Switzerland, Germany, Luxembourg, France
From the time we left Venice, the feel and pace of our trip changed somewhat. Up until that point we were just on holiday, going to places we wanted to go. But when we left Venice we had exactly one week to get back to Paris to return our car and catch our flight back to London. So it became almost part of the journey rather than the trip.
We left Lake Como on the Italian/Swiss border at lunchtime, and within a couple of hours we had arrived in Luzern. Motorway driving in Switzerland is very expensive. You have to buy a yearly motorway sticker that allows you drive on the motorway. This costs 30 Swiss Francs (they're not on Euros which was mildly inconvenient) but covers you for the whole year. Which is great if you live there or drive there often. But for us only being there two days, it was very expensive. On the other hand the roads are all very good and fast, and we went through the world's second longest road tunnel, the St Gotthard tunnel.
Switzerland and Luzern were beautiful, with snow still on the Alps and the sun shining brightly. We left the rain of Italy behind and encountered some of the hottest weather of the whole trip. I've been to Luzern before, and on that occasion it was overcast and I didn't even get to see the Alps. So this time it was almost like a different city, except that everything was still where I remembered it.
We arrived early in the afternoon and spent the rest of the afternoon and early evening wandering around town, seeing the old town and the beautiful Chapel Bridge. It was difficult to find somewhere to eat that night because it was all so expensive. We almost went to McDonald's except that even their combo prices were outside our budget (9-12 Francs / 7-9 Euros / 14-18 NZ Dollars).
The next day we left Switzerland and drove to Germany. Originally we had been planning to go to Munich then north to Heidelberg and then along the Rhine. But as we had discovered driving times to take much longer than we'd expected, we decided to head straight north through the Black Forest, rather than detouring off to Munich.
The Black Forest was really beautiful. We got off the motorways (which are free in Germany, yay!) and onto some small roads through the countryside, where the trees were tall and the houses were few and far between. It was almost as I imagined it to be. We visited the Cuckoo Clock Museum in the small town of Furtwangen and stayed the night near the spa town of Baden Baden. Tempting as it was we didn't take to the waters in Baden Baden the next day, as the minimum time for a spa was two hours and we were keen to get on the road.
The next place we went to was Trier, where we spent a couple of nights. Trier has the oldest Roman ruins north of the Alps and is ideally situated for day tripping along the Moselle River. We had been recommended earlier in the trip to go to the Moselle rather than the Rhine, and we spent a pleasant day driving along the beautiful river past countless vineyards, to the point where the Moselle and Rhine rivers meet, at Koblenz. Once again we tasted some local wines, and found the Rieslings a lot sweeter than New Zealand Rieslings.
Trier is just by the border with Luxembourg, and pretty near the French border too. We drove to the small town of Diekirch in northern Luxembourg. The country is so small it took less than an hour to drive halfway across it. Peter's family has a connection to Diekirch so we stayed a night there and visited the national war museum, which is very impressive for its scale and size.
The same day we also drove to Luxembourg City and spent a couple of hours wandering around there. There wasn't much to see or do there, but the city is built high above a river gorge and the view is pretty impressive. We also visited an old castle near the German border (we literally drove all over the country) which has been restored from ruins to what it looked like in the 17th Century (although there has been a castle there since Roman times).
Our last full day on the Continent we drove across Luxembourg, through Belgium (just because we could - our 10th country of the trip!), and back to France. We stayed in the town of Epernay in the Champagne region, right in the heart of Champagne producing country and home of many of the large Champagne houses, including Moet & Chandon. We took a guided tour of the Moet cellars which was fascinating and I learned a lot about the making of champagne. The tour ended with a tasting of Moet's Brut Imperial champagne. Wow it was nice. The nicest champagne I've ever tasted. I am going to have a very hard time returning to NZ sparkling wines. We bought a bottle from the factory shop to toast our last night on the Continent. It only cost 23 Euros (NZ$45). Also that night I finally got the courage up to try escargot. And I really enjoyed them, they were cooked in loads of butter and garlic and tasted meaty, not slimy as I'd feared.
The next day we packed up our tent for the last time and drove the couple of hours back to Paris and caught our flight back to London. It was so sad to leave Europe. After a month away we both started getting tired and wanting to go home to our comforts. But by the time we came to leave we had gotten our second wind and didn't want the trip to end. In some ways I enjoyed the last couple of days the most out of any because they were unplanned and unexpected, yet they turned out to be full of pleasant surprises.
We found along the way that it takes about two days to get used to speaking a different language. We had five nights in German speaking places, so were just getting the hang of it and learning new words. The menus in Germany/Luxembourg weren't particularly varied - everywhere was basically veal or pork or beef steak. However the portions were certainly large.
At the end of the trip it was really nice to return to France, which was certainly both of our favourite country. It was nice to return to what had become almost familiar customs, and to our favourite radio station
NRJ. Arriving back in England we found it really weird not to have to think about which language to speak. Several times I found myself wondering how to say something, then realising with a laugh I didn't have to translate anything.
We had a fantastic holiday, and are really sad now that its come to an end. Somehow returning to a proper bed (which at times we had longed for) just doesn't make up for what we are most definitely going to miss.
Italy, Part II
From Rome we drove south to Naples & Pompeii. Peter has done most of the driving on the trip, while I have been navigator. We had some pretty long and slow driving days in France, and by the time we got to Rome he was driving like a local. The locals in Naples have a reputation of being crazy drivers, but Peter managed to fit right in there and go with the flow. The road to Naples was straight and wide, with one lane in each direction. And Peter was quite taken with the local custom of passing the car in front whenever you feel like it, regardless of whether there's traffic coming the other way or not. That's just the way it's done there, and everybody pulls over and you have plenty of room to pass. Also, traffic lights are just ignored there. More than once we ran a red light just because we were going with the flow. I noticed a lot of cars in Italy, but especially in Naples, with dents in the car, but luckily we escaped any damage.
We arrived in Naples from the west and had to get to Pompeii in the east. While we could have (and should have) gotten on the toll road to avoid the city, we decided to drive straight through the city centre. At first it was quite fun - five lanes of traffic flowing down a three lane road and scooters dashing in and out all over the place. But when we got down to two cars trying to squeeze down one lane roads it got a bit frustrating and stressful. Luckily we made it in one piece, although it took well over an hour just to drive from one side of town to the other.
We stayed in Pompeii rather than Naples, at a campground just across the road from the ruins on ancient Pompeii. Didn't think very much of modern Pompeii at all - it is crowded and full of cheap tacky tourist shops, and overpriced overcooked pizza. Ancient Pompeii however is fascinating. While looking at the ruins in Rome we often said we just couldn't imagine what things used to look like. However because the buildings and everything in Pompeii were so well preserved, it was easy to imagine real people going about their everyday lives, in the shadow of Mt Vesuvius. There was everything you'd expect to see in a modern city - offices, shops, takeaways, houses & homes, bath complexes, theatres, temples, sewerage, central heating, graffiti/tagging, and the infamous brothels.
From Naples we drove back north again to Venice, stopping overnight in the town of Assisi, home of St Francis. Assisi is a very pretty hill town built out of pink marble. Most of the town centre is prohibited to cars, which made it very nice to stroll around the streets. There is not much to actually see or do there though.
We spent a day and a half in Venice, staying on the mainland at a campground frequented by Contiki and other tour groups. Unfortunately this meant we didn't get any sleep the first night because of all the music and yahooing coming from the bar.
Venice was really lovely. So clean and open and quiet, and best of all no cars. We wandered all around the islands, over the canals, did lots of window shopping. We visited the island of Murano and learnt all about Venetian glass making at the glass museum. We didn't visit any glass factories, although we did see one but didn't have time to stop. It is amazing how much they can do with glass, from drinking glasses and plates to beads to figurines and nik naks. And to think the process hasn't really changed much in 2000 years.
Another highlight of the trip to Venice was having dinner at a restaurant alongside the Grand Canal. I tried one of Venice's speciality meals - Cuttlefish (Seppie) a la Veneziana, which came with an intriguing black sauce that turned out to be "squid juice" as the waiter called it.
Finally our last stop in Italy was at Lake Como, just on the border with Switzerland. The lake was very pretty, surrounded by tall hills. We arrived in town nice and early, and then spent a very frustrating two hours driving round and round trying to find a campground. The instructions we were given said to follow the signs which quickly disappeared. The first campground we found appeared to be shut. And there was no tourist information that we could find. Eventually after driving round for hours we accidentally stumbled across the campground we were looking for. I don't think they get many foreign visitors. We ate at the campground restaurant, of which the only other patrons appeared to be the camp workers or the family of. There were no written menus, and nobody spoke English. They told us what the three options for dinner were and we said what we wanted. At least our Italian is good enough to do that. But for all that, Peter raved about his spaghetti and reckons it's the best he's ever had. It was certainly authentic.
And that brought our two weeks in Italy to a close. I found Italy more difficult to get around than I expected, and we had several frustrating incidents. We found the people in the north to be a lot friendlier than those in the south. Unfortunately we encountered lots of (what I'd consider) rude service in the south - in Pompeii definitely and also to some extent in Rome. Being ignored by waiters and other service people is the main thing. Or something as simple as not being greeted when entering a store, as is the custom all over France. Ok, so we don't understand everything people say to us in Italian, but we do understand the basics. But often they just wouldn't speak to us at all. So that was quite a shame.
Other than that we had a good time. Plenty of good food and good wine. Although we we're getting a little of sick of pasta towards the end. It rained every day we were in Italy, apart from the very last day. Venice was definitely my favourite place, as I'd been to all the other cities before. And now we head back to Paris to return our car in a weeks time.
Italy, Part I
We arrived in Italy on Thursday 8th April, three weeks after we left home, and two weeks since we arrived in Europe.
After a run of fine weather across France and Spain, once we got to Italy our luck ran out, down came the rain and out came the English brolly. It rained every day we were in Italy, sometimes only overnight / in the evening, often during the day but never really heavily. Just enough that we still had to bundle ourselves up in jerseys and jackets the whole time.
We stayed two nights in Pisa and five nights in Rome (plus another six nights elsewhere which is covered in Part II).
Pisa made an excellent base from which to see both the Leaning Tower and to travel into Florence. The campsite was situated just down the road (800 metres) from the Field of Miracles where the Leaning Tower is situated. We went there both by evening, by night and by day. In the evening it was great because we could look around without any crowds in the way. During the day was good because we could see a lot more and could go up the Tower. But it was so crowded and very expensive (over NZ$60 for both of us), so we didn't go up or stay very long.
We ate dinner at a restaurant near the Tower, and just as we were finishing our meals, along came a parade of hundreds of young men, representing what appeared to be many different football teams. The parade was proceeded by a band and followed by flag bearers who would stop regularly to twirl and throw their flags in the air. It was really neat to be caught up in this spectacle. We asked the restauranteur afterwards what the occasion was, and he said it was a protest march. Must have been something lost in the translation there because they all looked too happy to be protesting. It also happened to be Good Friday that day, so that may or may not have had something to do with the parade/march.
We caught a train to Florence and spent the day wandering around. It rained a lot that day and I played "dodge the umbrella" with all the other tourists crowded into the Squares and narrow streets. In the end I put my brolly away and decided I'd rather get a wet head than have to continually try and avoid hitting other people/brollys with it. Had a hilarious moment watching one girl walk across the Ponte Vecchio (old bridge), holding her umbrella without a care in the world - and watching everyone else in her vicinity either get hit by the umbrella or have to suddenly duck for cover. A fact which she was blissfully unaware of.
In Florence we pretty much just wandered around. Saw the beautiful old Duomo with Bruneleschi's (sp?) dome on top. I still think it's one of the most beautiful buildings in the world. Saw the Ponte Vecchio lined with expensive jewelery stores on both sides of the bridge. Queued for an hour to get into the Uffizi art gallery. After an hour we still hadn't made much progress and estimated we still had about another hour to wait. By which time it would be getting near to the time the ticket office closes, and quite possible we wouldn't even be able to buy tickets at all. And if we did manage to get in we'd have had maybe an hour inside if we were lucky. So we gave up and left. At least we'd had somewhere dry and out of the wind to stand during that hour we waited.
The next day we drove south to Rome through the Tuscan countryside. Everyone raves about Tuscany and I was looking forward to the trip. But perhaps it was the wrong time of year because I couldn't see anything spectacular at all. Just lots of towns, hills, trees, empty vineyards.
In Rome we stayed at a campground just outside the ring road. It wasn't very well signposted and we spent hours trying to find it, and it was getting late and we were both tired. Not fun at all. In fact we found this problem just about everywhere in Italy, that things weren't well signposted. Whereas in France we had no problem finding anything because the signposts were on virtually every corner.
Our first full day in Rome was Easter Sunday so we headed on down to St Peter's Square and saw and heard the Pope giving Easter Mass. I had expected the Square to be jam packed full of people but although it was crowded it wasn't too bad. We were able to see everything pretty well. Security was tight and to get into the actual Square you had to go through metal detectors etc. It's funny how much a part of normal life this procedure has become.
Then we walked into town and saw the main attractions - the Roman Forum, the Colosseum, the Victor Emmanuel moment, various Triumphal Arches, Churches and Roman ruins everywhere.
The Roman Forum is free to the public, but you have to pay to see the ruins on the Palatine hill above the forum. When I was last here eight years ago it cost 12000 Lire to get into the Forum so I was most surprised to find we could just walk straight in. At first I felt really guilty like we were breaking the rules, until I found out that it was free. The problem with not having to pay an entry fee to get in is that now you can't hire an audio guide or pick up a pamphlet at the same time you buy your ticket. So we were left wandering around looking at the ruins thinking "I wonder what that is". Also it is a real shame that by looking at ruins alone you just can't imagine what it used to look like. It would be really good if they had signs in several languages explaining what all the ruined buildings were, and perhaps an artists impression of what it looked like. But there is nothing like that. We bought a book from a trader but it didn't help much either. We saw several tour groups go through and overheard some of the commentary, but didn't know how to join a group.
Then we went to see the Colosseum. Outside we found where the tours go from. Just informally from the area between the Colosseum and the Forum. There is no tour office or building. The tour we went on cost 16 Euro each (I think) and included the 8 Euro entry fee for the Colosseum and a two hour tour of both the Colosseum and the Forum. It was well worth the money, especially as it allowed us to skip ahead of the two hour queue to get into the Colosseum. It was highly informative and interesting. We wished we'd known about it sooner.
On day two we visited more monuments (being Monday all museums were closed anyway). Saw the Trevi Fountain, the Spanish Steps (WHY are they so famous???), the Pantheon, several Plazas, Churches and more Roman ruins. Went to the Baths of Caracalla which contained many amazing mosaics (apart from those that had already been stolen and put into museums).
One of the best places we found in Rome (by accident) was Torres Argentinas. This is an archeological site full of Roman ruins and also home to 400-odd stray cats. 10 years ago a group of women began looking after the small colony of stray cats which had been abandonded in the archeological site. Now it has turned into a full time job for I don't know how many volunteers. They take in unwanted cats and neuter, vaccinate and rehabilitate them. The cats are available for adoption from the shelter, and until they are adopted they have the run of the shelter offices and archeological site. They all look like fat, happy cats. Tourists are welcome at the shelter and we spent over an hour there looking around and cuddling the kitties (we miss our babies at home). The office is constantly full of cats and people tripping over each other, and it is a place of lots of love and smiles. They do an amazing job. See
www.romancats.de for more information.
Tuesday and Wednesday were spent with our friends Tina and Wayne who flew over from Oxford for a weeks holiday in Rome (just a coincidence that we were all there at the same time). It was great to see some friendly faces again and to catch up with them.
Together we all visited the Vatican museums and St Peter's Basilica, and took a day trip out to Hadrian's Villa near Tivoli outside Rome. The Vatican is amazing. So many treasures and works of art (both in the museum and the basilica). The Sistine Chapel is neat but there are also many other frescoed rooms that are equally good, which you pass through in order to get to the Sistine Chapel. Hadrian's Villa was huge. The ruins of the mansion of the Emperor Hadrian, on the hillside with expansive views. The size and scale of these buildings would be on a par with the mansions of today's rich & famous, if not bigger (I guess - I've never been to the house of anyone rich & famous ;) ). Guest suites, bath houses, formal rooms, gardens, private oases, some of which were pretty well preserved. But like all the ruins we've seen, it was difficult to imagine what it looked like or how it was used.
It was a very busy week. It was nice to stay in one place for a while though, and not have to pack up the tent every day. Because we stayed so far out of town we ate at the camp restaurant most nights. Had some good meals though - and lots of gelati of course. Roman artichokes, raddicio, eggplant, suppli (cheese & rice croquettes), loads & loads of pasta, and lots of good wine.
From there our schedule had us travelling on to Naples and then back north to Venice. But that will have to wait for Part II ...
