A city in ruins



The Colosseum with more ruins behind it. Notice the marking
on the Colosseum. Those are from where marble was hung.



When rebuilding things in Rome, instead of knocking buildings down, the Romans would just bury everything and then build on top of it. Because of this, and the Romans amazing skill in architecture and building things so they last forever, there are ancient ruins in every section of the city. Our tour guide explained that there are only two underground lines because every time they try building another one they will find ruins and it will become an archeology site. Everywhere we went in Rome there were some sort of ruins being dug up. Next to one site there were a bunch of benches that were simply pieces of pillars from the dig next to it.

We arrived into town pretty late - around five. It was so hot and muggy there. I mean, it was hot and muggy in Venice, but it was so much more hot in Rome. Then added in with the humidity, I'm pretty sure we were dehydrated the whole time. We found our home for our few nights and instead of heading straight out we took advantage of our wonderful air conditioning, cooled off and dried out our gross sweaty clothes.



The maze under the Colosseum floor.



For getting in so late we accomplished much. We did a guided tour of the Colosseum, explored the area a bit, and checked out Trevi Fountain. Everything in Rome is huge. The Colosseum is massive and is actually smaller than it was back in its glory days. There are some parts of it that they have fixed up so you can see a little of what it used to look like. I knew a little about the battles of the past and whatnot. Something I didn't know was how many animals were stored under the stadium. Since the Roman Empire was so big they were able to ship in whatever animals they wanted from so many different parts of the world and used them for entertainment battles. Also, they would feed the animals by putting criminals sentenced to death into the arena and simply allow the animals to eat them. There's a whole maze underneath the arena where they had all of the storage and back stage happenings. The maze was covered by a wooden floor where the battles would take place. There were trap doors all over the place that they would use to make it seem as though animals and warriors would simply appear out of nowhere. On the topic of old graffiti (see my Prague blog), they have saved a bunch of old carvings from the upper sections of the stadium where the poor folk sat. The people would carve into the seats or walls images of their favorite fighters or animals and also gameboards for them to gamble on.

We happened to be able to see Trevi Fountain at night time which was very good for us. All of the landmark places in Rome get lit up at night time so it just looks beautiful. We took a few pictures and threw some coins into the water. We knew that we were supposed to do that according to legend but at the time we had no idea what it meant, if we were throwing properly, or how much we were supposed to throw. I looked it up and I guess we did things right and it means that we will return to Rome some day. How cute. We've learned that we should be careful with these good luck bad luck legends. In Munich we touched all of the lion heads along the residence hall and it turns out we were supposed to only touch a select few. Touching all of them means that we're greedy and we get bad luck. Oops. So all that to say: we did it right and we should be returning to Rome some day!



The canopy built from Nero.



We did a couple of tours that took us to different ruins and whatnot. Interesting fact: Everything that was built in ancient Rome was coated in marble. We see the Colosseum today as a giant stone structure. In its past it was completely white and beautiful. In the picture of it and other buildings you can see that they're all pockmarked. That's because those holes are where they had sort of hangers and they just had a bunch of slabs of marble hanging from them to make it seem as though it is one big piece. Clever, right? However, the Catholic church came along and destroyed everything, taking whatever was valuable and built their churches with it. This is a common theme we've noticed in pretty much every city we've been in. In fact, our tour guide told us that the canopy over the alter over Peter's tomb is made from the bronze statue of Nero that was altered into the sun god then was later melted down and used in the Pantheon and then melted down again to to find its final resting place as a canopy. I tried doing research on this to see if it is true, but I can't find any real information with the time I have available.



The Holy Steps

 Since Rome is home to the Vatican, there is evidence of Catholicism everywhere. We checked out San Giovanni's church, the Holy Steps (didn't climb them), St. Peter's, and a bunch of statues and fountains and whatnot dispersed around the city. We've seen many places who claim to have an apostle buried there and we've seen many artifacts that are claimed to be related to the life of Jesus. The steps were an interesting experience. They say that the staircase is the same one that Jesus climbed when he went to speak with Pilate and that the red stains on them are the blood of Jesus. Pilgrims and tourists pay money to climb the steps on their knees and meditate on what Christ had done at that time. I'm a very critical person and I don't know if they really are the steps, or if all the pieces of wood surrounded by gold and finery in the museums are really pieces of his cross, or if the slab of stone in San Giovanni is really where the soldiers gambled for Jesus' clothes. In fact, I have a bit of a hard time with all of the pomp around these objects. The worst part for me, though, was seeing so many people bowing down to everything and kissing the feet of statues. I started to feel like I was in the presence of a whole other religion worshiping a whole other god. But I did enjoy the art and the ancientness of everything.



The main cat sanctuary.



Something that cracked us up in Rome was the stray cats. They have so many ancient ruins in that city that they don't even know what to do with them anymore. There were two spots that we found that were blocked off by fencing. These places are where the cats live. There was a large area with so many cats that I couldn't even count them. And on the corner next to it there is a vet that takes care of the cats, getting them all fixed and whatnot. For our souvenirs, since we don't have very much packing space, we are buying magnets. For Rome we bought a magnet with some ruins and two cats on it.

The last thing I want to talk about is the food of Rome. It was so much cheaper in Rome than it was in Venice, which was exciting. It was also incredibly delicious. We had bruchetta and tortellini and ravioli and gnocchi and everything was wonderful. We tried to eat as far away from the city center as possible because that's where the food was cheaper and better tasting. In the center it's all expensive and isn't very good at all. It tastes like it was just microwaved pasta. Sadly, they don't do breakfast in Italy. Other than coffee and a small pastry. That was upsetting to me because I love breakfast. But the wonderful taste of lunch and dinner made up for it.

We're just now finishing up our stay in Barcelona, Spain. It's been amazing here and I will have a blog on that as soon as I can get it typed up. We leave Barcelona and head to Paris tonight! So, until next time, my friends!



This old Greek statue says so much. Firstly,
they used to be colored but the Puritans, I
think, went through and bleached all of them
because white is the color of purity. Second,
these statues all used to have glass eyes as you
can see in this picture. The Catholics went
through and broke all of them. Only a few remain
with their eyes still in tact. Third, a certain Roman
was offended by all of the nudity, so several hundred
years after this statue was carved the fig leaf was added
in order to hid his hidious penis.



This is the door to a church. I'm coming to
really appreciate doors and the art that is
put into them.



Venice. That is all.

I have to say, I'm unimpressed. I really don't have much to say about Venice but I'll give you some pictures and funny stories. I left you off in my Swiss blog with us driving through some crazy mountains and whatnot. After we left Gimmelwald we had about eight hours of driving to go to get to Venice. We went over a massive mountain - up into the clouds. It was terrifying and beautiful all at the same time. Again, more tunnels. At one point we came up on some cows next to the road that I had no idea were there until they were right next to us because we were up in the clouds. We have video of some of this drive. We'll share it when we get home.

At one point we drove through a tunnel for about a half hour to 45 minutes. I have no idea. It was a really long tunnel. When we came out the other side all the street signs were in Italian. We started to doubt out directions and wonder if we had crossed into Italy at some point in the tunnel. No. We didn't. We were just in the Italian speaking part of Switzerland! We still had a long drive to go.

Crossing the border into Italy was our first experience with the Italian people. And it was fantastic. We weren't sure which lane to go through to cross. There were lanes for regular cars, big trucks, RVs, and so on. Brandon directed me to one because it said something about passports. We were obviously in the wrong place. The border officer walked over to us and said, "Why are you in this row??" I immediately pointed to my husband and said, "Because he told me to!" The officer jokingly scowled at him and showed him his handcuffs in a mock threat to arrest him. Brandon apologized and the officer allowed us to pass through. No arrests have happened yet and we choose to keep it that way!

Directly after crossing the bridge into Venice we returned our car to the rental company. You can't drive on the island and I don't want to drive in Italy anyway. Italians drive much like Mexicans. No regard for lanes whatsoever. As we drove through the countryside we were treated by views of vineyards, beautiful Italian buildings, and a very large castle.

I'm actually not sure how to describe Venice for you, my friends. It's not super big. We walked most of it. Of course there are canals through the whole thing. We bought a "bus pass" which got us rides on the bus boats to get from one side to the other. We didn't do the gondola rides. They're very expensive and everyone has told us to skip them. However, it was fun to sit and watch them float by with the tourists taking pictures or joking around with their driver. At one point we saw a Husky's fan float by and Brandon yelled taunts at him in a friendly manner and everyone had a good laugh. One thing I will mention about Venice: If you ever visit, remember to pack bug spray! The mosquitoes are ridiculous. I should have known. It's a city on water. Where mosquitoes gather. Oh well, I'm all bit up.

This is some closeup of mosaics. I absolutely love them.

The streets of Venice are great fun. If we didn't have anywhere to be it was great to just walk and see where we end up. Usually it was St. Mark's Square. The streets are all more like alleyways, some big and some small. Some were very very small and we weren't sure if we should even go down them. It is so easy to get lost in those streets. If we tried to find a specific place we became incredibly turned around and unsure of what "street" we were even on. If we just purposely lost ourselves for fun then we found ourselves at St. Mark's. Weird, right?

The Genesis Dome in St. Mark's entryway. This is all mosaic.

St. Marks Cathedral is one of the most amazing churches I've been in so far. They say that Mark's body is buried there. I'm doubtful. However, everything else is pretty. And stolen. Pretty much everything in that church had been taken from Constantinople. Did I spell that right? This seems to be a common thread throughout all of the Catholic churches we have visited. You'll see stuff about that in my Rome blog later on. The cool thing about St. Mark's, though, is the art. The entire inside, and a lot of the outside, is covered in mosaics. The oldest in the back of the church, to the newest in the entryway. They all tell Bible stories throughout the entire church. My favorite was what is called the Genesis Dome. You can see why in my picture.

Food here in Italy has been really good. We're having a hard time getting out of the tourist areas where the food isn't as good as true Italian food. But we've hit a few good gems. Our first night in Venice was a score and a miss all in one. We had a fantastic cheese platter that came with some bread, jam, and honey. The jam was so yum with cheese. But then our risotto came and it was the saltiest thing I've had in a very long time. I just had to shovel it down my throat as fast as possible it was so bad. I don't even know what other flavors were in it because there was so much salt. We also shared a bottle of wine and I swear the wine here has to be stronger than the wine at home. I'll just leave that as that. Something very disappointing for both of us: breakfast isn't much of a deal here. It's just coffee (which is the best ever) and a pastry. Breakfast is our favorite meal of the day. It's actually hard for us to handle being in a county with no real breakfast!

So that's pretty much it about Venice. It's hot and muggy. I bought a super cute dress and a fan. I have no regrets. We are loving the Italian people. They are all so much fun. Right now we're in Rome. It's amazing. But that'll be for the next blog. Until then, my friends!

Swiss roads, Swiss chocolate, Swiss Alps

Our cute little car for traveling from Munich to Venice and
whatever else in between. So glad it was a small car. 

Our trip to Switzerland came at just the right time for us. We drove from Memmingen, Germany, through Austria, a brief stop at the Lichtenstein border, through Interlaken, Switzerland, to Stechelberg where we had to park our car. I have to say, I was really nervous about renting a car and driving it in a foreign country. It worked out wonderfully, though. The car wasn't too big, gas wasn't too expensive, and I didn't break too many road laws. I'm pretty sure. There were a couple of toll roads that I had no clue as to how to operate. I was supposed to go into one lane but went into another or something like that. I think we missed a couple of payments. But no tickets. After driving through all of these countries, I wonder why people always say, "You have to drive the Autobahn in Germany!" Firstly, "autobahn" is just "freeway." Secondly, the driving laws are the same in all of these countries. I reach a certain point on the road and I can go however fast I want. I really just stuck around 75 to 80 most of the way. I got a little over a hundred for a while just so I can say I did so.

A small view of a Swiss road. 

Once we got into Switzerland, driving got a bit more scary. All of the signs and rules were the same. It's the roads that were different. Switzerland is pretty much all Alpine Mountains. That means that all of the roads are either going around or through a mountain. I was either twisting around the roads or spending 10 plus minutes in a tunnel. My arms were beginning to lose circulation because I was keeping them and 10 and 2 the whole way, leaning forward a bit, staying as focused as I could be as I navigated roads that swerved around 350 degrees and tried to make sure the car behind me didn't hit me because its driver wanted to go twice as fast as what I deemed a safe speed for those roads. Eventually we finally made it to Stechelberg which is where we were to leave our car for three days while we took the cable car up to Gimmelwald and stayed in the beautiful Mountain Hostel.

The stunning view from our
hostel in the Alps.

I think that what we enjoyed the most about staying in the Swiss Alps was that we were away from the city, only had one site to set out and enjoy, and everyone else was there for the same reason. It was wonderfully relaxing. The hostel has four rooms. The girls room, boys room, family room, and the lovers room. We were housed in the lovers room. It was a bunch of row of bunk beds, but what made them cool was that they were in sets of two, so we could actually lay next to each other even though we were in a shared room. There were a lot of other people there our age and we had a great time hanging out and visiting, talking about travels and life plans. Pretty much everyone there was en-route to somewhere else and a common question to be hear was "So where's your next stop?"

One of the many cows we walked by
on our hike. Ain't she beautiful?

We had one full day in Gimmelwald. We used that day to go on a hike. We thought about going to the very top of the mountain, but we were told by seasoned travelers that it wasn't really worth it and that another hike was better. So we went on that other hike and regret nothing. The trail is called the North Face Trail. It pretty much follows the north face of the mountain. Get it? It was fantastic. We hiked for about three hours (with stops) and saw so many wonderful parts of the mountain. The view was amazing. The trail took us through farmlands, herds of cows, fields, electrified fencing, over a river, and along cliff-sides. We had to set aside all of our lifelong training of what trespassing means and go through a whole bunch of gates, walking through people's yards and by farmers working in their fields. The gates were attached to electrified fencing where the herds of cows are kept with their noisy bells, poo piles, and flies. We struck it lucky in that our one full day was the one clear day of the week. It was foggy before we got there and foggy again when we left. So we were treated to all kinds of awesome mountain views. We were also treated to a lot of hot sun. I got a lovely sunburn that I'm still babying today.

Probably the best meal we
had in Switzerland. For real.

Food in the Alps is terribly expensive. Check that. Restaurants in the Alps are terribly expensive. We at at a restaurant before we went on our hike but then after that we bought a bunch of food at the market and brought it back to our hostel. The hostel has a kitchen with a bunch of baskets and space for people to keep food there. They also had a couple of "free" baskets where they put things that people leave behind. So along with our market food and whatever we could scrounge from the "free" basket, we made ourselves an awesome dinner of tortellini and and salad and a delicious breakfast scramble that everyone was so jealous of. It felt great because, not only did we save an amazing amount of money, but a few of our new friends complimented us on how well we worked together to make some great food!

Two things about Gimmelwald that I didn't witness myself, but heard from other guests of the Mountain Hostel:
1 - Gimmelwald is home to Europe's first ever Honesty Shop. This is a store that doesn't have any staff manning a till. It's simply a room with a lot of stuff in it. You go in, find what you need - general supplies, souvenirs, clothes - leave the money in the designated location, and leave with your goods. Awesome idea for such a small town.
2 - One guest said that there was a cheese shop on our road that isn't advertised except for a little tiny sign outside of a house. He went up and knocked on the door and an old woman poked her head out of an upstairs window and called down, "Hallo?" He said, "I would like to buy some cheese?" She responded with an "Oh!" shut the window, ran downstairs, and opened the door he was standing at. She welcomed him into a little room that had three big things of cheese along with other knick-knacks and she sold him some cheese right there.

So that's Switzerland for you! Scary roads, cool mountains, great hikes, nasty sunburns, AHmazing chocolate. Really, we got some super cheap Swiss-made milk chocolate and it's the best I've ever had. I'm sad to leave that behind. We're about to finish up Venice, Italy, and I'm pretty sure our place in Rome has a decent computer so that blog will be coming soon! So, until next time, my friends!

Germany - The land of my birth

"New Town Hall" in Munich. Looks much
older than the "Old Town Hall."

Firstly - I'm writing on a really weird keyboard and I want to get done as soon as possible, so please forgive me if I get a little lazy with my writing. Really.

So we took a train from Prague to Munich. It seems so long ago. Right now, at this very moment, I'm sitting in a hostel in the Swiss Alps. But that's for the next blog. This one is about our experiences in Germany. One thing at a time, my friends!

Munich is an amazing city. Brandon was really excited about Germany because of his passion for WW2 history. I was excited for Germany because I was born in Memmingen, Germany, almost 27 years ago. Ew, gross. 27? Really? Let's pretend I didn't say that and move on.

The pillars are all pockmarked
from bombings. Up on the left
you can see a couple of patches.

Since we got in a little late, like 3:30 in the afternoon, it was too late to do any museums or tours so we just wandered around the city center by ourselves. The buildings all look so old. Some of them still have evidence of the bombings in WW2. We walked through large plazas and could just picture the major Nazi rallies that were probably held there. The next day we did a three hour city tour and found that we were correct in our assumptions. There's a big plaza outside of the Residence Hall where kings lived and Hitler held rallies there.

As we were walking into the city center we went through a plaza called Karlsplatz and there was a man preaching against Islam. That was right when we got into the city so it was an interesting welcome. There were cops all around him and a big crowd of people - some booing, some cheering. What was pretty scary about the situation was that there was a very large group of men and women who were obviously Islamic and who were getting a little crazy. There was a lot of yelling. I took some video and then we got out of there. I have no idea what he was saying, but the people were not pleased.

Brandon with his massive beer.

After our three hour long tour we went to the Hofbräuhaus which is an internationally known beer house. A king a long time ago was having beer shipped to him from far away and was costing the city a lot of money so he had his own beer house built. Eventually it was opened up for the people and they all sing cheers to him for that action to this day. They place is huge and the beers only come in one size - 1 liter. Brandon got one. We ended up spending more than two hours there because it took so long to get our food. The waiter first brought my food and we shared it. After about an hour and a half of him saying the kitchen is crazy and Brandon's dish is coming, he came back and said Brandon's dish was not coming and he has no idea what happened. Then after about 20 minutes Brandon's dish came. It was all very confusing. Also, it cut into our museum time like crazy and we were never actually able to go to one of the museums that I wanted to go to. 

Prison cells at Dachau.

The next day we went to Dachau. We got there pretty late as well because first we had to go rent our car. We had planned on picking it up at the train station across the street from our hostel but it turned out they had an Italian car at the airport which means that we don't have to pay the international dropoff fee which is 200 bucks. So the whole ordeal took a bit longer than expected. We tried to make it through everything at Dachau but we were just late enough that the crematorium closed before we got there. Brandon is still broken-hearted about that one. Some day we will go back to Germany and see the things we missed out on.

Two cool things about Munich:

1: When Hitler took power it was pretty much set in stone, and everyone knew it, that Germany was going to be going to war. Because of this a lot of people went around town with their personal cameras and took pictures of every detail that they could. After the war, when everything was completely destroyed, the city of Munich had two choices. They could either rebuild the exact same city or they could build a new city. Berlin decided to go the new city route. Munich took advantage of the pictures taken and rebuilt their city exactly how it was before the war - straight down to a cannonball that had been lodged in a church tower since the 30 Years War - see picture on the right.

2: Some cities have monuments and memorials for the people who suffered and/or died because of the Holocaust and Hitler's reign. Munich, again, decided to go a different route. They instead have a lot of small, more subtle memorials placed all around town. Most or all aren't labeled and you wouldn't know what it was unless someone told you. The one I have a picture of is a golden line of bricks in what is called "Dodger's Alley." Hitler had a memorial placed in the plaza across from the Residence Hall and required all who passed it to do the heil salute. If someone didn't do the salute, they would either be shot, beaten, or sent to a concentration camp. Scary, right? So the people who didn't want to do the salute would "dodge" the memorial through that alley to get to where they were going. The police eventually caught on and even going down that alley became dangerous.

Every city and town has its
own crest. This one is
Memmingen's on the
German flag.

After Munich we went to Memmingen which is where I was born. I never knew anything about the town because we left when I was a year old. So I really wanted to go see it. Today we told a couple of Germans that we went to Memmingen and they were incredibly confused. They said, "Why would you go there? There is nothing there." When I said I was born there they laughed and asked me why I didn't speak any German. The initial confusion was pretty funny.

Memmingen is the cutest little town. It was great to get out of tourist town. We went to dinner at a little pub with an old man who didn't speak a word of English. Brandon didn't get what he thought he ordered but we both smiled and he at it anyway. Turned out to be pretty good so everything is great. There happened to be a couple of trails laid out for tourists in the town center so we were able to get some fantastic exploring in. I don't feel like we missed out on anything.

So I think that's pretty much it for Germany. I mean, as always, there's more. When we get home I'll post all the pics with more information and adventures, but I think this blog is probably long enough. And I'm hungry. I want dinner. So, until next time, my friends!

Czech Nature

The amazing astronomical clock on the city's
town hall building.

So here we are completing our tour of Prague, Czech Republic. Loving the land, art, history, and architecture. The people, though... We're not too pleased. Maybe it's because we're in what we've come to call tourist-land? Maybe it's the language barrier? But, really, the people aren't very nice. When we first came into town they didn't stamp our passports so we tried asking around about where we could get that done. Turns out it's not really necessary in the EU. However, whenever we asked someone they would send us to a different person who would send us to a different person and so on. Finally we asked the receptionist at our hotel. Again, he tried sending us somewhere else. We explained to him that whoever we ask, we get sent somewhere else. At that he laughed and said, "That is just Czech nature." I see. I don't think I like Czech nature.

Brandon's disappointed face
that came with each beer he
ordered here in a town known
for amazing beer.

The restaurants have horrid service. This may go along with "Czech nature" but I feel like I'm causing my server a huge hassle just by asking for some more water. And, along with the bill, they always give a little piece of paper with the math and expected tip scribbled on it. Our first thought? "Don't tell me what to tip! You didn't even check on us once. We had to flag you down. And you want 20%? Yeah, right."

Today we were partially scolded by our waiter because we wanted to share a meal. He said that's just not the Czech way. If we want something small, we should go to McDonald's. We go to a restaurant to eat a full meal.

These were everything I wanted them
to be.

That's alright. The food isn't super exciting anyway. Except for the desserts. There is delicious ice cream everywhere and today I had some sort of sweet pastry baked in a tubular shape (see picture). It was wonderful.

St. Vitus Cathedral. I'm sorry,
the picture does it no justice.

On a lighter note, this city is absolutely rich with history. There's no way I could list it here but I can say some of these buildings date back to the tenth century and was the home of the Good King Wenceslas (you know, that guy in the song). We went and saw the castle and the castle's church and surrounding town. It was all amazing. Like a fairy tale. The castle church - St. Vitus Cathedral - is probably the most massive, most immaculate church I have ever seen. It has so much detail with spires, stained glass, gargoyles, and everything. We can see the church from everywhere we go in town, it is so big.

Prague is a town filled with towers. There are clock towers, guard towers, gate towers, and viewing towers. We bought a pass to gain access to all of them, plus a couple of other sites. All that to say: we have done a lot of climbing in our stay here. I am so ready for our train ride tomorrow to give my legs and feet a bit of a rest. But all of the towers were awesome. It was neat to climb them and learn about what they were used for and why they are there.

There was one tower that gave a lot of history to the bells of the city. I didn't realize how much respect went to the bells but they have a history, a purpose, and some stories to go with them. It's said that every year on the Thursday before Easter all of the bells will make a trip to Rome to receive a blessing from the Pope. Even objects that are made from melted down bells remember their history and make the trip as well. It is said that, because of this, soldiers couldn't find their guns before a battle in World War 1.

A spy setup in the top of a
bell tower.

Another tower is an old bell tower in a church and was used by the communist secret service agents to spy from. They used many towers around town because they provided a good view of the land so they could watch out for "people of interest." Most of these "people of interest" were from the foreign embassies. The tower we went up had a view of about ten different embassies, including the American one.

The carving of 1678 was in a statue at
the top of a gate tower.

Something that I have found incredibly interesting in these towers is all of the graffiti and carvings in the walls. These towers are so incredibly old and people have been carving their names in them since their foundation. The oldest I found was from 1678. We also did an underground tour and a couple of the rooms we went into were used as dungeons. The prisoners carved their names and messages into the walls of their rooms. It was amazing to see and to be able to touch something with such a story.

So that was Prague! There really is a lot more, but too much to be able to write in a blog. We're still having a fantastic time. My gut is healing pretty well. I've taken off two of my bandages. One of the incisions is being slow to heal and my belly button is pretty ugly and bruised. But I'm on my way back to being normal again! I totally climbed all of those towers at what I think was a pretty decent pace.

We carved our initials in a lock to put on one of
the statues on Charles Bridge. It's supposed to
be good luck or something like that.

So until next time my friends! Next stop: Munich, Germany.

Where, oh where, has my appendix gone?

The Freedom Train in Boston is a red line that
the tourist follows to different sites where
cool things happened in our nation's history.

First stop - Dublin! Our Europe dream vacation has begun and it's expected to be amazing. We took a red-eye flight to Boston, getting little to no sleep, and then another red-eye to Dublin. Boston was pretty cool. We went along the Freedom Trail and saw some cool sights. Before we even left I was feeling pretty sick. Sunday night I had a massive migraine and felt very feverish. Thank you to those of you who joined us for frozen yogurt, by the way. You guys made our short stay home quite refreshing. Anyhow - Through Boston I started getting stomach cramps and (the secret D word). The migraine and fever remained. I was taking medications to try to calm things down but nothing seemed to work. I felt as though Montezuma had a little more revenge in store for me.

Here's my gut. It looks big, huh? Sorry.

When we landed in Dublin we went straight to a pharmacy to see if I could get a different medication. The pharmacy sent us across the street to the doctor, the doctor sent us up the street to the hospital for some tests, and the hospital sent me into surgery and proceeded to remove my precious appendix. So that was Dublin. The whole time we had set aside for it was spent in the hospital. The staff was very nice and took good care of me. Brandon is frustrated because we both know that the swelling was from (the secret D word) and what I really needed was antibiotics. But when the doctors went in to check on my appendix, they said that the swelling was way too close for comfort and they took it out for safety's sake. I don't need an exploded appendix. I suppose I don't need an appendix in general. I don't even miss it.

So now here I am with three holes in my gut. After I was released from the hospital we had enough time to do a bus tour, which was a bit more bumpy than expected. Luckily, we have our last two days in Dublin, so we can go back and check on what we want. We still need to do the Newgrange tour and there are some pretty famous author locations we saw on our bus tour that I would like to revisit.

Look at those cool cats! This is us
with Marc and Rimalda way
back at Crater Lake.

Next stop after Dublin was Amsterdam. We took a wheelchair through the airports and it was awesome. No line waiting for us! I think a lot of people doubted my need for one... But walking hurt! First thing in Amsterdam, we met up with our good friends, Marc and Rimalda. We met them when they were doing a world tour a few years ago. They asked to share our campsite at Crater Lake and we've been buddies ever since! Marc said, "Call us up if  you're ever in Holland!" I bet he didn't realize we would actually follow through on that one!

So the four of us went to a concert that night at the Paradiso Concert Hall. It was a man named Donavon Frankenreiter. His band is pretty rockin' on stage. His CD is a bit more mellow. At the end of his show he did a song with his little boy on the drums. It was super cute.

Red light windows in the
Red Light District.

I'm still working on recovering from surgery so we didn't do as much as we would have liked to, but we saw quite a bit. We hit up the Van Gogh museum, the Rijksmuseum, and a sex museum. Van Gogh had a lot of art and it was cool. The Rijkmuseum had a lot of history of the country, which Brandon really enjoyed. And the sex museum... well, that was interesting. Amsterdam has what is called The Red Light District and they are pretty well known for this one part of town. It used to be where the sailors would come to port and seek out some lady friends during their short stay on land. There are doorways down the streets that have red lights over them. In each doorway sits a lady. We went in the daytime so as to say that we went, but to avoid as much seedy activity as possible. The women were really just hanging out, waiting for their next customer. Some would call out to the single men walking down the street. It was definitely an experience.

Current day! Totally love these guys

We had the chance to take a train out to Marc's parent's house where he and Rimalda are housesitting. It was great to see some countryside, relax with some friends, and have great food.

One thing we are enjoying on this trip is seeing all of the different architecture. It's all amazing. Amsterdam has such old buildings all lined up. A lot of the apartment buildings used to be docking warehouses. They have hooks up top that were used to load things in. The hooks have remained, and now people use them to move large furniture into their houses. A lot of the building faces also look like they're about to fall forward. I noticed many crooked buildings. I tried to get a good shot, but I don't know if a picture can truly portray the experience of seeing it.

So now here we are in Prague. That will be my next blog. I know I haven't been as vigilant as I would like to be. Hang with me. I'll get a schedule down by the time I get home. So, good night, my friends. Until next time. If you're the praying type, prayers for fast healing for me would be fantastic. I would love to get to exploring without cringing in pain so often. And I've got some towers to climb tomorrow!

Death by bus ride

This post has been sitting in my edit box for a week now. It's behind the times. So I sped through it. check my facebook for pictures if you want. --

I think I've re-edited this new post, like, five times now because I just haven't been able to finish it. Now, here we are back at home getting ready to take off for our next adventure tonight. I haven't blogged near as much as I wanted to. For that, I apologize. But, we had an amazing time in Mexico and hope to return some time in the future.
I've been thinking about this topic since our first day of school and simply haven't had time to write get it down. So here it is:

The Queretaro bus system is much different than our own back home. In Eugene the bus system is owned by the county - Lane Transit District. Buses are clean and big, accommodating all who want to ride. In Querétaro, there are four or five different bus companies who are all competing for business.
I'll start by saying, the roads there are already terrifying. Our first experience was in a taxi, swerving in and out of traffic, honking to let other drivers know we were there. I figured that that was just how taxi drivers drive. We've all seen the tv shows portraying the madness of of the taxi business. Then we rode with our host mom. Lanes and stop signs are more for the sake of image there. Drivers simply slow down at stop signs to make sure no one else is coming. We'll often see cars straddling the lanes while driving. Many will just stop in the road and hang out for a while or make a right turn from three lanes over.
Imagine this kind of traffic in a bus. They aren't all that careful, either. Since they've got competition, they need to make sure they get to the bus stop first. So the buses are all passing each other in whatever opening they can find in traffic. If there isn't an opening, they will make one. They cut pretty close to each other, too. At one point our mirror slid along the side of another bus as we were trying to squeeze by. Sometimes riding the bus feels as though we're in a racing game. The purpose is to go as fast as possible to be in first place, but then at the same time we have to stop where people are waving us down. So we're slowing down, speeding up, swerving to the left, swerving to the right, slamming on the breaks, and so on. At one point we went to pass another bus and our driver just slammed the gas. As we passed the first bus at full speed I noted the drivers making some sort of signal at each other. Our driver smiled because we won the race.
Grabbing a bus is interesting. I'm pretty sure the buses don't have any sort of time schedule. They simply have their route that they're supposed to follow. So we just knew that one would come eventually, if we stood in a certain area. There weren't real bus stops, except for little stations here and there, so we would just stand on a corner where other people stood, watch for our number, and wave it down. Sometimes it will stop, sometimes it won't.
Since they are different companies, the pricing is sometimes iffy as well. Since we were students, we should recieve a student discount with our ID cards. A half price discount. There were many bus drivers who simply wouldn't have it. We never took the S bus because the driver actually accused us of having fake cards. Normally, though, as long as we took the bus to and from school, we would get the discount.
end.