Swiss Family Pluess

Deciding to test Urs' assertion of the aesthetic supremacy of Swiss cows we made a dash for Lucerne Switzerland for the weekend to meet up with my Aunt Dawn, Uncle Urs and Cousins Karen and Nicole.

17 years!! or something like this is how long its been since I last saw them..that's half a lifetime ago for me. When we last saw each other it was at their ranch outside Brisbane Australia and I had long, 'I wanna be Jim Morrison' hair and was wearing a paisley, 'I wanna be Jim Morrison' vest with mirrored, 'I wanna be Jim Morrison' glasses. In retrospect, it seems that my attempts of capturing Morrison's unique brand of 1970's hippy-cool at the proud young age of 17 failed miserably as all Helen said when she saw the picture was "why are you dressed like Joey Laurence from Blossom?" ugh..sorry Jim, I know you're turning in your grave but she doesn't know..she doesn't mean it.

Anyway back to the family. Had a great time with my aunt and uncle. For many years Urs' job allowed them to travel and live in various parts of the world..and coupled with their native penchant and experience traveling for fun Helen and I spent many hours discussing the in and outs of much of the world. They are retired now and living on top of a hill outside Lucerne in a pyramid house that was apparently designed by an architect who was later abducted by a UFO. We stayed at the house for 3 days soaking up the sun and mouthfuls of refreshing mountain air.As it turns out cousin Karen and her beau Ray were already having a party Saturday night and this provided the perfect opportunity to catch up with them and my other cousin Nicole and her beau Faby. We ate, we talked we laughed..it was good to see the cousins again. :)
(At barn party, from left to right: Aunt Dawn, Cousins Karen and Nicole and Uncle Urs)

The next day we all went to Ballenberg which is an interesting open air museum of rescued historic homes from all over Switzerland. Apparently they rescue these old 200-800 year old cottages and mills etc and move them to this spot where they are preserved. Most interesting is that several of these old places are still working so you can get a chance to see how the 300 year old water powered wood mill works or how the meat smoke house works (i.e. with actual meat being smoked), and so on.

Monday rolled around and the cousins had to get back to their jobs and Helen and I needed to start heading west towards Morocco so we said our goodbyes and promised to not let another 17 slip by before seeing each other again.

J'aime Paris

What can be said about Paris that hasn't already been said? How about this: crappy architecture and the worst skyline yet. A bit harsh perhaps, but true. Unlike several of the other major cities we've hit and aside from several great structures (i.e. the Eiffel Tour; le Sacre Cour, Pompidou Center, the Orsay, etc.) downtown Paris is actually a nasty amalgam of 1970's block buildings. But this is fine, after all, this is not why you go to Paris..you go for the culture..or so thinks me.

So being the cultural aesthetes that we are, we booked ourselves into the Montemarte district...home of the Moulin Rouge amongst other things.. c'est magnifique!

It was at this point that time decided to hit me with yet another year. Merde. Wasn't so bad actually, spent the night in a bar with my belle and a Beatles / Doors cover band. We sing sung along with a pot pouri mix of garden variety Europeans: large drunk Russian ladies whose voice rattled like a plucked bandsaw, gay french men dressed as Elvis Costello growling away like an operatic Harvey Firestein, and several other stewy types. It was a good night.

Of course we took in the rest of the sights and even caught an Impressionist exhibit (read: Monet, Manet, Cezanne, Picasso et al) at the Orsay. Tres cool.

What else? tired of the relentless tourbook narrative? Here's some other color on the scene. Helen spent almost all of Paris sick with a cold, I got the runs from some bad Vietnamese food. Had a small confrontation with some Nigerian hustlers outside of the Sacre Cour..they convinced Helen to hold onto this piece of string momentarily and within a second they had braided this bracelet around her wrist and were now demanding 10 euro. We argued and insisted they take it back, that we didn't want it, they insisted and when several more joined the fray we tossed them 20 cents and walked away as their eyes burned into our backs. What else..oh yeah, tried absinthe..no big deal..tastes like a nasty watered down Sambuca..

As for our bodies and minds? aside from Helen's recent cold and the occasional spat of the splatters, we've been relatively healthy. Our foreheads and forearms are tanned from spending prolonger hours outside. Our legs are becomming very fit from all the walking/hiking/lugging of packs..I'm actually starting to grow some calf muscles which is a nice change from the chicken legs I'm used to step'n with. Our clothes are beginning to smell persistently despite our best attempts at washing (you try rotating between 3 pairs of socks and underwear for 2 months). We seem to be hitting less and less tourist sites and taking less photos..preferring instead to just relax and enjoy the scene..this at least seems to be working. ('this' being the saturation point that we were looking for, slowly we are shedding our tourist selves and are becoming travelers). Stress too has seemed to wane, I found myself sitting in a cafe the other day thinking of absolutely nothing and feeling more relaxed than I have in a long long time..this seems to be working too. Helen and I have begun to create our own language of hand signs and various head nods to communicate from across crowded trains or when we don't want our euro hosts to know our thoughts (remember all euros speak English..even if they pretend they don't).

Anyway, after several glorious days in ol' Paris we called up the Swiss family Pluess and planned our get away.

Altstadtfest

Heidelberg..what a cool place..big university town, lots of young international types, good Indian food, and of course great medieval German architecture.

We lucked out. Turns out the day (Sat) we arrived was the AltStadt festival celebrating the the history of the old town in traditional German fashion: Beer, Bratwurst, High school Oompah Bands, men dressed in colored bridge guard outfits drinking from hollowed out yak horns and playing trumpets. We ended sitting and singing with a table of local German dames and some other kids from Mexico city. Once the Germans found out we were from California they all erupted into a sort of hooting and shouting about this is where Paris Hilton was in prison and were we sad; I told them I cried the day she was sentenced. Shortly after, the Mexican kids 'taught' us all the words to la-cucuracha and had the table singing "nah nah nah nah, marijuana que fumar!". H and I of course knew what this meant but the rest of table seemed blissfully oblivious to the translation and kept belting out the lyric. Funny scene.

The high school oompah band left the stage and was replaced by an aging Rolling Stones cover band singing old favs like: "Unter mine Thumb" and "Hey yoo, git off of meine cloud" and so on.. We drank bier and ate sausages until the sun went down despite the rain. Later we wandered into the university campus area and ran across a french ska band that was actually good. Their manager, seeing me and instantly realizing my skill with the camera asked me to take fotos for their fan site. I obliged while Helen danced. The band's site I guess is http://www.roultaboul.com/

we rounded out the night with some good Indian food, several large glass of water and a hike to our subterranean room. Good times.

Sounds like Muzac

So Salzburg... We arrived last Sunday evening in the old salt city and made our way to the hostel. Actually it was a youth and family hostel which was quite fun. It had several large families staying across from us, a communal TV area where Sound of Music was playing and a bar. Helen watched the movie, I too tried to follow along out out of my one good eye. The next day we did our own sound of music walk, which is actually quite easy since the town is only about 30 min walking time across and all the sites are easily discernible on the stadtplans (city maps CK). We found the ivy covered tunnel that the Von Trapp family airplane danced through, we found Mirabell gardens, the gate, the nunnery and the Hohensalzburg Fortress. We also stumbled across Mozarts birthhaus and other rezidenze, which were both very drab. Later we found a cool little cafe selling a pan global fusion mix of Japanese curry with chicken and vegetables served over couscous..delicious! All in all Salzburg was very nice.












Next we made our way to Fussen in southern Germany. Fussen is the site of the Neudisneylandenstein castle and is apparently a top listed attraction for Chinese tourist. No kidding, we found a gasthaus (guesthouse CK) to stay in for the night and were shocked and awed to discover the next morning at breakfast the the place had slept 27 people that night..about 20 of which were Chinese. We then ventured into town and up to Schloss Neuwaltdisneyenstein to take pictures and waste money on the guided tour. It turns out the castle is apparently the inspiration for Walt Disney's Sleeping Beauty´s castle. What´s funny about the castle is that it was built by mad Konig Ludwig in 1869 or so in an apparent attempt to recapture some lost German Medieval romance. In 1870 castles were useless and quite out of place in the modern world, this castle was ridiculously anachronistic (out of time CK). Keep in mind that in 1870, among other things, the world had just entered into the Industrial revolution, The US had just had its civil war, and Darwin and Marx had published their seminal works decades before. The castle is itself a fairytale, it even has its own fairytale cave built inside that looks very much like the fake caves of the Pirates of the Caribbean ride at Disneyland and such. I wonder if Walt Disney didn´t get the whole idea for a fantasy land from touring the site. I also wonder if its this link to Disneyland that attracted so many Chinese to the area.

From Fussen we continued north along the Romantic Road (which itself is a post war contrivance aimed at driving tourism into the heart of Bavaria) to several old romantic Bavarian burgs ending up in Wurzburg.


Wurzburg was apparently leveled in WW2 by allied carpet bombing but was rebuilt again shortly after. All the buildings, forts, palaces, and churches were rebuilt in original baroque magnificence. They are stunning, they are grand, but again, because I know the back story they seem fake again..a romantic fantasy, a simulacra; again, much like Disneyland.













This seems to be a recurrent theme with our adventure so far..Disneyland. I don´t know if its because we´ve been reared on TV and everything seems like simulacra to us, if its because we came with fairytale visions in our minds, or if its because life does truly imitate art but we´ve had a hard time getting lost in western Europe. We can´t seem to go native, everything is too easy, packaged for our consumption, no danger: Mozart chocolates, Italian salumis (no, not salami´s..look it up CK), corner cafes, churches that charge admission, museums, thousands of Europeans who all speak perfect English..Argh!! And now it´s raining and is supposed to rain for the next 10 days. Brilliant. We´ve resigned ourselves to shopping in sports stores for quick drying trekking gear (my newest obsession) and internet cafes (hence this long @ss blog). Tomorrow we´ll try to head to Heidelburg then up into the Koblenz-Koln-Trier areas for some German wine tasting then off to Paris and then backdown through Switzerland to visit family, then finally to north Africa where even the one legged beggars are dangerous.

I should end by saying that it´s not like we´re not enjoying Europe, we are having a blast: Europe is very photogenic, the bathrooms aren´t that bad, and the beer really is cheaper than the water. I´ve even been contemplating buying and running a hostel during the summer months over here..the economics of it seem to work out (i.e. 27 people a night at 20 euro each during the 3 months of tourist season..you do the math.)

anyway...time for a kaffee i think.

that´s what she said...

so the last couple of posts were Helen´s.. here´s my two cents on the last couple of weeks:

I think what I liked most about Italy were the bidets, they´re very refreshing. I could probably write several stanzas on the joy of bidets but I wont..instead I´ll simply suggest that if you haven´t already and you do get the chance to try one take it!!!

Anyway, in general Italy is fun: There´s the clash of ancient and modern in Rome, the cluttered coziness of the stacked seaside abodes in Amalfi and the romantic rollings hills of the Tuscan wine country. And then there´s the history of it all, tres fascinating: The factions of warring Etruscan townships, the maritime supremacy of the Venetian Doges, the assassination of popes and the building of a better church, the Medici´s and the Mafia, and of course Marco Polo´s and Columbus´ contributions towards pasta.

Aside from being ridiculously expensive, the only other drawback with Italy is that its a bit too Italian. Sounds weird I know but it does seem that Italy is somewhat obsessed with it´s own cliches. Perhaps this is due to us hitting several touristy areas where countless culture mongers package and sell ´la vita Italia´ on every corner, or perhaps it was simply the endless masses of lost and confused tourists who always seemed to be in our way, or maybe it was having to pay €8 for two cappuccinos because we sat down and drank them (versus drinking while standing at the bar). Either way, we ate the food and we drank the wine, fillings ourselves until the taste was burnt into our palates...we came, we saw, we conquered. We´ll come back. We´ll be older, wiser richer...and hopefully the dollar will be stronger. Fin.

We´ve now moved into Innsbruck Austria. Its a nice change of scenery and of weather. Today we hiked in the Austrian Alps. We rode aging Olympic gondolas, we pet long blond haired horses grazing in their alpine meadows, we picnic´d overlooking scenic vistas straight out of the best postcards. It was a good day.

Tschuss!

Gelatos, cappuccinos, and primis

Mmmm... these are the things I will miss most about Italy. Our time here has been scrumptious so far.

We spent the last few days in Cortona and Assisi and loved every minute of it. Cortona is a small medieval town on top of a hill in the Tuscan countryside (we're also told that "Under the Tuscan Sun" was filmed there... but neither of us has seen it). We spent 3 days hanging out and enjoying the scenes... and if things weren't so expensive, we'd probably camp out there longer. We also did a day visit to Assisi in Umbria, home of Pinnochio and St. Francis.... more amazing views and stunning churches.

After spending a few quiet days in the countryside we decided to make sure we experienced Florence, which is where we are now, and after just a day here we are ready to leave. It is quite a big city and like Rome, wayyyy too many tourists and quite expensive. Lines to get into everything and reservations required for some. A bit too high maintenance for us.

Venice is our next stop, then on to Austria. We'll have to say our goodbyes to Italy... which will be hard, but 'tis a big world to see and we must move on.

Ryan doesn't know this yet, but I am booking a Sound of Music tour once we get into Salzburg. Can you believe he has not seen the movie.... EVER? If we get a room at a hostel we're eyeing in Salzburg, he will have no choice but to watch one of their daily free showings of the movie. He must watch it before we do the tour. I hope the actual scenes are still as pretty as when they filmed the movie!

Oh, and Ryan's bday is coming up soon.... perhaps we will spend it in Amsterdam?

various pics

VENICE

FLORENCE

Italia

Sicilia
Italy comes in many flavors. This last week we were in Sicily, the farthest south provence of Italy and man..what an..umm.. adventure. It seems that the further south you go in Italy the more impoverished it becomes. They say it's like the Appalachians of Italy. There are certain pockets that are nice though... we got to see Taormina, a very picturesque beachside town, and Syracuse. Also got to see Mt. Etna but we never made it to the very top since it was really cold and windy.
Special thanks to Den & Nano for coordinating everything and helping us adapt to the Italian ways! We had a great time with you guys and we miss you already!

Pompei

After Sicily, we took a train to Pompei. Some of you may wonder... how in the world do you take a train from Sicily to the mainland? They actually board the whole train onto a ferry and boat it across the sea, along with ferrying cars and people. Kind of like going to Balboa island I guess.

Anyway, we got to see the Pompei ruins where you can see how the people lived right up until the volcanoe blew. For such an old civilization, they were very advanced. It was amazing to see their homes... kitchens that had marble countertops! and we even got to walk through the town's whorehouse. You could tell what it was from the paintings on the walls (i.e. all the various positions!!). And the people... still preserved, in the very positions they were in when they died. Dogs too.

Speaking of dogs, Pompei is overrun with stray dogs, hundreds of them, but they are all very well behaved and polite. Yes, polite. Its kinda like Caesar Milan (aka the dog whisperer) meets Pavlov. It seems, having been ignored most of their lives they have tuned themselves into the human psyche and have learned to read our slightest signal and gesture. They have even learned to cross the road by watching and waiting for cars..kinda strange and interesting to see actually.

We also had a chance to visit the Amalfi coast. Very pictuesque... cities on cliff sides... kinda like Laguna Beach, but 10 times prettier! Definitely a nice retreat if you want to get away from the hustle and bustle of big cities. Unfortunately, we only had a day to visit so we only saw Positano and Amalfi which are overrun by tourists.

Roma

From Pompei, we took a train to Rome which is where we are now. We can't wait to get into St. Peter's Basilica and the Vatican museums and the Sistine Chapel! There is something to see everywhere you look.... churches, castles, Roman ruins, statues, etc etc etc! Too bad everyone else in the world is here to see the same stuff. It is very crowded everywhere you go. And lines to get into everything. We expected lots of tourists, but not this many! Strange enough it all seems like Disneyland.

Tomorrow we are planning to get to the Vatican museum by 7am (ayayayy) to wait in line until it opens at 9am. We were told that if we get there anytime after it opens, we could wait in line all day. And it takes several hours just to really take it all in. On top of that, Pres Bush is supposed to be arriving tomorrow or Saturday to visit with the Pope. The city is already preparing for his arrival, as well as the people... the streets are lined with anti-Bush and anti-war posters. They are expecting an anti-American protest right outside the Vatican... which should be interesting since that is where we are staying.

PS. HAPPY BIRTHDAY SHAWN!!!!!