As Promised

It took a little while but as promised here is the album. It's mostly my pictures but we'll have one up on facebook with tanner and my pictures.

EuroTrip 2010

I've done my best to comment on most of the pictures but if you want the real commentary find me!

Thank you again for joining the ride. Hopefully there will be plenty more to come.

The good ol US of A

So we all made it home safely, no missed flights or "lost" airplanes. I am happy to say that the Dutch pulled out an amazing win today, and it's good that Ghana didn't win, cause Tanner and I already watched that game in Rotterdam and the Oranje win it 4-1.
We're getting on the pictures, hopefully we will have a picasa album up soon, I'll post the link.

Thanks for following and commenting everyone, I'm glad I got to share my experiences with you.

Peace!

Au revoir Paris, vous allez nous manquer

Au revoir paris! We have had an amazing time in Paris and on our trip but every good thing comes to an end eventually and man was it awesome.
Yesterday we got up early and hit the sights. We saw the louve, grand palace, norte dame, the arc de triumph and of course the eifel tower. We saw that they had set up a huge screen for FIFA fan fest so we knew where we were gonna post up for the nightgame. We headed back home to make some sammies for dinner and change then we headed downtown to catch the game. The screen was huge and the crowds were even bigger! It was crazy. We had a water bottle of cocktails to wacth the game with and the eifel tower as a backdrop to the festivities. Tanner and RJ went up to the half way point on the eifel tower and got some amazing Picts when Spain scored. Smoke bombs went off and fireworks, everyone was cheering, it was awesome! After the game we sat and finished our wine and cocktails while playing around with creative pictures of the eifel. Afterward we hit up a brewery with some pretty good beer for being french, and met some new friends from conn. We hit the hay dreaming of soccer and the Paris sights. Today we slept in and decided to hit a waterpark, the biggest France! Waterslides and mini golf, lounging and swimming, it was fantastic. We all felt like kids again. And the best part was we had to buy tight swimsuits for some weird French "sanitary" thing. Leave it to RJ to get the tightest euro speedo they had... When in Rome right? We finished the day with a nice send off dinner with risotto and proscuotto salads, big plates of pasta and a couple beers. A great way to spend our last night in Paris. We just booked our shuttle to the airport and with happy, content, smiling faces, we're off to bed.

Only Lyon

Lyon! Yesterday tanner an I got up and went for a little run that turned into about 5 miles but we saw all the sights. We were too busy beachin it to do an actual tourist-y day so I'm glad we were able to fit them all in on an hour run. Then the gang grabbed some b-fast and checked out of the room. We stashed our bags and headed down to the... Drumroll... Beach! We just can't stay away from the soft white sand and blue water. We snached up our bags and zipped on the metro to the train station. We're getting pretty at public transportation and menuvering around crowded stations filled loaded with luggage. We reserved a bullet to Lyon and didn't have to wait more than 10 min. A game of gin rummy and good old fashion conversation made the 1hr 40min ride fly bye. We got to Lyon and for the first time in 5 weeks we were greated by friendly faces! Jace and Emily, cody's cousin and gf, met us right on the platform. Emily loaded our bags into her car(they filled the trunk and backseat) and we went with Jace on the metro. We made ourselves right at home in their wonderful little one bedroom apartment. We had a few brews and headed downtown to a little burger joint to watch the USA game. Some nice fat American burgers and fries and beers. Although we lost to Ghana we sill had fun and finished the night with some brews back at the apartment and a few laughs. Today we have plans for crepes for breakfast and the biggest park in Lyon. It has a zoo in it! I'll let you know how it is.

Marseille

Marseille has been full of beaches and new friends. We've been here for 4 days now and been to the beach 4 times, pretty good record. Yesterday we went with our new Ozi friends to a national park for some hiking and maybe some beaching but we weren't sure if we would find a beach. It was a nice 80 degrees out so after breakfast we made some lunches and headed off to the bus station. 5 minutes down the road we saw thousands of people in the streets and signs and banners and trucks blasting music, craziness! We had no idea what it was but we were in the middle of it. 2010 french revolution? we finally found our bus stop but none of the buses were running since all the street were blocked off so we hopped the metro to a bus station a little ways out of down and about a half hour later we were on the trail. It was good to get out of the city and back to our roots in the mountains. Will and Cal had done there fair share of walk-abouts in Australia so they kept up with us mountain boys. We got to the top of a peak and ate lunch with amazing views. We were mostly on trails and did a little bushwhacking too. We were looking for a beach that we'd seen online but after 2 hours I was beginning to think we were chasing gold at the end of a rainbow. We kept pushing on and next thing you know we came over a crest and were blown away with a picture perfect beach and little villa just like the picture. we scrambled down to the water and all jumped right in. Crystal blue water and sail boats anchored just off shore combined with some lovely topless French girls and 30 foot cliffs to jump off- we were in heaven! we spent the rest of the day on the beach and hiked out on the road which only took about an hour. The craziness of the rally that had stopped and we think it might have been a bus strike? But we rode the bus and it seemed to be on schedule so who knows. We watched the Dutch Oranje clean up Cameroon and made a pasta feast with our ozi buddies. We spent the rest of the night having dollar beers from the convenience store 2 doors down and playing cards with the ozi's and some other girls we had met in the hostel. The guy at the convenience stopped asking us "what'll it be?" and started asking "how many?" after the 3rd beer run. We said bye to Cal and Will since there were supposed to catch a train this morning but when we rolled out of bed they were still here, i guess catching trains and hangovers don't go well together. Today we plan to see some sights in marseille and probably hit the beach too.
We've lucked out with weather and haven't seen a cloud. Another wonderful day in France.
We leave tomorrow and we have Lyon and Paris left, we're making the most of it.
So for now, Merci Marseille, and au revoir!

Firenze

Firenze
Although we had a little drizzle in florence that turned into a  downpour we soaked up the sights and culture too. We got to Florence at about 8 and after walking in some circles and asking about 3 different people we finally found our hostel. It was a small unmarked place with about 4 or5 rooms each with about 6 people and only one bathroom. The check in lady hardly spoke English but we managed. We found some late night kebabs and started to walk toward the duomo. The duomo is the largest church in Florence and absolutely stunning. Made entirely out of marble it's about 200 feet tall with incredible detail. At night it's lit up with flood lights and seems to shoot up toward the stars. We saw the clean up of a race that had taken place eariler that day. We think the course went around the duomo. We saw a couple more churches and plazas on out way home without even trying and found out Florence is pretty small. The next day we were up early and off to see the sights. We saw some cool parks on our way to the museum with David. The line was about an hour and a half but we decided it was worth it. We took turns waiting in pairs while the others went and adventured around. We did a little street shopping and chatting with ours neighbors in line. Finally we at the front of the line and got see the majestic David in all his full frontal glory. The rest of the museum is pretty bland with some plaster statues and church Jesus art but it was worth the wait just to see David. After that we headed back toward our hostel to watch the Italy v new Zealand game. We all were secretly cheering for the kiwis but had to cheer for Italy to make it out alive. The pub was small but the screen was huge and we sat right in front. Italy's only goal was from a pk after a typical Italian flop in the box so we were able to get a video of the madness after they scored. The game was a draw in the end so we were happy. Then we relaxed at our hostel and found another pub to watch the ivory coast v brazil game. After all that soccer watching we were pretty hungry so we treated ourselves to a full Italian dinner. Big plates of pasta was sauce as rich as a king. Lots of wine and lots of tasting everyone elses dishes so we could each brag that ours was best. After lots of laughs and with full bellies we went home to crash. Today is another travel day with 4 different trains and 12 hours of travel to get to mersailles. We're only on the first train now so hopefully all the transfers go smoothly and we make it France in one piece. We love you Italy but travel bug is starting itch so till next time, ciao Bella. 
Our mersailles hostel sounds like the bees knees so hopefully we'll be happy since we have 5 days there. We have a lot of day trips planned to Monaco and nice and lots of beach time too. We hope the beach will be soft enough to play some beach soccer and frisbee but I know we'll love it either way. 
Right now rj is pretending to read an Italian news paper(I think he's just looking st the pictures), tan is tearing through the pages of his ayne Rand book and loving it, code is napping with some tunes and I'm about to get back to "on the road" and maybe finish it today. Thank you Logan for letting me borrow it! 
We love you all and can't wait to share pictures and stories in person. 
Ciao! 

More adventures

Roma! 
I've heard some wonderful things about Rome and they were all true. Our hostel was a little bungalo on a big camping ground and rv park. Our place was like a double wide but it had 4 beds and it was all ours. We cooked the first night and drank 1.80 euro bottles o italian wine and watched the Mexico France game on another sweet projector outside. The next day we got our tourist on and saw the colleseum and the roman forum ruins. We decided to get a tour guide so we got a little history lesson while we were pretending to be gladiators. Then we hopped a metro to the Vatican and spent the rest of the oohing and ahhing over incrediable art and sculptures and of course the most famous ceiling in the world. With tired feet and happy inner tourists we headed home for a dip the pool and some homemade pasta dinner. The next day rj decided to hang at the camp ground and swim and relax while Cody tan and I went back out for more Rome. We saw parthenon the fountain of trevi and walked up to borghese park with some amazing views. We had some gellato to help battle the heat and then hit the spectacular tomb of the unknown soldier. It's not as old as the rest of Rome and was added to as recently as 1920 but it is huge! The 16 meter tall statue of a roman goddess is dwarfed by the rest of the building. After feeling content with our site seeing we went to meet up with some buddies we met in our jeager hostel in Munich at a little bar called the drunken ship. We got there just in time for the US Slovania game and met up with our buddies mikey and Jonny and rj came rollin in too. Rj had hardly said hi before he dropped his pants to show us all his US flag short shorts. USA! The bar filled with backpackers all cheering for our under rated stars and stripes. We went down 2-0 in the first half but had an exciting comeback in the second half to tie it and then a third goal to win? But no, it was called offsides. BS! The rest of the night we mingled with other backpackers and owned the beerpong table. rj and tan had a 9-1 record only losing to jonny and I who went 4-0 until we ran outta beer and money. We also watched england tie Algeria which is huge for our group. We could win our group!  
We took the metro to the train which had stopped running so hopped a cab back home and we all passed out. We got up this morning and packed everything up to check out of our hostel. We put our bags in the luggage room and went back to the pool to relax and swim till the Netherlands vs japan game. Tanner and I were clad in our orange to root for our second favorite team. Hup holland! They beat japan 1-0 and are looking like they will win their group. After that game we went and grabbed our bags and headed to the train station to catch what we thought was an hour and 40 min train to Florence but it ended up being a 4 hour ride. So here I am with time to kill cruising the rails through the Italian countryside. We have big plans for Florence. We're also trying to fit in a day trip to Pisa and chicuaterra. For now it's time to kick back and relax. Like tribe says... Takin a train. Takin a train.   

Sorrento

A travel day from hell to the hostel from heaven

Although we all 4 love the night train this one wore us down a little. We took it from munich to Florence, then another train to napels one more train to sorrento and finally a bus to our hostel. We were hoping for a six person by ourselves but we were joined by 2 other ladies going to Italy to learn Italian. They were very nice and let us finish out our rummy game before bed on the train. None of slept very well since it was so hot in our cabin that we had to sleep with the window open. Needless to say it was pretty loud even with earplugs. But eventually we made it Florence and had about an hour in the train station to kill before the next train to naples. We hacked and had breakfast and finally our train came. We didn't get a reservation since it was only a few hours but we were supposed to. Oh well it was only 8 euro more. Then in naples we scrambled to find our bus and missed the one we were supposed to be on because I was looking for tickets. Good and bad cause we did in fact need tickets but had to wait another hour an a half forthe next bus. After the scariest bus ride I can imagine we made it to our paradise near the beach in sorrento. We had a pool a foosball table a ping pong table our own bungalo our own kitchen and free Internet in the back if the minimart. We relaxed and swam and played volleyball all day. We even swam out to some cliffs to jump off. After a day and a half we had planned to go to rome on the schuledule but we shuffeled things around and after an hour online canceling and booking we got another night in paradise. We took a day trip to Capri and it was one of the most fun days we have had yet. Amazing views from our boat that took us out there and even more amazing from our hike once we got there. We walked through the quaint parts of the town of Capri (named the same as the island) and the ritzy parts too. We found a loop that took around about half the island and about 2000 feet of vert ip and back down but it was worth every step. After a lunch of homemade sandwhiches we decided we were hot enough to go for a dip so we followed signs to a beach. When we got there the guy wanted 18 euro to get in! No way. So we walked along the coast until the cliffs were small enough climb down and we had our own beach. Tanner and rj swam out and climbed up a 30 footer to jump off while I perched on the other side to get the video. Then we finished our hike past some amazing houses along the coast and went back into town. Cody got some presents for family and we got some water then we walked back down to the beach to swim and relax till the boat came to take us home. We had some delicious cocktails on the pebble beach and back on the boat to sorrento. It was worth the headache of shuffling around hostels. We also got to see the Italy vs paraguay game on a sweet projector screen on the beach with a couple hundred other Italians all whooping and cheering. It was a tie but really fun. There was also a big fish grill out but we had all eaten already. We slept like logs and then we were back on the bus for one lane mountian roads with two way traffic back to the metro to finally get to the train station. We were off to Rome! 

Munchen

Munich has been pretty awesome. We're in the Jaeger Hostel and we got a free shot our first night, that coupled with 2 liters at the hofbrauhus and we were feeling pretty good. We also got some delicious German brats too. Then next day we trekked to the one of the biggest parks in the world. There was a super tall chinese tower in the middle and big beer garden all around it. There's a big river that flows through the middle of the park and at the entrance we saw a bunch of guys surfing it! It was like a water park. Then after we did a lap through the park we came back where the surfers were and decided to jump in. It was fantastic! Especially since it was a 95 degree day. I think we're going to go back today.

Yesterday we went to Dachau concentration camp on a tour. We haven't paid for many tours but this one was more than worth it. Our tour guide jamie was from ireland and really knew his stuff. We got a lot of the inside scoop that we would have never known otherwise. It was a humbling experience but one we will never forget. Dachau was in operation as a concentration camp for 12 years, longer than any other in Germany or the occupied territories. Jamie took us through the camp from a prisoners point of view which really gave us a feeling for what it was like.

After that we came back to the hostel to watch the world cup. Everyone is into it here in germany, it's electric! Today we're going to the olympic grounds then take the night train to Sorrento for some relaxing on the beach.

At the Chelsea stadium just outside london.

At the Heineken Brewery! They call it the heineken experience and we kinda thought it was gonna be hokey but it was totally wicked. Best "brewery" tour I've ever been on although it was more disney ride than anything else, but still awesome.

Praha

Prague

Today we did another tour of Prague on foot. Tan and I went for an awesome in the morning before the other guys got up. We found a couple awesome parks and one had stunning views of the city. We came around some trees in the park and Tanner almost forgot we were in Prague... "wow, this almost looks like pra... Oh wait, it is!" it was fun to excersise a little and interesting to run with a map. 
After we got back and showered tan RJ and I went off to old town square and then to what we thought would be the budvar brewery. In old town we climbed 5 flights to the top of the astronomical clock tower. A few laughs and a lot of pictures we went back down and headed to the where we thought the budvar (budwiser) brewery was. We snaked through some skinny cobble stone streets with tall buildings shooting up on both sides and After a few broken English directions found ourselves back in old town square. We munched some sandwhiches we had made and went back to the hostel and looked it up again to find it's actually 2 hours drive south of Prague. So maybe tomorrow. But we did find the starapromen brewery. We rested our legs for a little and headed out again. We could smell the grain before we could see it. The tour was closed but we got shirts and half liters and full smiles. Found a park on the way home only to get poured on about 10 min later but we found refuge in a Chinese food restaurant and had some cheap but delicious food. Now we're relaxin at the hostel while the buckets are falling outside. Forecast for tonights weather, more rain. For us, some staropramen (or strap-em-in as we like to call them) and a couple games of cards. Off to bed early and up tomorrow to catch the train south to the budwiser brewery then Munich. We loved Prague but wind carries us on to new countries and more adventures. 

Karlstejn castle

Decided to venture out to Karlstejn castle today for a little day trip so we had a little b fast in the hostel and packed up to walk to train station. I guess we were spoiled in holland because everyone spoke pretty good English but that's not the case in Czech. We had a little confusion about where to go after we got our tickets but eventually we were on our way. Good thing tickets were only 3 bucks each. Once we got there we all had smiles on our faces and glad to be out of suburbia and into a small town atmosphere. We walked about 1 k to the city info booth and found that the castle was closed on Mondays. That was our first bummer. But we wanted to see the outside so we made the 5k trek up to it. The pictures didn't lie, it was beautiful. We had our little sack lunch at the top and then decided to wander a little and look for an abandonded mine that had filled with ground water with hopes of a cool dip on a hot day. Bummer number 2- we didn't find it but had a fun time exploring Karlstejn and getting out into the wilderness that we all know so well. Another dinner at the hostel and some plans for a fun bar will wrap up another day czeching out Czech. 

Brussels pub.
Tanner at the Netherlands v Ghana game.

Us on the "I amsterdam" sign. Sorry these won't be in any particular order but the pictures are a jumbled mess on RJ's computer.

Praha!

A perfect prague day with only a slightly bitter ending, but we won't let that get in our way. We woke up a little late cause we were at the golden tree club last night till pretty late. It's an awesome underground club that is almost cave-like with little nooks and rooms all over. It has a big light-up dance floor and giant fish bowls with dark tequilla and coke... plus some dancers. It was awesome! We Euro danced our pants off. Then after we dragged ourselves outta bed we did some sight seeing on foot all the way up to prague castle. Amazing city! It is beautiful with cobble stone streets everywhere and red clay roofs on all the buildings. Big clean parks and a river that is pretty clean too. We stopped about half way up the hill to the castle for some beers then piggy backed a tour to get a little history lesson in. They have turned the kings garden into a vinyard, so of course we had to stop and have a glass, which also included the best views of prague we had all day! Full 360 and fully amazing. Plus the wine was cheaper than the water, so how could we say no. Had a little confusion on the trolly ride home and had to pay a fine for not having tickets but all is well that ends well. Made a little pasta back at the hostel with just a microwave, pretty impressive, and now we're off to have a couple brews.
We gotta figure out some italy hostels so that's all for now, Love and Jah!
D, Tan, Code and RJ (jr)

I'm out here on my night train

The night train Prague! Although we got to the train station a little early we were really excited to see it was just us 4 in our 6 person sleeper car. We flipped down some beds and flipped up a table and soon we had our own lounge complete with a few cocktails we smuggled in a water bottle. While we still had light and a slow moving train we saw a car show right next to the tracks. I heard rj say something about "it's my time" and next thing we know he's got a full moon to whole crowd. We couldn't stop laughing for hours. Maturity isfor fhe office. Later We were about 3 games deep in some gin rummy when a 5 th joined our party but he wasn't too bad. Fashion designer from Milan teaching. He mostly kept to himself. We slept like babies with the light hum of the cars over the rails and calm rumble rocking us to sleep. Open our eyes and we were there. We luckily found our Prague hostel to be much nicer than previous with a kitchen and free wifi! They are amenities that are quite taken for granted at home. We've already gone shopping for groceries and we will be livin large forthe next four days. Everything is so cheap we all took a sigh of relief and our bank accounts did too. Tan and I are doing a little laundry (thank you Heidi for mini detergents!) and cody and rj are catching up online back at home base. Clean clothes, informed loved ones, and a good night sleep... We're ready to hit the sites tomorrow.

Prague is in sight

So the pot museum was a overpriced bust but we got magnets. Now we're at the train station doing some good old fashion people watching. Last day in Amsterdam was overall sub par but a long day in Amsterdam beats a tough day in the office. Hopefully the next hostel will be a little bigger than our closet we had for the last few nights but at least Prague is cheaper. For now, good night and good luck. 

Killin time in Amsterdam

I figured out that I don't need wifi if I type a note then copy and paste so hopefully I can get some more blogging in. Today is our last day in Amsterdam. It was an adventure to say the least. We had to take care of some business checking out, returning bikes, getting a sleeper train for the night to Prague etc. We had a couple bumps in the plan involving a minor bike crash when i tried to bring 2 bikes back and some unforeseen bike costs but we got it all worked out. Now we're hangin in our favoetie coffeeshop and probably the most famous one. The bulldog. We are off to the pot museum then hangin till our train at 7. 

Amster... What was I talking about again?

Amsterdam! Where everything is legal and everyone is happier because they all ride bikes! We've had amazing weather and no flat tires. Or I should I say tyres. Today we took a paddle boat down the canals and relaxed. It's a fun way to see the city and as always waving and smiling. We have also seen the heineken brewery, sex museum, van gough, red light district, hard rock, the bulldog, and some good old fashion sippin the slosh while sitting by the canal. Our hostel ( yes el, I got it this time) is about five feet by 15. We all have to dance around each other in the morning which I bet looks pretty funny although we're not always laughing. tanner and I hopped a triain to Rotterdam 2 days ago to see the Netherlands v Ghana game. HOLLAND! It was crazy! Just a friendly match but the crowd was in full world cup action! We're gonna have some drinks and keep it low tonight. Tomorrow is the sleeper train to Prague and should be fun. First sleeper for all of us. Should be a good experience. More later. Bye for now. Love you all. Being open to everything that comes our way. Take it all with a smile. Thanks mom!

London (woohoo) to Brussels...ugh

Finally writing on a real computer instead of the ipod touch. Full keyboard is much appreciated.
London was awesoome! We saw the Prince of Persia on a 5 story imax and did a pub crawl and saw portabello market and strolled around hyde park. Sad to leave, but excited for the next stop.
Brussels!-
So we got to brussels last night but it wasn't without a couple bumps in the road. More like pot holes, really big pot holes, on a dirt road, one lane, with wooden tires, ok it wasn't that bad but you'll soon know.
First we packed up and said bye to the London Hostle, got a cab to the Victoria Coach station and got our tickets, we were a little early but everything looked like it was going smoothly. Then the coach was delayed a half hour, then an hour. Then we finally got our coach but don't try to put your own bag under the bus, as RJ found out. Got a little verbal smack down. Then we didn't have windshield wipers so we had to drive around to the garage and wait another 45 min for them, i was about ready to get out and put them on myself. Then finally we were on the road, until french customs. Usually they just let big coaches with lots of people drive right through but they were feeling especially french that day and made us all get off the coach, get all our luggage from under the coach, all cram into a very small room (and yes they made us all get in the room and close the door before anything could happen) then everyone had to open all of their bags and go through every belonging. Finally after all that they were happy to find out we weren't terrorists and simply tourists (understandable mistake) so they let us on our merry way, about 2 hours later. Then we got to drive the coach onto the channel tunnel train, which was pretty awesome. We got out of the coach and a little chunnel train hack session, then back on the coach and on our way to brussels. It was a little spooky to get on the train while driving on the left, and get off and be driving on the right, just glad i wasn't behind the wheel.
Finally we made it to brussels! We had a big sigh of relief and hopped in a cab to our hostle. It's an awesome 4 person private room so needless to say all our bags exploded, maybe we are tourterrorists, and everyone re-organized all worldly possesions. We came downstairs to find kids who had dragged a table into the elevator (4 person elevator and full size table) and were playing cards, girls playing ping pong without a table in the lobby and foosball game that was so intense the table wasn't on the ground much. We left the craziness of the lobby and got some awesome gyros and kebabs for super cheap. Went back to the hostle for a few drinks and some poker and we were out like a light. Today we hope to see most of brussels and we'll decided if we want another day since we missed one from our traveling day. Enough for now, we're off to find some belgium waffels.

Made it

Made it to London! I missed my 720 by about 30 seconds on Newark but made it on a 8 o'clock flight. Luckily found tanner in the airport without much trouble but it could have been bad I'd we didn't. Toured London today and now are waiting in the hostle for rj and code. Gonna get a phone tomorrow hopefully. Till then were soaking up the life and going with the flow. And maybe a nap.

Midnight travelers

Rj and code are en route from Ireland to London. Tanner is mid flight from Portland to
Newark and I'm chillin in the mile high city waitin to get
on winged tube to Newark. All paths collide on London and the workless cubeless and funfull journey begins. Luckily we won't be brushing our teeth with gin, but it was a close one

Giddy as school boys on the last day of school

Plane tickets booked, train tickets booked, hostels booked. It's all coming together. We're buying new shoes, new bags, and hopefully some new undiees. Hold on to your sacs cause The Tan-Man, Rowdy Rob, Cool Cody and Daring D-Foges are going across the pond!