Still trying to catch up!! (Amsterdam)

Well guys, I've found another internet cafe and I'm trying to catch up with this blog! I'm in Amsterdam at the moment which is a pretty crazy town.. It's a stoner's heaven with "Coffee Shops" that don't sell coffee on every corner! Just about every street is lined with girls on the job in windows, trying to lure you in for a small fee.. 50 Euro for the works is about the going rate in case anyone is interested :)

Amsterdam has a lot more to offer though than all this with Anne Franks house, the Heiniken museum, and a lot of wicked countryside with windmills and stuff. We hired bikes and pedalled our way round the small town of Edam, birth place of Edam cheese, which was a really quiet town, much different to the heart of Amesterdam.

We also watched a guy make a clog from a block of wood. Pretty crazy to see how fast they make them but I tried it on and it wasn't as comfy as my new Birkenstocks so I didn't make a purchase.


My last blog left off at Rome after visiting the Colloseum. From there, we headed to the island of Capri, just off the Italian coastline. This place had the warmest water I have ever swum in. It would have been almost 30 deg, much warmer than what I'm used to down the Island!!

The water was crystal clear and we got some great pics with the waterproof cameras.. This internet cafe doesn't have a USB connection so I can't upload any pics but I'll add them in at the next cafe I can get to. Update: Pics are in :)

From Capri we jumped on another ferry and headed to Sorrento, a quiet little town in Italy. We headed out for dinner to a little piano bar in town and got talking to the owner. No one was playing that night so he said I could jump on and play a few cruisy tunes. I played for about half an hour and it was mad :) The guys gave us a heap of free drinks, including some lemon cellio, a local lemon flavoured liquior, made in Sorrento. It tasted like rocket fuel but was great to try. Dinner was the best gnocchi I've ever had as well so was a great night.

The next day we headed to Pompeii and did a guided tour of the city ruins. It was lost under 21 feet of ash from the volcano Mt Versuvious near the start of time and wasn't found until the 1700's. The ash preserved everythin so well that most of the walls are still standing and they know an unbelievable amount about how the city once was. We walked through the old brothel and even saw plaster moulds of people in the exact poses they were in at the moment of their death!

From here, we jumped on another ferry and headed to the Greek island of Corfu. This was where I was the last time I did a blog and it was such a cruisy place. The first day we took an all day boat ride and checked out the Island. We cruised around all day drinking, eating, and jumping off the boat to swim in crystal clear water all around the Island. We spent the next 2 days lazing on the beach and by the pool and the nights in the bars that were literally 1 meter from the beach! It was great to actually have some time to relax after spending so long sight seeing and walking around cities.

After spending 4 days in corfu, we took a 24 hour ferry ride up the guts of the adriatic sea and headed for Venice. It was a long ferry ride but we slept alot to recover from all the partying we did in Corfu. When we got to Venice, we headed to the town of Verona, home of the real life Romeo and Juliet. We saw Juliet's balcony and checked out the rest of the town.

The next day we headed into Venice and did a gondola ride. The thing felt like it was going to tip over the whole time but it was great to check out the back streets of Venice and see where and how the locals live.

From Venice, we headed up into Austria to the town of Vienna. There, we caught up with the girls, Shelly, Sez and Rikki who were there for the night too. Was great to see them after so long! We stayed the night at their hostel and on the way some guy tried to roll me for my fake Rolex! Lucky I had the girls with me and they looked after me :)

The next day Dazzman took us to a pub that sold Chilli beer! Yeah thats right, beer with chillis in it.. You took the first sip and it tasted great. Then the burning started and the only way to get rid of it was to drink more beer so you took another sip. That fixed it for another 2 seconds and then the burning started again. This continued until the beer was all gone and you washed the taste out of your mouth with another one of their beers, brewed right there in the pub. Was an interesting beer but not something you could drink all the time.. Thanks Daz!

We then travelled up into Germany and stopped at the Muthausen concentration camp. We saw were they were kept, the crematorium ovens and some footage of bodies that were literally skin and bone.
Was pretty crazy to see what the jews went through and quiet sad. Definitely gave us all a new appreciation for the lives we lead..

From here, we headed Munich and set up camp. There was a standing wave in the river at our campsite and people were surfing it! I didn't get a chance to surf it cos I had no board but we're going to head back to Munich later in our trip. We had a few steins at some beer gardens throughout the city and had dinner at a beer hall. Munich is a great place!!

Time is running out so I'll finish it there for now. I'll be back on in no time to fill you in on the details on the rest of my trip up to Amsterdam and also post some photos :)

Man I'm getting slack at this! Not much time get to internet cafes but I'm in the greek islands at the moment on an island called Corfu. Beautiful clear water here but no sand! Only pebble beaches but it's still great. It's nice o have some relaxing time cos i's been pretty non stop sight seeing for the las few weeks.

Since my last post, we've been to lot more places, the first of which was Barcelona in spain. When we firsr arrived there, we checked out the gothic district which had some pretty crazy churches and buildings. Most of the have been designed by Gaudi and are pretty ou there to say the least. His apartment building is pretty famous and also the Sagrada Familia, which is still under construction and is due to be completed by 2025ish.

From barcelona, we headed to Nice which is a town on the french riviera, the coastline of France that meets the Mediterranian. This place had great bright aqua water and was very warm! We chilled on the beach for most of it and then had a rollerblade down the esplanade to explore the town.

One thing that is really killing me is all the differen languages we have to speak! I love learning them but I just get the hang of it and we're off to a different country with yet another lanuage!!

Good times trying to use the few phrases I know though :)

That night we headed into Monacco, the smallest country in the world which is only about 2kms sqd. There is a massie habour there with some even bigger boats! A lot of Ferraris and Masseratis. Most of the place is casinos so we had a gamble on the roulettte table and won some cash. Very handy so I bought a new car as you can see in the photo. So much money in this town..

From here, we headed to Pisa to see the leaning tower. I tried to push it back up

but couldn't quite get there. No gym for a while must be taking it's toll!

The next day we travelled to Rome and checked out the Vatican city. There was a 3 hour line to get in so we took a guided tour and went straight to the front. The tour was great and went through the museum, the sistine chapel wih Michaelangello's paintings on the roof and the Brasillica, where they say they keep relics like a piece of wood from the actual cross Jesus was crucified on. Pretty crazy stuff and some great artwork and statues.

We also checked out Colloseum which was crazy. We went inside and checked it out and the guys in there told us that the fighting days were very similar to the movie Gladiator.

Well thats it from me at the moment but I'll do another post soon to bring you all up to date. Only a fews days behind in my blog but the beach is caling my name! :)

Here´s a few pics of the ferrie from dover in England to France. You can see the white cliffs in the background.

We got to Paris and checked out all the sites. Saw the Mona Lisa and the Thinking bloke. Good times. Went to Notre Dame, the biggest church I´ve ever seen! We also went to the Lourve and the Eifel tower. It was a special time to see the eifel tower because the new president was being sworn in or something so it was lit up blue for the first time ever. Very cool :) We climbed up there and celebrated by sharing a very expensive cigar that one of the American guys bought.

After Paris we headed to Bordeaux where we headed out for dinner. Menus were in French so we had no idea what we were getting! haha.. I was one of the lucky ones who oredered lamb back strap which was great but one guys meal looked extremely falic! No idea what it was but glad it wasn´t me!

I finally had my first surf! It was in a little french town near the border of spain called Baritz. Was pretty good but short as we didn´t have much time. No pics unfortunaletly as everyone was in the water. Water was so warm!!!! a balmy 20 deg which is a lot warmer than Phillip Island. All the Frenchies were out there in wetsuits but we were just in boardies and not cold at all.

From there went into spain where we stopped at Pamplona. This is where they do the running of the bulls and we just missed it! Was due to start the day after we left.. The festivities were on tho in preparation, so we joined in. We stayed at a campsite that had 20,000 Aussies who were there to run with the bulls. Was a massive party, thats for sure! Feeling a little shabby now but what can you do..

On the way to Barcelona now so next post should have some crazy pics from there :)

The start of the trip

Well, the trip has begun and I'm sitting in an internet cafe in Paris, but I guess I should start from the beginning.. This is my first entry on this blog, which I'm going to use to document the trip of a lifetime!

The flight over here was long but overall not too bad. Dudas and I made the most of the trip with a few brewskies and a couple of movies. Only got about 2 hours sleep over the entire journey but you can sleep when you're dead hey?
We arrived in London met up with Dazzman, and headed out to Shake and Bake's bro's place in Paddington. Spent the afternoon in a quiet english pub with a few pints, a great way to start the trip.
After 2 more hours sleep we met up with the Contiki crew at 6am and headed off to France. Crossed from Dover in England to France and checked out the fanous White Cliffs of Dover. I'll get some pics up here soon.
Will post more about our time in Paris soon.. Got some great shots of the Eifle Tozer glowing blue at night zhich looked crazy!!
Ovwah!!