Bordeaux

Our trip to Bordeaux was great – the train was soo comfy… we did sit in the wrong carriage to begin with… but it was the nicest and  comfiest train we’ve had to date.

Bordeaux is very nice – the people have all been nice and we found the hotel very easily. They have great trams here that go along the river.

We checked into our room – of course we’re on the top floor and the stairs are nice and steep and windy!

The first day (the day we arrived) we went out and had lunch and just walked around and saw the grand opera, the water, some nice fountains, found the local supermarket.

We had a nice chicken salad for dinner that night and had a quiet night.

The next day we went out and got milk for our cereal and then after breakfast headed out to do the bus tour around Bordeaux. Their tourist buses are very cheap in comparison to other cities. It was a nice little ride – just under an hour. We didn’t get to sit together which sucked but it was still nice to be driven around and not have to walk for once.

After the tour we walked down the main shopping street and I found the difference between a German town and a French town is that where locals sit in the sun and drink beer – here they drink wine.

The weather here is amazing, we’re actually wearing t-shirts and feeling the sun on your back… We haven’t felt the sun in awhile. They have this cool water mirror thingo where you can walk in this sheet of water (like 2cm deep) and its refreshing but after however long – the water goes away and it’s sprays this mist out and thats awesome!

The lighting from the sun does something to the buildings here – it makes the ugliest building beautiful…. however, there aren’t many ugly building in Bordeaux – they have amazing limestone (I think) buildings.They’re quite WOW. I also like the olden day street lamps – they’re awesome.

After an exhausting day – we bought a roast chicken and potatoes from the supermarket and had a nice dinner.

The next day (today) we jumped on the tourist train which chug’s through the city – down nice little back streets and we saw some roman style ruins – after this tour we grabbed some lunch and took it down next to the river and had a great afternoon lying in the sun watching people cycle/run/skate/walk/hobble past.

The day was a perfect fish and chip day – but the lady from the tourist office just looked at us funny when I asked her if they had any fish and chips shops… suggested Mc Donalds. I don’t think she’s ever been to Australia…

Anyways… we’ve had a great time here in Bordeaux – probably be better if we liked wine. We’re off to Toulouse in the morning – hopefully another lovely train.

- Sorry for horrid blog. I suck at writing.

- Photos will be up for Bordeaux (France) after I post this.

Kath and Cindy

and btw – the person who voted our last blog 2 stars – not happy jan!

Munich, Dachau, Fussen

Saturday

We both slept exceptionally well… Not hard I guess when you are in a nice house, in a nice bed without springs poking you! After a shower and some breakfast, Karen drove us down to the local train station and showed us the route to take when walking back… We caught the train into Munich and when we arrived we saw that there was a Red Cross event on.. There were people doing scuba diving, dogs on parade and some rescue people. We had a walk around the block and made our way back to the starting point for the walking tour. We learnt the history of the Glockenspiel and some stories of the old and new town halls. We then made our way to an old church called Frauenkirche hat the “devil” built. On the pillars in the church you could see statues of the people who built the church. It was pretty cool (for a church), it also had the ‘devils footprint.’ We then went to another church where we saw a canon ball in the church from like the 1400′s but the church was destroyed in WW2, but they made it exactly the same from before ww2 – so the canon ball was put back up.

We saw the new synagogue which is quite ugly… we continued to the Viktualienmarkt which is a massive outdoor market which is pretty cool but very pricey! There was a fountain that allowed you to fill your water bottle with fresh spring water, it was outside a nice looking beer garden. They had an awesome may pole in the centre it’s pretty awesome looking.

We saw the famous beer hall – Hofbräuhaus, and had a break there (no beer though), we snuck into the Starbucks toilets without paying for anything… (hehe) for once a line in the woman’s toilets was appreciated.

We then walked down a very expensive shopping street – so many Porsche lined the streets… apparently you see stars shopping here every now and then, we saw a very expensive watch for 175,000 euros (who would buy that!!). Across the road, was the National Theater (that beer built) and the Royal Residence. After hearing the history of the Royal family in Bavaria we saw the Feldhernhalle and heard about the Beerhall push (where Hitler tried to take Munich and failed {ended up in jail}).

After the tour, we went and had a beer and pretzel with our guide and this other guy at a beer garden. It was great – such an amazing experience, beer everywhere! After about an hour or so we decided we’d go back to Karen’s. She was dropping Chris off at the airport – so we cooked ourselves some dinner and when she got back, we chatted for awhile and then we all watched a movie.

Sunday

This morning, we had a lazyish morning – We both chatted with our families and I walked around looking for deer, looking at the sheep. It was such a warm day (like a Brisbane day), it was the first real hot day we’ve had. When we were ready, we made plans to meet up with Karen in Dachau for some ice cream and visit the palace. – we walked to the train station, and caught the train to Dachau and walked to the camp memorial site. We got an audio guide (student discount) and what can I say – it was a horrible feeling camp(as they all are)… but this one was so chilly even on a boiling day. The museum and mini film were quite heart wrenching, seeing the beds and quarters just makes you question how people could do this to other people.

We saw the extermination block and the oven, these buildings were freezing – so cold. The gas chambers (showers) here were never used but the ovens were and it was all horrible to see, and so cold. We then walked to the bunker and as soon as you walk in – it’s like walking into a freezing air conditioned room, the tiny little rooms where they kept prisoners were horrible to see and the torture rooms.

Dachau camp was so horrible, seeing pictures of the prisoners was just heart wrenching, skin on bones…

What annoyed me is when you saw people posing outside of the gate where it says Arbeit macht Frei “work will set you free” – with a big smile on their face… you just want to hit them. We didn’t though.

After a few hours we caught the bus back to Dachau station where Karen found us on her bike, we walked to the ice cream parlour where we had ice cream and a nice break and had a good chat. We then walked up the big hill to see the palace and gardens. The views from the top was awesome – you could see all of Dachau and even to Munich! The palace wasn’t anything too special but the gardens – they were amazing, something out of a film… can’t imagine what it would look like when the walkway hedges are grown back up. It was amazing – the tulips here in Germany are beautiful – I think I have a new favourite flower. We said goodbye to Karen as she was cycling back home and we were going to catch the train back, so we walked down the other way in the forest and walked along the river and saw fish swimming (pretty big fish).

When we got back to Karen’s, we hung out for a while (Karen fed the sheep) before going to one of Karen friends pubs and had a massive (LIKE MASSIVE) pork schnitzel and chips. It was great. Was sooooo full afterwards.

We planned with Karen, that we’d come back on Wednesday night (as we didn’t have anywhere yet booked) and hang out there on Thursday before our bus to Vienna on Thursday night.

We packed a small bag Karen lent us (so we didn’t have to take a big packs) and were set for the next 2 nights.

Monday

This morning, we went with Karen to Dachau and caught the train into Munich from there. We dropped our bag of at the hostel and went back to the station as we were going to Fussen. We just missed the train by like half a minute – so we had to wait like and hour till the next one. The train ride was pretty good, the weather was pretty horrible (very wet and cloudy). When we arrived in Fussen – we jumped on the bus and saw our tour guide from the other day (she was doing the tour to the castles)…

Fussen is home to 2 very impressive castles that was built by King Ludwig II, he loved building holiday houses with the kingdoms money, that he was found to be insane and was found in the river along with the doctor who signed him off as being insane… bit of a cover up.

So the main castle (Neuschwanstein) was used in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang (which Cindy loves) so we walked up this massive hill and saw this beautiful castle and amazing views of the mountains with snow and waterfalls (Pollath Gorge) and a scary looking bridge (Marienbrucke). It was great – we didn’t pay the 9 euros to go into the castle – we just looked from the outside. We had an afternoon tea up there – it was nice. We then made our way down slowly and saw the other castle (Hohenschwangau).

It was a great day and we caught the train back and 2 hours later we were back in Munich and we got a snack to keep us going till dinner. We checked into our hostel and got our beds made. We then went to the pub in the hostel and I got 2 free beers with our drink vouchers we got.

We decided to head out for dinner and walked around for awhile before finding a Chinese all-you-can-eat buffet for 6.50 with a drink. After we filled ourselves stupid we wobbled back to the hostel and went to bed.

Tuesday

Today we were meant to go to Salzburg (in Austria) but the weather wasn’t looking great there so we decided that we’d do on Wednesday. So today we looked at places in Salzburg we want to go too. Today we went to the Olympic stadium of 1972 – it’s a pretty impressive stadium. We then went to the English gardens and walked around there for a while and found the beer garden where we had lunch and I had my first stein (and probably last). The beer was good… It was just huge and I was in so much pain needing to pee afterwards – I refused to pay to go to the toilet so I had to wait in pain till we got back to the hostel. Steins are only good if the toilets are free.

We then went back into the city square and walked around for a while, we got a huge pretzel – but it wasn’t very tasty. It was starting to get late so we got a metro back to the hostel. Where we started speaking to a girl in the room, she seems quite nice.

We had dinner at the same place tonight and wobbled back to the hostel, where I am now lying down with a very prominent food baby.

So tomorrow – we’re going to Salzburg – Austria… then back to Karen’s tomorrow night.

We’ll be on Skype – Thursday night your time if you want to talk.

We’ll also be putting up photos of Prague, and Munich tomorrow… when we put this blog up.

Hamburg & Berlin

Tuesday morning was a small lie in and headed to make breakfast. We saw our friend Rachel and chatted to her while we ate breakfast. She was doing the free walking tour as well that day but she left with the guy for the hostel pick-up. We finished our breakfast and went and got ready, then caught the metro to the start point for the tour.

The tour guide was really good, he was from the Netherlands and has been living in Hamburg for awhile now. The tour itself wasn’t as exciting as some of the cities we’ve been too… there’s a few old churches, lots of counting houses, lots of things were destroyed in the great fire of 1842. We saw the building where the gas was made for the Nazis during WW2… I hadn’t known that they used a pesticide and altered it to suit their purposes. We then continued to the old port and the new port. It was a nice walk around the city and it was a lovely day.

After the tour we said goodbye to Rachel and we then headed to the K-Z-Neungammen Camp, which was just outside of Hamburg. It took a while to get there… but we arrived at 4 to realise they closed at 4 (the buildings with the exhibitions). So we walked around the grounds, a lot of the buildings had been torn down over the years. The German/Hamburg Government actually put a penal system (a jail) on the grounds after the war (so that was only torn down in 2003). The ground was quite eerie… we read the information board around the ground and the conditions some of the ‘prisoners’ had. The camp was both a camp and a slave labour camp – as they used to make bricks and dig coal and stuff there. It wasn’t a death camp as such but a lot of killings still occurred, it was quite sickening to see where the ‘camp brothel’ was and the site of the camp crematorium.

After an hour or so, we caught the bus back into the the train station to get the S-Bahn back to the city. We picked up some ingredients for dinner (spaghetti) and headed back to the hostel, the hostel had cooked too much chicken for the school kids that were staying there so we grabbed a lot of chicken and Cindy got the meat of the leg bones for chicken sandwiches for the train the next day. We invited Rachel to have dinner with us and we had a good meal and a good chat… we also started talking to a Canadian guy too.. Rachel gave us some apples for the train the next day.

We had a reasonably early night and this morning packed our bags then headed down and ate breakfast. We then went back upstairs and got our stuff together and went and hung out downstairs until check-out. We saw Rachel and said goodbye (we’re meeting up with her in Berlin in a few days). We headed of the the Hamburg HBF (central station) and am now at the Mc Donald’s drinking an Orange Juice… we just missed the breakfast menu – so just an OJ. German Mc Donald’s are lame as they charge 8 euros for the wi-fi. We don’t know if it’s just Hamburg or all of Germany.

Our train leaves in an hour so we’ll just hang out in Maccas until they kick us out (if they do or not).

Train was very nice and speedy. We ate our chicken sandwiches (they were okay). We found the hostel reasonably easily and the girl on the desk was very nice and upgraded us from a 6 bed female to a twin room (as we’d have to change rooms throughout our stay)… the rooms quite crampy but we have our own bathroom and TV. We went and found a supermarket and bought some stuff for dinner and afternoon tea. This afternoon we looked at tours to do here and stuff to see here in Berlin.

Skype tomorrow – no promises about the speed of the net though.

Photos may be posted for Germany and the last day in Brussels tonight.

Paris

Monday/Tuesday

After our relaxing day in the hostel, we made our way to the bus stop and waited for the bus to arrive. When it turned up we were one of the first from our stop to get on the bus…. It wasn’t too busy but when we got to the next stop in Barcelona – It completely filled up… On the bus we had snorers and people who talked to themselves. There were lots of stops along the way… but we both got a bit of sleep. Although it took 15.5 hours it went reasonably quickly.

We found the hotel quite easily, I asked the metro lady if she spoke English in french – pretty impressive. When we were checking in – the guy was like do you speak french – I said no…. but I think he was impressed with my pronunciation and that… nice for a quick read of the phrase book.

We then got to our tiny room with tiny en-suite which we’re paying 50 euros a night… Its clean and nice enough. We rested for a little bit and consulted the huge map of Paris.

We caught the metro to the Arc De Triomphe and had some lunch, we then went and had a look at the arc. Its massive, you can go up to the top of it and see all of Paris. The arc is surrounded by a huge round about and the cars drive freakily around it… It’s quite scary to watch. Cindy and I were waiting for an accident. None came. However, apparently there is an accident every 5 minutes.

We then walked to the Eiffel Tower, We saw the Palais de Chaillot – which is an impressive building, but the Eiffel Tower – Its amazing! However, there are so many guys trying to flog of miniature Eiffel towers… when they see a cop they all run. (Pretty funny). We were going to go up the tower today…. but the line was massive – the screen said the wait was over 2 hours. We haven’t decided whether to do the stairs or elevator yet. Cindy wants to do the stairs because it is cheaper.. but its a lot of stairs!.

We then kept walking (the map makes things look really close, but Paris is a massive city)… We saw the Parc du Champs, De Mars, Ecole Militarie, Some cool museum building, National assembly, the Grand Palais, and saw the Concorde (a stolen obelisk) and went through a park and then saw the Louvre. Pretty impressive city – It completely exhausted us, we walked at least 6kms. We found a Lidl supermarket and got some ham and yogurt and got a baguette and had ham sandwiches for dinner. We think we are in the Asian part of Paris as every second shop is run/owned by Asians. We went into one supermarket and there was an entire isle of noodle.. Over 50 kinds… Crazy! We’re going to stock up before we go to Amsterdam.

We’re having a quiet night tonight – tomorrow we’re doing the free walking tour and maybe a illumination tour at night.

Wednesday

This morning we woke up quite early and had our cereal, then headed out to find the walking tour start point. We caught 2 metros to our stop then came out and went to buy tickets for the Illumination Tour we are doing tomorrow night (there wasn’t one at 9.30 tonight). After we got our tickets we went to the Plaza that the walking tour started in. There was a fountain in the Plaza which Napoleon III had built there. We could see the Notre Dame from there as well. We got into our groups and met our tour leader and started our tour. Our tour guide was Hugo. The first stop was to see the Notre Dame. It is an old Gothic style building which is house to the crown of thorns (the one Jesus wore on the cross.. apparently this is the original one..). We then walked along the river to the oldest bridge in Paris. The bridge has faces of all the people who were at a great party that a King had one night. Some of the faces are quite funny. We then went onto the “Lovers Bridge”, the bridge had padlocks on it. Apparently it is the bridge from Sex and the City where Carrie and Mr Big get back together. It is also said that the padlocks symbolises eternal love for the people who put a padlock on the bridge railings. Every summer the council comes around and takes them all down… We saw the building which part of the Bourne Identity was filmed on. We then went into the Louvre courtyard, we then saw the building that the Opera is held in, where the Phantom of the Opera was first performed and set. We then had a quick break for lunch. After lunch we continued past the Louvre, and saw the statue of Joan of Arc, which is the only female statue in Paris (it was also gold plated), then we went into the gardens (near the Louvre). Then to the Obelisk (which the French claim were given to them by the Egyptians after they conquered Egypt). We also saw the fountain which a scene from The Devil Wears Prada was filmed, and the penthouse that the winner of the Tour de France gets to use for 3 nights after he wins the tour. Also people like Madonna, Tom Cruise and Michael Jackson stay at when they are in Paris (obviously Michael doesn’t stay there anymore). The guide said it was about 2500 euros a night…. Cheap way to get in would be to win the Tour de France… We finished the tour up at the 2 Palaces.

After we gave the guy a tip (a hand full of coins), we walked along the river to the Eiffel Tower. The line wasn’t as big as it was the day before. We waited about 30mins before we got our ticket. The lift was quite scary.. It goes very high, and that is to the 1^st floor. You don’t realise from the ground how tall it really is. I thought it was like going up the giant drop (at Dreamworld), without the scary drop. We went straight up to the Summit. The views over Paris were amazing! You could see for miles. There were signs inside that said how far away you are to other places. I think it said that Sydney was around 17 000kms from the Eiffel Tower. After walking around the tower for ages, we went down to the 2^nd floor. We got a lift all to ourselves, I didn’t look out the window on the way down. People weren’t as small on this level. A bus was about the size of a car, rather than a ant. After we had enough of the views we decided to head out to try and find a McDonald’s to get free Wi-fi. We walked for miles, and saw the Duomo on the way. We had no luck in finding one, we were so exhausted we just decided to take the metro to the hotel. On the way back we stopped in at Lidl and got a chicken salad and some milk for breakfast tomorrow.

Tomorrow we are either going to Versailles or the Louvre (depending on the weather). Then tomorrow night we are booked on the Illumination tour. I am looking forward to seeing everything lit up and seeing the Moulin Rouge.

Naples to Rome and around Rome

We went and had our dinner at Napoli’s finest pizzeria. We lined up so we could be one of the first in when it opened it’s doors. Outside there were so many locals and tourist hovering, when they started to let people in we went upstairs and found a seat. We were going to share a pizza – but Cindy thought they’d be small… so we ordered two. The service was really good and the meals were really quick to come out – probably wanting to clear tables as fast as possible. The pizzas were massive… They were really good, they got cold pretty quickly though so that sucked… It wasn’t the best pizza we’ve had but it was really good. Cindy still thinks the pizza we had in Egypt is the best so far. Haha.
After dinner, we walked around Napoli and went back to the hostel and hung out there. We were heading to Rome on Sunday morning.
We caught the Intercity train to Rome at 10:24 – this train was 40 euro cheaper combined than the Eurostar train. The train was really nice – they had like 6 seater cabin type things (totally reminded us of Harry Potter – which was really cool). We were the first ones in our cabin so we snagged the window seats. As the time was getting closer to our departure, our cabin slowly filled up with all guys… we were the only girls in the cabin, but they didn’t say anything… they pretty much slept the whole way.
The rain came and went as we were going through the country… We passed so many farms – the country side was very beautiful… 2 of the guys got off at the stop before Rome so it gave us more room in the cabin for the last hour.
We got to Rome and we found our hostel really quickly, Cindy had taken pretty good notes on how to get there. We weren’t able to check in straight away as it was 1pm so we had 2hours to kill. So we dropped our bags off and went exploring… of course the rain decided to come then… we walked around and hung out in the Piazza della Repubblica – has a really cool fountain in the middle of this roundabout. We found that crossing roads at pedestrian crossings are scary… cars/scooters/buses, they don’t pay attention to you… we crossed when locals crossed, they would just walk out in front of cars… I got used to just crossing – but it’s a little daunting. We got something to eat and just hung out, we saw one bar sold Bulmers – but it was quite pricey.
When we checked in, we signed our names for the free pasta dinner that the Italian owners make every night. This hostel gives free breakfast and dinners… pretty much the reason we chose this place. They only give you 5 hours free internet – so we wont be on much this week.
Got settled in our rooms and thought we’d go to the laundromat and do some washing – we were getting low on clothes. So we walked around and found the place that would give discount. We thought it was self service… but we were able to drop it off and come back and pick it up later. So we went to the bar that we knew sold cider and we got Cindy a bottle of Bummers and I had a half pint of Harp (Irish beer) and we watched the football.
We picked up our clean smelling clothes and headed back to the hostel and had a shower and had dinner at 7. It was a really nice pasta and they gave free bread rolls with it. It was great.
The kitchen was really packed so it was pretty much an eat and then let someone else sit in your seat, so we went back to our room and spoke to a couple of French girls who were here for a few days.
Today we got up, had breakfast and the sky was clear and beautifully blue – we hadn’t seen blue sky in ages!! So we headed out to realise it was freeezing. But walked to the subway to catch a metro to the Colosseum.
As you walk from out of the metro – you see the Colosseum – It was absolutely amazing. We walked in and got tickets – I got in half price as an EU youth… (gotta love it). And we went exploring the Colosseum. It was really good, we had beaten most of the crowds so we wandered around quite happily. The centre of the Colosseum had like a mazey type thing in it (like in the movie jumper). From one side you can see the entrance with the cage/grill where the gladiator/animal would come out. We went down to the lower level and walked around and got a closer look at the mazey thing… I wish they would let you in the actual pit area – that would be cool. This is when we first started seeing frost on the ground and ice puddles.
After that we walked out and saw the Arco di Costantino which is this massive arch in the square between palatine and the Roman forum. We tried to get into Palatine Hill but we went the wrong way and found a church instead. When we found it, we walked up the less steep part where we met a British girl who wanted us to take a photo of her in her poncho she wore in the rain the day before as her boyfriend didn’t believe she wore it. A bit funny really…
We walked up the mountain and saw the stadium, some old houses, we went into the museum which was just a small room with remains of sculptures – mostly heads and a few torsos… There was so much frost and ice puddles around (Cindy loved jumping on them and making them crack). The views of the Roman Forum were great from the top of the hill, we then walked down the hill and saw another arch – Arco di Tito. There were a lot of old buildings/ruins – they looked like they were influenced by the Greeks (or they influenced the Greeks).
We walked out and walked towards the Vittoriano e Piazza Venezia- which is this really cool building with these amazing statues and these two big chariots being ridden by an angel. One side was being restored but the other side was really impressive. We saw the Colonna Traiana which is this cool column thing. We sat here for a little while – Cindy’s ankle has been playing up most of the day so we rested for a little bit before continuing our walking trip. We found an Irish pub that had strongbow on tap so we stopped here for lunch and had nachos, I tried a beer called Nazuro Azzuro.

We kept walking and found the pantheon – which was in this little square with all these little Italian restaurant all around, it was quite picturesk… Of course McDonalds snuck there building in there – but discretely. They had a fountain in the middle of the square with a stolen obelisk from Egypt. We kept walking and found the Palazzo Montecitorio which was another impressive building with another stolen obelisk in the centre of the square – but this one was massive (that would’ve been hard to transport). We saw the Piazza Colonna which was another cool column thing. Walking up through some small streets – we found this incredible building/fountain called Fontana di Trevi – it was this massive fountain… but not ordinary – it was absolutely incredible… These Romans knew how to make cool things!
We started to get tired of all the walking so we wanted to find a post office… we found the one we were told about and got in the line to be served… we were the 3rd from being served and then bam… they say stuff in Italian – We think they said – oh it’s 2 o’clock, its time to close… the two Italians in front weren’t happy they were saying (we think something like) We’ve been waiting for ages – can’t you serve us… Come on… But the postal workers weren’t budging…we decided to leave – and on the door it did say closing at 2… but still to not even serve the last few people in the line… but to just kick them out. We thought it was ridiculous – so far that’s the only thing that I’ve thought was pretty stupid so far in Rome. Rome is such a lovely city.
A new girl has just come into our room who seems really nice – Francesco is from Milan but is living in Dublin. We’ve signed up for our free pasta dinner tonight again– hope it’s good.

Tuesday
Last nights pasta dinner wasn’t as good as the first night. We call it pesto pasta. It pretty much had the same things that the pasta the night before did, except it didn’t have tomato sauce, it had a pesto sauce. Nonetheless it was great for a free meal. We had another quiet night, watched a movie and made plans for the following day.
We woke up reasonably early today, had our breakfast and headed off towards the Vatican. When we got off the metro there were all of these tour guides asking if we were going to the Sistine Chapel and if we had bought our tour guides. We just ignored them all (a good trick we learnt in Egypt). We went into St Peter’s Square where a giant Egyptian Obelisk was, and there were 2 fountains, 140 statues religious figures and also the entrance to the St Peters Basilica . We also saw the big screen that the Pope gets displayed on when he is making a speech. We then decided to go to the Vatican Museum. The tickets were really expensive and we decided if we couldn’t at least get one half price we weren’t going to bother about going in. We had to go through security before even buying tickets… We approached the ticket box and both of us handed over our Youth Cards and the guy gave us 2 discounted tickets – yay! We got the 2 of us in for the price of one. Once inside the first exhibition in the museum is an Egyptian one. So we wandered through there, seeing all the things that were stolen from the Egyptians. They had a really cool mummy – I took a picture of it.
The rest of the museum was filled with pictures of religious things, Jesus and Pope’s and famous religious things (Kath said they were famous – I have no idea). We saw a really good picture of Adam and Eve in a garden. We weren’t too impressed with the Sistine Chapel. We liked the paintings of the ceilings in the other rooms better. They were filled with more details.
We had some morning tea in the Pope’s garden. Well we thought it was the Pope’s garden as no one was allowed to walk on the grass. And it was very neat.
We then went to another garden like area that had a great big golden sphere in it. We had some pictures with that.
We then left the Vatican to go to hunt down the Castel Del Angelo. Our book said that it was 5euros each, then when we turned up it was 8.50euros each, we couldn’t justify that so we just walked around the outside of it and Kath played on a dolphin thing in the park. We then left there and walked back to the hostel. We were getting really tired from all the walking we were doing. When we got back we had another new girl in our room. She is from Japan and really nice.
We had the good pasta for dinner again, the tomato one. As usual we watched a movie and went to bed completely exhausted.
We had really rude girls in our dorm for the last two nights – they are so inconsiderate of other people in the room. Their alarm was going off full ball for about half an hour this morning. We got up and had breakfast to try and have some peace. Today we went to have our restaurant meal for Rome. We picked a restaurant out of our travel book. When we arrived at the via (street) it could not be found anywhere, so we went to a restaurant where it should have been. The meal was quite expensive, Kath had gnocchi. She really enjoyed it. I had cabonara, I stand by my pasta from Athens being better. We then wandered around the town for a while and then went to the Irish pub for a drink and to book our next hostel. After our drink it started to rain so we came back to the hostel to pack and got ready to go tomorrow.

We hope it doesn’t rain like it is forecast too…