nate and jenni: January 2009

Monday, 26 January 2009

Pisa

There is not much to do in Pisa but see the leaning tower. The following photos show tourists at their best (or worst)...

"Hey, look, I'm over here!"

Food in Italy

Four best things about Italy (aside from Michelangelo, etc.)....

Pizza

Espressos and Caffé Macciato

Gelato

and Pizza

Sunday, 18 January 2009

Goodbye UK, Hello France (and Monaco)

We spent our last day in the UK at beautiful Bath, named after the natural hot Roman Baths pictured below... Randomly, I ran into my old soccer coach from Sydney!

That night we drove our 'left-side-of-the-road' VW onto a Ferry which took us to 'drive-on-the-right-side-of-the-road' continental Europe. We arrived in France and headed straight for the beaches of Normandy. Pont Hoc, seen below, was an array of over 100 craters and heaps of broken bunkers caused by bombs on D-day. Solemnly breathtaking...

Paris was next for 3 wonderful nights but I'll save that for its own update another day. After Paris we stayed a night in Champaign to try some champaign then headed for some of the best times ever in Switzerland (also to recieve a separate update). Then, back to France and amazing Annecy. The streets of Annecy are intertwined with the town's river and has a backdrop of the French Alps...

After snow and below freezing weather for over a week we arrived in Southern France, Marseilles. The temperature was mild, the Mediterranean was sparkling and the architecture just as splendid...

Nice was next - a comfortable beach town with daily fruit and flower markets, excellent public transport, awesome hostel (our favourite so far) and a skip and a hop any which way to more beaches, cafes, history, panaramas and architecture...

While in Nice we took a day trip over to Monaco, the 2nd smallest country in the world, which is on the coast and surrounded by France. There is a spectacular guard change (complete with drums, trumpets and lots of gun twirling) once a day at the Monarco palace at 11:55am sharp. Nate and I jumped off the bus at 11:30 and ran like crazy for 25min to reach the palace right on time. The run was worth it just to see the pleasure on Nate's face as he watched the guards do their thing...

Below is the Monte Carlo - the famous casino that James Bond likes to frequent. We didn't see 007 but we did count 5 Ferraris, 8 Mercedis and Bentleys, 1 Rolls Royce (and 1 Smart Car) parked out the front.