The end of our trip is getting closer and closer! Today we are on our way to Paris which means we are almost to the end of our Europe adventures. But to go back a bit and fill you in on what we've been doing...
We left the cold, snowy landscape of Switzerland to have a lovely three night stay in Cinque Terre which is Italian for five lands or villages. It's a picturesque little area right on the ocean surrounded by a national park. The villages vary in size but average about 1000 people in each. The towns are linked by a train which makes it easy to get from one to the other or you can walk between them all which takes about five and a half hours. We stayed in Riomaggoire the southern most town out of the 5. We arrived late afternoon to our dorm/tiny apartment. It had the steepest set of stairs connecting the kitchen and room upstairs you felt like you needed a safety harness! After settling in we took a walk up the many tiny, winding, step filled streets to a little church overlooking the water. We made it just in time for an amazing sunset and then headed out to look for some dinner.
Being a little fishing town we we decided on a seafood restaurant who boasted “fresh off the boat” seafood. Carly got the Red mullet spaghetti (although we were hard pressed to find or taste any red mullet), I got the mussel spaghetti, and Ryan and Al both got the fried fish which came out as a massive bucket load of deep fried prawns, calamari, whole fish, and little octopus which Carly bravely tried for the first time, tenticles and all!
The next day we bought a pass that allowed us to walk from town to town. We walked from Riomaggoire to Manarola, then caught a train to Corniglia (because the path was closed) and walked to Venazza exploring the three towns as we went. The next day we went to Monterosso and spent the day lazing on the beach and exploring the town. That night I made amazing risotto (if I may say so myself) and the next morning we were off! So pretty much it was a few days of sleep ins, gelati, foccacia, wine and soaking up the dwindling autumn sun.
We then set off to Nice where we spent 2 nights. We stayed at a really nice and backpacker friendly hostel, with cheap washing, massive included breakfast and beers for €1. It rained the *whole* time we were there! We walked down to the beach which was nice but would have been nicer in the sun and walked up to a lookout to get a good view over the city and ocean. We walked through a food and flower market and bought a very big slab of Brie for lunch for a very minimal price. We bought fresh baguettes and saw that Nice was very nice even though it was rainy. We also went to Monte Carlo, Monaco for a few hours. All we did there was visit the casinos and get the feeling that it really was an extremely rich country. We had Chinese take away for dinner (not very French but good :-)) and the next morning we were off again to...
Carcassonne. All we had was a flying visit, but it was good to see the old city that the game is named after. You can see the walled citadel from lots of places in the city (including our apartment window), it's huge and consequently impressive! Inside is just more of the town, although nearly 100% touristy – cafes, gift shops, accommodation, restaurants etc. We had an overpriced cappuccino (which apparently is a cup of very bad black coffee with cream on top) and then were off to the train station to go to Spain!
And isn't Spain wonderful! We stayed two nights in San Sebastian in a lovely clean hostel. We hired bikes for the day and biked all around the city and along the beachfront and Alex and I polished up and practiced some of the Spanish we learnt in South America. The tide was coming in when we were cycling and we all got very wet on separate occasions by the massive waves exploding over the sea wall. Everything is very cheap in Spain so we ate too much food for dinner. Carly and Ryan, tried sangria but both politely declined a glass, so Al and I had to finish off the 1.5L bottle by ourselves.
The next day we were up early to spend the whole day on a train to Seville in the south of Spain. A really nice city. And we stayed in a fun hostel for 2 nights. It was like a family and we were welcomed from the start by being asked to join some people upstairs for a free dinner. We made some good friends. In the morning we went to a little town half an hour away that Ryan was recommended and checked that out and in the afternoon we went on a free walking tour. It was 3 hours long and was really interesting. We found out a lot from our guide (some things true, some old myths) but we really enjoyed it all. We were invited by another of the guys from the hostel to participate in a dinner he was cooking for “just a few special people”. It cost €7 to cover costs and boy was it worth it! We started eating nibbles at about half 8 or nine and didn't finish eating until 12. The wine was flowing the whole time. We had bread and salsa and fried potato patties and pasta and fried vegetables and fresh battered and fried fish and prawns and whole squid and to top it all off ice cream! We had a lovely evening and went to bed very content indeed.
The next day we had half a day before the train so we went to a palace which was beautiful with massive gardens and rooms. As we were walking around we were planning what we would do with it if it were our house. After a few hours Al and I went to see an archive museum which had some old maps and things (some that Christopher Columbus drew) while the others shopped for dinner/lunch. Then we were on our way to Barcelona.
Barcelona was an amazing city! We spent 3 nights there and had a really good time. We saw parks and museums and just took in the wonderful culture the city has. I fell in love with Gaudi an artist from the early-mid 1900's who designed quite a few buildings and parks in the city as well as a church that has been getting built since the 1800's and is still in the process of being finished (they predict 2020). He has a great style and all his stuff reminds me of something out of Willy Wonka or Cat in the Hat. He also uses lots of mosaics.
I had seafood paella, a traditional rice dish and yesterday we ate at an all you can eat buffet... it turned out badly, but on the plus side that was at 3 yesterday afternoon and here we are at 11.30 the next day and I'm still not hungry :-) Last night we went to see a flamenco show which was really good and that brings me to now, sitting on a train to the city of love, Paris. We are staying with my aunty and uncle which will be really nice! More on that later but for now...
Adios amigos!
Nika
Cinque Terra
Vernazza
Nice
Carcassonne
San Sebastian!
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