Singapore

Well just a quick update as we are about to head to bed for a good nights sleep before our last leg home :)

Flight from Heathrow to Singapore was uneventful... as you want them to be. Only problem was that neither of us got any sleep and it was the flight that we really needed to get a couple of hours on.. because we left London at noon Friday & arrived in Singapore at 7:30am. So when we made it to our hotel around 10ish Nicole crashed out for a few hours & Phil managed to stay awake for an hour but caved not long after. We did get up about 1pm and decided our best option (with very limited time & still feeling very tired from the flight) was the on/off tour bus which had two circuits that covered a big chunk of the city.

We did both circuits and got a really quick introduction to a very diverse city. We had a lunch/snack/dinner in a food court before taking a walk to see the Merlion fountain which Phil remembered from his childhood visit here.We then got the last bus back to the hotel & went downstairs for a beer, snack & to listen to some singers that the hotel had performing in the lounge.

Now we are back in our room and are ready for some sleep before our 10 hour flight which gets us back in at 7:30 tomorrow night.

Can't wait to see everyone soon
Lots of love
Phil & Nic

Our last day in Europe

Well as expected yesterday was another big day... we had breakfast in the hotel at 8:15am and didn't get back in from dinner until 10pm.

We had a little time before out first stop, yes I know were were running ahead of time, unusual for us :) So we headed into Regent park for a little walk around. London has some really beautiful parks, that's for sure. We were able to see and get up close to some ducks, swans, pigeons and even some squirrels. The squirrels were very interested to find out what the camera tasted like.

First stop on the trip was Madame Tussaud's - a very cheesy stop but one we thought would be fun & not as intense as the other two places we were going and we were right :)

Not much can be said about it other than it is quite amazing how real some of those things look and we had fun posing for pics & watching other people and their poses.

Next stop was the Cabinet War Rooms & the Churchill Museum - these are both housed in the actually War Rooms that were used by Churchill and his crew during the war. It was very interesting to imagine how loud and busy it would have been down there during this time. We do know however that there would have been no whistling as Churchill hated it. We got to see most of the rooms down there one of which was the Map room which had the actual maps that were used during war time, which had graffiti about Hitler on them. Another room was his actual Chamber. This was interesting and a still had one of his cigars on the be side table.

We moved from here back to the Tube where were headed out to see the Imperial War Museum. This place was massive. We were there for about 3 hours and only got to cover about 40% of the things there. When we go back to London again, some day, we will have to finish this off. His had things from all the wars and major displays about WWI and WWII. That had lots of actual items on display and plenty of things to read. There was also a massive Holocaust exhibit. We were able to piece together the things that we had already heard and seen at Dachau and things made the experience even more moving. It was hard to comprehend how big Auschwitz was compared to Dachau. We were able to see a diorama of Auschwitz that helped us realize this, completely unbelievable.

It had been a long day, and we were both tired and not feeling the greatest. I think travel belly is getting the better of us now :) So we headed back to the hotel for a quick snack and a sleep before taking the 2nd last part of the journey.

Wont be long now until we can tell you some stories in person.

Looking forward to seeing you all soon

London Take Two

Ok so we didn't have a great plan for this afternoon but we knew we wanted to have a look at Trafalgar Square & St Paul's. To do this we had to use the Tube :) which we didn't do last time we were in town but given our recent train experience the Tube was no worries.

We had a quick wander around Trafalgar & also did a quick stroll around the National Gallery (unfortunately quite a few areas were closed off due to a strike).

We hopped backed on the tube and made our way to St Peter's were we got some great shots (using the great afternoon sun again). Sad to say we really should have visited here on our first trip ... on our first drive by we thought it looked great but we think now that we have seen the Vatican it just didn't look as impressive. But that said... it is still a very beautiful church.

We then took a stroll over the Millennium Bridge (not too wobbly today) and once on the other side realised we needed to walk back because there aren't any Tube stations near by on the other side. So we walked back - got on a tube & headed back to the hotel.

We then found some dinner in a pub ... interesting choice of venue given that England was playing soccer tonight. Lucky for us - they won!!

And now we get ready for bed... tomorrow is a very big day - Madame Tussaud's, Cabinet War Rooms & Imperial War Museum.

No doubt we will have a blog update tomorrow

Night all

Phil & Nic

Back in the UK

Well we successfully made it back into the UK yesterday and picked up our hire car from Stansted airport. First stop was the Duxforth Airfield where they have a few museums set up.

We hadn't heard of the place until we were chatting with the Gladstone couple at the Normandy tour. They told us they thought it was great but to be careful as you need more time than you would think.... and how right they were.

We arrived in the car park at 12.30 and pretty much ran thought most of it and we didn't get out until 4:30ish. There are half a dozen different hangers which house different kinds of information. The first one we went to had a collection of different planes that had been restored by the staff at the airfield (and some volunteers). It also had a "History of Aviation" area which had a time line of videos, data boards, pictures, etc and also had an interactive area (Craig - photos will prove I played Flight Sim :) )

When we got out of the first hanger we realised that we had been in there for over an hour & we still hadn't been to the two main hangers. So we decided to walk to the other end of the complex where they were. The highlight of the trip out there was definitely the next hanger - Land Warfare Hall. This hall is a museum of every piece of army equipment that you could imagine - tanks, car, hats, guns, shoes, artillery... did we mention tanks :) Phil's aim this trip was to get a picture with some WW2 tanks and this place provided more photo ops than we had time to take them. It was great to see so much of the equipment that we had been told about during the Normandy & Ieper tours.

Next hanger - American Air Museum... again another massive collection of planes and army gear. The most interesting thing here was a series of glass panels that made up a border fence outside the museum. Each panel had little planes printed all over it. The panels went on and on - we couldn't fit them all in one photo. This wall was representative of all the US planes lost during war. A truly amazing sight and one very hard to fathom.

By the time we got out of this hanger it was about 4pm and this was the time we had said was the very very latest that we could be leaving. So we skipped two hangers which we thought would be of least interest to us but we did make two more quick stops - one of the restoration hangers and the Battle of Britain hanger.

We had a quick look in the gift shop and then got back in the car to head to our next stop - which we needed to get to before sunset - Stonehenge.

We made pretty good time so we did a quick stop at the hotel to check in as we weren't sure what time reception closed and it turned out the hotel was about 3km from the stones.

We were so impressed at our timing... until we got there and found that it had closed at 6pm... current time was 6:30... DOH!!!

We did get quite a few pics over the fence and we got to see our first beautiful sunset this holiday. Even from a distance Stonehenge is quite impressive but not quite what either of us was expecting ... very stange to see something so impressive sitting in the middle of sheep farms and motorways. But regardless, it is amazing to think that they have been there 5000+ years.

Our plan was to head back to Stonehenge this morning to get a closer look but, as has been the case a few times this trip, we were delayed with a little bit of travel belly and didn't end up leaving the hotel until just after 10 - and we needed to have the car to Reading by 11:30 (just over an hours drive away) or pay for another day of hire. So we made the decision to head off and get on to the next adventure.

We dropped the car off to Reading (with 2 minutes to spare) and got a taxi to the train station. We got the train to Paddington & found our hotel - which this time is much closer (about 2 minutes walk). And now we are working out what we are going to do with our last day and a half in Europe.

We will no doubt have another blog or two before we go so until then .. love to all

Cheers

Phil & Nic

Berlin

Nothing very exciting on our train ride from Prague to Berlin - only we figure we must be getting used to the travel now as the five hour trip felt like it was over very quickly - more like two hours. Some German ladies did think we were wonderful as we changed seats with them so they could share the 4 seater section. Little did they know we wanted to swtich so Phil could face forwards. In return for our generosity :) we were rewarded with two cans of wine - a very interesting concept to us but not wanting to be rude we accepted and we enjoyed them.

We arrived in Berlin to a few clowds and we were happy that it looked to be clearing. We easy understood the Berlin train system and managed to make our way to our station. We found the hotel, checked in and headed out for a walk. We didn't take the camera with us as we figured we would be doing plenty of walking around today. On a few occassions Phil commented that he wished he had the camera as the lighting was perfect for some shots of a couple of different buildings we passed.

We found a fish & chip place to grab a snack - we had missed lunch again (a problem we seem to have here) and it was too early for dinner. I think the guy thought we were American because we both ended up with a litre of tartare sauce on our chips.

We decided to head back to the hotel, where we made the most of having a shower that worked properly - we both have a new found appreciation for clean hair :)Next challenge was some dinner....

We found a tapas bar/steak house which was very nice - we may have liked it because it had gas heaters & shelter from the wind :) The food was great, only problem we had was I got in trouble for not eating the salad and we also got weird looks when we said we didn't want any bread. We knew all was ok though when we asked for the bill and the cheeky waiter said NO (keeping in mind he didn't speak a lot of English) and walked off with a cheesy grin & giggling. He went inside and was watching us through the window - still grinning away. He came back a couple of minutes later with a receipt that they had written up in English for us :) and was smiling even more when we left him a tip.

Today we headed out on the tour that Michelle L had recommended to us - The Famous Insider Walk!! We were really looking forward to this one as it looked like it was going to show us a lot of sights that we were both keen to see.

Phil jumped out of bed and ran to the window and yes... you guessed it... it was pouring rain. Really why did we think this tour would be any different to the rest of Europe :) but as the brochure said - we walk rain or shine... so off we went.

Our Scottish guide, Kenny, first came to Berlin 10 years ago and has been doing tours for the last 4. He was a great guide - his humor & excellent knowledge made for an interesting day. His ability to build up a story really put you into the moment.

We ventured around the city - East & West - and learnt many new things about this amazing town. So hard to believe that these things were still going on in our life time.

We saw the remains of the Berlin Wall, Brandenburg Gate, the sight of Hitler's Bunker, SS & Gestapo headquarter buildings, the Jewish memorial, Checkpoint Charlie & many more.
The four hour tour lasted over 5 (a rather interesting finish of a swallow crashing into the window we were standing next to - I think a few people missed the closing minutes of the tour as they were worried about the bird) and was definitely worth the $$ & effort. We highly recommend anyone coming to Berlin does this tour.

Another city & many more additions to our reading list :)

As the tour finished ... out came the sunshine. So we decided to do the tour in reverse :) and took some more pics without the water wash over the lens. Well to be honest we only made it half way in the reverse direction (seeing the main sights we wanted to revisit - along with a stop at the outdoor photo exhibit - Topography of Terror) when we realised how exhausted we were and found the train station and headed for the hotel. (But not without being approached by a few low lifes trying to sell us expired train tickets - we've been here too long to fall for that trick buddy)

Tomorrow morning we head back to the UK (via plane) and we pick up a hire car to go and see the American Air Museum (yes Craig we will get you a few piccies) and then to Stonehenge.Not sure that we will have net access until we get back to London on Wednesday so that will probably be our next update.

Hope all is well at home - not long now and we will be back in Oz (wishing we were here)

Cheers

Phil & Nic

Salzburg

Hey Guys,

Just got pointed out to us (thanks dad) that we have missed writing a blog about Salzburg...opps.

We had an interesting start to the morning, the alarm didn't go off and Phil woke up about 20 minutes before we were supposed to be meeting our tour group downstairs. So in a record time we showered, dressed, packed and checked out. We had 5 minutes to spare so we ran up the road to grab some snack food to pass as breakfast (seeing as we had missed our complimentary one in the hotel). Not a very good idea - while we were away the tour bus came & went.

After unsuccessfully trying to call the company Nicole finally got some help from the hotel receptionist and we were picked up about 10 minutes later ... and it turned out to be a very good mistake- rather than being on a coach bus for the tour with 35 other people we got a mini van tour with 5 others and a great tour guide who was very passionate about the area and the movie :)

We got to see a heap of sights from the movie and learnt quite a few bits of trivia. The tour follows the path between the movie sights but also gives history on the area so we found that part really interesting too.

The tour was enhanced (well for Sound of Music fans) by our guide who had an incredible singing voice and broke out into song on many occasions. Mum Crouch you would have loved this tour and she would have loved you because none of our group would join in as we were even more embarrassed by our abilities after listening to her.

Salzburg really impressed us - the scenery was the most amazing that we have seen (and we have seen some impressive stuff on the trek around). The pictures pretty much say everything because words can't describe it (and keep in mind that the pics aren't the best because it was raining/overcast most of the day). We recommend that everyone who hasn't seen the area make the trip over to see it for themselves :)

When we were done with the tour we headed to the train station to get the train to Munich and you've got the blog updates from there :)

And now we must run to get our train to Berlin....

Prague

We have moved country again since our last update – we left the internet cafe in Munich and walked across the road to collect our bags from the hold lockers. We then realised we were ready way too early so we grabbed a great Germany coffee ... from Starbucks.

After a bit of a wait we were able to board our overnight train to Prague. The train was pretty good – we had a room to ourselves with a couple of bunk beds. They weren’t the most comfortable but it was definitely worth the effort because we saved ourselves a day of travel and got to spend the extra time in Prague (and it turns out it was more comfortable than our bed in Prague :) )

Anyway we arrived in Prague around 9am and had a couple of rough instructions on how to get to the hostel. Only problem was it neglected to say if we needed to go right or left out of the station. We stupidly tried to find a spot to stop and work out what we were doing and almost instantly we were set upon by a guy who tried to pin Phil into a corner. We walked off ... at a quick pace... and he followed us down a few corridors and stairs until we managed to lose him at the exit. We made a quick call and headed out to the right of the station... of course... we should have gone left. But not knowing this we went about looking for the street name we had been given... or perhaps a map that would help us out. Instead we found another scary guy who spat at me and then followed us down the street saying something in a language we didn’t understand. A great start to Prague!!!

After doing a big circle we arrived at the hostel and the guy who looks after the hostel wasn’t in yet... so we (with our packs that seem so much heavier as the trip goes on :) ) walked around for a while to find a coffee & some money. By the time we made it back to the hostel we were able to check in... they didn’t have the room that we were supposed to have so we are in the top floor apartment that is meant for about six people to share – it is a lot bigger than the rooms we have been used to of late. We have a lounge room, bedroom, kitchen & bathroom but it is a bit run down.

Anyway... yesterday I had my first hit of home sickness. It has been a really big adventure & yesterday the tiredness hit in and after the trouble getting to the hotel – I cracked! So we didn’t get up to much yesterday. A little bit of a walk around in the afternoon and then we had a late lunch/early dinner before heading back to the room for a quiet night.

Today I felt much better and we headed out this morning for a walking tour. The tour went for about four hours & we got to see different areas of the city – Old Town, New Town, Jewish Quarter, Lesser Quarter & Prague Castle.

Our tour guide was a local girl who gave us quite a bit of information / history on the different areas. This holiday has definitely highlighted to both of us how little we know about geography & history and we have a huge list of things we want to read about when we get home... in preparation for our next adventure :) which won’t be for a few years as the list is really really long.

After the tour we headed to the train station to book our tickets for tomorrow’s trip – our last use of our Eurail pass – Prague to Berlin. We spend a big chunk of tomorrow on the train so probably no blog update until Monday night (Tuesday morning Bris time).

Hope all is going well at home.
Love Phil & Nic

Munich

Well Munich started out very well. We made the train from Salzburg and and earlier connection to Munich than we thought, so that meant we had some time to explore when we first arrived.

We had a little wonder around, and we made one of our first purchase for the trip, umbrellas. With two walking tours in Munich we thought it better then our rain covers. This was a great idea in the end, it made it much easier.

The first night we had dinner in a traditional beer hall. These things are massive!! Quite an experience indeed. Phil even managed to work his way through a Stein.

The next day, which was the day for the Dachau tour, we woke up not too well. Before you ask, it was not from the beer....maybe the food was too rich, but we both had stomach issues. Anyway we sucked it up and made it to the tour meeting point in the rain, only to find out that it was postponed until the afternoon. We went back to the hotel to rest......and then by the time the afternoon had come we were not well enough to go, so we made a phone call and changed the tour to the next day. This meant we would be doing two walking tours in one day...maybe hard work, but better then not being able to do them at all.

We rested for rest of the day,except to venture out for dinner....Bed early, which we were both keen for.

The next day, today, we woke up pumped and ready to go. Quick breaky in the hotel and off to the meeting point. It was raining today, again, but that was not going to stop us.

The first tour was the 'Third Right' tour. This was very good. A walk around the Munich streets and buildings that had meaning in the build up of Hitler and the Nazi party. We both learned a heap of things on this tour and are very interested into taking it further.

The next tour was a tour around Dachau Camp. This was very emotional. We could not believe some of the stories that the guide told us about this camp. The camp was massive and he also told us it was a 10th of the size of some of the other ones around Germany. It is hard to imagine or even describe. Like a lot of the things on this trip, we are going to have to tell you this is probably one you need to see for yourself.

The weather was not kind to us, and it rain most of the time.....so pictures were hard to come by, but we have some. We are currently waiting for our night train to Prague, and posting this in a cafe, so you will have to wait for the pictures until we get to Prague.

Anyway thats it for now. Just to let you know we are both feeling much better. Probably need a rest, which we have now had. Ready for oour next adventure.

Thinking about you all. Hope all is well.
We will reply to your email from Prague

Trip to Salzburg

Just a quick update today as we only have an hour of web access & also we didn’t do much besides more countries.

About five minutes before we were due to get up we got a wonderful phone call from new dad Craig letting us know that Hayden Filippini had finally decided to join us. (Congratulations Anita & Craig & welcome to the world Hayden – looking forward to meeting you and to watching you grow up).

After that news we were wide awake & got ready for our lift to the train station. The train ride was good – Nic got to chat with Anita which was great & we also met a couple more Australians – you really do have to wonder how many of us there would be if we were all in Oz at once because there are a lot of us over here :)

It was incredible to watch the scenery change as we moved over the Italy/Austria border – we thought Italy was beautiful but Austria is incredible. Mountain after mountain, crystal clear water (& waterfalls) and green as far as you can see.

We took a couple of pics from the train but they can’t really do justice to the beauty (given that it is through a window & the train is travelling at 200+ km/hr.

We are now in our Mozart themed room in Salzburg and will probably stay in tonight as it is raining here at the moment. Tomorrow morning we head out on our Sound of Music tour & then tomorrow afternoon we get the train to Munich. Hopefully we will be able to get on line then and show you some amazing pictures from around Salzburg.

Until then .... love to everyone
Phil & Nic

Another day in Venicen

We had a little bit of a sleep in today and then headed to the restaurant next door for a bit of breakfast. The shuttle bus picked us up at 11:15am and we headed back to the island for the day.

We took the same kind of approach as yesterday and just wandered around for a bit with our first challenge to find some lunch. Yes - pasta & pizza again!!! While eating we did a bit of people watching & today we also got to watch a dozen pidgeons playing around with scraps that people were throwing to them. This reminded us of something an American couple staying in our hotel had said about feeding pidgeons in a square. So we set off to try and find San Marco Piazza.

As the photos show we had a great time with the pidgeons and for a few days we will have the claw marks on our arms as souveniers of the experience. We did bathe in the anticeptic wash when we were done though :)

We then continued wandering around for a few more hours. A very different Venice today to what we saw yesterday. Today there was a regatta on and the crowds were crazy.

As the day went on we found more & more that it is really hard to tell where you are going, where you have been & it is even harder to work out where you are on a map. Around 5:30 we thought we should look at heading back towards the meeting point (we wanted the extra time to be able to stroll back) So we headed off in the direction we thought it was..... then we hit the edge of the island :) wrong way – go back!!!

It turned out we had been walking for about an hour in the wrong direction - I guess that is what you get when you don't follow your map :) But it was good mistake because we got to see a whole new area and then another new area on our way back to the pick up point :)

We are back in the hotel now... nursing some very sore feet (Hours walking - 6.5 Approx Kms covered - 18) but the two days provided an amazing adventure that we are glad we got to experience.

Next we move on to Salzburg - where we do the Sound of Music tour :)

Happy Fathers Day to our dads and to all the other dads out there reading this (as we have had quite a few messages from strangers reading the blog)

Good luck to Anita & Craig who will probably become parents tomorrow (well today Bris time) - we are with you in spirit as you go through the experience.

Love to all

Hugs to Bundy & Haydos

Cheers

Phil & Nic

Venice

The day started out very nice. We walked down to the train station to check out the types of seats available on the Munich to Prague train. We had a really nice ticket guy who helped us get a Private Double Sleeper, which is handy meaning we do not loose a day in transit. He also showed us that we needed to pay a little extra to travel in Czech Rep as the EurailPass did not cover that.

We then had a nice quick breakfast at a little cafe down the street, but on finishing our coffee realized we were running late! We got back to the room and packed and had 10 mins to get to the train...which was about a 15 min walk away. It was on.....We ended up jogging there with full packs and made it onto the train with about 2 mins to spare. Lucky we had 3 hours on a train to recover.

On arriving in Venice we had to book the train for Salzburg in a few days time. Then after reading the instructions on how to get to our hotel, we bought a bus ticket and jumped on the number 9, This was interesting as we were not 100% sure what stop to get off at....was it the last one, or the 2nd last one??? We decided to wing it as usual. As fate turned out, we were the only people left on the bus after about 10 mins. When we felt we were getting close, i walked down to the bus driver who we knew did not speak English and I simply said "Villa Dori". He opened the doors and pointed across the road, at the hotel :)

We were staying on the mainland as it is about 20 times cheaper then on the island itself. This hotel offers a shuttle service to the island for $2.50 each which is sensational. We put our bags in the room and headed for the islands.

On arriving, we had a bite to eat....more pasta, and then set out to find stuff. As the guide books say there is no real need for a plan in Venice, just walk the streets and you will find something extremely beautiful everywhere you turn. We took this approach and loved it. It is the most relaxed we have felt all holiday. Strolling down little lanes, over bridges and into little parks and squares. On our travel we came across heaps of the things that the guide books had recommended to visit. It is very interesting seeing the water splashing against the back doors of the buildings.

We are heading back today for more of the same.

Florence and Pisa

Another day, another successful one. Today we headed out of Rome after a wonderful couple of days. We are getting pretty use to the train thing now, so much so that we left until the last 10 mins to arrive at the station or should I say termini :) We jumped on the train heading to Florence, in 1st class and sat back and enjoyed the view. Nicole did some catch up work on the paper Journal and I did some...important ipod work.

We arrived in Florence with ease and even easier to find our new base for a few days. It is in the heart of the action, just down the road from the Duomo. Not quite as big as the church we just saw in Rome, but pretty impressive. The walls of the church were designed to be so impressive that people would say nothing more could have been done to improve them (which as some of our pics might show – it has a lot of intricate detail). The dual dome was put on by another architect so it is a bit different but pretty impressive as it has no support structures.

Speaking of impressive, our room is on the 4th floor.....which is actually the 5th as they call ground floor “0”.....Whatever it is called it is a long way with full packs and sore legs from Rome :) but as normal these holidays we found that little bit extra and made it, and then found the bonus.....air con. That immediately hit 18 degrees :)

We took a few mins to settle in then headed out the door to find lunch and investigate Florence. Taking guidance from previous times, we found the open top bus and did a lap of Florence to get to know it. Like we have said we found this the easiest way to kick start the sightseeing.

This place is amazing. It is like it is out of a painting. The countryside is beautiful, everything is very green. The river is very inviting, to the point of wanting to jump in it, but given that we don’t trust water that isn’t in a sealed bottle – it probably won’t happen. The houses/buildings are so cute. They all are sensational colours and have these shutters on all the windows. Even our place has them.
...................................................

That was yesterdays contribution to the blog but we didn’t get a chance to add it.

Today we struggled to get out of the very uncomfortable bed but once up we were on a mission, another lap on the bus to get a better look at Florence and then a train ride out to Pisa.

We are glad we had another look around on the bus because we got to see some more of the beauty that this place has to offer. We hoped off at Michelangelo’s Piazzale which looks over Florence. Unfortunately the day started out a bit hazy so the pics aren’t as good as we would have hoped but you’ll have to trust us that it was truly breathtaking.

We haven’t had time this trip to look at any of the galleries or museums but I’m sure we will be back one day and we will allocate more time to Tuscany.

Next on to the Pisa trip!!! Purpose of the journey – cheesy tourist shots :) and we succeeded!!!
We got the train out to Pisa, about an hour away from Florence and took a guess that we would be able to find the Leaning Tower with easy (ie we didn’t take a map or guide book). Good call by us – the train station and the Tower are at opposite ends of the main city area but it is only a small area which made for a nice walk after we grabbed a bite to eat. (Yes – Pizza again:) )

We both had different expectations of the Tower – Phil thought it would be bigger – Nic thought smaller but in the end we both thought it was great and worth the travel. We got a great laugh watching tourists pose for the “Tower Holding” shots and then we got into the spirit and joined in :)

We took a different route back to the train station and got to see a bit more of the outer city area (more suburban) – although there were a couple of moments we thought we may have made the wrong decision but we got there in the end.

With twenty minutes till the train we decided to find some gelato – and got our best bargin yet – waffle cones with three big scoops of ice cream for 2.50euro each. A great way to cool down.
Anyway now we are back in our hotel room – after discovering we can access the net in here for $0 – another great bargin :)

Tomorrow morning we head off to Venice for a couple of days – which looks like it will be a budget blower! But we are sure it will be worth the $$$.

Oh by the way – the Italian heat has done us both well – both colds are almost gone now.

Hope things are going well back home. We miss everyone heaps but will be back before we all know it (we leave in less than 2 weeks now).

PS GO THE BRONCOS

Rome was walked around in a day

Today was probably our biggest challenge so far this trip. Rome may not have been built in a day but we managed to walk a big chunk of it.

In the extreme heat we set out to walk around Rome. Our first stop of the day was at the internet cafe for the last blog post. We then walked about the minutes to find some breakfast/lunch (I think Rome has been the most expensive city so far but we haven’t really been thinking about it too much – we don’t check the prices of things until we go to pay the bill and then we get the shock :) )

Next stop was the train station to reserve our seats for the trip to Florence tomorrow – pretty easy, given that everyone we deal with here seems to speak English.
We then started our trek to see as many sights as we could. We were a little worried in the beginning because the park that our hotel guy had told us to walk through was packed with gypsies, gangs and homeless people and we were a little scared and a couple of times got a little frustrated as we kept getting lost as we worked our way around the trouble spots.

In the end we made our way to the Colosseo (Colosseum) and it was worth all the effort. We decided we didn’t have time to line up for the couple of hours it would take to get inside so we just took a walk around the outside which was amazing enough.

Next stop was much easier to find, right next door, Foro Romano (Roman Forum). This was by far the toughest part of the walk – the photos give some indication but it was like walking through the desert. It was so hot, almost no shade and what shade there was was occupied by hundreds of people trying to escape the sun. Again it was worth the sunburn (and yes we were drowning in sunscreen – it just doesn’t do much here) to walk through such an incredible place.

The next few stops included – Piazza Venezia, Pantheon, Mausoleo of Augusto (Opera), Piazza Dei Porto Di Ripetta, Piazza Di Spagna (Spanish Steps) & Fontana Di Trevi (Trevi Fountain). There were a heap of other places we stopped at along the way but couldn’t really keep track of what they were.

We’ve just worked out that pretty much we walked the tour bus route which would take about an hour to drive around. So not a bad effort we think.

The downside to walking around is that we don’t get to take as many pictures because we have to put the camera away between sights, but the upside is that we get better pictures of the things we want to concentrate on and we got a heap of pics on the bus on the first couple of days so together we think it works.

Anyway as we set on the last post we are off to Florence tomorrow so hopefully we will be able to get on line then if not we will definitely have access in Venice on the weekend.

Now off to dinner - PIZZA. We have to keep finding different places to eat because we are in the same clothes :)

The Catch Up

Ok so we have had a bit of a break since we did the last update, it turns out that we can’t access the internet from our accommodation in Rome, but that it because we are in a beautiful room hidden away from anyone else.

So we have a bit of action to update on, since we last wrote we have had another day looking around Paris. We started the day off by going to the train station and using what they call “left luggage” This turned out to be sensational. For $10 you can use secure lockers to store your stuff up to 72 hours.

So we took use of this and headed to the train station to book our ticket on the overnight train to Rome. From the station it was a quick, and I mean quick metro train trip back to St Lazare where we hoped back onto the tour bus that took us straight to Arc de Triomphe’. We both knew how big it was but being underneath it really drove this home. For example the flag that was hanging under the Arc was about 100 times bigger than the American one in teddies bedroom.

From there we headed back to the Eiffel Tower, where we grabbed some more fries and an ice cream and just hang out in the park for a while. This was a great time to relax and people watch. We have become accustomed to the gypsies around all of the main tourist spots, so they really do not bother us anymore.

We made our way to the train station to pick up our bags and head to Rome. We were a little worried about the train trip as we were sharing the train cabin with 4 other people. This trip was 14 hours to Rome so this could turn our very bad if you were placed with the wrong people. We eventually found our seats and it turned out we were with 2 Italians and 2 Scots and a French guy that was trying to stow away? (this is a bit of a story but in the end the Italian took his bag and placed it in the hall a few doors down.)

The Train ride turned out to be very cool. The Scots had some great stories about their current trip (their honeymoon) and also Scotland, of course. The Italians seemed to love that we were talking and trying to get to know them. Phil even got to the point of them writing a menu out for what to order when in Rome. We ended up exchanging address with the Italians and they want us to send them a few pictures.

We arrived in Rome and found our first Rome Scheme. The break the public phone and then rig it so it does not spit the change out. The can be only making about a euro from each phone call, but when there is over 100 phones at the station and thousands of passengers, that makes for a good little businesses. After we worked our way around that drama, we connected up with our contact in Rome. He showed us to our room in a building in the middle of Rome. And WOW.......it is billisimo.

We really weren’t sure where to start with Rome – so many things to see in such a small amount of time. Our first challenge was to try and find some food and as we thought it wasn’t too hard – a little harder than usual as a few places are closed because the Italians are on holidays at the moment, but that’s a good thing for us as it is a bit quieter on the streets.

On a side note – we’ve had a bit of a change in weather (which is helping to dry out the colds we both have) – Italy is in a heat wave at the moment.

Then we were back to the issue of what to do – so we went with what had worked for us in London & Paris – we found a tourist bus and hopped on. These buses have been a great way to get an idea of where everything is and give us the ability to see most things to decide where we want to go back to.

That night we found a restaurant pretty much next door to our hotel and here we were educated about “Italian Time” – they really aren’t in a hurry to do much. The service was really good all the way through but when it came time to get the bill, well – that took longer than the ordering & eating put together. But we weren’t in a rush so it was good because we got to people watch some more.

Yesterday we decided to use the bus to get us to the farthest point – the Vatican. Our plan was to have a good look around there and then make our way back to the hotel stopping at a couple of places on the way. Well.... that didn’t happen. The Vatican was so amazing that we ended up spending the whole day there. We did a guided tour with an American Guide. His information was really good and it was the type of tour we were after. We did not want the long detailed version of every piece and every room. This short tour ended up being 3 hours as it was :)

His American style was sometimes hard to take, but that’s typical I guess. He did make reference to Michelangelo and Phil looking similar several times. (Long Hair, Beard, Crazy.....)We got to see all the very good things to see at The Vatican and since we were on the tour, we got express access.

There was so much to see. There was statues, painted walls, the floors....everywhere you looked there was something amazing. We got to see and hear about Saint Peter, We heard heaps of stories about Michelangelo and Raphael. The guide explained to us the meaning of several of the works of art and also why things were where they were. An interesting story is the markings on the floor, they are like bragging rights. They show how big the Vatican is compared to all the other churches in the word. Needless to say, it is by far the biggest. As the guide pointed out the Statue of Liberty could stand up inside the Basilica and not touch the top. This was all in just in the Basilica, we had not even stepped foot in the Sistine Chapel yet.

Stage 2 was the Chapel and the museum. The guide did a good job explaining how it was created and what things meant. Interesting to know that Michelangelo didn’t want anything to do with the Chapel, but was pretty much made to do it by the Pope at the time. It took him 60 days to paint the first section on the ceiling – he didn’t like the first attempt so the next day he redid it, and again the next day, and again and again until after 60 days he finally got it right. He then realised it would take far too long to put that much detail into the whole ceiling so he made a rule that he would only put 2-6 people in each section and by the end he had worked out so many to save time that the last section was completed in 4 hours.

A funny thing pointed out to us was a bit of Michelangelo’s humor – he was upset with the Pope for making him ”waste” 4 years of his life so he strategically positioned one of the paintings so that Jesus’ backside would be pointing down at him while he was preaching. He also hated the art director (because he thought Michelangelo’s work was no good) so he used his face on one of the depictions of the devil. Lesson from this – don’t make enemies with a painter – people centuries from now might be laughing at you for it.

Also interesting to see the statues that have been beheaded by German soldiers during the war – their way of taking home a souvenir. The Sistine Chapel was truly breathtaking – unfortunately the Japanese who own the rights to the Chapel have put rules in place so you can’t take photos – so those who haven’t seen it will have to add it to their list of things to see – well worth a look.

At this point we finished the tour but the guide recommended that we go through the Tombs for a quick look (the tombs also provide the easiest exit out of the Vatican).The tombs contain all the Popes from the last 800 or so years – the most popular of which was Pope John Paul II – who had a crowd of people around him, most of whom were praying. Very touching to see how loved he was (and still is).

So we were out of the Vatican and it was stinking hot and we didn’t know if we had time to do much else so we decided to head back to the hotel, have a shower & get some grub – in the interest of getting an early-ish night and starting out early this morning. We found a little pub to have a feed on one of the main corners and we ended up people watching for hours. Guess we’d better sign off now – time to sweat a bit more while we walk around in this Roman heat.

Our problem now is how to we fit all the remaining sights into one day??? Tomorrow morning we head to Florence. Hopefully we will be able to get online again then.

Thanks to everyone for your emails and messages – they are really great to read after a long day. And thanks to Mum C for checking up on us :) Sorry that we had you worried.

Anita & Craig – no doubt Puff will be out soon so best of luck to you both – can’t wait to get the phone call.

Love to all

Phil & Nic

PS

Sorry for the massive update, but it has been a while. Also sorry there are no pictures inside this blog, it could not work out how to do it correctly at the internet cafe. I have uploaded some Rome ones to the Picasa site though, so check them out.

Paris - Turns it on

Well today was our day to explore Paris. We woke up and looked out the window and could not see the houses in the next street. Fog had set in and it looked like it was going to be a very gloomy day.

Since we are on a time budget, we headed out anyway and went to see what we could see. Our first stop was the Eiffel Tower. We again caught the Metro, which is a piece of cake now. It was only a few stops before we hit the tower. We followed the crowds, as we couldn't see the Tower yet. As soon as we came around the corner - Boom - there she was. Well there was the bottom half of her. And the bit that we could see was incredible enough. She is much bigger than either of us imagined. We found a coffee & a pastry and found a seat to sit and enjoy the beauty of the fog clearing slowly.

Next we went to find the open roof bus tour. We now figure this is the best way for us to see most of the big cities given that we have no idea where we are going and what anything is.

Took heaps of photos again while driving around. Went past all the big sights and eventually hopped off at the Louvre for a wander around. By this time the fog had finally cleared and we were left with a beautiful blue sky over Paris.

The Louvre was another great place to see given its recent publicity. We took a walk over the river and then along the banks up to Notre Dame where we saw our first bag snatch - our security measure tightened up after that - even though we were already being extremely careful.

We wandered around for the rest of the day, and hopped off and on the bus a couple more times.

We finished the day by taking a walk from the Grand Palais, which looks down over the Eiffel base. Grabbed some french fries with mayonnaise :) and took a seat to watch the sun go down and the lights come on.

It was about 9:30pm by the time it was done and we decided to head back home as we are both sick now and in need of some sleep.

Today we wander around Paris for a bit and then tonight we get our first overnight train to Rome. We have made a change to our trip and won't be seeing Switzerland - we are disappointed but we need a couple of nights in one spot to try and recooperate a bit.

Hope you enjoy the pics of Paris

Love to all

Phil & Nic

Normandy - D Day Tour

Since we last made an entry on the blog we have moved from Brugge to Bayeux. This was an amazing adventure.

Firstly we had to find what trains to get. This involved us getting a few transfers along the way. We successfully started to work out the Begium train system by “winging” our way through French. We then arrived in Paris, where we had to use the “metro” to transfer to another station. We were a little worried about this so our plan was to go to an information booth in hope that they spoke English. We we got of the train to move to the info booth, the line was about 30 deep with tourists. We only had 40 mins at to make our transfer or else we would miss our train to Bayeux and there for miss the Normandy tour.....that was not an option, so we sucked it up, read the metro chart the way we thought it worked, bought a ticket and BINGO, we made it. We caught first class trains and can i just say ....wow, food and drinks all the way, very nice indeed. We made it to Bayeux refreshed, fed and ready to go......that was until we tried to catch the local bus service to a closer location to our hotel. No one spoke any English, not even enough for us to get pass “bon jour”. After two attempts with different bus drivers, we decided the only way we were going to make it before dark was to walk it. It was 3 kms with full packs, windy, chilly and Nicole with her cold/flu/cough thing. We made it and made it in great time. Nicole has really been showing that she is putting her all in and then some, as this is our once in a life time tour....no time for the rest or wicked.

Today was the day for the Normandy tour. We had both been looking forward to this since we found it. Again with the tour it was a great way to be able to see all of the spots that we had heard, read and seen about quickly. We could have easily spent 4 weeks here doing it ourselves, but that was not the type of holiday we were on.

The tour was great and did go to all the right spots. The guide was good, but not as good as our previous guide in Ieper. I think we may have been spoilt there, but we were expecting a little more out of this guy.

We did learn a heap of things that we did not know and also taught not to believe everything you see on “Saving Private Ryan” and even “Band Of Brothers” or though they are pretty good representations.

The weather unfortunately was not very good for us, as it was cold, windy and even raining during parts of the day, but this did however give us a more realistic point of view how it was on D Day for the guys. As one of the stories we did learn was that D Day was meant to be the 5th June 1944 but was postponed due to weather and then given the green light on the 6th even though weather had not improved.

We took a heap of photos even though they did not turn out as good as i had hoped, because of the sky, they do however mean a lot to Nicole and I as we know have a full idea of how it really looks over here in Normandy

Hope all is still well over there for everyone.We are missing you heaps.

PS – tell puff he does not have to wait for us.

PPS – sorry for the heaps of photos today :)

Nous partons demain

The Crouch Travellers

Ieper - The Great War

Today we had a trip out to Ieper (or Ypres or Leeper - depending on who you speak to and which signs you read) to go out on the Flanders Fields Battlefield Tour.
To start with we had to get a couple of trains out to Ieper from Brugge (via Kortrijk) - which we managed to do with minimal fuss (we were rather impressed with ourselves - it does help to know that pretty much everyone has a small knowledge/understanding of English)

We had a quick walk out to the city centre to meet up with the tour van. The tour was great because we only had 6 of us in the car and the guide (Chris) had so much information / stories to share that the 4.5 hours flew by and we are now very inspired to learn more about WWI & II.

We visited 4 cemetries out of the 150 that are within a 10 sq mile area around Ieper. Over 850,000 died in the area over a 4 year period. It was quite amazing to stand at the biggest of the sights and picutre a man standing at each grave - and then imagine them all being slaughtered. Very heroic that they never gave up even though most knew they weren't going to make it home.

Chris gave us some great details into the Australians who were awarded the VC medal and also some interesting stories of others who gave their life to save their comrades - never let your cobber down.

The 14 year old who used his brothers name to get into the army was an intresting story - his parents thought he was volunteering at a ammunitions factory and it wasn't until the letter arrived informing of the older brothers death that they realised where he had gone.

We have a million other stories but we can't do them justice telling them on here.

Once we were done with the tour we made our way back to Brugges (sucessfully :) and in first class) and had a walk around the streets to find some Waffles - very very good and very very sickening.

We are off to Bayeux tomorrow (via Paris - but only to change trains) to do the Band of Brothers tour of Normandy on Thursday. Should be a great day and I'm sure we will have heaps to share once we get to the net again.

Love to all
Hugs to Bundy & Haydos :)

Au Revoir
Madame & Monsieur Crouch

Est-ce qu'il y a quelqu'un qui parle angais?

Today was a a busy day, but not a great deal got done. We started the day off with some time in the hostel. We charged the camera and phone and repacked the bags and we were ready to go,

Todays mission was to leave the country and head to a new one. We drove to the airport and dropped the car off on time. Things have been working out well so far J Next we checked in to our Ryan Air flight from Glasgow to Brussels. This also went very smooth and even though it was sit anywhere seating, Nicole and I got to sit next to each other. The flight was very nice.

On the way over there it hit us that we have just finished the easy part of the trip, now onto the countries where English is not their primary language. This was proven at the airport where we tried to catch a train to Brussels Central. After a few questions here and there, we were on our way.

In Brussels we got to see Mannekin Pis ( the little boy releaving himself) It was amazing to see so many people huddled around a street corner. We also so Grand Place which was amazing. The workmanship on the stone is just something to see. It is hard to catch that sort of stuff in photos.

From here we hiked it back up the hills to the train station, where some more questions were asked about how to get places. We then validated our “Eurail” pass and we were on our way to Brugge.

We have not done much sightseeing yet here, but what we have seen we have fallen in love with. We had a stroll around the streets and then stopped for some dinner at a little restaurant. They spoke broken English so that made it very easy on us. The food was amazing and we also got to try a local beer. It was very nice indeed.

That about it or us today, tomorrow we take on a Flanders Fields.
Hope everyone is well. Glad to hear there was some rain in Brisbane.......we have plenty of it here.

The Crouch Travellers