Sitting in a cafe in Dubrovnik writing on my iPod. I ordered a Coke and Tom has a beer. The beer was cheaper than my coke!
Yesterday we had an unfortunate food experience. We got into Dubrovnik at around noon and set out for lunch and sightseeing. We grabbed a couple mini pizzas from a bakery and sat down in the shade to dig in. Everything was going well until I started to look closer at the ham on my pizza... It wasn't ham, it was Spam, or the Croatian equivalent to spam 'shudder'. It was horrible. Tom tougher it out, picking off the more obviously gross bits. Me, I had to pull the whole top of my pizza off and try and finish off the crust without thinking about what had been on it. We had to get gelato after to ease the pain.
Today we took a quick ferry to a small island off the coast and spent the day swimming and exploring the fort, monastery and garden on the island. It is stinking hot here so we try not to venture to far from the water!
Tomorrow we set out for Split where will will catch an overnight train to Zagreb. From there we catch a bus to Prague that takes, oh, 12 hours.
Wish us luck!
Monday, June 14, 2010
Saturday, June 12, 2010
Korcula
Another day, another Dalmatian Island, life is rough. We found the campsite last night after a 30 minute walk with packs (why I indulge Tom is still beyond me). We set up camp, and went for a lovely dinner on the beach after a quick dip in the ocean. It was a swealtering hot day today and since I am still recovering from that burn I was waering as much of my full coverage clothing as possible, not fun!
Korcula is another bautiful town with crystal clear water and friendly people, but we are tight for time so tomorrow it is off to Dubrovnik!
WE are currently looking into options for getting to prague from Croatia. Right now it is looking like an overnight train and a 12 hour bus ride....soooooo fun!
Korcula is another bautiful town with crystal clear water and friendly people, but we are tight for time so tomorrow it is off to Dubrovnik!
WE are currently looking into options for getting to prague from Croatia. Right now it is looking like an overnight train and a 12 hour bus ride....soooooo fun!
Thursday, June 10, 2010
Burnt to a crisp in Croatia!
Lesson number 6
No matter how glamorous or exotic lounging on the beach in Croatia may sound, the end result will be the same....one very sunburned Kate and Tom.
We have been in Croatia now for 3 days and it is fantastic! The people are friendly, the scenery is amazing and we are getting the best nights sleep thanks to readily available cheap accommodation! Whenever you arrive to an airport, bus depot, marina, there are a dozen or so people who will come up to you and ask if you need accommodations. So for about 15 euros per person per night (pennies compared to Italy!)Tom and I have been in fully private, clean and quiet apartments. It is beyond amazing to not be woken up by
a) a deflated air mattress
b) the traffic from the highway behind your tent
c) the crazy person in the next bunk who wont stop snoring! (ok, it´s Tom, that one I cannot seem to escape)
Fantastic!
The one thing we are quickly realizing, is that aside from accommodations, Croatia is not that cheap! The food, wine, sightseeing trips are pretty much on par if not slightly higher than Italy. And the shopping, so sad, but it is also much more expensive. A watch I bought in Italy for 2 Euros is 10 here. So I guess I will have to curb my shopping, which is probably a good thing because I don´t think Tom´s bag can hold much more ;)
We are on Hvar Island right now and are off to another island tomorrow, not sure which one yet. So far it has been far easier to find internet here than in Italy so I will write again soon...you lucky reader you.
No matter how glamorous or exotic lounging on the beach in Croatia may sound, the end result will be the same....one very sunburned Kate and Tom.
We have been in Croatia now for 3 days and it is fantastic! The people are friendly, the scenery is amazing and we are getting the best nights sleep thanks to readily available cheap accommodation! Whenever you arrive to an airport, bus depot, marina, there are a dozen or so people who will come up to you and ask if you need accommodations. So for about 15 euros per person per night (pennies compared to Italy!)Tom and I have been in fully private, clean and quiet apartments. It is beyond amazing to not be woken up by
a) a deflated air mattress
b) the traffic from the highway behind your tent
c) the crazy person in the next bunk who wont stop snoring! (ok, it´s Tom, that one I cannot seem to escape)
Fantastic!
The one thing we are quickly realizing, is that aside from accommodations, Croatia is not that cheap! The food, wine, sightseeing trips are pretty much on par if not slightly higher than Italy. And the shopping, so sad, but it is also much more expensive. A watch I bought in Italy for 2 Euros is 10 here. So I guess I will have to curb my shopping, which is probably a good thing because I don´t think Tom´s bag can hold much more ;)
We are on Hvar Island right now and are off to another island tomorrow, not sure which one yet. So far it has been far easier to find internet here than in Italy so I will write again soon...you lucky reader you.
Friday, June 4, 2010
What are you sinking about?
Since we have not spent a lot of time in hostels we are getting to know a different crowd of people in the campsites. Mainly German campers. The Germans love to camp...who knew? I would say that at all the campsites we have been to about 80% of the people are German. It is still really hard for me to not think of the German coast guard ad when I hear someone from Germany speaking (google it if you have not heard it!....Is that bad?
Another Roman Adventure!
The following was written on my iPod. Please excuse the huge number of spelling and grammar mistakes!!!
We just finished off another jampacked day in rome. Saw the Trevi fountain (huge!), forum, coloseum, pantheon, everything! But even with all that, yesterday was our big exciting day.
We had a late start to the day, packed a lunch and headed out to the catacombs. So cool! Over 500 000 people were buried there at one point and 4 underground levels cover 20km. We only got to see the first level but pie guide made it pretty sweet. He was an older Philipino brother who was unintentionally hilarious. We were divided into groups by languages and the best part came when our guide, in an urgent tone, called out to our group, " we must hurry. The Germans are
Coming!"
Very very nice man . he bought Tom and me a cappuccino (from the coolest machine ever ) later on.
After re catacombs we took our fist bus back to town and were
PlAnning to just head back when we saw a huge crown growing around st Giovanni church. Turns out the pope was going to be making an appearance. We decided to stick around and were about 100 metres away from the front with an unobstructed view. Then they opened a gate and we managed to get about 15 meters away from the front! Now, I have to warn you, this is shaping up to be one of those"and then... And then" types of posts, so bear with me. So there we Are, 15 metres away from were the pope will be any minute now and Tom turns to me and says,
"looks like rain"
RAin is an understatement.
What happened next can only be described as an absolute torrential downpour, worse than I have ever seen in Vancouver! Me in my goodie and Tom in shorts and a tshirt( what else) were absolutely drenched within seconds. Wihin the minutes that the rain started we realized that they were going to hold mass in the church instead and were about to head home soaked and dissapointed, until someone near us opened up the gate and people everywhere started rushing the church . Tom and I said what the heck and joined in, pushing nuns and priests out of our way as we scrambled for A spot in the curch (just kidding, it was the nuns who pushed us, they really wanted to see the pope).
Excuse me as I take a sip of my Italian wine, this is exausting!
Ok, so we are now soaked, and pressed up against the side of this enormous church wondering where to go because some peoe are leaving and others are still scrambling to get in. Then, someone again opens a gate and we all rush into the front covered area of the curch ( where the swiss guards were during all this I do not know! ). Now we are soaked and standing in the massive foyer of this church wall to wall wih people. Then they let us in and we end up listening to thr pope deliver mass in the most beautiful churches I have evr seen, from about 50 meters away. Words cannot describe how cool our day was.
As we made our way home at 9 that night, freezing, starving, and feet acching (when do they not), we knew we had pretty much the best day in Rome ever!
Phew, well, off to sorrento tomorrow! And it is now time for some bruchetta.
We just finished off another jampacked day in rome. Saw the Trevi fountain (huge!), forum, coloseum, pantheon, everything! But even with all that, yesterday was our big exciting day.
We had a late start to the day, packed a lunch and headed out to the catacombs. So cool! Over 500 000 people were buried there at one point and 4 underground levels cover 20km. We only got to see the first level but pie guide made it pretty sweet. He was an older Philipino brother who was unintentionally hilarious. We were divided into groups by languages and the best part came when our guide, in an urgent tone, called out to our group, " we must hurry. The Germans are
Coming!"
Very very nice man . he bought Tom and me a cappuccino (from the coolest machine ever ) later on.
After re catacombs we took our fist bus back to town and were
PlAnning to just head back when we saw a huge crown growing around st Giovanni church. Turns out the pope was going to be making an appearance. We decided to stick around and were about 100 metres away from the front with an unobstructed view. Then they opened a gate and we managed to get about 15 meters away from the front! Now, I have to warn you, this is shaping up to be one of those"and then... And then" types of posts, so bear with me. So there we Are, 15 metres away from were the pope will be any minute now and Tom turns to me and says,
"looks like rain"
RAin is an understatement.
What happened next can only be described as an absolute torrential downpour, worse than I have ever seen in Vancouver! Me in my goodie and Tom in shorts and a tshirt( what else) were absolutely drenched within seconds. Wihin the minutes that the rain started we realized that they were going to hold mass in the church instead and were about to head home soaked and dissapointed, until someone near us opened up the gate and people everywhere started rushing the church . Tom and I said what the heck and joined in, pushing nuns and priests out of our way as we scrambled for A spot in the curch (just kidding, it was the nuns who pushed us, they really wanted to see the pope).
Excuse me as I take a sip of my Italian wine, this is exausting!
Ok, so we are now soaked, and pressed up against the side of this enormous church wondering where to go because some peoe are leaving and others are still scrambling to get in. Then, someone again opens a gate and we all rush into the front covered area of the curch ( where the swiss guards were during all this I do not know! ). Now we are soaked and standing in the massive foyer of this church wall to wall wih people. Then they let us in and we end up listening to thr pope deliver mass in the most beautiful churches I have evr seen, from about 50 meters away. Words cannot describe how cool our day was.
As we made our way home at 9 that night, freezing, starving, and feet acching (when do they not), we knew we had pretty much the best day in Rome ever!
Phew, well, off to sorrento tomorrow! And it is now time for some bruchetta.
Thursday, June 3, 2010
Church Bells
I have decided that Vancouver needs more church bells. There is nothing better than sitting in the middle of a city and hearing churchbells start to ring. Such a fantastic sound! Who do we need to write to get this?
Wednesday, June 2, 2010
When in Rome...
My aching feet! Huge day touring the Vatican Museum and St Peters Cathedral (I should mention that I cannot find the apostrophe on this keyboard...so any mistakes and very formal sounding speaking is not my intention!). I had no idea the museum was so big. It was so great to finnally see the Sistine Chapel in person. On thing I have realized is that I have a definite limit when it coems to seeing things. We were in the Vatican museum for about 4 hours and that was rushing through some things! I think the pooint at which everything begins to meld into one is around the 2 hour mark. Tomorrow we are going to head out to the Catacombs, I am really looking forward to them, I hope they are kind of creepy.
The campsite in Rome is like no campsite I have ever seen. It is huge and has a pool, 2 hottubs, 2 bars, a restaurant and market, ping pong, you name it. I convinced Tom that I needed a few nights in a real bed and not on my air mattress which has a definite slow leak (mornings are rough!). So we are spending three nights in one of the cabanas that is basically a delux tent with beds...heaven! Aside from the fact that it backs onto the freeway, it is sooooo nice.
Off to dinner now....as long as I live I will never get sick of pizza....ever.
The campsite in Rome is like no campsite I have ever seen. It is huge and has a pool, 2 hottubs, 2 bars, a restaurant and market, ping pong, you name it. I convinced Tom that I needed a few nights in a real bed and not on my air mattress which has a definite slow leak (mornings are rough!). So we are spending three nights in one of the cabanas that is basically a delux tent with beds...heaven! Aside from the fact that it backs onto the freeway, it is sooooo nice.
Off to dinner now....as long as I live I will never get sick of pizza....ever.
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