Lisbon

After actually managing to catch the plane from Barcelona we arrived in Lisbon.

We were staying at Rossio Hostel run by Marco, a friend of Sam's brother who we haven't seen in three years.

We managed to make it from the airport to the approximate area where the hostel is. We grabbed a map and asked the guys behind to counter to show us where to go "down near the river" so off we went.

Looking at the map it didn't make sense that we should be going towards the river. We headed back where we came from and thought we had found the right street after walking up a huge hill. Again it looked like we were in the wrong place.
So we asked the police and they told us to go back where we had come from. It took us two hours to realise that we had been dropped of 100m from the hostel.

We were really kicking goals that day.

Marco was working that night so we caught up with him then. It was great to see him. He was hosting a tapas night and was cooking chorizo and got Sam to help him. Nervous about Sam cooking alcohol soaked sausage with an open flame. I watched from afar.

The hostel was beautiful, great rooms and comfy beds. Marco's mum cooks everyone breakfast the next morning (the pancakes are sensational!), man is she a good cook.

The next day we wanted to suss out Lisbon so we walked down to the river and checked out the monuments and old buildings.

That night the hostel was booked out so we stayed at Marco's place.
He had invited us to go to a friend's party. A Brazilian girl he knew had just graduated and it was her birthday so it was time to celebrate.

We got a taxi to where Marco thought it was, he said he had been there a few times, but each time he had been very drunk so he wasn't really sure.

That really filled us with confidence.

He asked some people nearby if we were in the right place. One older guy had a long and animated conversation with Sam and I. In Portuguese. He seemed to speak more Portuguese the more we told him we couldn't understand him.

Turns out we were in the right place. We headed up to the party and met everyone. I'm struggling with the two kisses each time you meet someone.

My confusion has led to me accidentally head butting some of the people I've met.. I'm sure they understand. But nobody likes a headbutt.

The party was fun but it was also confusing. Only because most of the talking was in Portugese. Everyone was really lovely.

One guy, a painter named Migel Angelo (yes, really!) was convinced that I was Portugese and refused to speak to me in English.

The party was heaps of fun but the small apartment full o people smoking hit me around three and I went back to Marco's whilst the boys stayed and enjoyed what was left of the night.

Partied till the sun came up..

With the boys sleeping off the night before I had the day to myself to eat Portugese custard tarts and go shopping without the worry of a chap sitting out the front waiting for me.

I went back to Marco's that afternoon and found him cooking eggs and going through the photos of the night before.

Seems they'd had a great night but unfortunately Sam had lost his license that we'd fought so hard to get back in Santorini.

After a night of recovery we headed to Peniche the next day to see Super Tubes, the portugese wave that is on the pro tour.

The tubes were not super, they were not tubes at all. I knew how much Sammy was looking forward surfing.

flat as a tack..

We decided to come back again the next day in the hope that the was some kind of wave that Sam could surf.

The next day there were waves, enough to surf at least. I really tried to take as many photos as I could of Sam in the water but they all look the same, I got Sam at the start and then I got some great shots of some other guy.

I decided to put the camera down and go back to my book.

We took Marco out for dinner to thank him for the wonderful time he'd shown us. He picked the place, from the outside it looked like not much, but the inside was beautiful, ballrooms and murals on the walls - it even had a chandelier. This place was the real deal.

The food was fantastic. Probably the best I'd had whilst I was in Lisbon, washed down with green wine. Perfect.

We went for a walk to see Lisbon by night. It was beautiful, I really really didn't want to leave this time.

We said goodbye to Marco and thanked him for his hospitality and got ready to head to Madrid.

Barcelona

We arrived in Barcelona just before dinner, walking to the hotel we passed a lot of badly dressed middle aged women leaning against walls and sitting on the curb.. I didn't realise that they were prostitutes until one of them grabbed the crutch of an elderly man walking past.. Welcome to Barcelona!

The view from our hotel

After navigating our way through the maze of whores (I never thought I'd have reason to write that sentence) we dropped off our suitcases and went exploring in the backstreets. We had been told do not eat in the main drag. The tourist menus are no good.

So we went to a tiny little wine bar where only a few locals were hanging out and had the best tapas of my life. The food was so fresh, after all those days of pizza and cheese I was in heaven.
We spent the rest of the night people watching in Las Ramblas drinking sangria.

There were so many sights to see in Barcelona, all the Gaudi. But after two days in a row on a bus we wanted to stop learning and relax we walked the streets of Barcelona shopping and taking photos of alley ways.

After doing the same pose in every photo I've decided to mix it up by randomly waving my arms around. Holwell isn't thrilled with the concept..

We listened to Spanish street band Microquaqua who were that good we decided to buy their cd.

Desperate for amazing food like the night before we had our eye out for more tapas. And then we saw the tourist menu (knowing full well that tourist menus are no good) we sat down and ordered the (very cheap) paella special.

It was bad, really bad.
The calamari in mine was green, Sam's had prawns so small we were convinced that they were actually bait.

The moral of the story - THE TOURIST MENUS ARE NO GOOD!

We headed to the beach to recover from what was close to a near death experience.

The beach was beautiful, a nice relief from the heat of the day. Sam even managed to find something that was sort of a wave to body surf.

They were selling all sorts of stuff along the beach, "mojitos mojitos, saaaangrrriaaa sangria" was the background noise, until the police rocked up and all of a sudden the beverage sellers disappeared and became beach goers.

We were going to take photos of the beach but the topless ladies around us meant that we decided against it. Probably for the best.

After the beach we really couldn't be assed walking all the way back to our hotel so we got on a sort of bike powered tuk tuk. Our driver/rider's name was Cheese Bar.. "like cheese and like bar - Cheese Bar"

It was only fair that Sam introduced himself "G'day mate, I'm Wicked, Wicked Dude"

Cheese Bar and Wicked Dude really hit it off.

Cheese Bar and Wicked Dude - Photo: Embarrassed Girlfriend

When we got back to the hotel and I started to think about what I'd write in the blog.. That nothing terribly funny or ironic had happened. And then I checked the flight confirmation for the next day.
When I read the boarding pass I felt sick, I'd booked the plane for the wrong day. We'd already missed the flight - the lesson here is that a. Planning is better than winging it and b. Don't book flights in the middle of the night when you are tired and a little bit pissed.

I rebooked the flights for the morning and pretended I hadn't thrown all that money away with the help of some Spanish beer.

Dinner was at a Spanish/Mexican fusion restaurant that didn't look like much from the street but the food was sensational.

After dinner we joined he table next to us. The table was very multicultural, French, Spanish, Italian, Swiss and us..
I dazzled the group with my ability to locate the toilet in many a language.

We would have stayed longer with the group to chat more but we had an early flight to catch now so we headed back to the hotel to pack for Portugal.

A brief encounter with Florence and Nice

Bus-ing about

After the bus picked us up in Rome we headed to our first stop Aviano.
Aviano is a cute little town on the top of a very large hill. So large in fact, that you can only get up by Funicular. It's a cable car thing that goes up the side of a hill.

A cable car full of hot hungover types is probably the last thing I needed.

No, I don't know why Sam isn't wearing shoes.. stop looking at his feet, look at that view!

The town itself was beautiful, it was the Italy I had always imagined. Windy cobbled streets, old buildings and beautiful Italian food.

I had the best coffee I have ever had on that (very large) hill, followed by the tastiest gelato imaginable. Hangover cured.

We headed on to Florence and made friends with a chap named Alex. We all decided that we should have wine and cheese when we got to our accomodation.
When we arrived at reception, they mentioned it was 38 degrees, and the rooms were tents so therefore had no air conditioning.
There was only one thing that could lift the mood.
Wine and Cheese.

Cheeese!

Alex had a theory that we should only drink bottles of wine that cost 1 - 2 €.
So that's what we did. We drank a few bottles of Italy's finest (cheapest)  - and ate about four blocks of cheese.

I've never met a man more excited about cheese

Throughout the evening our table became longer.
Alex, Sam and I met an Irish couple Gavin and Avril who were at the bar to watch Ireland play in the Euro Cup.

Then met another couple Chloe and Beau who jumped on to our table.
Then another Aussie couple Cassie and Rob from Queensland who also had a cute black dog they were missing terribly.
Then a group of about six English girls joined the end of the table. It was clear to us then that we had to play a drinking game. And that we did. With red wine..

At the end of the night I got lost trying to find our tent and lost Sam in the process. This is what skulling red wine will do to you.

The morning after cheese and wine night was as you would expect.

But we had to put that behind us because we were on the bus to Nice with a whole different group of people.

The journey took a detour at the leaning tower of Pisa so we could take ridiculous touristy photos.

I'm trying to flick it so it's straight again.. get it?

We drove on through Monaco and discovered its pretty bloody hard to move there. Just a lazy million euros to apply and even then you might not get in. Might just stay in Barwon Heads for the moment.

We saw Grace Kelly rock, where princess Grace's car went over the cliff.

And then we arrived in Nice, a picturesque beachside French town.
We didn't see a lot of Nice, but I promise we were there!

We went to a tiny restaurant La Mamas, where the owner only spoke French. It made me excited to head back to Paris again!

The next day we were on the bus to Barthelona..

Amsterdam

Amsterdam would like to be known for tulips and canals rather than coffee shops and the red light district.

As I looked around the bus when we left Paris I had the feeling that no one was going to Amsterdam for the tulips, but then neither were we. I wanted to see prostitutes in windows and eat a space brownie.

We were on a Bus About bus, kind of like a tour. Our guide for the trip was Amy, a girl from Brisbane who told us we'd be stopping in Bruges on our way to 'the damage' (which apparently means Amsterdam)

After about an hour and a half we got there for a toilet stop and to pick up some other people - one of whom was a friend from home, crazy to run into someone you know in Bruges!

I came out of the ladies to see Sam with a Belgium beer in hand.. It was delicious.

Amy had been very clear that you've got to be on the bus when it's meant to leave or it will go without you. So after finishing the beer we walked back towards the bus. Until we saw a windmill, and started taking photos..

Then we hurried along to meet the rest of the group but were held up at a canal crossing.. For 15 minutes (those boats do not move quickly) thankfully the bus didn't leave..

As we drove into Amsterdam Amy gave us an overview of the city, activities and the nightlife. She even handed around literature on prostitutes (which Sam read, in depth)

We had all decided to meet up for a drink later that night, after heading to the wrong hotel we finally got to our room and headed out.

Amsterdam is cool, everyone is trendy and the buildings are amazing. It was great to walk through.

But my god, watch out for the bikes! We got into the habit of yelling bike at every crossing to remind ourselves - they don't stop for you. Ever.

We met our new friends from the bus at a hostel and had a few beers and got to know everyone. There were a lot of people from Melbourne, a few from England and one guy from America.

After a few hours of drinking and deciding who were the most annoying people that we needed to avoid, we went to a coffee shop.

I shared a brownie with one of the girls and Sam had a smoke.. Words can't describe the atmosphere at that point, these pictures will give you the gist.

Brownie time..

The look on my face says it all

And this is the part where shit started to get weird..

After the coffee shop we all decided to head to a sex show.. When in Amsterdam.

It wasn't great - it was disturbing.
The final act involved a middle aged couple loving each other, on stage..

And at this point in the show two Norwegian guys were standing behind me shouting messages of encouragement to the man on stage.

Time to go...

We ended up back at the hotel eating McDonald's at two in the morning.

I was planning on going for a run the next morning, needless to say that didn't happen.

We slept the night off and were going to hire bikes and make our way around the city. But it was raining, so we bought an umbrella and wandered around the winding canals and little alleyways.

Since it was raining we decided to go to Anne Frank huis. The line was enormous, so we found ourselves a pub and waited until the rain stopped.

When we returned the line was smaller and the sun was out.

The tour of the house is incredible, everyone is silent as they walk through. On the walls are excerpts from her diary and the house looks as if it did back then.

That was a must see for me, really interesting especially since we are going to a concentration camp when we get to Munich.

Our last night in Amsterdam was tame compared to what we'd gotten up to the night before. We had a big dinner and then headed to another coffee shop, I wanted to go to Bulldogs, which is a recommended one and Sam wanted to go somewhere less touristy..

When we got to Bulldogs I got another brownie and Sam had a smoke, then we were on the hunt for Poffertjes, small Dutch pancakes that my mum makes. We found a place and got some to go. When we got to our hotel room we opened the box and it was one big pancake. The effects of the brownie masked the disappointment and we got stuck into the massive pancake.

On our last morning I went for a run around vondelpark a massive park in the middle of amsterdam. Apparently it's legal to fornicate in the shrubbery here (why you would want to I don't know) I decided to stick to the paths.

Sam managed to find me some Poffertjes for breakfast and then we were off to the airport.

Two days was not enough in Amsterdam, if we had more time we probably would have gotten to know more about tulips and canals and to explore the city some more.

If I came back I certainly wouldn't see a sex show again.. But I'd love to learn all about the tulips.

Paris

Day one in Paris was by far the best day. ever.

First of all we are in Paris, I probably don't need to go on  - But I will.
We arrived on the train from London late Saturday night, our hotel was only a short walk away and it is perfect! Very cute room on the top floor of an old building in Montmartre.

We went for a late dinner (which is totally normal in Paris) to an Italian restaurant with a menu only written in French - It doesn't have to make sense. There was a fair bit of guess work involved but in the end it was delicious.

On Sunday, our first full day I went for a run along the streets of Paris and it was amazing, hardly anyone was about, I felt like I had the city all to myself.
All my life I've wanted to be here and here I am.

After crossiants for breakfast  I checked the map and Sam and I headed on foot to the see the Louvre. After about half an hour of walking Sam checked the map and realised I'd directed us in the opposite direction to where we were meant to be going. Sam took charge of the map (possiby for the best).

We arrived at the Louvre and I was that excited, until I saw the line.

The Louvre, and the line..

We didn't go in, plan is to go tomorrow morning before it opens to see the best bits (Mona) and then get moving before the crazy crowds begin (lets just see how that pans out!)
Then we wandered on to the Arc de Triumph, munching on crossiants and sipping coffee that I had ordered in French - they totally thought I was a local! (no, they didn't)

Bouyed by my successful beverage order I even asked a frenchman (in French) where the toilet was and got a response, after that I'm pretty sure that I am French - oui!

Poor Sam had no idea that we had to walk down the Champs de Elysees to get to the Arc, he didn't complain.. but after walking around two shops I started to get the feeling that it was enough when he said "Oh No! the boyfriend chair is taken!"
On to the Arc, we didn't climb it, I negotiated with Sam that if he climbed the Eiffel Tower with me we could view the Arc from below.
At this point my feet felt like they were going to fall off, and I'm sure Sam felt the same - because he was wearing thongs.. No comment

So  we stopped in at Laudree for some macarons, it was the sugar hit we needed. We added the left over macarons to our bag of picnic goodies and headed to the lawns beneath the Eiffel Tower.

Baguttes, macarons and red wine beneath the tower was probably the best way to spend the afternoon.

And then we climbed the Eiffel Tower, we went to the second viewing area - not the top. But it didn't matter, the second I started climbing the stairs I had the biggest grin, and it didn't go away.

From red wine beneath the tower to a celebratory white on top the afternoon  was unbeatable.

Given that we had walked about twenty kilometers that day already we decided to get a taxi back to the hotel and get this, the driver only spoke French and we still managed to get to the right place.. That'd be my excellent linguistic skills coming into play again.

With tender feet we wandered around Montmartre to find another cute little Italian place called Michelangelo's the food and the wine was fantastic. A picture of the Mona Lisa hung on the wall, so maybe don't have to go back to the Louvre..

The owner was so sweet, he gave us a free shot of something before we left.. Not sure why maybe because we were the only tourists there.

The next morning we headed to see the Sacre Couer Basillica, luckily we we were all over the tricks they play to get you to pay them money. The string trick - where they go to shake your hand and then tie string around your wrist/finger and don't let you go until you pay - was attempted on us about ten times, they really should communicate better.

The view from the dome of the Sacre Coeur was amazing, even after climbing the Eiffel Tower the day before. We had to climb teeny tiny stairways that went on for ever (did I mention I'm slightly claustrophobic?)

We also visited the church and the crypt, I'm not religious but it was pretty astounding. All the sculptures and alters and even the grandness of the ceiling.. There was writing on some of the sculptures, and the stone that made up the building, can you do that? I'm pretty sure if you are the guy that writes I was here on a statue of Jesus in a Basillica bad things will happen to you.

Then the camera ran out of battery... (yeah, that's not going to happen again)

After returning to the hotel to charge the camera and discuss who's responsibility camera charging is we headed to Galleries Lafayette. I wanted to have an outfit that I could refer to as 'oh this old thing, I got it in Paris..' you know, like a wanker.

Sam didn't know what he was getting himself in for - neither did I. Everyone there was insane, it's like they had never been shopping before.

After we'd navigated through six floors of insane pushy women we reached the top which had a fantastic view of the city. And I had another photo with the Eiffel Tower behind me (there will never be too many photos of me with the Eiffel Tower, maybe for you - but not for me.)

The shopping experience had scarred us both, so we sat and had lunch and drank red wine and champagne before heading back to the louvre.

The line was so much smaller and we saw Mona! I'm quite sure that the insane crowd clamouring to take photos of her had come straight from Galleries Lafayette.

It was our last afternoon in Paris and our feet were achy from walking the halls of the louvre, so there was only one thing to do. Sit in the street and eat Nutella crepes.

And on the way home I got my Parisian outfit..

Staying in Montmarte meant that we hadn't seen the Eiffel Tower light up at night so dinner on our last night was right out the front, with a prefect view. The food was delicious (it would want to be, it cost us a whole days budget) and we saw the tower light up and got more photos with it (I told you, there will never be too many)

Im sad to be leaving Paris, it was exactly what I had hoped it would be, but there is so much more to see, I'll be back Paris..
Au Revoir

And the planning begins..

Seven weeks until we pack our bags and head to Europe, seven weeks to go and all we've booked is flights (although I have got a spreadsheet).

Sam and I are finally heading to Europe.. I'm desperately obsessed with Paris and am quite sure that when we arrive I will become slightly hysyterical and make a scene (completely normal.. right?).

The trip will begin in Paris (so i can get the hysteria out of the way) and then we head to Amsterdam, Munich, Rome, Athens, Santorini, back to Rome, Florence, Nice, Barcelona, Lison, Portugal, Madrid, San Sebastian and finishing off in London. It's challenging enough to get that list of places in a sentence, let alone in five weeks - hence the spreadsheet.

Although the spreadsheet is causing a lot of 'vigorous conversation' at the moment. Sam wants to wing it.. and I'd like to live my life by the spreadsheet, for those five weeks at least. Let's just say the conversation is ongoing.. and unresolved - good times.