Rest of June - Belgium, France (Pt. 1), Italy

***Bernie Mac put up photos, so check it out at bernieblogsthrougheurope.blogspot.com***

Okay...so it's been a long time since I've been able to update the blog and/or email you all, so I apologize! I can barely keep up with my own life, let alone all the great things that are happening with you all.

Since Koln, Germany, I've made my way through 5 countries and roughly 15 towns or cities. We're motoring! After Koln we made our way to this beautiful little place called Bruges in Belgium, just outside of Brussels. It was a quaint little place that is only surviving today because of tourism. We stayed at this crazy hostel with chain-pull showers and 30 Belgian beers in stock. Met a lot of great people, and we saw plenty in the couple of days we were there. If you ever make your way there, ask Melissa at De Snuffel about the alligators in the river that eat the sewer rats.

We made our way to the wonderful city of Paris and probably walked 40km in the days we were there...we saw almost everything Paris had to offer in one day, and even caught the Eiffel tower lit up at night. We managed to find the only open hotel in Paris (for dirt cheap) that weekend, as it was the first day of summer, and every year Paris celebrates with la Fete de Musique. Over 3000 musicians and bands hold impromptu concerts around the city, so everywhere we went there was live music. It was a fantastic experience, and pretty wicked that it only happens one day a year. Many more stories to tell, but hopefully they will be in my blog soon.

Attempted to get to Milan from Paris but the trains were booked, so we made a wonderful yet unforgettable detour through Lyon. Absolutely amazing, and quite possibly the best food I had had all trip, and for the best price. Quite an amazing church on the hilltops in Lyon, that we hiked (read: took the funicular) to, which gave us a panoramic view of the entire city. We also ended up staying in a 3 star hotel for 70 EUR altogether...and with four people, you can imagine how cheap it was. A great little rest before moving on with the rest of our trip. Off to Milano! Or is it?

Before we left Paris, we attempted to figure out our route to Milan, since our direct train wasn't available. The SNCF lady tells us that we can connect via Torino and get into Milan. Perfect. We've got times and dates, we're ready to roll. As we leave Lyon, we arrive to buy our tickets for the train...but reservations are closed. What? Train reservations don't close. Train? Oh no, it's actually a bus. Perfect. You can't buy tickets for the buses unless you arrive at least 30 minutes before, and having waited in the line and speaking to a representative that can't speak English, we had 15 minutes to get to the bus and plead to get on. Hello grade 9-12 french class! I manage to use broken French to speak to the conductor to get us on. Sure he says, but for 30 EUR each. No, no, it's free with our pass. No, it's not. Sure enough, we go into the station and we speak again to the broken french crew, and we get on for free, and don't even have to get a reservation. We're on our way! Schonberger and her french class really saved us there. Kind of cool to be able to use another language!

Milan was cool, lots of shopping and trying to get Kim to stop shopping (to no real avail). Milan didn't have too many sights, so it was a fairly relaxing couple of days, with some shopping in the middle.

Made our way down to Rome, where we spent 5 days and 4 nights taking it all in. Some very impressive sights, although Rome is unbelievably touristy. Not to say that we weren't tourists, but I don't know if we saw any locals at all! We were staying right in the middle of Rome though, and for once did not have to take a Metro or a bus to get anywhere. Tackled the Old City in one day (Colosseo, Roman Forum, Palatine Hill, St. Peter's Basilica in Vincoli) which was nice but not as cool as I thought it would be. The next day we tackled the Vatican, and it was a good thing because the next two days it would have been closed! St. Peter's Square is amazing, with colossal stone structures everywhere and some pretty cool architecture. The Vatican was overall decently impressive, although the Sistine Chapel wasn't all it was cracked up to be. As soon as you walk in, the guards tell you no photos...then you look up and there are about 300 people all with their cameras out and snapping pictures. Guess they don't care that much! The artwork itself was nice to look at, but not necessarily worth all the hassle. The Basilica on the other hand was downright amazing. Every direction you turned, you were faced with some amazing sculture or piece of artwork. The alter was fantastic as well.

Decided to chill at our hotel with some bottles of cheap wine (1.85 EUR specials...haha) on our terrace. We ended up staying beside two Icelanders (Andri, and don't remember) who gave us the lowdown on Reykjevik, and somehow we agreed to an Iceland 2008 trip? We've got his info if we actually follow through.

Our last night in Rome actually fell on the Festival of St. Peter (San Pietro) so very little was open, but it was fun to just kick it around and eat gelato like it was nobody's business. I'm very ready to get the hell out of Rome though and onto greener pastures.

Alright, the Tour of Italy continues on as we make our way to La Spezia (Cinque Terre), where we'll be meeting up with Reena and her sister Puneet. Good times!!