Santorini/Athens

Greece overall was one of our favourite places to visit and it was an excellent way to end our trip.  It was our mentality that we were going to relax and explore and not worry about any tourist traps.  We decided that we would fly from Athens to Santorini (a 45 minute flight) as we only had limited time to spend there and didn't want to bother with a 5-8 hours ferry ride (depending on which one you take).  We stayed at an AirBNB that turned out to be more like a hotel located in Karterados, which was just outside Fira, the capital of Santorini.  We were picked up at the airport and we immediately rented a quad from the daughter of the couple that we were staying with, it was to be delivered the next morning.  Our first night consisted of walking to the grocery store and preparing dinner for ourselves in our own personal kitchenette.  The next morning, we woke up and first stepped outside to check out the amazing views.  Our balcony faced the eastern side of the island, with the blue ocean off in the distance with stark-white greek buildings and blue shutters, all around us.  That morning, our wheels had arrived!  The quad was an awesome feature as it was very cheap (15 Euros per day plus gas) and gave us mobility on the island we hadn't experienced on our trip to that point.  It was also necessary as the bus system was very limited.  Our first full day we decided to head out exploring on our quad to the nearest "black beach" nearby.   The island was formed by volcanic eruptions approximately 2 million years ago, so a lot of the rocks are volcanic.  This causes there to be black beaches, white beaches and a red beach. There was no one on the first black beach so we took our quad off-roading down the beach, getting stuck a couple times. We continued on exploring to the eastern shore where Kamari beach is located, another black beach.  The weather was very nice and the water was the warmest we had experienced yet.

 Our ATV on Kamari Beach

The view from our balcony

Just cruising on the beach

The second day, we explored the red beach which was on the south side of the island.  The water was extremely buoyant in that bay, and it took us awhile to find our way down to the beach as the path was roped off in order to get down there.  We finally figured it out, and after a bit of a risky climb down, we came across the infamous red beach, along with some strange doors built right into the cliff side.  After spending the afternoon there, we made our way back to the hotel.

 The walk down to the red beach

The red beach

The third day, we explored Fira, went for lunch and tasted ouzo (Kev liked it, Holly, not so much).  We explored the shops and also went back to Kamari beach.  That night, we decided to check out the infamous Oia sunset, located at the northern point of the island.  That was definitely a must-see, it was an absolutely breathtaking sunset.  The town of Oia was neat itself, very old buildings, neat shops, and everything was on multiple levels above the ocean.  Afterwards, we went for dinner in a neat restaurant that had a view of the sea and the moon before heading back to our room for the night.

 Kev drinking ouzo

 The views on the way to Oia

 As the sunset started in Oia

 Sunset in Oia

As the sunset ends in Oia

The next day, we went to the volcano off of the island.  In order to get to the ferry, we needed to climb down the craziest set of stairs.  There were donkey rides for 5 euros either way, so we decided to walk down in the morning and then we would take the donkeys back up later in the day, after the volcano tour.  When we got down to the bottom where the ferries were situated, we found the tour we were going to take and got on to this really neat old boat with a huge mast.  The tour guide was very friendly, and once we got to the volcano, we hopped off and got to explore.  There was sulfur smoke coming up out of many areas, and it was very hot on the volcano (it didn't help that it was bright and sunny, and that we were standing on mounds of black volcanic rock).  

When we finished exploring, we got back on to the boat and were taken to the "hot springs".  We both thought that they were more like "warm springs", as the water was maybe a bit warmer than luke warm.   When we got back to the port, we took our donkey rides up the stairs, which was a hilariously fun experience.  Kev's donkey was charging ahead, while Holly's donkey kept playing this dancing game with another person's donkey the whole way up.

 The view out towards the volcano

 Down at the port

 Down at the port

 Sulfur smoke 

 Oia from the Volcano

 Sitting on the volcano

 Our donkey rides

We decided to spend the last complete day of our trip in Athens as we were flying out from there to come home.  We flew from Santorini to Athens first thing in the morning to arrive around 8am.  We took the metro system to the hotel we booked near the city centre.  Our hotel turned out to be gorgeous and because we were there before our room was ready, we were upgraded to a suite with a built in Jacuzzi ("quite nice" as Peiter, our BNB host in Bruges, would say).  We headed into town in search of food and stopped at the first souvlaki joint we could find for some cheap lunch.  From there we headed out on foot to admire some of the ancient architecture and to check out the famous market.  The market turned out to be fairly underwhelming in my opinion based on what we were expecting but it was still pretty cool.  It was a lot of American brands which made it lose some appeal.  The city centre area was crazy though, packed with people and some officers patrolling the streets with swat gear and large firearms (I guess they are very cautious with some recent unrest of the people in Greece).  We continued on walking to check out some ancient architecture including Zeus' temple and to get a good view of the Acropolis without actually going inside.  That night, we packed our bags and went out for our final dinner of the trip, a very bittersweet moment.  It sucked to be going home but the trip was a huge success and produced some great memories!

 Overlooking Athens

 Zeus' Temple

 A fallen pillar at Zeus' temple

Rome/Pompeii, Italy

We left early in the morning on Sunday to arrive in Rome early afternoon, so we could get to exploring right away.  We pre-ordered our colosseum tickets online and decided that would be a good landmark to check out in the afternoon as it was only a 10 minute walk from our hostel.  Since we booked online, we paid a small extra booking fee but it was well worth it when we arrived.  We walked past hundreds of people in line in what was estimated as a 2-3 hour queue to the "reservations" line with only 5 people.  We walked around the colosseum with our pre-downloaded audio guides so we wouldn't have to bother with a tour guide.  We found out some interesting information, for example:

• Place for fights between gladiators, fights with animals and public executions by wild animals
• 9,000 animals slaughtered in colosseum in the inaugural year in 79 AD
• 4 levels of seating (moving upwards) were for senators (personalized seats made of marble), knights, Roman Citizens, poor citizens and common women
• Where the private entrance for the emperor was located
• Up to 73,000 spectators

The ticket also included access to Palatine Hill and the Roman forum which we visited right after. These sites were full of ancient ruins.

The following day we decided on a day trip to Pompeii as other travellers had highly recommended it and we had an extra travel day to use on our Eurail pass.  Pompeii was covered in 20 feet of ash in 79 AD after an eruption of Mount Vesuvius and later uncovered to find the city to be very preserved due to the lack of air and moisture.  We were there for a couple hours and got a chance to see a good portion of the city including the amphitheatre and voids between the ash, filled with plaster, to see the positions of the humans when they died.  We were kind of hoping to see the people as they were in the houses but the people and artifacts have all been removed and put into one area.

Our final day in Rome was to visit the Vatican City and St. Peter's square.  We booked online, which once again saved us waiting in a MASSIVE line, allowing us to walk to the front and right into the city.  We're glad we did our research before visiting these huge Roman attractions.  The city was neat, although there was waayyy too many people in there so it was hard to move around freely.  We saw a lot of the famous artwork, including the Sistine Chapel, where security tried to keep everyone silent to little avail.  After the Vatican, we headed out to check out St. Peter's square where the Pope comes out most Sundays.  Unfortunately we were not there on a weekend so only got to check out the area.

We then finished the day by heading out to an Italian restaurant that specializes in gluten-free pizza and pasta for our last night in Rome.  Holly had the gluten-free pizza she had been craving and I had a large calzone that looked like a giant pizza pop.

We headed back to the hostel for an early night, as we were off to Greece the next day!

Kev

Cinque Terre, Italy

We arrived in the Cinque Terre a little later than expected, due to the reliability of the Italian train system.  After checking into a small family run hotel, we explored the village we were staying in (Vernazza) before going out for a nice dinner by the ocean.  All the villages in the Cinque Terre are extremely charming, with so much color, character, and situated in the most beautiful landscape.  It's no wonder the region is considered a World Heritage Site.  Due to there not being much on at night there, we just checked out the stunning sunset and watched the powerful ocean waves explode over the rocks, before calling it an early night. 

The next day, we hiked the trail from Vernazza to Corniglia, the next town over.  The hike consisted of rugged landscape, absolutely breathtaking views of the ocean, and friendly people along the way.  Surprisingly, most people we talked to in this region were North Americans,  which was definitely a change.  After exploring Corniglia (situated high up on a cliff, unlike Vernazza which is right on the water), we took a train to the village on the other side of Vernazza, named Monterosso.  This is the most resort-like town in the Cinque Terre, with the nicest beach.  Here, we relaxed on the beach, checked out the town, and we were going to hike back to Vernazza until we were advised against it.  So instead, we took the train, and arrived back in Vernazza within five minutes.

After dinner, we spent another quiet night researching Rome, which we left for today by 630 am.
Holly

Florence, Italy

We arrived in Florence in the evening, after a long travel day.  It took us about fifteen extra minutes to find our airBNB host's apartment, as Florence has a system consisting of three different numbering systems for addresses.  They are color-coded, and of course the number we were looking for was in the palest color of all three (and as our host said, "nowhere else in Italy do they have this, only in Florence"). We had a rather lengthy introduction to the apartment with the host, where Kev had to prove he could unlock the apartment door about three times and turn on the gas stove, and as for me, the important information was where the iron and hairdryer were - and whether or not I approved of the bathroom.  Finally around nine pm, after a swift goodbye, our host whisked out the door and we went out for a nice dinner.

Our first full day consisted of exploring the main focal points of the city.  Included in this was the great Duomo (cathedral) which was absolutely breathtaking, the central market, the piazza del Signoria, and the piazza Michelangelo which had magnificent views over the city.  That night we went for dinner at a buffet where you pay 9 euros for a big drink and all you can eat.  However, the food was pretty mediocre, so the all you can eat aspect was lost on us.  We also had to check out a gelateria, which Italy is so famous for.

The next day, we checked into a hostel in the morning, and went for lunch before going on a budget wine tour in the Chianti region.  The guides drove us and fourteen other attendees in two vans, first into the Tuscan countryside to a vineyard up in the beautiful hills.  After getting to try the grapes right off the vines, we arrived at a charming house where a very passionate host gave us a tour and then a wine tasting.  The tasting consisted of three different wines (two reds and one dessert wine), olive oil, a very small tasting of truffles (worth €5000 per pound), bruschetta, 8 year old balsamic vinegar, and finally 3 drops of 30 year old balsamic vinegar on vanilla ice cream (delicious - don't knock it until you try it).  

After the tasting, we got driven to Siena, which is a beautiful small city sort of similar to Florence.  We got some free time there, where Kev and I went for a drink with four other people from our van.  The next leg of the journey was where the 'budget' part of the type was extremely apparent... We basically got dropped off in some fortress in the middle of nowhere, for ten minutes of exploring.  To top it off, we couldn't even see around us because it was already 8 o'clock at night.

Finally, we got to our destination for dinner, which must have been the most entertaining part of the day.  Our host, an older Italian man named Giovanni, couldn't speak more than three words of English (hello, goodbye, and thank you), but still spent the whole night singing, drinking wine, and interacting with all of his guests.  Our dinner was a three part meal, all delicious.  We started with appetizers of Italian meat, cheese, bruschetta and salad, and then had spaghetti (they even had gluten free spaghetti for me), and finally we had dessert with a mousse-like cake and another apricot pastry.  Of course, with this was all the wine you could drink (the bottles were at least 2.5L each).  

 

After a great dinner with great conversations, we got driven back to Florence where we went out with all of our fellow wine tourmates, before heading out the next morning for the Cinque Terre.

Holly

Austria

So we decided to add Austria to our itinerary for a relaxing time outside of the big touristy towns we've been visiting and so Holly could see some of the Sound of Music sites that are famous in Salzburg and surrounding areas.  We stayed just outside Salzburg with an AirBNB host who runs something  like a small hotel in a little town called Loibichl in the mountainous region. Our first day we rented bikes from our host and spent the day cycling up and down the hills, through the bush and along the lakes for a total of 34 km.  We were exhausted by the end but it felt very good to get a solid workout in coupled with some gorgeous scenery.

Our next day we spent cycling around our area and the nearby city, Mondsee, where we visited the church where the wedding was in The Sound of Music.  There wasn't much going on in the town, so we called it an early night and were headed off early the next day to Florence (we decided to skip Venice as it is very expensive and we suddenly ran short on time for Italy).  Before we caught the train in the morning we spent an hour to check out Salzburg and some more Sound of Music scenery.

Munich - Oktoberfest

Our visit to Munich was short and very centered around visiting Oktoberfest so our experiences were almost exclusively based on this event.  All accommodations are very expensive as they are scaled up through the roof as there are an extra 4 million people visiting the city over the course of the festival, so we decided 2 nights should suffice to experience it.  We had a long travel day to get there from Interlaken, arriving in the middle of the afternoon.  We got settled and decided to take the S-Bahn into the festival area to get a feel for place before we spent a full day there the following day.  The initial impression was overwhelming as there were more people in one area then we'd ever seen before including a lot of Germans from all over the country as well as people from all over the world mixed in.  Almost all were dressed in traditional Bavarian outfits with the men sporting lederhosens and the women dirndls.  We were not dressed up for the event yet but we realized it would be a necessity for the full experience the next day.  The crowd included people of all ages from families with small children to old couples who I could imagine having attended the last 40 years.  The most intoxicated individuals were all between 16-30, many of which appeared to have lost any one they had come with with no clue what was going on as they stumbled through the crowd bumping into everyone.  We were both hungry and decided to dip inside a restaurant and order a half-chicken each as that is one of the main food options at the festival.  Of course to fit in it must be accompanied with a 1-litre stein of beer for myself and glass of wine for Holly as a gluten-free alternative.  We then continued on to the absolutely packed festival (it happened to be a German holiday that day to make it even crazier) to scope out some alternatives for beer tents to visit the next day including the Hofbrau tent, Hippodrome, Augustiner, etc.

We had ordered costumes to wear for the festival although Holly's did not arrive in time and mine was extremely tacky compared to the authentic outfits people were wearing.  The next morning we went into a discount clothing shop underneath the apartment we were staying in and hit the jackpot with Bavarian outfits being cleared out as there was only a couple days remaining in the festival.  Holly's was a very nice dirndl and my lederhosen looked very legit as well although I could have fit two of me inside of it.  We were at the festival early to try to get a seat in a tent, arriving just after 11am. We went into the Hofbrau tent as this was one of the most famous.  It was already packed but we narrowly missed a lineup about to form as they reached capacity.  The atmosphere was amazing as we looked around to see 10,000 people with beer steins in their hands clinking glasses and having a great time.  The band would come on sporadically and play one of the Bavarian tunes that was heard all over the festival to a huge response of cheering from the crowd. There were very few seats left as we looked around but we managed to squeeze in right between a group of Germans and a group of Italians who we partied with for the next few hours before we were kicked out at 3pm for all the people that had reservations.  We had an excellent time and actually fit in pretty well with our outfits, even the Germans were impressed we dressed up for the 1 day.  We then hung out with the Germans for a while before heading back for a nap and supper.

Hofbrau tent statistics

Next we went to Salzburg, Austria.

Kevin

French Coast

From Barcelona we took the train to Marseille for the night and spent the following day there.  The main attraction there was the huge port and the views along the coastline.  We used the city bike rental service that cost only 1 euro for a week long subscription as long as you switch the bikes off every half hour. The bike stations were all along the coastline which allowed us to bike all day, traveling just under 20 kilometers at a leisurely pace.

Port in Marseille

Biking along the Marseille coast

The following day we headed into Nice for a 4 night stay.  We spent our first full day on a beach just outside of Nice which had an excellent view along with warm, clear water.  That night we headed out for a night on the town with some people from the hostel.

We spent our next day in Monaco where the Monte Carlo casino is located where they filmed Casino Royale of the James Bond collection.  This is one of the most plush areas either of us have ever been to, with a brand new Porsche being one of the lower end cars on the road.  Most cars on the roads were Ferraris, Maseratis, Rolls Royce, etc.  They also happened to have a yacht show where they had the craziest yachts in the world on display.  A guy was leaving and gave me his pass (80 euro value) to check it out for a little while before it closed.  I spent some time on one of the classic sailboats letting the yacht broker show me around.  It was very nice but I decided there are more practical ways to invest €15M, although it was one of the cheaper ones.  Some of the new yachts were up around €40M that I saw.  We headed back to town and went out for ice cream that night after dinner.

Kev with some of the cars parked outside the Monte Carlo casino

Today was a thunderstorm for a good chunk of the day so far, thus why I am inside writing the blog in the middle of the afternoon.

We're heading out to Interlaken, Switzerland tomorrow for some hiking in the alps before Oktoberfest in Munich from October 3-5.  We will keep you posted.
 Kev