica, and as John said, "Pope went a little overboard on the holy water." What he meant by this was that as we were waiting in line, there was a downpour on all of us. And no, I don't mean a few drops, or even a heavy rain. I mean it was like being at a water park and standing under that giant bucket of water. And we forgot the umbrella. Other than that, it was another good day and our electronics survived the drenching!

A Home Away from Home

For both of us, staying with Jamie and her family was a relief, not only for me for the company of a fellow Buffalonian, but also for John, for the company of the Irish descent. Also, having pancakes and other American breakfast foods helped!

While my parents were dying to talk to me, I found out only moments later that who they really wanted to talk to was Jamie, and that was why they were so keen to skype us all the time (something they didn't do for most of the trip! haha jk mom and dad...sort of).

Fortunately for Roberto, the presence of John and I apparently spurred his wife's cooking abilities more so than they had experienced in a long time. Every night he would look at the food on the table with shock and awe, exclaiming that this was more food than he had seen in a week! Now, we both understood that this was heavy sarcasm, but I doubt many people would have, since no one in the family denied these claims.

When we went into the city of Firenze (Florence) we were able to, between two days, make it to see the Duomo, the Medici exhibit, a Da Vinci exhibit and the Uffizi and Academia museums (the Academia holds Michelangelo's statue of David). All of these places were beautiful, as well as interesting.

Funny story: we bumped into our friends from the Barcelona hostel! No, it wasn't in a museum, or on a busy street. We bumped into them in a tiny off-street corner of a market, and only by John's good vision did we spot them at all! We tried to work out the odds but all we can say is that it was very strange indeed and that the odds are astronomical!

We took an excursion to Pisa, which is a lot like Segovia. There are three things to see. Only difference is, the three things are right next to each other in Pisa. No no, not like a two minute walk, not even a 30 second walk. They are about a 5 second walk from each other and you can fit all three into one picture.

We spent our 3 year anniversary in Siena, a beautiful little area which surprisingly was lacking in the typical tourist groups and street vendors trying to sell you anything from jewelery to bouncy balls. It was a relief from the normal cities we were used to!

Excursions when in Parma

Our first day trip outside of Parma was to Venezia (Venice). It is everything you would expect and more. Much more actually, because the prices were astronomical. Everywhere you go, people travel by water because that is the only way to get around the city. The decorative hand-made masks that Venice is so famous for are strewn everywhere. We eventually cracked and got one that we admired for the apartment (mailed it to Ireland, but we're praying it got there in one piece...). Would definitely recommend it as a city to see because the sights are one of a kind, but pack your own lunch to save on money.

Our next trip was the Cinque Terre. A little-known Italian jewel (except, of course, to the Italians). It is five little towns all located on the Mediterranean with bike paths, hiking paths and mini trains connecting each of them. After several hours lying on one of the beach getting color (brown for one, red for the other--guess who), we eventually decided to take one of the hikes to the other town. Little did we know that setting out on this path could lead to the end of our relationship. Chelsea's running phrase throughout the endless flight of stairs ascending upwards towards a mountaintop that seemed to be growing as we climbed, was, "I want a divorce," much to the amusement of me and other hikers who understood what both of us were talking about. It was probably the nicest walk I've ever been on, you know, it just happened that I swore for 3/4 of it.
It was, however, epic scenery with an unbeatable view of the sea, and of course great company....

One of our favorite moments from the ascent up mount death was Monica. Monica was an 8 year old Italian girl who clearly had no say in what her family activity of the day was going to be that day. She obviously had no choice in the matter after the decision was made. We passed them out several times and then they would pass us and everytime this happened, it was like watching a movie rewind and play a specific scene over and over again. Every time they passed, we would hear Monica going, "Acqua mama, acqua" (water mom water); to which her mother usually replied, "NO Monica. Andiamo!" To which Monica would then respond in a very blatant physical statement of "fuck you." She would promptly sit down wherever she was and remain there scowling until her parents stopped yelling at her. Now, they didn't give in to Monica's tantrum, oh no. They actually did what every parent threatened countless times to do to their own child when they were acting the bollox: they left her. Eventually, (we can only assume) Monica followed after them.

Parma - A nice Ham and Cheese sandwich

So after Paris we set sail for Italy. We took an overnight train down through France and we found out that Italian Trains are wonderfully imaginative on how to waste time. We stopped off in Switzerland for an hour and a half for no apparent reason. In fact, anyone who has ever been to Italy will be aware of the wonderful time-keeping ability of the Italian train people. So we finally landed in Milan 3 and a half hours late, just brilliant really that we turned up in the right country and not Narnia to be honest.

Most of this will be written by John with my help, but I just have to interject that when we were taking the train from Milan to Parma, John looked at me and said with wide, hopeful eyes, "I hope my Italian mammy is going to feed me!" At which point I laughed but remained silent, realizing John had no idea what he was in for...

Parma is a beautiful, quaint little city, full of medieval churches, more churches, and some more churches; you know, for good measure. It was great to be out of France for the start of the world cup...lovely as they may be... Henry we're still waiting for you to come to Ireland.

As had been predicted on the train, mammy Italia was quick to feed us, more importantly me, and feed me and feed me. :D :D Unfortunately, I had no idea about courses. I ate like a horse for what I thought was our entire meal, only to realize that second course had yet to be served. However, mammy Italia's eyes lit up when she realized that I would eat more than originally expected and for the remainder of the stay she would continue to offer me a hopeful second helping of whatever she was serving.

Francesca was kind enough to take us to a party outdoors. And I mean OUT doors. It was basically a pub and club in the middle of a field, very strange at first but turned out to be a good night, met a load of her friends and even the twins-two of the lads were so fashionable that they wore the same shirt, i mean jez lads don't ye consult one another on what ye are wearing before you go out amatuer mistake.

Probably the other greatest thing about Italy is homemade Gelato, imagine the greatest Ben&Jerry's(HB) ice cream you've ever had, well good Gelato knocks its socks off.

Now everywhere we seem to go one or two funny incidents seem to happen, the trip to Parma was no exception.
The first mishap was when we went to post postcards to Ireland and America, silly us, we thought the must efficient place to do this was the Post Office, but by god were we wrong. We took a ticket and waited in line for about 10 minutes for our number to be called. When it was called we went up the the woman, real pleasant looking thing she was too, with an actual Italian speaker in Francesca thinking that this may break down the whole language barrier that happened every so often. We told the lady where we wanted to send the postcards. She informed us that we needed stamps to post them, no problem right!? we are afterall in a Post Office, no there was a problem. Apparently that woman doesn't sell stamps that's another person's job, here was my thinking that the Irish can be somewhat inefficient but the Italians have someone who's sole purpose of their job is to sell stamps and only sell stamps. So we took another ticket, got in line and waited for Little Miss Sunshine 2. When we got to her, in fairness, she did her job description prefectly and gave us some wonderful stamps but then informed us we had to get back into line to post a bigger package, which was a tshirt, because apparently that was someone else's job. We lined up for another woman to weigh it and give us another fucking stamp for it but to send it, guess what we had to do, get in another line. In total it took us 45 minutes to send 2 postcards and a tshirt. Watch out the Irish government these Italian Post Office workers may pass you guys out on efficiency.

There also was a biddy case happening while we were waiting. This poor old lady came out to set up her booth to ease the line of people waiting to be redirected to another booth but it her "mad rush" to help out she misplaced her glasses. God bless her, she was convinced for a good 2 minutes that they must of been locked in her money box but opened it to find nothing, she then asked the other alert and agile young minds of the Post Office had they seen them. The sad fact was that this went on for 15 minutes and numerous trips to the back office to search for the missing glsses only to realise that they were on her, I don't mean they were in her hair, I mean she was wearing them on her nose.

The other fantastic event happened when we went out for pizza one night with Francesca. When we got to the place we asked a guy for a table and he just seemed to wander off back into the back kitchen. After waiting 5 minutes for this kid, about our age, to return we just asked someone to seat us. This was an excellent choose as it turns out, why? because the first kid was an idiot,a complete and utter fecking eejit. He had this constant dazzed and confused look on his face like a deer caught in the headlights but he'd an IQ seemingly matching a deer just hit by the headlights. Most restaurants have themselves split up into areas that each waiter and only he covers. Clearly nobody had informed this kid of this system as he went for table to table,area to area cleaning off one table then going over to another one and asking if they had ordered even they already had their food in front of them. At times he came out with trays of food and just went from table to table asking who ordered what, no sure where to dump them. But he's moment came to shine, this group of 3 girls his age came into the pizzaeria about a minute after us and he made a beeline to seat them and look after them for the night. He took their orders, I think, and dropped off their Coke's, the only thing was 45minutes later when we were leaving they still hadn't gotten their food, some treasure of a catch he would of been for one of them.

Ahhh, Paris...the city of Louvre

So, we thought we would start by saying we are so sorry we have been behind on blogging, but what with travelling to 3 countries in such a short period of time, we were a little frazzled! So this is a really long (but funny) blog about our adventures in Paris.

Paris brought with it more than a few surprises, the first being the people. So we hear from everyone for about a month straight how to watch out for Parisians and how they are so rude and mean to you, and of course we were dreading our trip to France and considering our options for avoiding all human contact for 48 hours. Well! when we arrived we were greeted with a slew of some of the nicest people we have ever met worldwide, nevermind in France! We thought our luck may run out when we finally arrived at the hostel but lo and behold, they were even kinder than anyone else.

So Paris, much like Barcelona was a whirlwind tour to put it lightly. We managed to get most of the major sights out of the way within a 2 day period.

Our first stop--with backpacks still in tow (ugh)--was Notre Dame. Funny thing about cathedrals....they aren't too keen on letting people in with oversized luggage, ie 20 lb backpacks. BUT, if you are stuck behind a New Zealand couple who offer to walk closely in front of you in order to help you sneak the backpacks in by your feet, then you're sorted. Also, not quite sure if you have to pay or not....we didn't.
Now, for those of you who have seen or read The Da Vinci Code, may be aware of those gold stars in the ground that he talks about located around Paris. We found one outside of Notre Dame, but had to step on a few toes (literally) to get a picture of it.

The next stop was the Pantheon, which neither of us had ever heard much of, cost €5 to get into. We thought this was insultingly expensive. I mean, the Notre Dame Cathedral was free (we think?) and everyone has heard of that! So you can see on facebook that we took some lovely photos of the outside.

After, we dropped our bags off into our shady hostel (hey I said the people were nice, not the hostel). Shady is putting it in a nice way. Imagine The Shining with French subtitles crossed with the movie Hostel and you have something with about 50% of the creepiness of this hostel. Paint (if you can call it paint anymore...I think we were looking at the insulation) was chipped everywhere, our ceiling was at a slope, and the lock looked to be about as secure as Irish passport control. However, it had a lovely balcony and free (ish...another Notre Dame incident) internet, so we were happy!

The next stop was the Musee D'Orsay. Beautiful...but definitely can make a person (guess who) ashamed to be American at times. You can see where Europe and the rest of the world gets their not so nice opinion about good ol U.S. of A. The majority of the Americans in the Musee D'Orsay were loud, talking on their phones, and being all around obnoxiously ignorant to the artwork and other people around them.

We then eventually made it to the Eiffel Tower. We white-knuckled the ascent to the very top of it--no literally, we did; we are both only so-so about heights. The view was worth the heart palpitations.

In the evening, as you do on a typical Tuesday evening, we took a boat trip up the Seine as the sun was setting and the Paris night life was just beginning. We took about 100 pictures of the Eiffel Tower lit up (John has threatened to send me to P.A.--photographaholics anonymous at the end of this trip).

The next day we awoke happily to find all of our limbs and organs still intact, with none of our items missing. We headed off to the Louvre. In the rain. Fortunately, our saving grace was the bakery just outside the hostel. For breakfast we got a baguette with chocolate chips baked into it. That's right. Chocolate. Chips. Greatest invention yet. After the Louvre we dropped back in again to the bakery...twice. Both before and after we picked up our luggage.
Oh yeah, the Louvre wasn't bad either.

We then made it to the celebrity cemetary. Our one and only goal being to see Oscar Wilde's grave, which was the most pleasant surprise! Here we are, thinking we won't be able to tell it from any other grave in the whole damn cemetary, and this is a big cemetary. Yet incredibly, we found it with great ease as it was pink. No, it isn't painted pink, it's not pink marble--Oscar Wilde's gravestone is covered in kisses and "I love you Oscar's" in various languages. Basically the best de-facing ever.

Our trip was spectacular in Paris and brought about a lot of pleasant surprises. The only thing we'd caution about is to bring a magnifying glass to find the metros because the only way you'd find them is if you fell into it.

Old Biddies

On our travels we have come across a couple of incidents involving old woman acting a little bit mad. The two most memorable ones are as follows.

The first occured while waiting for a bus in Segovia, Spain. While we were in the bus station a group old women rambled in, clearly they were on tour or else shared the same piece of fashion genius to wear the same t-shirt on that day, I mean its annoying if one person has the same clothes as you its a fucking disaster if 20 people are wearing the same hideous lime green t-shirt as you. So they shuffled in with their bobble heads and out onto the bus, this was a public bus and not a specialised tour bus, clearly in Spain they have free travel for over 65's and they would much prefer to save save their money for chewy sweets\candies or a nice wooly cardigan.

On they piled, after a quick--I mean "granny quick" check they realised that Mary, Margaret and a few more were missing. Realising they were tight on time for the bus leaving on them (both the physical one and the metaphorical one of life) there was a bit of a rush on to find them. Bridey made a dash to the door to help Kathleen and Paula to the bus.

Another quick count, probably because they forgot since the last one, they realised that Mary and Margaret were still missing. Margaret god bless her, wandered in with a minute to spare looking a bit confused and lost but there was still no sign of Mary. One of the younger biddies at this point, who we are going to call Rosey, because calling her heavy on top is mean. Rosey anyway decided the only thing to do was a give an earful to the bus driver, who was just about to leave and demand that he wait for the last member of her entourage. Clearly a little scared of grannies since his childhood, probably from being beaten with salami sticks, the bus driver trundled off the bus. Pacing the station floor, he clearly had a "what-the-hell-almighty-are-they-at?" look on his face. After a quick chat with her, evidently being told off by her again, he lit a cigarette and wandered out of sight, presumably into the office.

Now any of ye who have been on a tour of any sorts, would clearly know that there is always one. Always one feckin eejit who forgets what time we're leaving, where we're leaving from, or how to get there. This is generally caused by shiny objects, alcohol or sheer stupidity. This however, was different. This was just due to the fact that she probably couldn't move faster than a tectonic plate. Seven minutes after the bus was scheduled to depart, in pops Mary, looking delicately refreshed, clearly after a nice stroll, with no idea that the rest are screaming bloody murder at her behind the glass doors. On she bundled, once again a roll call was made (because they forgot again). Finally, they were ready to go. Except they faced a new problem: the bus driver had gone missing. A source close to the matter said Rosey's direct quote was "where the fuck almighty has that bastard gone now?" upon which she toppled off the bus in a red red rage. Into the office she charged, almost in a swat-like manner and demanded why on earth he wasn't currently on board and leaving because they were now all present and accounted for.

note specifically from Chelsea --John presented a running commentary--no doubt completely accurate of the words exchanged between the biddies.

Second one will follow shortly

Barcelona!!

So after leaving Madrid we took a 3 hour train to Bacrelona. When we arrived we were welco,ed like we were in every other place by, a light drizzle but by the time we checked into our cute little hostel it had stopped. Since there was so much to see, we thought wer would start early and attacked the Sagrada Familia and the Park Guell which is up a god awful hill but thankfully they put in escalators for us. It is a breathtakingly beautiful scenic park; it has a wonderful view overlooking all of Barcelona and contains some of Gaudi`s finest works.

Chelsea- The best part about Parque Guell was the famous Gaudi tunnel that the girls from America`s Next Top Model used for their finalè runway!!!! Also, the film Vicky Christina Barcelona was filmed in part of the park!!!

John- Wowww.....

Chelsea-Shut up, you were just as excited as me. The most intriguing thing about the Sagrada Familia is that it is the only structure that you are not unhappy about seeing under construction; in fact, you are witnessing history.

Though Mondays are usually the worst day of the week, we spent it lying on a beach in Barcelona after walking down the famous La Rambla. We also checked out the Pedrera as well as a few other works by Gaudi, and stopped for smoothies in a famous market on La Rambla.

We managed to make some friends in our cozy hostel and even went to a fountain musical show held on weekends in front of the national art museum (which we saw earlier that day). It was magical and amusing because they even played Queen`s song "Barcelona" and had the colors and waterworks show match up to the song rhythm!

It is a very beautiful city, probably better equipped for tourists than Madrid, and we had a fantastic 2 days there.

§§§£ç¤èéà° µ --all the cool symbols on the French keyboard

Ohhhh Segovia! By Chelsea AND John

On Wednesday, we set out on another public transport adventure to Segovia. Fortunately, this went better than the one to Toledo, which was too stressful to talk about yet.... Plus, John was quiet because of all of his burns and he didn't want to move too much. (yay)

Segovia, thankfully wasn't burdened with the hills of Holy Toledo. It was more of a flat, omelet style place.

There are three things to see in Segovia, three. There are more things to see in my room. You have the aqueduct, the cathedral, and the castle. All of these are about a three minute walk from each other. So, three sites by the 15 minutes spent there, plus the three three minute walks, equals five hours of a day trip. Plus lunch. Impressive, huh?

Chelsea-The aqueduct was awesome, and not in the "oh, dude, that banjo is totally awesome" but in the awe-inspiring sense that the word was originally meant to be used for. There is absolutely no mortar holding up the massive thing that spans for about 200 meters. It has been there for over 2,000 years and we totally snagged a piece of loose rock from it for my brother (got him one from the Acropolis 2 years ago). The aqueduct alone is worth going to see Segovia for.

John- The aqueduct obviously had no planning permission. Clearly serving no purpose going right through the middle of the town! Without even a drop of cement! Feckin Romans...what did they ever do for us? Also quite unusual, was the amount of sparrows, and I don't mean four! There had to be at least 1,000, I mean Jesus lads, get a job like!

Chelsea-yes, there were sparrows. Get over it, John. Next was the Cathedral...that we mosied past because we couldn't be bothered to go inside anything holy after spending the previous day in Toledo practically being smacked in the face by Jesus himself.

John- Little bit scared to go into the Cathedral, made out the burns were not due to the sun, but may be due to the large amount of contact with holy objects. Good news is the stigmata's gone!

Chelsea-The third thing we saw was the castle. It was really neat but we were chased by screaming schools of Spanish children on their field trip. It slightly ruined it for me. That and John, the five year old who wanted to go up as high as he possibly could, made me walk up to the tower. Up like a million flights of stairs that spiraled so tightly that you couldn't see the person in front of you and if anyone wanted to come down or up the opposite way of you, well they were S.O.L. It was very beautiful though. Nice view. And by nice, I mean we could see for miles and miles in every direction and it was gorgeous.

John- Well, anyone that knows me knows I'm a five year old at heart--well, we'll say ten year old, at least give me that much! So when I saw the field trip of kids, I thought "yayy fun!" First game that I wanted to play with them was "How many of them will fit in the moat??" Because I think they would have been good at that game! 40 foot drop? They would've been fine! They were basically like Japanese tourists! Their cellphones, their flashing cameras...only difference was these were a little taller! Basically, it was a case of musical rooms; every room we went into, they followed--it was a nightmare. To clarify about the St. John Tower, which already sounded awesome from the word go, hadn't had million flights of stairs that were previously stated, but 152 steps. That's right people: 152. God bless her, she's beautiful but she really can't count. And it was totally worth it!! So far, my favorite scene of the trip was up on that tower.

Bloody Hills and Damn Churches-Another blog by John :)

This week was started with a lovely trip to Toledo on Tuesday. When I say lovely I mean long. Well, it wasn't long so much as having a crazy American talking loudly next to me for an hour on a bus ride and for once it wasn't Chelsea!

When we arrived in the beautiful medieval, picturesque town, we were greeted by heat, hills and Christ.

To explain, Toledo is a beautiful town, the main attraction being the actual age of it. The center of town is surrounded by an old wall built in the middle ages, even though the town has expanded beyond these borders now. To explain the heat, its beautiful architecture really did crank the heat up another few degrees whereby I started to become my toasty tomato red. We are still reeling from the effects days later.

We were fortunate enough to be there two days before the celebration of Corpus Christi so we got to see everyone put up hanging baskets of flowers and bed linen as street covers (view pictures for explanation). They were useful as they provided some shade in the sweltering heat.

We went along to see the Knights of Templar exhibition which was quite interesting. We also got to see a groovy instruments of torture exhibition! My God those middle age boys must have had some fun with them. Nothing like a rack to straighten out a back kink!

There was, however a little incident (besides us getting lost for the better half of the day) whereby it was quite possible I may have been--in fact there was a slight chance I might have been hit by a car. This was completely and entirely not my fault....possibly. But note: never crouch down on a corner where traffic does pass and is only 3 1/2 feet wide. Lesson learned here! Thanks Chels.

There was also a cathedral that we could have entered but since there were holy objects being thrown about the place left and right, I think I am blessed enough to not attend mass until next Easter! But would recommend anyone else to go see it, looked quite nice!

Speaking of future visits, if you do plan on visiting Toledo, bring a tent. You'll need it. There are more hills and fecking drops than climbing Everest. Our ascents were populated with swearing and huffing and pufffing. Descents were basically a bit of a run down the hill in order to avoid rolling. All in all, lovely town!

¿What's on the menu?

The fortunate thing about living with a Spanish family while we are in Spain is that we get to try all traditional/typical Spanish cuisine. John is far more adventurous than I in chowing down these dishes but so far neither of us have been disappointed!

Here is a list of some of the dishes we have tried:

-Snails (surprisingly really good)

-blood sausage (ew.)

-white asparagus

-octopus

-frittered chopitos (still don't know what chopitos are, still don't want to, I like em and that's enough!)

-zucchini soup

-gaspacho

-some sort of hard salad leaf with blue cheese and smoked salmon in it

-potatoes bravas

-pastries

-paella

- and most importantly: churros with chocolate (YUMMM)

Some of these things are definitely not on your typical American (or even Irish) menu, but it has certainly been an adventure trying some truly Spanish dishes! Can't talk long we are having lunch soon and then going into the city but we will blog about Toledo and Segovia soon!

Oh the Spanish - John´s First Blog Post thing-a-mo-bob

Now I´m all for learning new cultures and willing embrace them. Spain has so far been amazing, beautiful weather, beautiful scenery, beautiful .... oh wait I have a girlfriend.

But there are two particular stories that already stand out in my mind.

The first is our friend Jimmy (or Jaime as the Spanish call him) who was kind enough to put us up and feed us, decided to take us out on Saturday, upon getting in the car he informed us that we needed fuel, no big deal right?, well if you know what type your car takes, Jimmy does Not despite driving it quite regularly, it was on of life´s mysteries that had so far eluded him so he had to call his mother for clarification. Once the decision had been reached whether it was Diesel or Petrol the mountainous task of how to actually fill developed, this another Herculean like task was undertaken with much enthusiasm on Jimmy behalf, many "Oh Jesus you can´t be serious" on my part. After three trips into the store for confirmation on the matter Jimmy began to fill. And oh boy did he fill, anyone who drives their parents´cars from time to time will know you only put enough fuel to get you to where you are going and back and that´s all. Not our Jimmy, he was going hammer and tongs for it, bye bye €10, sayonara €20, this man was on to the fill the fucking tank. At the realisation that the kid as lovely as he is had no idea what was going on, we managed to flag the speedster down at €37. He siad that he wasn´t too sure if that was enough to drive for 20 minutes each way or not at this point we revoked all fuelling filling responibilitiess from Jimmy and have given themm to Chelsea coz I don´t like it on my soft hands,

The siesta which Spain is famous IS LIES. I had my first and last one there on Saturday. Ok I don´t like to be woken from slumber, like any reasonable sane person, I especially don´t like it when I´ve only been asleep for 45 bloody mins, complete mind bogging mayhem. You wake feeling some what groggy and dead with your consciousness trapped between Wonderland and Hell. I was woken from my darling sleep froma combination of demon heat and a "lovely" girlfriend, who decided that what I needed was a swim in the Artic Circle also known as Jimmy´s pool. Upon telling her that I was fine and just needed to be left Alone she insisted. I rolled out of bed and finding my swimming togs, now labelled Death, because that´s how it felt hittint the floor. Dragged out of the house by my left ankle, knuckles dragging, I had to cross the deck of burning fires to the pool. I stayed on the ladder for a while because .... well I want to have kids and that wasn´t going to happen if I went in. Eventually thanks to continously nagging I succumbed and plunged. On a scale of 1 to 10, that water for shagging freezing so about a 14, I think my brain still suffering now went into some kind of shock. I lost one of my nipples and am now down to 2. Oh well I guess it woke me up.

John.

Meet the Parents ¿

John and I have been desperately attempting to learn at least basic Spanish. We managed to fumble out enough coherent Spanish words to get us train tickets and food but other than that, when asking for directions we mostly just said the place we were looking for and pointed in either direction, hoping that they understood us enough to point us in the right way.

Jimmy's parents don't speak much English. In fact, his mother speaks none at all. Today, when we got back from visiting the Palacio Real, the Plaza Mayor and the Jardines del Moro, we were greeted with Jimmy's father, Eduardo. Eduardo spoke very good English considering the fact that he hasn't spoken much of it since he was 12. John and I pulled out our phrase book but it offered little help when attempting to carry on a conversation in essentially Spanglish, with John and myself throwing random words and phrases from the book. Conversations for the hour often went something like this:

Eduardo: "So are you enjoying your stay here?"

John: "Yes, err I mean si! Um....I can say colors to you...azul...rojo..."

Me:"I can tell you that my gums hurt in Spanish. Would that help move this conversation along?"

At one point we all had sat in silence for so long at the kitchen table, waiting for Jimmy to come home that I just blurted out not-so-subtly, "...Awkward..."

Jimmy thought it would help if we watched more television in Spanish, so he chose for us the German film,"The Downfall" which is spoken in German with Spanish subtitles. Needless to say my head is spinning!

One thing we did learn about Maria and Eduardo, Jimmy's parents, is that they are definitely people to be envied. For one, they are both doctors; two, they are both very good looking Spaniards; and three, they are currently out dancing and won't be back until well after 3 in the morning. Nice life!

Love to all!

The Backpack Debacle

Ok, story time.

So my boyfriend likes to fly by the seat of his pants or the skin of his teeth or whatever you'd like to call it. Bottom line: he's a take-chances, last-minute kind of guy. Two days ago, John got his license; supposedly he has been driving around Ireland for 9 months without one because he refused to replace his lost one. Yesterday, John got his travel insurance. Get the picture? So it should come as no surprise to anyone that when we arrived at the airport, we had no bags to check because we'd "chance carrying them on" even though mine was above the weight limit and his was well above the height limit, like 5 inches above.

Ryanair, for those that don't know, is a notoriously cheap airline for some very specific reasons: you can't adjust the seats, which are mainly plastic, you're charged €5 for a sandwich and they make back most of their revenue in charging you for ridiculous things--like charging €35 for your bag not fitting the height and weight parameters.

We spent a grueling 2 hours waiting at the gate as john desperately tried stuffing things in his pockets to make his bag smaller and I debated putting on two more shirts in order to lighten my load.

I was sweating bullets, fearing both public embarrassment and extortionate charges that were undeserved because my boyfriend had failed to listen to my pleas of checking the bags. As we queued up to get on the plane, we watched person after person being told to put their bag to the side to be checked luggage. John was in front of me, brushing off my hissing comments of making the next 6 weeks a living hell for him if this didn't work.

John walked confidently up to the measurement panel, and as I anxiously watched, he looked at the box and said, "Ah sure, that'll fit." He then proceeded to slam his bag in and by some miraculous crushing force, the bag fit within the parameters! He put his foot not so suddenly down on the box to pull up his bag out of it, and said to the attendant, "If mine will fit, hers will." With that said they waved me on with a slight look of shock on their faces.

¡Bienvenido a España!

I was unsure where to start, but I am so excited to be in Spain that I have to talk about that first and there will be more posts to follow regarding other stories that have happened recently.

When we arrived in Spain, we started sweating and remarking on how much warmer it was versus Ireland. Jimmy informed us that this was the coldest day of the week. When we arrived at his casa, located in a place called Pozuelo De Alarcón (which John and I prounced like ¨Buffalo blah bla´-on?") we were greeted with my dream home. Jimmy lives in the most beautiful three story Spanish home, filled with abstract paintings and expensive-looking artifacts collected by his parents (who both happen to be doctors--who knew!). John and I fully intend on taking a dip in Jimmy´s backyard pool tomorrow.

We're an hour ahead of Ireland now so it is nearly 10 p.m. and we are about to have our dinner. Apparently the way that Spaniards eat is a small breakfast, a gigantic lunch, a snack at 6 and then dinner late at night (I feel like I remember this vaguely from Spanish class 3 or 4 years ago).

John and I have been watching TV for the past hour and a half with Jimmy in order to better our Spanish; watching the news helps the most, since John and I can figure out the headlines and then pick up words here and there and relate them to the photos. We'll be fluent yet!

It is a gorgeous country so far, and tomorrow we will venture into the city to visit perhaps the Palacio Real and the Plaza Mayor, but who knows?! We're in Spain!

Quip about Irish girls and fun things I'm doing :P

I have to say something about Irish girls. In my time being here I've met a handful that I've liked, and they've been the vast minority of who I've met. I don't know if it's because I'm American or what, but they really don't need to be giving me nasty looks when I walk down the street. According to one (nice) Irish girl, apparently Irish girls just don't like other girls. Ok, I'm done with my rant, I was just ''accidentally'' pushed into one too many times in a store to not have to say something about it.

Back to what I've been up to:

It's been beautiful weather here in Ireland, but the countdown has begun to leave for Madrid (which I assume has nicer weather)! I was lucky enough to have a girl's night out at a cocktail place called Suas (the Irish for ''up'' which makes sense because it's upstairs on a balcony) with my lovely friend Anna Murphy :) I have to say that €8.45 for a cocktail is excessive but the atmosphere was well worth it. To all the girls reading this: a Debutante is a drink with chocolate schnapps, butterscotch schnapps, cream and chocolate shavings. HOW AMAZING DOES THAT SOUND??!

Before I went out, John and I met up with Colm and Sparky to watch a rugby match (our team lost) which is a sport that I'd say is understated in the states. I understand why soccer isn't that big but rugby is awesome and makes football look like golf.

John had a boy's night with some of his buddies at a pub and we met up around 11 and stayed out until after midnight (we're lame, we know).

I'm still down with a bit of a cough but eh, whatever, John worries enough for the two of us. I'm teaching him Spanish and we have to get to the train station but other than that we're pretty much ready to go!

Gotta go now, we're heading over to meet John's grandpa and hang out with his little sisters :)

love to all

Lonely Planet's #1 thing to do in Ireland...

So as you may know, Ireland has many beautiful qualities and miraculous sight-seeing places such as the Cliffs of Moher, or the Aran Islands or the Blarney Castle. But the number one thing to do in Ireland, according to the Lonely Planet guidebook is: Go to a Pub. Wow.

So, following the guidebook like it's my new bible, that's exactly what we did last night. If anyone wants to know, it takes approximately 4 shots to get me twisted (or flutered, trollied, cut, merry or any of the other Irish terms for being drunk) (sorry mom, I guess I am your daughter :) ).

Colm, Tomsy, John and I went out to several pubs, so I guess it's the Irish version of bar-hopping, but really we moved from pub to pub because they all close at different times so we were trying to beat the last call in each, known as a bar crawl.

It was a ton of fun, and Cork City is really nice out at night. Turns out I'm one of the happiest drunks the lads have ever met so they were happy with that.

Today (after sleeping in til noon) I went shopping and tonight I am going to a midsummer festival launch (some opera and music summer festival thing) and then we are possibly going out again tonight. I'll try to take more pictures than I have been and post a few on here.

Love to all, and Caitlyn, I will be in Bergen.

Back in Ireland: My Home Away from Home

So, despite the volcanic ash from Iceland I still managed to make it in to Dublin just minutes after the airport opened. It's so good to be back! John and I made it back down to Cork and visited with his family for the rest of the evening yesterday. This afternoon he had an exam so to keep myself busy, Emma (his roommate's girlfriend) and I made a cake from scratch with the limited tools that an apartment for two boys had for baking.

Not too much to report as of yet, but hopefully we are doing something fun tonight that I may be able to talk about in future messages! I'll be sure to keep you up to date (mom) and Caitlyn, I would love to see you in Bergen!

Take care :)

Itinerary

So it is 57 days and counting until I am in Ireland and begin the trip with John. I probably won't update this until then but since the itinerary is finally complete, I figure I'd put that up ahead of time before I forget to make a blog at all!!!
***Red=days traveling between countries; pink=days traveling within countries (and no, the whole day will not be spent traveling, but I don't put any big events on those days so they are dedicated to getting from one place to the next!!)

May 16th: Leave for Dublin, Ireland
May 17th: Arrive in Dublin, and drive down to Cork
May 18-25th: Hang out in Cork
May 26th: Drive up to Dublin
May 27th: Fly from Dublin to Madrid, Spain
May 28th-June 5th: Hang out in Madrid/Spain
June 6th: Take train up to Troyes, France
June 7th: Hang out in Troyes
June 8th: Take train up to Paris for the day
June 9th: Hang out in Troyes
June 10th: Take train to Parma, Italy
June 11-13th: Hang out in Parma (possibly visit Venezia)
June 14th: Leave Parma for Firenze
June 15th-18th: Hang out in Firenze
June 19th: Leave Firenze for Roma
June 20th: Fly from Roma to Athens, Greece
June 21st: Hang out in Athens
June 22nd: Leave Athens for Mykonos
June 23rd: Hang out in Mykonos
June 24th: Leave Mykonos for Santorini
June 25th: Hang out in Santorini
June 26th: Leave Santorini for Athens
June 27th: Fly from Athens to Vienna, Austria
June 28th-29th: Hang out in Vienna
June 30th: Leave Vienna for Oslo, Norway
June 30th: Fly from Oslo to Bergen
July 1-6th: Hang out in Bergen
July 7th: Fly from Bergen to London
July 8-12th: Hang out in Kent
July 13th: Fly back to Cork
July 14th-16th: Hang out in Cork
July 17th: Drive back up to Dublin
July 18th: Fly home

*PHEW* We're going to be really tired by the end of this trip :P