Iceland, The End of Our Journey…..

We visited Iceland in February 2011, so there weren’t too many things we “had” to do. That being said, Tuesday was an extremely lazy day. We finally left our hotel room to walk a block or so away to get a late lunch and then went back. We then left our hotel around 9:00pm or so and wandered down the main street in the city center and grabbed some dinner. Excellent dinner, mind you. We ended up going to the famous hot dog stand and they were delicious. (We also went there on our previous trip.) It started to rain on the way back to the hotel; September in Iceland is still really cold! It didn’t feel too much different than when we were here on our last trip! We hurried back to our room and went to bed. Great day!

There were a few things that we could not do or see on our last trip because of the weather, so on Wednesday we set out to finish them. We drove two hours to Seljalandsfoss; an impressive waterfall that you can walk behind. Well, if it isn’t a frozen sheet of ice! The pathways were completely frozen when we visited in 2011, so we went back to finish the excursion. It rained quite a bit on the way there, but it cleared off and was sunny and nice. We were able to walk back behind the waterfall, but with the breeze blowing the mist back on us, it was cold! We were pretty damp and numb by the time we walked back out to the front, but it was worth it! We took some more pictures, climbed back in our car, and headed to the next destination: Geysir, the original geyser that all other geysers are named after. Geysir itself is rarely active, but there is another active main geyser, Strokkur, and many steam holes similar to Yellowstone National Park.

Along the way to Geysir was Urriðafoss, another waterfall that we visited in 2011. Parts of it were frozen then, so we decided to stop off and see it now. The water was a very unique, opaque color that we assume has to do with the still present ash in the area from the volcanic eruption a few years back. We wandered around a while, taking pictures, and then continued on our way.

When we visited Geysir in 2011, not only was it frigid cold and raining, but the winds were howling. The wind was blowing so hard that when the geyser went off, we couldn’t see anything because the wind blew the steam and water straight sideways along the ground. It was beautiful and sunny this time! On our previous trip there were two people at the park, this time it was packed. Unlike Old Faithful, this geyser went off many times frequently. We were there only a few moments when it went off, and then we stayed for another fifteen to twenty minutes and saw it go off a few more times. Some better than others, but they were all better than before! We then wandered into the food court and gift shop, but then decided to wait to eat until back in Reykjavik.

It was an hour and a half drive back to Reykjavik and we didn’t eat dinner, at TGI Fridays, until 6:00pm; the first meal of the day. Needless to say we were both hungry! We then drove to Nauthólsvík, a geothermal beach in Reykjavik. While there were many people in the pool, only a couple ventured out into the man-made lagoon. It was high tide so there was much more sea water than warm geothermal water making it quite chilly. After checking out the beach for a short time, we then headed back to our hotel for the evening. Only one more full day left of our adventure!

 The last day of our trip was another lazy day. At lunchtime we walked to the hot dog stand and ate another great lunch. We then spent the next couple hours walking around the city center wandering through shops and art galleries. We made our way back to our room and relaxed some more. We then went back out for a quick dinner and then headed back to our hotel to watch a little TV and to pack our bags for the last time.

Our flight home is today at 5:00pm, so we had some time to kill before we left. We slept in and didn’t check out of our hotel until close to 11:00am, and then we slowly worked our way toward Keflavik; about 45 minutes away. We drove out through the lava fields and checked out the continental “bridge” that we visited back in 2011. We then dropped off our car at the rental agency at 1:00pm and headed into the airport. After checking our bags and getting through security, we had plenty of time to eat at the café in the airport and wander through the shops. We are now sitting around waiting for our flight home as I publish this last post. It has been quite the ride!

 

Throughout our trip many people have asked what our favorite parts were. That is a very hard question!  It would be easier if someone asked about the worse parts. That would be doing our laundry every other day or so in bathroom sinks, and the showers in Europe. Not counting a couple places, Europeans do not believe in having showers that keep the water inside. Some did not even have doors that covered the shower opening, and the shower curtains in most other showers did not really reach to seal off the doorways. Almost every bathroom had tile floors that sloped toward the shower drain and the water just slopped all over the bathroom. We flooded at least one bathroom and had to put up a towel barricade just outside of the shower to stop the mess. Our bathroom in Iceland even had a large squeegee to “wipe” the water back toward the drain when we were done! Craziness! Okay, enough of that, now back to the “favorites.” Each place we visited had its own “greatness.” The people and places of Norway were fantastic. The sights and history in Ireland were great. As far as sightseeing and history though, nothing can compare to Rome. The time we spent with Melissa in Germany was beyond compare. We did so much during this trip that it is hard to remember all that we did. When we were in Rome it felt like months or years since we had been in Inderøy, and it was only a couple weeks before! All of this being said, here are a few highlights:

Norway: Nothing can be said for how great it was to meet so many relatives. Not only were they kind and accommodating, they treated us like family. Of course for me, a family history buff, it was beyond words to be able to see the places of my ancestors. The natural beauty of Norway is incredible and seeing so much of the coastline was amazing. Preikestolen (Pulpit Rock) wins the best hike and scenery award hands down!

Ireland: Although this was a “side trip,” it was great to see the famous Dublin. Our time in Belfast was very short, and it is definitely a place I want to go back to.

Rome: Without a doubt this was the best part of our trip when it comes to world history. Nothing can compare to seeing all of the ruins and other historical buildings of the Roman Empire. Touring the Vatican was an added bonus.

Germany: Having Melissa let us “hang out” with her was a highlight of the trip. She showed us some touristy places, but being able to go out with her and her friends to trivia night, hashing, and festivals was great. Of course, topping it all off with the Minstrel Festival in Ribeauvillé was an incredible finale. Plus, just being able to spend time with a cousin that you do not get to see very often is awesome all of itself!

Countries surround Germany: Although our side trips to the surrounding countries were a bit of a whirlwind, there were some great places that we were able to spend a little time in. Going to Dachau was an incredible experience. It was a bit sobering, but great nonetheless. Seeing the Neuschwanstein Castle was also another great sight to see. All throughout these countries there were many castles and old churches that are always impressive. The war memorials in Luxembourg and Belgium were very nice and something I would recommend other travelers to visit.

This adventure had so many different facets to it that I could never pinpoint a favorite. It has been a trip of a lifetime and one that, although it will take awhile to process all that we did, I will remember for the rest of my life.

I have definitely learned that traveling can be exhausting, especially for two months. It is much different than vacationing. Moving to a different city/town every few days, washing clothes in sinks every couple days or so, trying to figure out different languages, learning different customs, guessing on street signs, learning public transportation systems, meeting new people; although exhilarating, it is also exhausting. I think that after this trip, I need a vacation! :)

I know I chronicled our journey for my own diary, but I hope that the few of you that read it enjoyed it and didn’t mind my longwinded dialogue. I am sending this last blog post from the airport in Keflavik while we wait for our flight, so as long as our plane makes it home, hopefully I will see you soon and be able to share our experiences in person. See you on the other side of the pond, and thanks for taking the journey with us!

Germany and Beyond!

Saturday morning we checked out of the hotel and headed out, with no exact destination in mind. First, I had to find a geocache in Austria. I didn’t find one the night before, so we set out to locate one. We drove to the town of Feldkirch, Austria, and (after a little driving around) found a parking spot. The geocache was located within the walls of the Schattenburg Castle, but outside the actual castle proper. We were able to go inside the castle, where there is a restaurant, but we didn’t stay long. As Melissa told us when we first got here, after a while it is kind of, “Ho hum, another castle.” But I still think they are pretty neat to see. After finding the geocache, and looking at the castle, we walked back to our car and headed off to find another geocache that was nearby. We then wanted to go to Lichtenstein, and I wanted a geocache there, so I found one and punched the coordinates into the GPS. We stayed the night near the Austrian/Lichtenstein border, so we were only minutes away.

We drove through some beautiful farmland and popped out into a small town. We arrived at a small park area with some walking trails. We could see some stone walls where the geocache was at, so we walked up the trail and arrived at an old castle ruin. It was not a very well preserved ruin, but it was actually quite neat. It is used by people for a park, as there are a couple fire pits inside, but there was not very much left except a few walls. We searched and searched for the geocache, but could not find it. One of the irritating parts of geocaching! But, it still brought us to a neat place. I punched in some more coordinates and we headed out. We ended up in a small town that had a huge sports complex. We parked the car and walked around the complex. We found the geocache and kept walking down the path to the adjacent town. We stopped at a little pond and then continued on to the main cross road before walking back to our car. When we got back to our car the local firemen were doing a drill crossing a stream, so we walked over and watched them for a few minutes before heading out once again.

Lichtenstein is a very small country, and it didn’t take long to drive around in it. We then headed over the border in Switzerland. Lichtenstein and Switzerland share the same currency: the Swiss Franc. That is not all they share, they are both very expensive. Not as expensive as Norway, but really close. Switzerland’s road toll sticker was also very expensive. Where Czech Republic and Austria were around the fifteen to twenty dollar mark, Switzerland was almost forty five dollars. And this is just for us to drive around for a few hours! The cost of marking a new country off the map, I guess. I plugged the coordinates for a geocache into the GPS and we worked our way through some very small farm roads to the site. Right after we crossed over in Switzerland it started to rain hard. When we pulled up to the base of the hill with a castle on top (about where the geocache was), I wasn’t sure I wanted to get all wet to find it. But David said we were already way out here, we might as well go up and try to find it. Okay. We started walking up the very steep pathway (at least we were covered by trees for the first part) and lightning and thunder started up. Great. Oh well, we kept going. And we were glad we did. We walked past a hotel (way out in the middle of nowhere!) on our way up the slope to the castle. Not only was it a publicly owned, abandoned structure, but it was very well preserved and had stairs and walkways so we could walk around in it. This is one of the things I love about geocaching, finding off the beaten path places that are fantastic. We wandered around the castle, and tried to stay out of the rain as much as possible, and then headed back down to our car.

We then headed for Zurich. Driving in a new city is hard enough, but add in that I can’t read the signs and I don’t know the rules/laws very well, always add to the excitement. We looked for any kind of landmark, so we ended up going to St. Peter’s Church. Of course, I drove up some road (where the GPS told me to go) that I wasn’t supposed to. Technically it is drivable, but only for special circumstances. It was a cobblestone street, very skinny, going in-between storefronts with a multitude of pedestrians. Hmm. Then when some woman was really questioning what we were doing (and of course we have that whole language barrier thing going here), we made a few point turn around and headed back where we came from as quickly as possible. (I saw a sign later, which after knowing what I knew then, made sense. Yep, we weren’t supposed to drive there!) We found a parking spot and walked back up to the church. We checked out the church (yep, another church) and then wandered down a couple cobblestone streets looking at the stores. We then had enough and went back to our car. It was a bit crazy leaving Zurich, only one u-turn, but we finally made it back onto the highway. We then drove the two hours back to Melissa’s apartment. It was quite the weekend road trip. Over the three days we drove over 800 miles and went through four new countries!

Sunday was a lazy day. We didn’t have anything to do except drive north and pick up Melissa. It was rainy weather, so it was a great day to just relax. Of course we slept in, and then we lounged around until about 2:00pm. Originally Melissa was going to be in Sinsheim, at our meeting point (she was being dropped off by Jim, Jan, and Joanne), at 4:00pm, but because of the rain and heavy traffic she said it would be more like 4:30pm. It was about an hour and fifteen minute drive for us, but because of the weather and the fact that they were stuck in traffic, we left early. We arrived in Sinsheim about 3:30pm, never really hitting much traffic. We just missed it. We passed very heavy traffic heading south, so we weren’t in a hurry for Melissa to be there. Thank goodness. Traffic was so bad coming west (they were in Poland) that they did not get there until about 6:15pm! After transferring her pottery and glass purchases, we headed back to Böblingen. Traffic was still so bad that we took a side highway to bypass it. The “shortcut” worked great and we arrived back at Melissa’s apartment close to two hours later. We just relaxed and visited for the remainder of the evening.

We had another lazy day Monday. David and I sat around doing nothing. Okay, we actually watched a movie (the first TV/movie we have watched in “forever”), but just hung out until Melissa came home from work. (I actually walked around the walking path loop by Melissa’s apartment to get a geocache, but there were yard maintenance workers working at the exact spot the geocache is hidden. I will probably try again and I hope they didn’t destroy it!) When Melissa got home she made us all a steak dinner (delicious) and then we headed out.

Every Monday night Melissa goes to a pub for a trivia contest, so we thought we would join her. Many of her friends did not make it, so we only had one team consisting of seven people. It worked out well! Out of about 16 teams, we pulled off a win. There were three rounds of questions on sheets of paper. We aced the first round and did mediocre on the next two, but it was good enough for the win. Melissa had to work the next day, so left as soon as the trivia was over and got home around 10:00pm or so.

David and I figured that we should at least see downtown Stuttgart. Melissa explained which trains to take and we headed out on Tuesday “morningish.” We didn’t do their whole ticket system perfect, but no authorities ever talked to us so it worked out fine. We took the train to the main downtown subway station and walked around their huge pedestrian area. There were many people, shops, plazas, and booths set up for the festival starting the next day. (In Germany there is always a reason for a party or festival. They basically take down the banner for one and replace it with another.) As we were going out with Melissa that evening, we didn’t have too much time, so we walked around for an hour or so and then headed back to the subway.

We then took train to the Mercedes Benz museum. It is a huge, 8 floor building where you start at the top and walk down ramps to each floor. It started with the beginning history and the first automobiles, engines, etc, and then continued on to the present, concept cars, and racecars. Going down each ramp in between floors they had information on the walls about the current world affairs at the time of the floor’s timeframe. It was a great museum that we “flew through” in an hour and a half. This is definitely a place that you could spend many hours in. We caught the train back home. When we first got on the train in Böblingen, we purchased a roundtrip, four zone pass to get us to the city center. When we went to the MB museum, we had to purchase a roundtrip, two zone pass. No big deal until we had to return. We needed to use our two zone pass to get back to the main downtown station, and then use our four zone pass to get back to Böblingen. The problem is that it is the exact same train and we had to validate our ticket in the station. Trains run every fifteen minutes or so, but we didn’t want to get off and wait. There were a few people getting on the train at the station, so we ran off the train when it stopped, ran to the ticket validation machine, punched the ticket, and then barely made it back on the train before the doors closed. Phew! The last thing I wanted to do was get fined for not validating my ticket, even though they don’t check that often. But you know Murphy’s Law….

When Melissa got home from work we headed out once again. Melissa belongs to a running group (Hashers) that goes out every Sunday and Tuesday. (This is a world-wide group, with many people doing it all over the globe.) This is not a typical run, but more of a race through paths, woods, etc where you try to catch the “hare,” or leader. The Hare sets a course earlier in the day with dead-ends, etc and then runs the correct route during the race. He is given a head start and then the group tries to catch him. He leaves clues along the way, but sometimes they can lead to dead ends. The leaders of the pack trying to catch him will find his clue and then search all around it to find another clue as to which way he went. When they find the trail again, all of the others (sometimes still catching up with the leaders) take off in the right direction. Sometimes the catch the Hare, sometimes they don’t. It is all part of the game, but it is mainly about the run. On Sundays it is more of a family event where people bring their children and they will set up a shorter walking trail as well. Luckily for me and a few others, the Hare set up a walking trail for Tuesday. The group was close to catching the Hare, but they were a little behind by the time everyone got to the finish point. After the race every sat around visiting and eating dinner. (Usually everyone chips in and buys dinner, but the Hare was leaving Europe so he treated everyone.) After standing around and visiting for an hour or so, we went back home to bed.

Melissa was borrowing a car from a coworker, so David and I could take her car on a road trip on Wednesday. We dropped Melissa off at work just after 7:00am (she was taking her coworkers car from work) and we headed out. We were going to drive up to Luxembourg and Belgium, and see what happened. (I also wanted to find geocaches in these “new” countries, but I am not going to hash out every one of these in this post.) We were thinking we might spend the night somewhere and then drive back to Böblingen the next day, but we were not sure. The only thing we knew to go to was the Luxembourg American Cemetery and Memorial. This is an American cemetery, taken care of by Americans, where many soldiers who died during WWII are buried. (Almost half of the servicemen who were originally buried here were reinterred back home.) This is also the cemetery that General George S. Patton is buried at. We took about an hour or so walking around the cemetery, reading the plaques and information boards, looking in the chapel, and roaming around the cemetery looking at all of the white crosses marking the graves. It is an excellent memorial and the grounds are kept up marvelously.

After driving around a little, we headed over to Belgium. I really wanted a Belgium waffle, actually in Belgium, so I found a place online that was supposed to be excellent. We drove to the town of Arlon, Belgium, and found the restaurant. Unfortunately, the quit serving waffles a couple hours before we got there, so I had to settle for a crepe instead. I was a little bummed out, but what do you do? After we ate we drove up to Bastogne. There was another great memorial there that I read about online. We were not expecting it to be as large as it was though! It was not some small memorial, it was a huge structure! Not only was it very large, but they also had a staircase so you could climb up to the top of it and look around the panoramic view. It is a totally open-air structure, and inside they have the story of the Battle of the Bulge written on the walls. Around the outside and inside they have the names of all fifty states inscribed. There is also a crypt onsite, but it was closed while we were there. After walking around, and taking many pictures, we headed out once again.

Because it only added about an hour and a half to drive through the Netherlands, we headed in that direction. We drove through a couple small towns and then we drove out to the countryside. There were many walking trails, and so this is where I found a couple geocaches. We then drove back over into Germany and ate at McDonald’s. We decided that it was too late to really do anything, so if we stayed in a hotel somewhere we would just have to head out in the morning to make it back in time to pick up Melissa from work. So we just drove back to Boblingen (saving the money for a hotel), arriving about 12:30am, so we could do something during the next day (while we had a car) before picking Melissa up from work. In all, we drove just over 600 miles and made it to three new countries in our 17 hour day. Not bad!

We slept in Thursday morning and didn’t get going until almost lunchtime. We drove about 15 minutes to the Ritter Sport chocolate factory. I had never heard of them (believe it or not), but they are quite famous for their chocolates. They have a museum, but they do not have a factory tour, instead we just visited their store and bought some “samples.” Ok, David bought a few bags of their small individuals and I bought a grab bag of their full size candy bars, almost 4.5 pounds of chocolate! Either they will melt or I will have quite the stomach ache coming up. (And yes, the “little” that I have tried is delicious.) We then meandered back to the apartment and hung out for a couple hours until we were to meet Melissa at her work.

We met Melissa at the base and followed her to her friend’s house to drop off his car. We then headed to downtown Stuttgart for the festival of the week. Not only was the festival area huge, but it was crowded! On a Thursday night, no less! It took us a few minutes to locate her friends that we were meeting, but once we found them we enjoyed a good dinner and sat around visiting for hours. We didn’t leave until after 10:00pm and it took us a little longer than it should have to get home. We got on the wrong train heading in the opposite direction that we needed to go and didn’t notice it for a few stops. We got off that train and took the next train back to where we came from. The only problem was, this train ended one stop before we needed it to. We then had to take a bus for the one stop (our ticket covered all public transportation, so at least we didn’t have to pay more!) We then arrived at the correct station and walked back to Melissa’s car. She had to work the next morning, so Melissa went straight to bed and David and I wound down a bit before heading to bed.

Traveling for two months can be exhausting. David and I have been so thankful for some easy days while staying at Melissa’s house. We have gone out and traveled a bit while here, but we have also had a few slow, relaxing days. Friday was another one. We slept in and sat around until Melissa got home from work. We went out to eat at a restaurant a very short distance from her house and then went back for the evening. We sat around visiting and watched a movie, and then went to bed.

We got up Saturday morning and headed out for France. We stopped off at the city of Strasbourg and toured around their Petite France area for about an hour or so and then continued on to Ribeauvillé. We met Jim, Jan, and Joanne (that we had met previously) for lunch in town, and then they had to head home. We then drove out to the campground and set up our tents. We sat around visiting with many people as they began showing up until 7:00pm when we then walked about a half mile or so into town. We went with some of the people that were camping and we met others that were staying in a hotel in town and we all went to dinner. We stayed at the restaurant until almost 10:30pm before finally heading back to the campground. The streets of Ribeauvillé were still quite alive! There was a large Irish bagpipe group playing and marching around town; so we followed them! They were headed in our direction anyway, so when they marched into the quarters and stopped playing, we just continued walking to the campground for the night.

We got up Sunday morning and hung around the campground until 11:30am or so, and then walked into town. Along the way we were able to see some of the parade floats and participants getting ready for the festivities. It was a taste of what was to come, and it was looking pretty fantastic. They had the whole main part of town blockaded and we paid an admission fee to get there. The town was crowded. There is no other way to describe it. We walked down the main part of town, through the throngs of people, and made it to our table. David and I wandered around town a little bit, and then met up back at our table. Some friends of Melissa stayed in the restaurant’s hotel, so they were able to reserve three tables right on the parade route. While everyone else stood for the parade, we were able to sit at our tables. (Of course, most of us still stood to take pictures and see up and down the line.) The parade did not start until 3:00pm, but our lunch was served at 1:00pm so we would be done before it started.

Here is a little background on the festival. The Minstrel Festival is the oldest festival in the Alsace region of France. It perpetuates the links between the Lords Ribeaupierre of Ribeauvillé and the minstrels they used to protect. Every year has a new theme; this year’s theme followed a Wagner opera. (I don’t remember which one off hand.) The parade participants are not just from the small town of Ribeauvillé, but from many of the surrounding towns. Each float in the parade told a part of the story of the opera, and each float was from a different town. The floats, music, and costumes were completely amazing! I have never been to another parade that comes close to topping this one. The parade took two and a half hours, and it left you wanting to see more! Pictures help show what it was like, but they cannot even begin to give the experience of being there. The atmosphere was so vibrant and alive!

The parade ended at 5:30pm and David, Melissa, and I decided to head back to Boblingen. We still had to pack up our bags for our morning flight, and we also had to hang up our camping gear to let it dry out. It was nice on Sunday for the parade, but it sprinkled on Saturday so we had to let everything dry out. Traffic was not the greatest, so we were glad we left when we did. It is about a two hour drive, but we got back to Melissa’s apartment around 9:00pm (after eating too). We then hung up our tents and gear in the attic to dry out, and then we packed up our bags and went to bed.

Our time in Germany with Melissa was incredible. I don’t know how much she enjoyed us being there, but we thoroughly enjoyed our stay. Not only did we get to travel around a little bit and see other countries, but she was a great host and let us see her life. A lot of people always try to be tour guides when they have visitors (which Melissa did as well), but just being able to go out with Melissa and her friends was so much fun! Instead of being “tourists” in Böblingen/Stuttgart, we were able to “live” there for a couple weeks. The parade and festival in Ribeauvillé was the grand finale to our trip. We still have a few days in Iceland, but we are now in the “end of our trip” mode. We have already been to Iceland before, so we will see how much energy we have to tour around. The time in Germany was basically the end of our trip, and Ribeauvillé was a great way to end it.

One of Melissa’s friends, Jim, who we met previously, happened to be going to Copenhagen for work and that is where our flight connection was as well. We picked Jim up Monday morning and then headed for the airport, getting there about two hours early. Everything went fast and smooth, so we had time to sit and visit with Jim before our flight left. We arrived in Copenhagen to find out that the Danish security had gone on strike. Because Jim was staying in Copenhagen, he just went to find his bags and go to his hotel, but David and I had to go check in for our connecting flight and see what all was going on. We had an eight hour layover and had planned on going into downtown to sightsee. We checked in and got our boarding passes, and then found out that the strike had been resolved and it should all clear up by the afternoon/evening. The airport was very crowded with people who had missed their flights because they could not go through security. People who had already gone through security before the strike were able to leave on their planes (which left with very minimal passengers), but those who were not were on their own. Something like this is not refundable; so many people had to purchase new tickets to get wherever they were headed. When we boarded our plane later that evening, we sat next to a man who was taking it all pretty well. He had gone through security with plenty of time before his plane, so he went back out for a cigarette. He called it his “Twenty-six hour smoke.” He went out, the security personnel went on strike, and he could not get back in and missed his flight.

The strike was over so we decided to go to the downtown area. Luckily the Metro train station at the airport was at the terminal where we arrived at and were leaving from. It was a pretty short line, so we bought our tickets and boarded the train. It only took about 12 minutes to reach downtown, so we found a map at the train station and started walking around. We walked to one of the main areas, saw some neat buildings and their multitude of statues and fountains (not quite like Rome though), and then walked through a large pedestrian area with many shops. We browsed a couple souvenir shops and then grabbed some lunch. We were both completely exhausted from our long weekend and late night, so we headed back to the airport early. We only stayed downtown for a couple hours, but we decided we were tired and we also didn’t want to take any chances back at the airport.

We took the train back to the airport and saw that it was still quite hectic. We were also glad we took the train into town when we did, because when we got back the line to buy train tickets was very long. We assumed that it was because people who missed their flights could not get another flight, and then had to head back into town to find hotels. Glad we were just passing through! The security line was actually quite short, so we had a lot of time to kill. We sat at Starbucks for about an hour, then we went outside for a half hour or so, and then we decided to just head to the gate and wait. We still had a little over two hours before boarding, but we just wanted to sit in comfortable chairs and relax. We boarded our plane a little late and then we sat there. There is nothing worse than just sitting on a non-moving plane at the terminal. Because of all of the security problems, there was a huge backup of planes trying to take off. We finally got in line at the runway and slowly made our way to the end. A little over an hour late, we finally took off. An added bonus was the massive headwind we were flying into. This added an extra fifty minutes onto our flight time. Our flight was crowded and hot, so it felt like a really long flight. The saving factor is that it was an IcelandAir plane; they have great planes and are a great airline. Each seat has its own screen and you can choose many different movies or shows to watch.

We finally arrived at Keflavik airport in Iceland a little after 10:00pm local time. (There is a two hour time difference between Copenhagen and Iceland.) Keflavik airport is fairly small, so I was wondering about our rental car, but luckily the car rental agency had someone waiting at the airport with our name on a sign. He picked us up, brought us to their shop, and we were able to pick up our car. We then drove the 45 minutes to Reykjavik and arrived at our hotel, the same hotel we stayed at on a previous trip three years ago. By the time we finally got in our room it was closing in on 11:30pm (1:30am on our body’s time), so we went straight to bed.

Leaving Rome, Arriving in Germany, and Touring Europe

We got up Monday morning, our last day in Rome, and took our time getting ready for the day. Our flight to Stuttgart didn’t leave until 4:40pm, so we had some time to kill. We checked out of our hotel around 10:00am, left our bags with the bellhop, and headed out for one last tour around Rome. Because we had missed the Pantheon, that was our destination. We walked down to the Trevi fountain one more time on the way; it was empty and they were cleaning it out (both washing it and collecting all of the coins). We kept meandering down the alleys, past all of the vendors and shops (stopping in a few), and popped out in the Pantheon plaza. We went in and looked at it; not quite what we expected. It was great, but we thought there were going to be multiple rooms to go through, instead it is one massive circular room with objects around the outer wall. There were a few really neat sculptures and mementos. One that I thought was great to see was the artist Raphael’s tomb. He died and was immediately buried there in 1520.

After touring around inside we exited the Pantheon with more time than we thought we would have. We needed to kill time until 1:00pm, the time we had a taxi scheduled to pick us up at the hotel. We were also trying to not sweat too much, as we had to fly and then go to our cousin Melissa’s house, and it ended up being one of the hottest days we had in Rome. We just had to walk slower, stay in the shade as much as possible, and just take our time everywhere. Oh no!! (This is hard for me to do!) We didn’t want to walk too much farther away from our hotel, but a few blocks away was a really neat plaza, according to our tourist map, to check out. We walked through an alley and popped out into a huge, magnificent courtyard plaza, the Piazza Navona. There was a tall monument in the center, with fountains at each end. There was also a large building (I am not sure what it was) that was very ornate with a large dome. After a while, there are so many really old, ornate buildings that they sort of become “ho-hum,” but they are still always fantastic to see. There were also many, many street vendors in the plaza selling their wares. David made a purchase and then we started heading back toward our hotel.

We wandered back through some streets we had never been through, walking past some huge government buildings, and ended up back at the Trevi Fountain again. Still empty, but the area surrounding it was filling up with people. Even empty, the fountain has a special draw for people. We then walked back to the hotel area and went in to McDonald’s. We were both quite hot, and starting to get too sweaty, so we thought we would just relax in the air conditioning. We both ate a light lunch and sat there for about a half hour or so cooling off. It was then 12:30pm, so we walked the two blocks to our hotel and gathered our bags. The concierge called the taxi and he was there in less than five minutes! We then took off for the airport.

Taxi drivers are just fun. There is no other way to put it. He was flying through the streets, passing people all over, and almost making me hold on. He also took some shortcut, which made us both a bit nervous (some guy driving us through some deserted back alley on the outskirts of Rome), and we made great time getting to the airport. We walked in and found which desk we had to check-in at (which was not open yet) and saw the line for another flight. It was so long there was no way they could all get through the line before their flight left. There was one man standing in line for when they would open our desk and start check-in, so we decided to not risk having that long of a line and waited too. It took about 45 minutes before they opened the desk, and our line wasn’t that long, but we were still glad to have waited it out. We checked our bags, got our boarding passes, and then headed through the security. We figured that if the check-in lines were that long, we better not chance it. The security ended up being quite fast, so we had about two hours to kill waiting for our plane. Oh well, better than missing the plane, right? Because we purchased checked bags, we also had seats at the front with lots of legroom (and a “free” meal). As with a few other things on this trip, money well spent. It was only an hour and a half flight, but being able to stretch out was glorious!

We arrived at the airport in Stuttgart, Germany, and got our bags fairly quickly. We walked through the customs area and Melissa was right there to greet us. There are many good reasons to see our cousin, but seeing a familiar face, who speaks English!, was just a great feeling. We stopped off at a local restaurant and had dinner on our way to her apartment, which is in Böblingen, a suburb of Stuttgart. We then got to her apartment, she gave us the tour, and then we sat around visiting. As she had to get up for work in the morning, and she just got back from work after coming straight from a trip up to Sweden, Finland, and Estonia, she was very tired and needed to get to bed. She still didn’t go to bed until around 11:00pm or so! I love family J

The next two days were almost total relaxation for me and David. We slept in Tuesday morning and just relaxed until Melissa came home from work. Well, we both did laundry; clothes smelling like laundry detergent never smelled so good! After washing our clothes in sinks (except for one time in Inderøy) for the last 6 weeks, using a regular washing machine was just amazing! It is the small things in life…… I also got caught up on a few computer things that have been piling up. It is amazing how dependent we have become on Internet access. I was also finally able to post my pictures from Rome on Facebook!

When Melissa got home, she changed clothes and we went out. We first had to go to the military base to get permission for me to be able to drive her car. David was also supposed to drive, but he misplaced his international driver’s permit. (We think he may have accidentally packed it with the things he sent home.) After getting permission to drive her car, we went to the mall on base and picked up a few things and had a light lunch. We then drove to a couple nearby towns that Melissa wanted to show us.

The first town, Bebenhausen, was a small walled city. We walked around inside for a while, me taking pictures of course, and then we headed for the next town. Tubingen is much larger and is a university city. We parked the car and walked through the main part of town. There were many shops, some of which we wandered through, and many beautiful Bavarian buildings. It was like walking through a large, authentic, Leavenworth, Washington! We walked through the town and went to a park that is a skinny, but really long island in the middle of the river that runs through town. We walked down the length of the island and then back again, enjoying the scenery (many small gondola type boats going up and down the river, as well as the buildings along it) and each other’s company.

We then headed back to Böblingen and went to a Mexican restaurant that Melissa had wanted to try. Nobody was too impressed with the food, but it was sustenance. We then went back to her apartment. While Melissa was packing her clothes for her upcoming long-weekend trip to Poland, David and I visited with our cousin Sarah, back in Silverton, via Facetime on Melissa’s iPad. Technology definitely has its perks! Melissa went to bed while we were talking to Sarah, and then after chatting with her for a while, we said our goodbyes and we went to bed.

Wednesday was another lazy day. These two days of relaxation were so wonderful after six weeks of pretty much on the run traveling. Especially after 6 days of walking all over Rome! We lounged around the apartment, I finished catching up on some computer work, and we packed our bags for a long weekend jaunt around Europe. Melissa got home from work and we headed out. She was meeting three friends in Ansbach (Jim, Jan, and Joanne), about two hours away, at a house they own. They do not live there anymore, but they have rented it out to a friend of theirs. We all met up at the house and their friend that lives in the house, Bonnie, made an unbelievable meal for all of us. When it comes to hosting, she went all out! After a salad starter, we had (and of course I didn’t have everything) ham, a delicious potato dish, a yams and cinnamon apples dish, broccoli, and whatever else I am forgetting. After that she had two different desserts; a coconut cream dessert and a multilayered cake. Yes, she went all out. After we all ate, we sat around visiting for a couple hours before heading for bed.

We woke up Thursday morning and visited over pastries from the local bakery in town that Jim, Jan, and Joanne walked down to get. We then parted ways: Bonnie to work, Jim, Jan, Joanne, and Melissa headed for a pottery festival in Poland, and David and I headed out for a road trip. We drove a short distance to Rothenburg (full name is Rothenburg ob der Tauber), probably the best preserved walled city in the world. We were not prepared for what it was. We parked our car, paid for an hour and a half parking, and walked to the wall. It took us a couple minutes to find a way in, and then we entered through the opening. It was really neat. We turned left after we entered and saw some doors to go in. We walked past the doors to start with and went out to the main entrance to the city. After checking out the entrance, with a bridge across a huge moat, we walked back into the city and walked in one of the doors. It went inside the entrance buildings and we were able to walk up and around the front section of the city. We then exited this area, to the outside of the city, and walked back around through the moat (which has been turned into a nice park-type area). We then entered the wall through another door and went back up to the main entrance area. We then went in another door that went up and around the building to the perimeter wall. This was a walkway that went along the wall around the city. Not the entire walled-in city has walkways along the wall that is accessible to the public, so we hear. We never got to the end of it. We knew it would be bigger than Bebenhausen, but we didn’t expect what we saw. This was not a walled-in town; it was a walled-in city! It was gigantic! Walking along the wall we could see out over the buildings. The city is a fully functioning city; people lived in all of the houses, there were many, many businesses along all the streets that did not have houses on them. The place was huge! We kept walking quite a ways along the wall until I noticed the time; we only had about 25 minutes to get back to our car. We then went down one of the stairways off the wall walkway and worked our way back to our starting point. We walked through quite a few house-lined streets, and one of the main streets full of businesses, before we got back to where we started from. And we did not even come close to seeing a fraction of the city. Well, so much for thinking we could just bomb through and see it in a short time. Oh well, it is a place I could definitely go back to and spend some time roaming the streets. We made it back to our car with about 5 minutes to spare; not that there were any cops or meter maids in sight, but we didn’t want to have to explain to Melissa that we got a parking ticket within 2 hours of her lending us her car!

We then decided to drive to the Czech Republic before heading down to Dachau. We were not that far away, so we could go and pin another county in our map of countries visited. We drove a couple hours and went to a bigger city, Plzen (Pilsen). It was so crowded and we could not find/figure out their parking system, so we just drove around town for a while and then headed out. (My regret is that we didn’t spend more time here, figure out the parking, and get out walking around and taking pictures. There were quite a few neat park areas and plazas that were pretty nice.) I was on a mission to find at least one geocache; I wasn’t to be persuaded! I punched in the coordinates to one not too far away and we set out. We ended up going down a rutted up old road, out in the middle of nowhere, and finally popped out at the edge of a really small town. The geocache was still over a half mile roundtrip, through a farmer’s recently plowed field, with houses around us. I wasn’t about to try for this one. Disgusted, I found another one closer to the freeway, and punched those coordinates into the GPS.

It brought us to an even smaller town that had a huge building along the road. We pulled in to a small parking area close to the geocache and I went to see if I could find it. It was located down some ravine with nettles and trees along the bank. Once again, I wasn’t about to try for it. Being this far out in the Czech Republic, where very few, if any, people speak English, I wasn’t about to risk any weird confrontations. Instead we just walked through the doorway in the large building. It went through a little portico into a very large courtyard. There were a number of restaurants and shops in it (mostly closed) and a large Catholic church making up one part of the courtyard. There were a few people sitting at some outside tables for one of the open restaurants, but they didn’t pay us too much attention as we walked in, took a couple pictures, and then walked back out again. Disgusted again at not finding a geocache, I punched in the coordinates for another one at a rest area close to the Germany border. I was getting down to my last chances here!

This rest area was quite large. It not only had a large truck stop, but it also had McDonald’s at it. Thank goodness! We had not eaten anything all day and it was about 4:00pm, we were hungry! We had wanted to eat at the McDonald’s in Plzen, but we couldn’t find any parking. We wanted to keep up with our tradition of eating at a McDonald’s in every country we visit, so this was our chance. And, most importantly, the geocache was in the McDonald’s parking lot and it was an easy find! Woohoo! I knocked out two birds with one stone! I tried to find one more that was supposed to be in the rest area complex, but the road was barricaded that we were supposed to drive down. Oh well, I got one so I should just be happy with it. We then set the GPS to head down toward Dachau.

One thing to mention here: the Autobahn is awesome! I will probably not get used to it, but it is a weird feeling to be driving down the freeway at 100mph and being passed by someone like we were standing still. This happened so often, but we were still in awe. It wasn’t just young guys driving fast, it was everyone from business men driving home from work to families in the family wagon driving somewhere. It was just incredible. I mainly drove between 80mph and 90mph, where it was unlimited speed, but once in a while I got up over 100mph. Because this is my cousin’s car, I don’t want to push it too much. (I am sure I will by the time the weekend is done! Sorry Melissa J ) It is tempting to rent a sports car for one day just to take it out and drive really fast.

Anyway, the whole point of talking about the Autobahn is that we made pretty good time getting down to Munich. I was not sure what the hotel situation would be in Dachau (or in Munich, for that matter), so we punched in a hotel on the outskirts of Munich and headed there. This is how David and I like to travel, just find a hotel on the fly, but I was nervous about how it would be in Europe. We figured we would have to search for a while and try many different hotels before finding one, but we got lucky on the first one. It was pretty cheap, available, had parking, and was nice and clean. We checked in, put our bags in the room, and then headed out to see what we could find. It was about a half mile walk to the main part of the town (a suburb of Munich) and when we got to the main crossroad we smelled pizza. Sold! Not only was it good (I had pizza and David had a calzone), but it was also cheap. After we ate we walked back to our hotel and relaxed. (I also took this time to write this blog post up to this point. I had not written anything since our last day in Rome, so I thought I better write down everything I could remember before I forgot more than I probably already have.)

We woke up Friday morning, checked out of the hotel, and headed for Dachau. We weren’t sure what to expect, but we thought we would spend about an hour there and then head toward our next destination. Little did we know! Dachau was very impressive. It was a mixture of emotions to be there: sad, disgusted, intrigued, fascinated. We spent three hours touring around the grounds. We went through the prison cell block that is still standing and open for visitors. We were able to walk down the corridor and peek into many of the cells. They had a lot of information about many of the more famous prisoners in the cells that they occupied, and they had a lot of information about many of the Nazis who served there. We went through another prison building that has been transformed into a museum. It had multiple banners and boards talking all about the camp and the war. It also had a room for the survivors where many of those who survived the camp and lived to be older were honored. Of course there was also the memorial room with many artifacts, etc. We took a lot of time going through this building, but there is only so much a person can take, so we went through it a bit faster toward the end.

We then walked across the grounds, which were very expansive, and looked at the perimeter wall that was recreated many years ago to what it had been during the war. Across the grounds were all of the foundations for the other barracks that housed prisoners. We walked to a memorial that looked like it was created out of some old structure, and we also visited a church of sorts that was built as a memorial to the Polish prisoners who were killed. We then went through a gate in the wall and entered the crematorium area. This was disgusting when you looked at it and knew what it was for. We toured inside and saw the furnaces and also went through the “showers” that were used to gas prisoners. We then walked around a pathway that went back behind the buildings and walked past the shooting wall where prisoners were executed. Along this path were also many small memorials showing where the ashes of a multitude of unknown persons were buried. We had enough of this area and walked back into the main camp. We went through the one barrack that was open for touring. It showed the bunk beds (newly recreated) that were used to house the prisoners. This was neat to see to be able to understand how they were able to imprison so many people; around 60,000 at one time at the height of its use. After this we exited Dachau and made our way back to our car.

We then set out to find the Neuschwanstein Castle. This castle is very famous, even though it was built in the 1800s. It was this castle that Walt Disney modeled his Sleeping Beauty castle after. The castle was magnificent! We read up on it and decided to not take the inside tour. It didn’t seem that you would see that much more, we were running late of our “scheduled plans,” and just wanted to see the outside. We took a little bus up to the top and walked to a bridge that spans high above a river and looked out to the castle. The view was amazing! The bridge was crammed with people taking pictures, and had wooden planks for the base, so we joked about how lucky we were it didn’t fall once we got back off of it. We took many pictures of the castle and surrounding area and then walked back down to the turn off to go to the castle, and then walked up. Up close and personal, the castle is immense. We took many more pictures and then walked up the pathway to the entrance. The tour is for the interior of the castle, but we could still go inside the inner courtyard of it and look around. I did not think we would be able to do this, so it was an added bonus. Inside the walls was also very impressive. We took quite a few pictures and then slowly worked our way back down. It was getting late in the day, so the bus would not sell any more tickets, so we had to walk back down to the parking area/town. It only took about 20 minutes to walk back down, so it wasn’t too bad. We went through a few of the souvenir shops at the bottom and then headed for our car.

We weren’t exactly sure what to do. It was already fairly late, so we didn’t really want to drive to the town I had originally planned on trying to stay in. We could drive back to Melissa’s apartment and stay there, but it was about a 2 hour drive, or we could just drive closer to where we wanted to go and hope to find a hotel. We went with option B. We plugged a hotel into our GPS and drove on. We got to the Austrian border and luckily, at the last minute, I pulled off the exit. As with the Czech Republic, we had to pull in and purchase a toll pass. We bought the toll sticker and the continued on. We pulled into the small town of Rankweil, Austria, and drove to the hotel.

The lady at the desk laughed when David asked if there were any rooms available. I guess a town not too far from there was having some festival or something and the whole town of Rankweil was gone. So yes, they had rooms available. Phew! It was after 8:00pm, in the “middle of nowhere,” and we didn’t want to have to drive all over to find another hotel. She asked if we wanted to see the room before we agreed, and we said, “No, it will be perfect because we aren’t driving anywhere else!”  We dropped off our bags and walked down the street to find a restaurant that the hotel clerk said would still be open. The streets were pretty much deserted, on a Friday night! So yes, I guess the whole town did leave for the festival. We ate dinner, which took about an hour and a half, and then went back to our hotel room, now 10:00pm. The hotel had Internet, so I finished writing this blog and posted it! Yahoo! We have now been in nine countries on this trip, and we hope to add at least two more tomorrow. It has been quite the ride!

Rome: Caput Mundi (The Capital of the World)

When my alarm went off at 3:45am (I know some of you normally get up that early, but I don’t!) I about croaked. I didn’t sleep too much, just off and on during the night, but it was still hard to get up that early after a day of a lot of walking and a later night. But all is well that ends well. We caught the 4:45am shuttle to the airport and we didn’t have any problems at the airport. We arrived at Rome Fiumicino airport a little after 11:00am and caught a shuttle van to our airport. We were going to take the train into town, but it didn’t leave for a half hour and the shuttle van would drop us off right at the hotel. It only cost a little more, and it was money well spent! We checked in to our hotel, dropped off our luggage, and headed out.

We had no idea where to go, but we headed out anyway! It was beautiful, sunny, and hot; just what we wanted/needed after a cooler month in Norway and a cooler few days in Ireland. Heat at last! We started wandering down the main street near our hotel and turned in the direction of the Colosseum. Well, wrong turn; exactly opposite wrong direction. No problem though, this is Rome. There is something fantastic in every direction! We ended up at the famous Spanish Steps and the fountain at the base of the steps in the Piazza di Spagna. After wandering around for a bit in the area, I used my phone to find out where we were and how to get to the Colosseum. (Yep, I used my phone quite a bit in Rome for directions. The roads are not laid out in nice, even squares, so it is easy to get turned around.) After looking at my map I saw that I took a right instead of a left from the main road near our hotel. No problem, we just started walking again. On the way we found the Fontana di Trevi. The Trevi Fountain is one of the most famous fountains in the world, and it is the largest Baroque fountain in Rome. After looking at it for a few minutes, we kept moving on toward the Colosseum and ate a sandwich at a little street vendor.

Walking up the street, we were able to see part of the Colosseum between buildings before it came into full view. It was looking quite impressive! Once we finally got to it, yep, it was a lot larger than we thought it would be. It was one very extraordinary ruin! We took some pictures and hung out in the area for a little while, but because we were doing a tour of it the next day, we didn’t stay very long. (I just had to find out how to get there and see where to go for our tour.) Because we were both tired and did not sleep much the night before, we headed back to our hotel and took naps; very needed!

We got up and walked back to the Spanish Steps and sat and people watched. The fountains of Rome are all drinking water, so there were lines of people to walk up to the two spots where you could fill your water bottles or splash water on yourself at the fountain. The water actually tasted better than at our hotel! After we walked around a bit more, we stopped off at a gelateria for some gelato. David got a small cone and I wanted a dish, the big one. He questioned me about it, but I said yes. Well, it was quite large. It was also decorated with many little pieces of wafers, etc and I was getting a little uncomfortable watching him make it! He knew it was only for me, but he gave me two spoons in it anyway. It cost a fortune, but it was worth it; it tasted great and it was just what I needed! We then wandered around the area a bit longer, and then we headed back to our hotel for the night.

We had to get up fairly early Thursday morning for our tour of the Colosseum. We needed to be there at least a half hour early, and we wanted to be sure we could find it! We left our hotel at 8:15am and walked the 1.2 miles to the Colosseum arriving early enough to go inside and to take some pictures. We then walked back out to our meeting point and waited for our tour to start. The tour was most assuredly worth it! Not only did we have a guide to explain things to us, but we were also able to go to different parts of the Colosseum that the normal public could not go. We started off the tour by going out onto the arena floor. They have recently built part of the arena floor back over the underground ruins to show what it all looked like. After explaining quite a few things, our guide then gave us a few minutes to take pictures. After that, we headed down to the underground; the place where the gladiators, hunters, and animals used to enter the Colosseum floor. Yes, most of the “underground” is visible from everywhere in the arena, but we actually went down and looked at everything from the actual underground perspective and saw the arena floor from the underside. After more explanations and picture taking, we headed back up to the public areas. Our guide explained a few more things as we walked through the public area, and then we headed up to the upper sections where the public could not go. Felt kind of special when our guide kept unlocking gates for us to go through! We climbed the steps to the upper area and she explained more about the history and workings of the arena. We then had time to take more pictures and wander around a little bit in the area open to us. Then our tour was over and we all walked back down to the main area. David and I then walked around the public areas, taking pictures and enjoying the fascination of actually standing in the Roman Colosseum! There is so much history here, and in all of Rome, especially for a Christian, that everything is quite awe inspiring.

We exited the Colosseum and took more pictures from the outside, and then decided to head to the Mamertine Prison. I wanted to go to Rome for two things: the Roman Colosseum and Mamertine Prison. Everything else in Rome, as great as it is, was just a bonus. The prison is not far from the Colosseum, so it only took ten minutes or so to get there. The tour is a guided, short tour using headphones to explain things. We were told when we purchased our tickets that it was a fairly religious tour; great! It did lean a bit toward Catholicism, but was actually quite good. I am sure that someone who is not a Christian might feel uncomfortable, but I thought it was great. We went down into one of the cells that has been preserved, went to another area where we could look down into some of the ruins, went to a couple different videos (which were very religious, explaining Salvation, etc.), and then ended in a small chapel. In the chapel was almost a sermon of sorts, and then it basically ended with a moment of silence for reflection on what Christ has done for everyone who believes.

We exited the prison and then headed to McDonalds for a quick lunch. It was the craziest McDonalds I have ever been in. There were many counters and they also had computers set up to purchase your food and then pick it up at a special counter. And the place was packed! It was a really neat setup for the restaurant, basically subterranean. We walked through a McDonalds Café, with a few seats, and walked up some stairs into the restaurant. (Because of the road elevation, we were still underground even though we walked up stairs to the restaurant.) We fought our way through the line, got our food, and then wandered around for a few minutes before we finally found a couple seats next to some people at a seating bar. After we ate we headed back to our hotel to rest. I knew we would be walking a lot in Rome, but not this much!

I didn’t think I was that tired and that I wouldn’t even take a nap, but I did fall asleep, for around two hours! It felt great and I was ready to head back out for more! We started walking in the direction of the Spanish steps, but once again my sense of bearing was a little off. Didn’t matter though, we found a little restaurant and stopped off to eat. David had lasagna and I had spaghetti; we wanted to at least eat something Italian while in Rome! We took our leisure time and then headed out. Instead of getting to the Spanish steps, I was a few blocks off and we ended up at the Trevi Fountain instead. The place was so crowded! It was some Italian holiday so there were many Italians out and about besides the normal tourists. I had to jockey my way around in order to take pictures, but it was worth it to be able to people watch at the same time. There was still a little light in the sky when we first got there, so it was a very beautiful setting; the fountain lit up, soft light on the sculptures and buildings, a dark blue in the sky. I just wished that it wasn’t so busy so I could take a really good picture. (Not that I am a great photographer, but I might be able to take better pictures if I wasn’t always being jostled.) We hung out for quite some time; I took many, many pictures hoping a couple might turn out decent, and we each threw a coin into the fountain (Rome tradition). We went in to a little gelateria and had more gelato (great stuff by the way) and then stood around watching people (and taking more pictures, of course). We finally decided to start the walk back to our hotel, so we headed out. It was probably a mile back to our hotel, and it was still very warm out, so we were both quite hot and sweaty once again. I love it! We got back to our hotel and relaxed for a while, did a few necessary chores, and then headed to bed.

We got up Friday morning and headed to the Palatino (the Emperor’s Palace) and Roman Forum. Our tickets to the Colosseum gave us entrance to these, but they had to be used by the next day. We didn’t know how long it would take, so we didn’t do it on Thursday after the Colosseum, instead leaving it until Friday. Good thing we did. The Palatino is huge! The Roman Forum, which is not that big of an area, did not take us too long to go through, but the Palatino took us over three hours to tour. There were a couple areas of the palace that we missed, but by the time we saw one nice one that we had missed it, we didn’t have the energy to go all the way back to it. The actual palace itself was very large, but it is the grounds that make the whole palace immense. Everything is ruins, but there are many, many that are still quite well preserved. The Roman Forum has very little in regards to large ruins; most are fairly small in stature, but great in historical value. After touring the grounds and looking in some of the museums, we exited and headed back to our hotel to relax. This has been a long trip for my legs and knees, and although worth the pain, I definitely need some downtime after walking so many miles and standing around so much.

After we napped, relaxed in the room, and cooled down, I went online and purchased tickets for the next day to visit the Vatican museum and the Sistine Chapel. We then headed out and wandered around town a bit so I could find a few geocaches. At one place I was fiddling around with a wolf statue connected to a flag pole when a local woman came up to me and started talking to me in Italian. I tried to convey that I didn’t understand and she kept pointing at the wolf and jabbering away. Finally she said a word I understood; Polizia. I tried to tell her that I wasn’t doing anything, but she was very adamant. I wasn’t about to try and explain geocaching to the Italian police, so we just left and searched for another one. After we wandered around a bit, we found ourselves close to the Spanish Steps. We found a little restaurant nearby, so we stopped off for some dinner. David had lasagna and I had some short noodle pasta dish. I thought mine was fantastic! I was tempted to order another helping, but decided I would be better off with some gelato. We wandered over to the Spanish Steps, which were quite busy once again. This was a Friday night after all, plus many of the Romans were now on their normal vacations. We walked down to one of the gelaterias, got some gelato, and ate it on the way back to the steps. We found a spot partway up, which was still very warm from the daytime sunshine, and sat and enjoyed another warm evening in Rome. After dinner we stayed for around the Spanish Steps for almost two hours, until close to 10:00pm, and then walked the mile or so back to our hotel for the night.

We purchased tickets to the Vatican for 10:00am on Saturday. I wasn’t sure how it would all go, so we took the subway and arrived a little after 9:00am. There was a line a mile long; ok, not really a mile, but it was about a quarter mile, maybe a little more. Luckily someone, selling tours, told us that if we had a reservation for our tickets we did not have to wait in this line, but walk around the block to the entrance and take a different line. Wow, I was thankful we got our tickets online the night before. We never would have waited in that line to go in and we would have missed the museum and the Sistine Chapel. The guard would not let us enter until 9:30am because our reservation said ten, so we waited around for fifteen minutes and then headed in to the Vatican.

We went through security, picked up our tickets, and entered the museum. To say they have a few artifacts there would be a huge understatement. We went through some of the area fairly quickly, and we took our time in a few others. There was basically one way to go through the whole Vatican Museum, with many “museums” along the way, which went through many corridors that were so ornate and with such beautiful paintings, that words cannot describe them. After the museum we entered the Sistine Chapel. It is a holy place, so pictures were not allowed and people were asked to be quiet; nobody took pictures, but they had to keep “shhhing” people. The paintings all throughout the chapel were amazing. To think of the great Michelangelo painting the ceiling was a neat image to have. The work that the artists put into the chapel is incredible. We looked at all the paintings and paintwork along the walls and ceiling, and of course stood and gazed at the most famous of all, Adam and God with their arms reaching out to each other in the center of the ceiling. The whole place was mesmerizing. After spending time admiring the Sistine Chapel, we left and went to the exit area. There was a gift shop at the exit (there were also multiple gift shops/booths along the corridors of the museum) where David and I both bought postcards so we could send them from the Vatican with the Vatican postmark. We then exited the Vatican and had to walk all the way around to the other side of the Vatican in order to enter Saint Peter’s Basilica.

Tickets were not required to enter Saint Peter’s Basilica, but there was a fairly long line that we had to wait through. Because we were entering the Vatican again, we needed to go through security once more. It didn’t take too long and we gained entry to the famous church. It is immense! The church is still used for normal services; they were holding mass while we were there. We wandered around the many areas of the church (I am calling it a church even though the word church does not conjure up a correct picture of how large the basilica is), taking pictures and admiring the walls and ceiling, and then saw a line heading down some stairs. We weren’t sure where it went, but we figured we better go! It went down to where the burial areas are located. It has many popes buried there, along with (the supposed) burial tomb of Saint Peter. After walking through the tombs (where pictures were not allowed) we exited outside to another line, this one to climb to the top of the cupola. This was a fee area, but of course we were going to go up! We paid the extra two euros and took the elevator partway up. We still had about 330 steps to take, but the elevator cut out an additional 225 or so. Money well spent! We walked in at the rotunda where we could look down into the basilica, right in the center. They had a fence around it where we were allowed to go, so pictures were not the best. We then exited the rotunda and hit the stairs. It was single file, person to person, throughout the whole climb. There were areas of circular staircases, regular staircases, switchback staircases, and a couple sections of ramp. As we went up to the top of the cupola, the sides start slanting, so we were walking up stairways with the left wall leaning in on us. It made for a bit of an awkward climb, but that was not the bad part. The bad part was that it was very, very hot in the close quarters. Much of the stairway was so tight two people could not pass each other if they wanted to, and there were only a couple places where there was a slot in the wall going outside. Other than that, it was a very closed in, hot climb. We finally got to the top, exited the stairway, and walked out onto the small area surrounding the cupola of the basilica. It was completely crowded and we had to fight our way to make it all the way around. Except for a few areas, the pathway around the top was only about four feet wide. It was also a game of patience to wait for an opening at the rail to take pictures overlooking the Vatican and Rome. It was worth waiting in line and the climb to go up to the top.  The view was spectacular and very breathtaking. After slowly fighting our way around the top, taking pictures along the way, we exited and headed back down the stairs. Same situation on the way down, except it went much faster (and of course the wall was slanting from our right!). We exited the stairway, took the elevator back down, and exited back inside the basilica. We spent a few minutes inside before we exited, two hours after arriving, and left the massive church. We took some more pictures of the outside of the basilica and the surrounding grounds (which were spectacular), and then we walked back to the subway station. We grabbed some lunch on the way back to the hotel, eating it in the room, and then sat around relaxing our tired and sore legs.

After resting for a couple hours, we headed out once again. We strolled in the direction of the train station to go and check on tickets for the next day to make a short day trip to the coast. On the way I went and grabbed the geocache that the lady had threatened to call the police on me for the previous day. After that, we headed in the direction of Trevi Fountain and decided to just eat pizza and gelato. Well, I ate gelato twice. We strolled in and out of many shops, just following the crowd, for a long time. We kept walking until we popped out into a large courtyard area; what do you know, we stumbled upon the Pantheon. I had forgotten about it, so I was glad we went out walking. It was closed, but at least we went and saw it. After hanging out there for a bit we decided that our legs had had enough. I checked my phone and we were about a mile and a half away from our hotel, so we started heading back. Ouch! We were both feeling quite sore by the time we reached our room. It had been a long day, with a lot of walking and standing. We started just before nine in the morning, took a couple hour break, and then went out again until almost ten. Not counting our break during the day, we only sat down for about ten minutes at night eating a quick dinner. No wonder my legs hurt! We got back to the room and I started trying to organize some pictures to post on Facebook and finish writing this blog post.

We took our time getting up and ready on Sunday morning. David got up earlier than me, but I didn’t get up until 9:00am. We wanted to go to a beach, so we researched it and found one to go to. We knew it would be busy because it was a Sunday and that a lot of Italy was on their vacations, but we figured we could at least dip in the water. We went to the train terminal and purchased our tickets for the 12:15pm train to Santa Marinella, and then tried to figure out where to go! It was a very large train depot and it was very confusing. We finally found someone to ask and he pointed up to the rail we were supposed to go to. It was a long ways away and, because the train was behind schedule by five minutes, we had about twelve minutes to catch it. When we were at the correct rail, we weren’t sure what car we were supposed to go to, so we asked someone (who we luckily found) and he told us any car. As we were walking back to the cars a “bus boy” of sorts came up to help us out. He grabbed our ticket and ran us down to the machine to validate it (which I had already done, but he didn’t see it) and then ran us back to a car and found us two seats. I gave him the change in my pocket (a couple euros) and he was offended; he wanted more! I was going to dig out a five euro bill, but then he told us ten each! I said not a chance and didn’t give him anything else. He asked a few times and I told him to forget it. He finally left to go find some other sucker. I don’t mind helping people out, but we had everything done except step onto the train and grab our seats and he wanted 20 euros! Rail robbery! I am not sure what some of the locals thought of us; tightwads or suckers, but a while later they helped us figure out where our stop was, so they didn’t think too lowly of us!

It was about an hour ride to Santa Marinella. We got off the train and walked the few blocks down to the beach. We read before leaving the hotel that most of the beaches were private and you had to pay to use them, and that there were a few public beaches. We were right in our initial assessment, it was crowded! We also found out that all of the sandy beaches were the private ones and the public beaches were just a rocky shore. All of the sand was trucked in to make the nice beaches (roped off into private sections), therefore the private owners (hotels, etc.) charged to use them. All of the private beaches had umbrellas and chairs that you could rent, and the beach was covered with them except for the shoreline. We tried a couple beaches, but they would not let us on. They were “sold out.” They only let so many people on (which is a good thing) and told us we could walk down to the public beach. The man was nice enough to tell us how to get to the public beach, because we tried earlier and couldn’t find a way down to it. We could just walk through the private beaches down to the waterline, and then walk along it to the end, past the last umbrellas. There was still a bit of sand at the end that overflowed from the last private beach and it was fairly crowded. After all, it was only about fifty feet by twenty feet big. We walked down and found a spot on the rocks where we could sit. Because we didn’t have any way to secure our belongings, I went in the water first while David watched our stuff, and then we switched. I didn’t really need to go swimming, but I just wanted to be able to say that I took a dip in the Mediterranean Sea. Been there, done that, check it off the bucket list!

We sat around on the rocks drying off a little bit, but felt a little uncomfortable sitting there. We gathered our stuff and walked over and up to the main walkway that overlooks the beach. We sat on the stairs for awhile until we dried off sufficiently to put our socks and shoes back on, and then we walked around a bit. (We had said the night before that we didn’t want to do any walking, but we still ended up walking a couple miles!) We had about 45 minutes to kill waiting for our train back, so we found a bench that overlooked the beach and sat there people watching and relaxing. We then walked to the train depot and waited for the train. There were a lot more people there than we expected, but we figured it was a Sunday evening and people were heading back into Rome. The train was already crowded when we got on, but I was able to have someone move their bag and sat down, and then David did the same. Many people had to stand and we still had about five more stops to go before we got to Rome! Not only did we get to go swimming in the Mediterranean, we also got an Italian sauna. The train was so unbelievably hot that I was almost as wet with sweat as when I got out of the water! There wasn’t any air conditioning in our car (there had been on the trip there) and there were only a couple small windows at the end of the car. That was one long hour! All part of the experience, right? We survived, arrived in Rome around 6:00pm, and walked to our hotel. We sat around cooling off for an hour or so and then went to grab some dinner. Neither one had the energy to do much, so we just went to a little pizzeria located close to our hotel; we ate and headed back to our room. We got back at 8:00pm and stayed in for the night. This was our first night where we actually got in early and had time to just relax in our room before going to bed. Splendid! After five days in Rome, our bodies are screaming at us to stay still! It is our last night in Rome and I hope that our time in Germany (and elsewhere) is a little more relaxing. I am planning on driving to a lot of places and touring that way, but we will see.

Because our Internet is really bad in the hotel (hence the really long blog; I kept typing more and more even though I couldn’t post it), I have never been able to connect my computer. I am now using my iPhone as a hotspot to at least post this blog (probably cost a fortune!). The things we must suffer! Until next time…….

 

Good Ole Ireland!

We got up Saturday morning, packed up the rest of our belongings, and walked a few blocks to the main bus terminal. I didn’t have a clue how big the Stavanger airport would be, so I wanted to get there early; plus I knew we would have to go through immigration. We took the bus to the airport so we would get there about 2.5 hours early. Well, not only is it not a big airport, they don’t bother opening up certain things or giving out certain information until really close to when the flight is supposed to leave. The British Airways desk didn’t even open up until 2 hours before the flight left. We were then able to check our bags and head to the departure area. After going through security, we looked for what gate we were to be at. They don’t even give that out until closer to the departure, but someone was able to look it up for me early. Then we tried to walk over to the gate, but first you have to go through immigration. The immigration office didn’t open up until 40 minutes before the flight. Grrrr. It wasn’t like our gate was far away, but I just wanted to get to our gate so there would be any problems. We were finally able to board our plane, but we just sat at the terminal until we were about 10-15 minutes late. A couple people were having problems at immigration so we were waiting for them. Well, open up the office a little bit earlier and this wouldn’t be a problem! Hah, there, I said my piece.

We got to London Heathrow and had to go through all of their immigration and security measures; after taking a bus from one terminal to another. Yes, London Heathrow is huge. Once through immigration and security, we had to sit in a large seating area (basically a huge long shopping mall) and wait to find out our gate. Yep, once again they do not give out the gate until 30-40 minutes prior to departure. I am sure this has something to do with them not knowing what gate a plane will be at yet, but when their sign says it takes 25 minutes to walk to some gates it is a bit frustrating. Anyway, we finally got on our plane and had about an hour flight to Dublin.

We arrived at Dublin airport and finally figured out where to catch our hotel shuttle bus at a little wandering around. It was only a short distance to our hotel, so we were checking in about 15 minutes later. Our room was the largest room we have had on our trip by far. Because I asked for a room on the quieter side of the hotel (I read about doing this on TripAdvisor), she gave us the top floor, corner room. Not only was it quite big, because it was the corner unit is also had a balcony; sweet! After dropping off our luggage in our room we headed out for dinner. Except for some candy at London Heathrow, I hadn’t eaten anything all day (David had a little breakfast) and it was now closing in on about 8:00pm. Next door to our hotel is a TGI Friday’s. Perfect. We loved the price difference from a month in Norway, so we each got their two course meal special! After dinner we just went back to the hotel and relaxed watching TV (many channels, and all in English!) until we went to bed.

Sunday morning we asked the front desk about getting to downtown Dublin. We were staying in Swords, about 7 miles outside of Dublin. We took the public bus to the city center, which took about half an hour, and enjoyed listening to a few people still celebrating their Saturday night; they were quite comical. We got off and wandered around Dublin; we had forgotten our tourist map at the hotel, so we just walked around figuring stuff out. There were quite a few tourist arrows pointing the way to the main attractions, but we eventually got a map at a tourist shop and it helped make sense of where everything was located that we had already found.

We walked through Temple Bar (which is an area, not just the actual famous bar) and then made our way to Dublin Castle. There were some artists creating sculptures out of sand inside one of the castle courtyards. They had pictures of previous years’ works around the cordoned off area, as well. We then walked to St. Patrick’s Cathedral. It had a beautiful park setting on one side of it where there were many people hanging out, so we stopped and I took some pictures. We were a little disappointed that the church was not open for visitors to look inside, but it was still a very impressive church from the outside. We then wandered around the streets, wandering past Christ Church Cathedral, and made our way to the famous Guinness Storehouse. We didn’t feel like standing around on a tour (nor did we feel like paying to tour it), so we just kept on walking the streets. One thing that we were very grateful for, because Ireland drives on the left side of the road, was that at most crosswalks they painted on the street which way to watch for traffic. This may seem silly, but after always looking for traffic from the left, it is very hard to look to the right first! We eventually worked our way back Temple Bar and we went to a walk-up pasties stand. David had a pork and apple pasty and I had a chicken pikka pasty (chicken with a similar sauce to curry). We sat on some steps in the Temple Bar center and ate our pasties and people watched. I don’t know how crowded it is on weekdays, but there were quite a few people out on a nice Sunday afternoon.

We then decided to work our way back to our bus stop and go back to our hotel. Work it was! We walked up and down the main street that had all of the bus stops (and where we got off the bus), but we could not find the stop with the bus number that we needed. We finally passed a transportation office, which was closed, that had a map showing the city center bus stops. We figured out that we needed to catch our bus on a side street, a couple blocks away. We finally found the stop and had to wait about ten minutes for our bus to arrive. The bus dropped us off a few blocks from our hotel, so we walked back and relaxed before we went out for dinner. After a tasty meal (at McDonald’s) we went back to our room to figure out our plans for the next day.

We got up Monday morning and took the hotel shuttle bus back to the airport. This was the easiest and cheapest way to connect to their bus line that would take us to Belfast in Northern Ireland. We looked into taking a tour up there, but one was sold out and the other was closed when we called to make a reservation. We decided to just go up there and see what happened. The bus ride took about 2-1/4 hours and was great. We were able to see a lot of the countryside and the bus also made a few stops in some smaller towns.

We arrived in Belfast, got off the bus, and looked for a tourism shop. Luckily there was one not far from the bus station. We purchased the Hop-on Hop-off bus pass that toured throughout the city and walked to where it the tour started. We got off at the Titanic Quarter and walked along the wharf to the next bus stop, and it began to rain on the way. We caught another bus and just stayed on it for the next hour-plus seeing the sights from the dry bus and listening to the commentary from the tour guide. It brought us all over Belfast, including the “bad” sections of town where the Troubles were centered. We saw many of the buildings and areas where bombing was prominent, many of the memorials throughout Belfast, many of the murals depicting both sides of the Troubles, and also the Peace Wall, which actually separates the two sides of the fight. Although there was a treaty of sorts made back in 1998 or so, there are still quite a few people with bad feelings and the wall remains. The wall was built right down the side of a road, through the middle of a neighborhood. It goes along the road on one side, and it is the backyard fence for the other side. Belfast is now one of the safest places in the world for tourists, but one always has to be careful. Another place that we went by was Campbell College; one of, if not the, most prestigious colleges in Ireland. It is very expensive and hard to get in. We were just able to drive past it; it is not open for touring. This was one of the schools that the author C.S. Lewis briefly attended when he was younger. Inside the grounds of the college is a lamppost; this was the lamppost that, later in life, C.S. Lewis depicted in his famous story, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. For someone like me who loved the book, and the Narnia series, it was a pretty neat bit of history/trivia.

When the bus returned us to the starting point of the tour, David and I wandered around the streets looking at shops and landmarks for a bit longer, and then headed back to the bus station. We only had to wait a short time (we had a schedule) and then hopped on for the ride home. On the ride back to Dublin Airport we had a double-decker bus (and we sat in the top), so we had a great view of the countryside during the trip. We arrived back at the airport, had a half hour wait for our shuttle bus, and then arrived back at the hotel a little after 9:00pm. A pretty long day, but well worth it. We ran down to McDonald’s for a late snack and then headed back to our room for the night. Another country marked off our map!

We didn’t have anything planned for Tuesday, so we slept in and didn’t get going until around eleven. We took the bus back down into downtown Dublin and walked around. One place of interest that we went to was St. Stephen’s Green. It is a large park in downtown Dublin. Not to the same scale as Central Park in New York City, but felt similar. We then ate at a little café in Temple Bar and then wandered around some more. We checked out a few landmarks, watched some street performers for a while, and then went back to Temple Bar and sat on some steps and just watched people. People watching is a great pastime, and there were probably more people here now than on Sunday. Luckily the weather was not too bad, cloudy but not rainy, so we were able to just hang out. While sitting in the Temple Bar center we saw a newscast of some sort filming a small clip for their program. They were doing it right in front of us, and it took many, many takes for the fifteen second clip, so we (along with others) enjoyed “the show.”

We finally decided to head back to our hotel so we took our time and ambled back to the bus station and jumped on the next bus. We didn’t get back to our hotel until a little after five or so; we dropped off our stuff, relaxed a bit, and then went out for some dinner. We had seen a sign for a hot dog and pizza place near our hotel, but we hadn’t been able to find it before. This time we walked around the whole building and then saw it tucked in an out of the way place. It was great food, and we were both stuffed! We then went back to our hotel, now closing in on 8:00pm, and started packing our belongings once again. Early morning flight to Rome; we have to catch the 4:45am shuttle to the airport!