Athens was an interesting city. We, of course, went on the free walking tour there and learned so much about its history- which, not surprisingly, including being conquered by the ubiquitous Ottoman empire! Again, I have to admit my ignorance and share some of the the biggest surprises that Athens had in store for me:
1) The ruins are not in great shape. Sure, they stood for thousands of years so obviously they are going to have some [...] Continue Reading
I really cannot say enough about Istanbul. It was such a cool city! It was such an interesting mix of cultures- its almost like it was once the crossroads of the world. We tried to see as many of the sights as we could in the short amount of time we had in Istanbul, and it was tough, there is just so much to see and do! We walked down our hill every morning, passing the Galata Tower and crossing the Galata Bridge. Even our walk down the Istiklal street was interesting, known for being [...] Continue Reading
We landed on Istanbul completely unaware that the night before riots had broken out in the streets. Istanbul is about as far away from the Syrian border as you can get in Turkey (half of it is on a completely different continent for goodness sake!) and we felt safe going there, even with all the trouble with ISIS along the border. So we were completely taken back when we heard that there were riots going on in Istanbul. We grew more concerned as we learned that the common area for protesting was Taksim square, the area of Istanbul we were staying in!! [...] Continue Reading
Malta is so incredible- I am so bummed we only had 4 days there, we could have easily spent another week or two exploring the islands. It is beautiful and warm and full of cool places to swim and explore. The buses were clean and air conditioned and went all over both islands. And, the best part, there were free restrooms all over the island and they had soap and paper, it was practically a miracle! Most signs and menus are in English and most people speak it well, which is nice for us lazy Americans who only speak English. We swam and snorkeled every day, except one. Oddly enough, that was the day that we got the most soaked [...] Continue Reading
Malta is very interesting. And warm- we left the chilly fall of Poland to enjoy the still warm breezes and Mediterranean in Malta. Getting to Malta was an all day event, but so worth it. Especially the bus rides on Gozo (the small island we are staying on) where, as far as I can tell, driving is one big game of chicken. The streets are two way streets, but very winding, narrow, and hilly, with very little visibility which makes [...] Continue Reading
We mispronounced the name every single time we said it- saying "row-claw" until one of our tour guides kept referencing a town called "vrots-swauve" and finally, it clicked- Wroclaw is pronounced "vrots-swauve". The bus was very nice, another double decker, it had wifi, outlets and a bathroom with paper and soap- it was also cheaper and faster than the train. We were impressed by these things, but what really made the difference was... the juice boxes they handed out! Yup, good ol' fashioned [...] Continue Reading
We took another night train from Bratislava to Krakow. This one was only about 7 1/2 hours- which was good and bad. Good because it was another full sleeping compartment (fortunately we were on a bottom and middle bunk) and the couple on the top bunks were clearly very unhappy about being up there and sighed loudly climbing up, stood on someone else's suitcase to climb up and once they were up talked loudly & angrily to each other. Then, they kept climbing up and down all night, loudly and [...] Continue Reading
Bratislava is a short train ride away from Brno, Czech Republic. Of course, we had to go. While we have talked about visiting the Czech Republic eventually on this trip and hitting Prague, Brno and Cesky Krumlov we couldn't pass up the opportunity to visit Brno now. Nick studied abroad in Brno for 6 months and has so many stories about his time there. With friends and even just amongst ourselves, the conversations almost always eventually turn to travel, places we have been and adventures we have had. Nicks best [...] Continue Reading
Slovakia (not be to be confused with Slovenia) is our 10th country! We are staying in the capitol city of Bratislava and to celebrate our 10th country we are staying in a Botel on the Danube! A botel is exactly what it sounds like- a hotel on a boat- and it is twice as cool as it sounds. Our botel even has its own Indian Restaurant and free breakfast buffet. Plus, whenever big waves or debris hits the boat it [...] Continue Reading
Ahhh Bucharest- here is what we did: Nothing. And it was awesome! Thanks to Nicks super awesome travel hacking skills we ended up in the Intercontinental Bucharest- a five star hotel- for free! We even got a room upgrade which meant a giant room and a lovely fruit basket, and because he is a platinum member with them, we got free internet (what is up with fancy hotels charging for internet? If we had not had the upgrade we would had to pay 16 Euros per day for internet! Achaw!) [...] Continue Reading
