End of the Road

There's a video in this blog! Go to the blog website to see it!

Arriving in Budapest, Hungary, the first thing we noticed was that everything was a bit more dated (read: older) than many other European cities we'd visited so far. Their metro was built during the communist era and is one of the oldest still operating today. A shaky ride, but it got us to our destinations.

Budapest is a beautiful city that still holds its historical European roots quite well, with the grand Danube River separating the Buda and Pest sides of the city. We crossed the chain bridge, walked up Castle Hill and toured the Budapest History Museum, which was once the Buda Palace.

We sampled an amazing Hungarian funnel cake; it was so good that our goal is to try and replicate it when we get back home (we'll let you know if we're successful).

In addition, we sampled a few different goulash dishes accompanied with various dumplings, which didn't disappoint. Over the next few days we explored Heroes Square and the big City Park, stumbling upon the Vajdahunyat Castle.

Heroes Square

Then we packed up and took a 7-hour train to Prague. Right away we knew Prague was a special place, a castle looming over the city and the River Vltava winding its way through. It is one of the few cities that wasn't bombed during the World Wars so it has retained its 18th-19th century feel. The views at night are even more spectacular!

We explored the old town area containing a cool clock and stumbled upon the main shopping district. We even came across a recently-opened Patagonia outlet store, which had unbelievable prices! The fact that the weather was getting chilly, and we each only had one measly fleece jacket, easily justified our purchase of another warm outer layer each. And shopping makes you thirsty, so of course we had to pop into one of the local pubs to try delicious and cheap Czech beers (where the original Budweiser comes from). Our clothes needed some laundering, but it ended up being the most expensive laundry we've ever done! - about $13 for a large load! So a note to future Prague travelers: skip the laundry and stick to the cheap beer!

We walked around the Prague Castle, browsed the inside of the beautiful St. Vitus cathedral, and then explored the quieter Lesser Town. We also explored the grounds of Vysehrad Castle, which was a couple minutes from our apartment and had amazing views of the city. We spent six wonderful nights in Prague, but we had somewhere to be.

We had booked a flight on Ryanair from Wroclaw (pronounced frawt-suave), Poland to Brussels, Belgium for practically nothing, but first we had to get to Wroclaw. Bus is the only option from Prague, and we guess it's not too popular, because when we saw our bus we thought "No, that can't be it." But it was - an ancient-looking Russian bus with 4 "drivers" chain smoking in the front. Luckily, no smoking was allowed in the passenger area, and the drive was uneventful, but we weren't sure what to expect in Wroclaw. We only stayed two nights, but ended up really liking what we saw of the university town, even through the rain.

The city has an unusal attraction - dwarf statues. The reason for these lies with the Orange Alternative, an anti-communist movement that took place in the 1980's where dwarf paintings covered up communist slogans. Since then, a local artist has placed over 30 miniature sculptures of different dwarves throughout the city. We even bought a map of the all the locations of them, so we set off on a dwarf hunt! We didn't find all of them (one is supposedly underneath a seat in a movie theater), but found most, and it ended up being an excellent way to see the city.

In addition to hunting dwarves, we visited the famous Raclawicka Panorama, a 360 degree painting depicting one of the most courageous battles in Poland's history. We also got breathtaking views of the city from the top of the Wiez Katedralnych (cathedral) and tasted some perogi ruski at a market hall.

All too quickly we were on the move again, with a quick flight to Brussels. We weren't impressed with Brussels; it was just another big city with lots of people everywhere. It did, however, offer a wide range of shopping for chocoholics and beer connoisseurs alike, in addition to having a good variety of restaurants. We ate at a little family-run Thai-Vietnamese restaurant that brought back familiar flavors, and also had some tasty mussels at the famous Chez Leon, where they go through a ton of mussels a day!

Anna found a liking for the Mort Subite Kriek (cherry) beer while Ryan favored the Westmalls Double Brown beer, just a few of the Belgian beers we sampled at a pub called Mort Subite.

All this was really just an introduction to what we'd find in Bruges. An hour after hopping on the train there, we found ourselves wandering the streets of Bruges in search of our hostel. We found it, unfortunately, because it turned out to be one of the worst hostels we've stayed in, but we cancelled one night and changed to the nice family-run Hotel Nicolas on our third and final night.

Bruges did not disappoint - the town is unbelievabley picturesque with old Flemish architecture, endless bridges crossing the many canals

and quadruple the amount of chocolate shops that were in Brussels! We got a complimentary tour of the recently built concert hall, saw Michaelangelo's “Madonna and Child” sculpture (one of his few works outside of Italy)

and “toured” some of the pubs while trying to escape the constant threat of rain. In a close tie with Prague, Bruges is our favorite spot in Europe.

With less than one week left, we had one last place to visit: the grand city of London. We stayed with some friends that we had met in Egypt (well, Ryan had. Anna had food poisoning at that point), Abner and Rachel, who treated us to traditional cottage pie for our first dinner in London. Delicious! They were extremely kind in letting us stay in their flat.

Abner walked with us around a lot of the city our first day there, and for the next four days we continued doing the same. With the dollar being so weak, most of the attractions were out of our budget; however, a neat thing about London is that many of the museums are free. We explored the Tate Modern, the Museum of London, and the Natural History Museum.

We waited with the masses for the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace:



saw Big Ben:

and the London Bridge (not what you think!):

 Tower Bridge (what you think of):

and stumbled upon the premiere of "Fantastic Mr. Fox," where we saw George Clooney, Bill Murray, Cindy Crawford, and Jason Schwartzman walk the red carpet to the theater (who knew we'd have to fly all the way around the world to see movie stars in London...go figure).

We also met up and had a great dinner with one of Ryan's high school friends Alexis, who we also stayed with on our last night. We are typically not fans of big cities, but London was an exception. It was also a fantastic place to end our trip as it is influenced by so many different worldwide cultures, and really made us think back to all the great memories we've had over the past year.

The day has come however. We flew an uneventful 10-hour flight back home, and now have the task of fitting back into the world that we left.

This has been an utterly amazing life-changing adventure, and we will never forget all the wonderful people and places we've encountered and loved.

We hope you've enjoyed reading our blog as much as

we've enjoyed experiencing and sharing it.

Ryan and Anna

A few stats about our year-long around-the-world trip:

• Number of photos taken:   over 10,000
• Number of trains taken:   18  (overnight trains: 5)
• Number of boats:   20
• Number of times Ryan shaved:   7
• Number of flights:   19
• Number of buses/minibuses:   50  (overnight buses: 4)
• Number of times slept in car:   1
• Kilometers driven:   over 21,000
• Number of times driving a Spaceship:   1

Mmm.

A Family Reunion: Part II

We boarded another cheap RyanAir flight, left the beautiful coast of Girona, Spain and arrived in Roma, Italy an hour and a half later. It was midnight by the time we got into our hostel room, and the next thing we knew we were sipping cappucinos and biting into flaky croissants for breakfast. We were south of the city but had to get north to the small town of Riano, where The Flavour of Italy, our apartment, was, and where we would be meeting Ryan's family!

There was a little confusion as to how we were to get to The Flavour of Italy, but after borrowing the cell phone of a helpful Italian woman, and an hour's wait at the train station, we were greeted by our host Wendy. After settling in and snacking on pizza adorned with zucchini flower, the Kloch clan (parents LeeAnn and Steve, sister Jaime and boyfriend Matt) showed up! We promptly celebrated by popping the top of some tasty Cava that we brought from Spain, sampling some local Italian wines, and enjoying some delicious homemade gnocchi.

A couple of gnocchi lovers

We also had an unexpected visitor, Francis, the friendly yellow lab, who became our pet for the next couple days (we have met many friendly animals over the course of our travels, and it's amazing how they can make you feel right at home!).

We woke up the next morning and had a wonderful breakfast at courtesy of Wendy, then caught the train into the city to start some sightseeing. We saw Michelangelo's Moses sculpture, the Colosseum, Palatine Hill, the Roman Forum,  and the open-roofed Pantheon.

The sun was out and the heat was on, but we managed to make it over to the Piazza Navona, which turned out to be everyone's favorite spot of the day.

Of course, we couldn't leave the city without sampling some gelato. For dinner, we headed back to Riano where we were taken to Casa de Luca, a hidden local restaurant where the menu consists of whatever the chef feels like making that night! We didn't know how much food we'd get, so we ate everything (liking it all) and the dishes just kept coming! There seems to be about 8 courses total! The food was flowing, along with the wine and limoncello. We left feeling gorged and very happy!

Even though we were all feeling a little worse for wear the next morning, we toughed it out and headed back into the city, destination: Vatican City. The line into St. Peter's Basilica wrapped around the square, so we wove through the Museum, ending at the Sistine Chapel, first. Then, St. Peter's.

Leaving St. Peter's, clouds closed in and it started to pour:

so we bought some bumbershoots (umbrellas) and dodged puddles until we got to the Trevi Fountain, where some coins were tossed, and big wishes made.

Since it happened that this day was also our first anniversary, it was only fitting to celebrate, which we did big time, at a wonderful, filling meal at Ciao Bella Grille, with many thanks to Grandma Rita!

We had train:

tickets for the next morning taking us northward from Roma to The Cinque Terre (The Five Lands) on the coast. The views of the Italian countryside were beautiful, and we changed trains in Florence, then ended in the small seaside town of Riomaggiore, one of the five towns that make up the Cinque Terre area. We checked into our quaint, tri-level apartment, then took a lovely walk along Via Dell'Amore (Lover's Walk) to the next town of Manarola, ending with a tasty dinner at Dal Billy Trattoria before the stroll back.

The rain followed us from Rome, this time bringing some powerful thunder and lightning along with it, which made for a fitful night's sleep. The next day we explored three of the other towns (Monterosso al Mare, Vernazza, and Corniglia) via a convenient train that ran between all the towns. One of the most interesting aspects of Cinque Terre is how they plant their gardens and vineyards on the terraced cliff sides:

Manarola

Corniglia

Looking toward Manarola

We left this unique coastline for another astonishing one - Venice. The no-cars aspect of the city is super-nice, and taking boats to get around is just so different! We caught the vaporetto (waterbus) on the canal to our apartment in the heart of Venice, and more good food with a bottle of prosecco capped off the day.

Another rainy day awaited us, but armed with our new umbrellas, we set off toward Piazza San Marco, taking refuge there just as a downpour started.

We thought we could wait it out, but the Piazza is notorious for flooding; we didn't want to get stuck there for the rest of the day, so we made a dash for it back to the apartment.

Soaked and tired, we opened the door to our apartment -  to find that it too was starting to flood! The roof was being replaced, and the workers must not have got a covering up before the rain started. Luckily it only covered part of the floor and the only casualty was some of Jaime's bag. We used our resources, blow-dryer included, to get the water out and dry off our gear. Although the rain subsided, we decided against venturing back out, so instead we cooked our own pasta dinner and enjoyed staying warm and dry. We also said our goodbyes to Matt that night, as he was headed back to the States on an early morning flight.

The sun decided to show up the next morning so we took a vaparetto to Murano Island, famous for its blown glass. We perused the shops and gaped at some of the prices, but we enjoyed looking at the art nonetheless. We headed back early in the afternoon as we had to catch our train to Klagenfurt, Austria. The scenery from the train ride was amazing, with the high rise alps looming above the tiny Italian, then Austrian villages. We arrived just in time to grab a bite to eat, huge, delicious salads that we'd all been craving oh so badly. In the morning, we picked up our rental car and headed for the town of Kloch!

Yes, it is true, there is a town in south-east Austria by that name and it's actually known for its wine. After driving through several neat little towns, including Diepersdorf:

Autumn in Diepersdorf

we arrived to the official sign stating we were in Kloch.

Back to the roots

We ate lunch at the Klocherhoff, hiked up the Kloch castle:

and then tasted some of the Kloch wine at the local vinotek. We even bought some wine glasses adorned with the Kloch coat of arms! That night, we stayed in Graz, and were walked around the city long enough to climb to the Uhrturm Clock Tower (we actually took an elevator up and hiked down) and have a drink in the middle of the Mura river at the very strange Mur Island bar.

We left early in the morning for Salzburg, where we had another nice apartment. Salzburg is one of our favorite cities; the town is completely walkable, with an imposing fortress overlooking everything. We walked around Mirabell Gardens:

Garden with fortress in the background

toured the Hohensalzburg Fortress:

View of Salzburg from the castle

visited St. Peter's Church and Abbey, walked through the house where Mozart was born and raised, and more.

Mozart's hair

After that, LeeAnn, Steve, and Jaime went on the Sound of Music tour while we went to the Stiegl brewery, where we sampled some of their beers, and finally ended the afternoon with one liter mugs at the local beerhall!

Our last stop on the Austria tour was Vienna. We stayed outside of the city in the town of Baden. The afternoon we arrived, we took a stroll through the vineyards to the tiny wine nook of Soos, where we sat down to some delicious cheeses, bread, spreads (liptauer was a favorite), and of course wine. One offspring of the wine process is a drink called sturm (basically drinking the product of the first fermentation in the wine process, when the grape juice has only reached 4 percent alcohol). We tried this in Soos also - it's quite different than wine and pretty tasty!

We fueled up our bodies for sightseeing the next morning thanks to the generous breakfast of the Steinkellner Pension: meats, cheeses, eggs, fruit, breads, and individual carafes of coffee got us going! We took a tram trip around Vienna's city ring, marking our map of where to head back to, then saw St. Stephensdom, took the metro to the Danube River, and ate some kasekrainers (hot dogs with cheese in the middle). After a long day, we headed back to Baden, and also back to quaint little Soos for a last delicious dinner at the Fischer Winery, as the next day the Kloch family would be heading home.

We said our goodbyes after another delicious breakfast, then we left the Pension for a hotel closer to the train station in the city. That day we walked around the enormous Schonbrunn Palace and its gardens:

and did some window shopping and some errands. Next thing we knew, we were awake at 5:00am and catching a train to Budapest, Hungary!

If you would like to know how living life on the road for a year is, this photo sums it up: laundry hanging, dinner on the table, clothes in the closet (wait, the extra bed and chairs are the closet...), and Ryan hard at work in the office.

Una Siesta En Espana

Anna’s parents dropped us off at the bus station on their way to the airport; we found our bus easily enough, and 8 hours later we said hello to Spain again. Specifically, Madrid. Finding our way to our hostel was a little challenging because of the fact that the metro line we needed wasn’t yet finished. But we got some exercise in, found our centrally located room, and then the first thing we did was go around the corner to the Museo de Jamon. This is a must for anyone visiting Madrid, especially those on a budget. It’s basically a bar that serves up tasty bocadillos (little sandwiches) and tapas, and many of their items cost only 1 euro! – including beer and glasses of wine. Our taste buds and our wallets both agreed with this place, so we visited a few more times.

Madrid was just the right size for walking around, so our next four days were spent exploring the city and visiting many of the top sites. We visited the Palacio Real (the Royal Palace), where displays in the royal armory of old weaponry and full body armor (horses included) was the highlight:

The well-known Prado Museum has free-entrance times, so we took advantage, viewing works by Goya, Velasquez, and the impressive The Garden of Earthly Delights by Bosch, to name a couple. One night at dinner, the beer tap was built right into our table! A screen on the wall displays the amount you’ve drank, because it’s easy to overdo it when you’re bartending for yourself! And we ate a huge pan of good paella. It wasn’t cheap though, so we limited the amount of our imbibing.

And we made a major decision – our big Europe splurge was going to be football game, so who better to watch than Real Madrid? Considering the team has two of the best players – Ronaldo and Kaka – it was easily justifiable. Unbeknownst to us at the time of buying our tickets, Usain Bolt was scheduled to make an appearance before kick-off, which he did, ending his field time with his signature “bolt.”

That surprise made our evening that much more exciting! The game was great, the fans fun, and Real Madrid ended up beating Deportiva 3-2.

Markets seem to be the place where cities show their colors most, and we went to Madrid’s street market on Sunday morning, and were fairly impressed. The stalls seemed never-ending, snaking along side streets, and selling everything from souvenirs to any type/size of rubber band you could think of!

The city’s modern art museum, Museo Reina Sofia, also had free entrance hours (a few other attractions do this as well which makes sightseeing in Madrid fairly cheap) so we strolled over to examine the unique and often strange works of Pablo Picasso (his huge Guernica is a stunner) and Salvador Dali.

We liked Madrid a lot, as it seemed to cater to every kind of tourist – luxury jetsetters or budget travelers like us. But it was time to keep moving northward to Barcelona. Another eight-hour bus ride later, we arrived in the city. Our reserved room tipped us off that Barcelona was going to be more expensive: we were paying almost 50% more than we did in Madrid for one of the smallest rooms we’ve stayed in. There was even a fridge and microwave crammed in with us! The owners of Barcelona 294 were extremely nice (they owned a little hamster!) and breakfast was included, so these things somewhat made up for the lack of space.

Everyone told us that the first thing on our sightseeing list should be La Sagrada Familia, to which we said “the what?” La Sagrada Familia is a massive mid-construction church. Plans were developed and started in 1882, and the projected year of completion is not until 2030! The mastermind behind the building is Antoni Gaudi, a remarkable architect who unfortunately passed away early during its construction. Gaudi took his designs from nature; for example, the photo below shows how the columns inside mimic trees. Seeing the actual building of a structure of such proportions and precision was astounding! Workers these days have the advantage of modern cranes and equipment, too.

Next on our tour of Gaudi, we hiked up to Parc Guell, where a house where Gaudi and friends spent time was located, along with another magnificent creation – tile mosaics underneath a main terrace seemed to come alive.

Classical musicians taking advantage of the acoustics in the pavilion

The view from Parc Guell; notice La Sagrada Familia towering over the city on the left!

The artist’s other two popular buildings, Casa Batllo and La Pedera, were a little too pricey to visit inside, but we did wander by to see them from the outside, taking careful notice of “the most photographed chimneys in the world:"

We strolled (along with every other tourist in Barcelona) along Las Ramblas, the main drag that attracts all kinds of street performers decked out in crazy creature costumes. It’s also the city’s informal pet warehouse, selling animals such as rabbits, lizards, and even squirrels (no dogs or cats, however); what a crazy place! Our favorite find was a tapas bar named El Xampanyet, where a delicious house Cava (a type of sparkling wine from Spain) was served alongside excellent tapas.

It wasn’t too hard to leave Barcelona for a few reasons – 1. It was just a little too expensive for our budget, which limited sightseeing; 2. We were feeling a bit cramped in our room after 3 days; and 3. We were looking forward to our next stop: the beach of the Costa Brava. We decided, since we had a flight to Rome from Girona, Spain (about an hour north of Barcelona) to stay in a coastal town just east of Girona called Llafranc, for 5 nights.

We took a chance and bussed up the coast without accommodation reservations, but since it was toward the end of their summer vacation we got an incredible deal at a rental agency we stopped into. For less than what we paid for our closet in Barcelona, we got an entire 2-bedroom 2-story apartment that was 200m from the beach!

If ever we imagined a Spanish beach paradise, this was it. Llafranc was small enough that we could walk across it in 10 minutes, passing a perfect crescent-shaped beach looking out on a picturesque bay of crystal clear Mediterranean water.

When we got tired of lying on the beach, there was a peaceful coastal path that reached the next small town in 15 minutes. But we didn’t get tired of the beach much; it was the most perfect beach weather you can get, with refreshing ocean a few feet away. Heaven!

Our break from city sightseeing was just what we needed, as these beach bums are going to do some serious touring in the next 2 weeks! Next up: the Kloch family + Matt!