Sunny Croatia... and the difference between a double and shared

So we





have arrived in sunny Croatia. Its is beautiful here! Extremely hot (again). We have just spent a night in Split and then off to an Island to stay tonight. We stayed in a guest house last night, of a lovely Croatian couple. However, we made a slight mistake with our booking... rather than asking for a shared room (two single beds) we went for double (one double bed). So we got that lovely pink number you see on the left. It really looks quite small in the photo! But be assured, we did have a man gap! Its been really good in Croatia, because our currency is a lot stronger, so finally things seem a bit cheaper! We will enjoy it while it lasts.
Sorry to hear about the bad weather in NZ, we will try and get some extra sunshine for all of you. Life is tough at 32 degrees :)

Even gladiators get hungry too....

This was priceless. We were just walking through the train station and out of nowhere these two gladiators came to get some burgers. We had to take a double take.
We cant work out why the one on the left appears to be headbutting the counter

The worlds biggest watermelon?

We went to a supermarket today and found this monster.

It was 11.5kg and it was the norm. It is twice the size of a head.

Its huge.

A message from the Colleseum

So here we are in the colleseum. Pretty amazing here to think that 50,000 people would cram in here to watch humans vs elephants. We just had to imagine.

We also took a big guided tour today through the Vatican, Sistine Chapel and St Peters Basilica. Was so amazing. So much history! Like things before Christ. It was really cool. And we had a great Irish guide, he had one of those accents that sounded funny even when he was being serious!

So Rome has been very cool. Pity we are staying in Alabama. Its taking us like an hour and a half to get into the city from the hostel. The place itself is really nice, but its been a bit frustrating cos it takes so long to get there!

But weve still had a great time here, and off to Ancona tomorrow

Our time travel

Just finished an amazing night in this city called San Gimignano. It was like we had travelled back in time. It was full of old churches and towers, most of which had been built in the 11th century, and not much had changed since then. We stayed with this Italian woman who spoke no English. Whatsoever. She spoke a lot too. We just dont know what about. But her place was cool. And right in the middle of town.
We are both rapidly falling in love with/ getting addicted to Italian gelattos. They are so good!
We had the transport mission of a lifettime, 3 buses, 3 trains and a metro to get to our hostel in Rome. But we have made it! We are in Rome. So it is now time to as the Romans do. Well we are going exploring now anyway.

As a side note, Jenna, those were totally crutches on the picture. But I didnt see it. The crutch was really thin and its really hot here and maybe my brain was functioning. You have to admit, it was a pretty big arm though....

Bruce Willis?

Chris is pretty sure he was sitting beside Bruce Willis on the train. What do you think? And who would have known he was fluent in Italian?

Venice and some other photos

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So we are just coming to the end of our time in Venice.

Its been pretty cool. So much history, no roads..... everything is floating. Roads are rivers. Ferries are cars. Troy hasnt spilt anything yet.

We have gone through several churches and cathedrals, built in 15th and 16th centuries which have been amazing. Gone to some islands. We went to two different islands today.

Troy- Forgotten the name. Memorable. Thin narrow streets and walkways. Like walking through a maze with a lot of construction. If that doesnt evoke feelings of magicalness, I dont know what will.

Chris- I went to this island called Burano. I heard it was super colourful so I went. Wow it was like the most colourful place on earth. Every house was so colourful and a different colour too. Ive put a photo in.

That top photo is of Troy being a terminator and walking towards the Venice sunset.
Then we have colourful Burano, one of the villages from Cinque Terre and us before we took a scooter ride (We survived).

Off to a town just out of Florence tomorrow. We are healthy and well. Except for a complete inability to format pictures and words on our blog. Sorry if its all over the show a bit!

Weird signs in Venice

We saw this sign on the ferry today. What does the third picture mean....

Seat reserved for hip hop dancers? People with long arms?

Living in Italian paradise

We are now in a little Italian town called Levanto. Its really refreshing to be in a town thats not totally touristy! It is so little that our computer is very old school and has no USB drive, so cant put any photos up yet sorry!

At least in France Chris spoke a bit of French. In Italy we have nothing apart from hi, thank you and please. So dinner was interesting last night when the menu came out only in Italian.
Chris knew (due to expert tuition) that tortellini pasta was a winner so ordered that. It came out. Pasta and only pasta. No meat. No veges.
Troys selection was more bizzare. It was under the antipasta section. And it was salami and what we think was sliced and uncooked bacon. It was really weird. Then not to be content with spilling drinks on planes, Troy lent back and snapped his chair. In the small village it sounded like a gun shot. The lady was luckily very forgiving.

Today we did a walk called the Cinque Terre. 5 lovely little beach side villages all within close walking distance. So we thought. We walked the first one. It seems there are two things that have not yet been introduced to Italy:
1.) Clouds
2.) Flat walking tracks

It was 31 degrees, very hilly and very unprotcted from the sun. So after we walked the two hours to get there and drunk 3 cokes, 3 waters and a fanta between us without once going to the toilet we decided that the train might be the better option. So we saw the rest of the villages, via train, and it was remarkably more pleasant!

Off now to ride a 2 person scooter around town before Italian dinner take two!

We will be travelling tomorrow so may not make it onto the internet, but will put up some more photos the following day.

Chris and Troy

The Day we saw 3 countries in one day like it was nothing

We have just finished an accidental detour which has been incredible. Our original plan was to take an overnight train from Paris to Genova, Northwestern Italy. But it was completely booked so had to change our reservation. So instead we took a train to Cannes (Where they have the big film festival each year, and quite close to Nice) in the South of France. We stayed in this amazing Gothic Mansion, where the owner was renting out a few rooms quite reasnobly. We pretty much dropped our bags and went with our other roomie, Jen from Louisana, to a Lebanese restaurant. It was a really nice night.
The next morning (yesterday) we had our earliest start yet (8 oclock) to catch a train to the second smallest country in the world, Monte Carlo/Monaco. It was blinged out and awesome. It seemed that everyone either had a Porsche or a Ferrari. It was definitely not a country short on money! We did a bit of shopping, Troy even considered buying another knife! Eventually we both got some new sunglasses, Chris because he sat on his in Paris and Troy, just because they looked good. And then we watched our second changing of the guard in Europe, equally impressive.
We went into this amazing chocolate shop and almost brought some to bring home as presents, until we realised that the chances of keeping it unmelted were extremely slim! So sorry! No Monte Carlo chocolate coming home with us!
We cruised into Italy at 2am. We had been awake for 6 hours and been in 3 countries. Not a bad effort!

Paris- the City of Love

Ok so Paris is amazing. You can see how people love it. So much history, so much atmosphere, so few road rules.

We did this bike tour last night which was really cool. We met at the bottom of the Eiffel Tower at 7PM and then started the 4 hour tour. So there is about 20 of us cyclists being led around by this great American tour guide who gave us two rules:

1.) Dominate every intersection

2.) Never look any taxi driver in the eyes

So it was great fun. We went around all the sites of Paris and he would explain the history behind them. And then when it finally got dark around 10.30 we were all put on a cruise boat down the river to see the lights of Paris. Magical.

We are off to explore some markets today. Should be good.

Love hearing from you all and how you're going.

Chris and Troy

The day Troy nearly got arrested

So we are running late for a train from London to Paris. We have three minutes to get our bags checked and run through to the train. Time is of the absolute essence. Then the trouble starts.

"Beep, beep, beep" goes the metal detector as Troy walks through. I assumed it must have been his belt, so thought nothing of it.

As it turns out, Troy had a 3 inch swiss knife on his belt. Just because he always does. As he admitted it was his, he was informed that this was infact a violation to be carrying this and that the police would be called and he would now be arrested.

To worsen his case, he just got his eyebrow pierced and looks remarkably dodgy.

Luckily, a large and endearing black lady came over. She had a good morning. She decided that they would be better to just confiscate it and let Troy go.

No jail time. Also no train as it was long missed.

It was one of those things that was quite scary at the time, hilarious now.

Famous people in London

London is so full of famous people! I mean, just already we have seen J Lo and Samuel L Jackson. I had a slight altercation with Sam. I think he got jealous of my beard I'm growing. Anyway we stared each other out. It was intense.

Ok so if you have astute eyes and an unerstanding of my imagination you will see they are made out of wax. It was incredible! You literally thought they were going to move at any second, so well done.

Tourists and Walking Marathons

Hey guys, We arrived in London on the 15 June to the heat of the european sun :) We have pretty much done everything touristy you could imagine; The London eye, Westminster, Buckhingham Palace, couple of bridges. There was a bus you could take around to see all the sites, but was gonna cost about $65, so we just walked. Oh, how we walked. We both have foot blisters and have calf muscles that don't function anymore. Oh! If only one of us was a physio...

The prices here for things are ridiculous. I (Chris) went to this Indian place with my old flatmate Jono last night. Rice was not included with the meal, and for a bowl of rice we payed the equivalent of $9. Lets be fair though, it was very good rice!

Off to Paris in a few hours. Continuing our apparent tour de Rodney, in his honour as our intenirary somehow resembles an R. We will pretend it wasnt accidental.

Itenirary

So this is a map of our trip. I think its clear that

a. We are going to a lot of countries

b. I may not have such a huge future in art

Very excited. 5 days to go and we are both already packed. Slightly geeky, but very organised.