Day 74:
Dearest Boggers and Floggers,
We have been thinking lately that our blog has lost some of its initial pizzazz....not as much siss boom bah as it once had. So we endeavour to rekindle some of that spark as we venture forth into the land of food and many things of the oldish kind. We hope that from now on our entries will have as much character as the boot shaped land. We will bring back the biff.
But before we do....we must tie up our little Greek odyssey.
TWO THINGS:
1: Totti has taken to air swinging in the direction of pigeons, just because she hates them. We can’t actually pin point where this hatred came from. We feel she could be suppressing a horrific childhood memory which entails her being mauled by pigeons at some point. Madray and Padray Totti – care to enlighten? So anyway, the air swinging - generally it’s enough to shoo them away. We joked about the day that she would finally connect with a pigeon, and the feeling of pure elation at FINALLY getting her revenge for all the times she has been publicly victimised by them. Wah. Feel sorry for her. It just so happened that this glorious day came upon us, casually strolling back to our hotel on our last day in Athens. Complaining about something as usual, Totti aimed a lazy kick in the direction of a terrorist.....But this time hit the jackpot. Her face was torn between feeling back, and shock – it was quite possibly almost two months worth of pent up frustration released in this one special moment, and I quote: “I felt bad....but then I was like, actually. Fuck you! Pay back’s a bitch”
2: We are now fugitives of Greece. Stupid metro and their non gates and no ticket booths! So there’s a bit story. We had discussed wether or not it was worth getting a taxi, as it would rape our wallets of 50 euro – we have taken to becoming tight arses, so we decided that the 1 euro metro option would be better, even if it did take longer, and meant dragging out luggage through the streets and sweating our faces off.
So we finally made it to the station with only a few minutes to spare and headed straight down for the train. We assumed that you could buy tickets down there, so we just strolled on through......no ticket booth......”let’s just hop on and hope for the best”.......make it through the train ride un-scathed.....spot some train police.....we try to look innocent and casual......fail. The first people they came to when the train stopped was us. FFS! We tried to pull the whole “we validated our ticket and threw it out” card. Not so much.
In the end they slapped us with a 60 euro fine EACH. The moral of the story – pay 50 euro for a taxi and don’t be such a tight arse! Needless to say, we are totally bad ass, fleeing the country without any intention what so ever of repaying this fine. We feel we spent our money’s worth on Gyros and drinks. Eff you, Greece!
And so we waved goodbye to Greece and had a little giggle as we flew towards our next point of domination – Italia. Touch down in Fiumicino was a welcome relief – once again we got stuck with a child who was in desperate need of an exorcism, we’d both developed twitches because the brat screamed for the entire duration of the flight. FML. Our freaking ears!
By this time we were well over eating Gyros (Sorry Matty, I know it’s sacrilege for you to read this but we needed some real mangiare! Lol), Totti had been craving Penne, which she so delicately pronounces “Pennay” in her most beautiful mock Italian accent. So I texted the order through to my aunt Nadia. When we arrived to the apartment she promptly dominated the kitchen and started cooking up a storm. Totti was practically salivating at the dinner table with knife and fork at the ready – the plate wasn’t full for long.
Well tired we were grateful at the prospect of having a real sleep in – with air con.....which turned our room into the north pole and by 3am we both located our hoodies because we were so cold...why not turn it off, we hear you ask? Well we couldn’t find the remote, and honestly, at 3am, CBF!
Day 75:
With a sleep in under our belts we rose to the warm Roma air and begun our domination – today’s stop, the Via Del Corso, for some retail therapy.
1hour....
2hour...
3hours...still nothing purchased. So, naturally we decided it was time for some pasta and headed to a local restaurant and proceeded to fill our faces with the goodness. We walked back to the metro station and caught the train back to Ela’s aunties.
That night we again fed our faces with delicious pasta and fried chicken breast. We literally ate ourselves into a food coma and passed out – little did Totti know that this was only the beginning of our food coma episode! Lol.
Day 76:
Another sleep in – we are getting good at these! We enjoyed a delicious breakfast of jam on toast together with some awesome pastries which Ela’s aunty purchased for us fresh every morning – thanks Nadia!
Today’s domination...St Peter’s square, the Vatican. We dressed ourselves in appropriate attire and made our way to the metro and headed for the Vatican.
Several photos later we were inside St Peter’s cathedral and Totti landed her eyes on the holy water – dear god, help us! She crossed herself with the sacred h20 and prayed for relief from bird attacks. Now we will see if there is a real god!
We spent a good while in the church – there is so much to see. We decided it would be interesting to go into the basement and see to catacombs. We were surprised to see the number of mourner’s still saying their prayers outside Pope John Paul’s tomb. A few crying old Italian ladies. Wah for them.
Next stop, the Sistine Chapel....pfffttt, eff that. Turns out Rome thinks it’s cool to charge people to enter a church, well we showed them. We turned away in disgust at the thought of paying to look at a church and decided our money was much better spent on some delicious Gelato and an Italia jersey. Eat that Sistine.
On the way back to St Peter’s, we were casually walking, every now and then throwing in a skip or two (for those of you who think we are strange, well we have developed a nice repertoire of walking styles for everyone’s viewing pleasure. We sing too) minding our own business when all of a sudden, BAM. I kid you not, a pigeon lands on Totti’s frickin head and spooks the shit out of us both. There were feathers everywhere, kicking, screaming. Totti makes a bolt for her life. WTF. “It must have been the holy water”, she says, with a fist shake thrown in for good measure. LOL. “Eff you pigeons, I will get my revenge!”
We decided that would complete our day being tourists in Rome and headed back to Ela’s aunties for another massive meal. Oh my. Eating our way to domination and rolling our way back down under. Totti says it’s like Christmas Day, EVERY day.
Day77:
No sleep in today – our alarms were set for 5am because we had to be on the first metro at 5:40am – destination: Camping Roma to meet our Bus-About group. FML.
We were happy to see that everyone else had mass amounts of luggage...not us. Uh-Uh! We set ourselves the challenge of packing only ONE overnight bag between the two of us. Eat shit, back pack, we hate you. We comfortably put all of our clothes into one tote bag for the next 3 days. We even only had 1 toiletry bag – it really was the bomb diggity! Lol.
We were on the bus by 8am and begun our trip down to Pompeii. It was actually the hottest day in history today (worse than our Berlin weather) so we sweated our faces off as we were guided around the Pompeii site. It was a really interesting tour complete with awesome action shots – we totally fucked shit up in Pompeii.
I just need to interrupt here for a second. Now, we all know that Italian’s are very open about the human form, in fact they often like to encourage freedom of phallic expression: Enter Winged Wangs. I don’t think I have seen such a look of awe and delight on Totti’s face since she kicked that Pigeon. With winged Penis’s a plenty for sale – yes she bought one. For shame. Actually it was pretty friggan funny. Apparently it’s a symbol of fertility. Sure sure, i reckon it’s just an excuse to rock out with your wang out. A thankyou! lol
After our 2hr tour we took refuge in the Pizzeria where we enjoyed a delicious traditional Pizza Napoletana and downed a nice cold Coke. Mmm....life is good!
We continued our journey to Sorrento where we were camping for the next two nights. We were feeling the heat by this stage so we retired to our little tent for a well earned siesta.
Well rested, we ventured into town and made a visit to the “Lemonchello” (Limonciello) factory. Ah so many flavours...we HAD to try them all. FML. I had to drag Ela kicking and screaming away from the factory – she was in wog-kid heaven. The Lemonchello killed any taste buds I ever had – feel the burn. We met up with the rest of our tour group and enjoyed a 4 course Italian feast. Belissimo.
Our tour guide took us to a cocktail bar where Mario and Luigi poured the cocktails long into the night – standard measures of alcohol do not exist in Europe, the term ‘free pour’ is the most delicate way to describe their methods, so they were rather potent concoctions and did not take long to sink in. We have a running joke now “Would you like some coke with your rum?”. We left Mario & Luigi in the wee hours and were walking to another club when Totti stole a soccer ball from some street kids. She bolted a few metres with it before guilt got the better of her and she decided to return it. Somehow simply HANDING the ball back totally escaped her thoughts, so she decided to BOOT the bloody thing back over the over our tour group to the kids, buuuuuut she missed kicked it and smacked our tour guide square in the face. EVERYONE lost their shit, literally tears of laugher as the whole street was bent double, clutching their stomachs. Totti’s face was priceless. Our tour guide, Ben, was a bit of a princess (if you get my drift)...he even has a Katy Perry dance. LOL. His words when he got hit “OMG. OMG. I’m going to have a black eye!”. LOL. So funny. We laughed all the way to the next club – while Ben cried! LOL.
We soon decided to part with the Sorrento nightlife and bus it back to our campsite – lucky we did too, within 5 minutes of us tucking ourselves in, it bucketed with rain. It was quite amusing hearing the footsteps of our fellow tour peeps rock into the campsite during the downpour. We giggled!
Zzzz....
Day 78:
Today we were off to explore the Isle of Capri – known for its lavish views, expensive shopping and gorgeous swimming lagoons...oh and the blue and green grottos!
We met with the rest of our tour group at the camp reception...then it rained. Not just a sprinkle, it pissed down. Boo. Well everyone apparently had spoken to God the night before and were warned about this downpour, we missed the memo. And..lucky for us the little homeless man in San Francisco stole our pretty pink umbrella so we were left to our own devices to seek shelter from the rain. Ela followed her intuition and decided the best shelter would come from a brochure of Sorrento which she stole from the reception counter – she had just washed her hair, literally 20minutes before the rain (she said it was a good hair day too!). Unfortunately the brochure soon disintegrated and she became a drowned rat with shit hair!
We finally made it to the water’s edge where we got picked up by a boat. Hangover + waves as big as Mt. Everest = VOMIT.
As we finally rocked our way into Capri (so much relief), we decided that Sofia Loren was a villa whore with too much money. That is all.
We caught the bus from Port Piccola up to Capri and strolled around looking at all the richies and the spectacular views. This place was way out of our league so we caught another bus along the “OH MY GOD” road to Ana Capri – literally a road built into the cliffs edge, no more than 1.5 metres wide. It was a very hair raising ride when bus met bus on the edge of the cliff. Eeekkkk! We could put a finger out the window and be in the bus next to us.
Once we got there we located this giant chairlift that went to the very top of Capri and decided it was time for an adventure. The chairlift was AMAZING – 360 degree view of Capri and surrounding islands, single chair, peace and quiet. We spent a good hour at the summit taking photos and admiring the views. We are developing quite a collection of spectacular action shots – look out Filia and Steph, we see you! Then after another peaceful ride back down the mountain, our stomachs decided it was time to have some lunch, naturally we selected to eat some “pennay” at a restaurant overlooking the beach, and enjoyed the serenity.
Well fed and falling into a serious case of 3:30-itis, we found a rock on the beach and basked in the sun while we waited for our boat to pick us up and take us back to camp. Too lazy to actually swim ourselves, we contented ourselves with living vicariously through the hundreds of enthusiastic bathers already enjoying the water. Yes, we have taken laziness to a new low.
On the way back to camp we took a detour around some more of the island and we came across a massive yacht named “Magic” – yes, Magic Johnson was hanging out on his MASSIVE yacht in Capri, claim to fame bitches. We also saw the houses that belong to Georgio Armani, Michael Douglas, The Chianti Wine owner and the Fiat owner. These guys seriously have money to burn. There were also numerous other villas that belonged to people with too much mula, but we tuned out, information overload. We also passed through the lover’s arch – it is part of these three huge cone shaped rocks the stick out of the sea, and the one in the middle has a natural arch in the bottom of it, supposedly if you kiss your lover at the moment you pass under the arch, you live happily ever after. How sweet. (Vom).
Seeing as it had been a jam packed day, we hiked it all the way back up the cliff side and passed out in our cabins............3 Hrs later.....missed dinner........it’s dark.....it’s cold.......we’re hungry......what time is it??? 9pm. Siesta fail. We trudged up to the camping ground restaurant looking like zombies. Hair was all tangled, eyes bloodshot and popping out of our heads, dazed looks on faces and minor drooling down the side of the face. Yes. It’s true.
So we were seated and a young, relatively attractive waiter came to take our order. So it began. “Oh, you have beautiful eyes” I just sat there and rolled my eyes, having heard this phrase about a million times. Totti just sits there and bats her eyelashes, relishing the compliment. “My name........is Francesco, what is your name?” “Kate”. Oh god, please kill me now. Did he mention that he was an engineer? “So. Kate – we go soma where a and drink a something?” (P.S everyone, he still had not acknowledged that I was even alive, or the fact that I may actually want my dinner some time soon). He then indicated me with a jab of his thumb over his shoulder and exclaimed “or you hava too-a staya with her-a all nighta?” My face was blank, I had no words. He finally left, our meal came, and we ate. Totti wanted a take away and asked me if I thought they would let us take our left over pizza away. I replied and told her that the waiter would probably give her what ever she liked. Sure enough, it went like this: “Can we please have this to take away?” “Ah....Kate... You—ah cana hava.....what ever you lika!” *insert sex eyes*. LOL. FML.
We paid a bill and headed back to our tent...Totti left Francesco with a “maybe” that she’ll come back and have a drink with him. We both passed out from an intense food coma...how unfortunate, poor Francesco!
Day 79:
We said goodbye to our luxurious twin share tarp tent with one door and one window and boarded the bus for the much anticipated Amalfi coast drive. The beginning of the drive was spectacular – words really can’t describe what this place looks like, you have to see it for yourself (or...look at our awesome photos when we get back!). They say that going to heaven would be just like another day in Amalfi – so effing true. We stopped at Positano for a stock up of fresh fruit..mmm...peaches! We took some photos and enjoyed the view. Interesting note: Along the coastline, residents with even number plates can only drive on every other day – like water restrictions back home. Also, buses are only allowed to drive south – one way.
We stopped in Amalfi for a good 3 hrs where we boarded a boat. The best way to see and capture Amalfi is definitely by sea and we got some great pictures. We saw some watch towers that were built a long time ago – they were old! Back on land, tummy again made a ruling that we must find Arancini – OMG. Totti had died and gone to heaven. Rice balls made in pasta sauce and fried in bread crumbs – seriously Italy...you are killing my 6-pack!
After our delicious feed, we wandered around the streets with one of our busabout buddies, Kristy. She had taken a liking to us on the first night at dinner, when totti amused her with her boganesque Ee-taliano. Oh. My. God. Apparently in Italy, there are such things as “Vine-Oh”, “Pennaayy” , “Fet-oo-chin-ay”, “Party Pasta (the pasta that they make out of three colours” “Leeemon-Chello” “Graz-ee”. I don’ think I have ever cringed to much in my whole entire life. Hilarious.
So anyway, Totti, Kristy and I wondered into a pasta shop and it began, ripping out all of the buzz words from dinner, the shop keeper was looking at us with pure horror on her face – seriously entertaining!
It was time to head back to the bus and make our way to our final destination – Ravello. We had been looking forward to going up there (yes, because we haven’t already eaten enough) because apparently there was meant to be this place that made the BEST sandwiches EVER. So after all the hype, we just had to see what all the fuss was about. Taking one for the team, again.
Oh. My. Lord. The sandwich was literally as big as our face. We have photographic evidence. It was AMAZING. Salami.....Provolone.....Prosciutto......More cheese.......More salami.....Sundried tomatoes......Eggplant...... Totti got dominated by her sandwich, and because I am a good little wog child, I kept eating, even though I was full to bursting. There was no way I was going to let the stray cats eyeing off my sandwich get anywhere near it. I’d rather pass out from eating too much. So it did live up to expectations, but we were so full we dragged ourselves back to the bus and sat in silence for the remainder of the trip back to Rome. Literally a food coma! Totti would like to point out “Notice how we don’t write anything about what Ravioli looks like?” WTF, she means Ravello. LOL.
We FINALLY made it back to my aunties house, grateful for a normal shower, a normal bed that wasn’t in a tent smelling of plastic. Now.....how can we possibly be hungry after everything we had eaten that day.....We’re full, seriously, we can just have a light dinner.....do you girls want pizza? Ok. Wow, really had to twist our arm on that one. My god. We actually suck!
We called it a night and decided to start packing for our trip to Sardegna the next morning.......well Totti packed, I had massive CBF and felt I had all my gear in order, so we turned in for the night, looking forward to the next four days, which would be spent on the beach, then feeding our faces off at my aunties beach house.
Day 80:
Well what can I say, it pays to be organised sometimes (thanks Dad for that gene). I had packed the night before – knowing quite well that we had ALOT of souvenirs that we had to be reunited with and somehow fit back into our luggage. Ela actually sucks. When we left Aus, Ela had her rack sack, her laptop bag and a hand bag....Ela now has – her rack sack, a tote bag, her laptop bag AND a hand bag. WTF. So we decided we should both get rid of our tote bags and buy one suitcase to fit all our souvys in...except coz Ela sucks only she managed to put all of her CRAP (souvys plus crap) into the suitcase. So...Ela carried, her rack sack, her suitcase, her laptop bag, her tote bag and her hand bag...while I laughed...hyseterically...there were tears. She was angry – I laughed some more. Crazy bag lady, I reckon she has some crazy cats in her bags too. Boo.
We packed up the car and bid farewell to Ostia and headed to the port. Some Pringles and h20 to ease the pain we boarded our ferry to Sardegna. 6hrs later...annoying Grandma speaking Italian....annoying kids pulling hair....annoying...annoying...we arrived. Lucky for us we parked the car first in line so we were the first to get off the boat – yippee! Sardegna is island famous for its beautiful beaches and chilled our atmosphere. Heaps of famous people choose Sardegna as a holiday destination as do majority of the Italian population!
We arrived at our beach house and Maurizio got straight on the job and fired up the BBQ. Ah...food...food...more food. We started with salami...then had some lamb....some more lamb...some salad...some vino...more lamb...starting to baa now....more lamb....Su Katie bevi, bevi, bevi!! Again, Italy had put us deep into a food coma. Zzzzzz....
Day 81:
We awakened to a plate of fresh pastries and fruit – we were very spoilt. After breaky, Maurizio picked us up and dropped us at the beach. The beach was filled with hundred of Italians getting their tans on – white sand and clear waters. Nadia (Ela’s aunty) couldn’t handle the sand for very long so she ditched and left us to even out our tans. 6hrs later and a very crispy bum we moseyed back to the house where we were fed until our belly buttons turned into outies. Tuna pasta with spicy tomato sauce...entree. Pork chops and salad for main course. I’m smelting in deliciousness!
There is always room for gelato, right? Yes. So we walked into the Piazza – through the night markets and swarms of people...to the gelato store, and beyond. Delicious. We people watched from a park bench for a little while and then headed back to get ready for our evening at the club.
A quiet night at a beachside bar where Ela’s cousin works. He kept the free drinks pouring as I attempted to sing along with the Italian singer. Fail. Ela ghosted some old couple doing the salsa with her Beyonce moves...Nadia got jiggy with it on the dance floor. I did the twist...for old times sake. Fun.
Zzz...
Day 82:
A bit of washing, a movie, more food, daytime siestas and more food. It was really nice and relaxing. We then went to the wholesale (bulk grocer) to help Maurizio and Nadia stock up on food for dinner. Meanwhile...while they did adult stuff, we explored the wholesaler and found a giant Nutella jar, giant Cheese slabs, body moisturizer with cheeky titles and tested many deodorants. Mature...we even got to drive the trolley!
So clearly an hour or two had passed and no food had been consumed, so we made our way back for dinner. Massive fresh fish over baked to pure deliciousness accompanied with roasted potatoes and salad. Oh dear lord...help me now! It was soooooooooo tasty. If only I could bring you all back a little nibble...sorry!
So relaxed and content, we finished with a exotic fruit which I can only describe as Marmalade fruit. It was the strangest thing – had bits of orange, lemon and grapefruit. Delicious....especially with chocolate!
Day 83:
We headed to a different beach today – soaked up some more sunshine, munched on some more fresh fruit. Ela had an interesting encounter with a saggy boob. She was casually wading in the water, admiring her surrounds whilst waving her arms from side to side when a old lady walked a little too close to her – Ela copped a hand full of sag. She ran screaming out of the water, much to my entertainment! Ha.
Now I know you’ve probably heard this before, but can you guess what we did next? Yes, we ate. Lol. Pasta cocktail – penne, bowties and spirals...pasta heaven! Usually we wouldn’t complain about eating a massive mountain of pasta, however we realised that 3hrs later we had to back up and do it again at dinner.
We enjoyed a nice family meal - the menu went something like this:
Appetizer: Salami, Sardegna bread, Olives, Cheese, Tuna peppers
Entree: Massive bowl of penne pomodoro and basilico
Main: Pitzaiola – veal soaked in tomato sauce and potatoes on the side
Dessert: Assortment of delicious Sardinian biscuits – from amaretti to meringues followed by more Vino, Limoncello and Rum & Coke.
Day 84:
Today Nadia took us to a little beach hideaway, she explained to us that this was the spot where Princess Dianna was the day before she died. It’s got very little actual beach, but is famous for this massive rock where people climb up and sunbake. We decided to bomb the crap out of it instead. We had a lot of fun climbing and exploring all the rock formations and trying to achieve the biggest splash with our dives.
We feel that the highlight of the day (besides the amazing view and crystal clear water) was when Maurizio arrived with a portable refrigerator full of lunch type goodness. So we spent the rest of the afternoon feeding our faces on prosciutto, bread and rockmelon. Needless to say that we couldn’t really swim afterwards, we just sunk. So we waded in the shallows and skimmed rocks for a while. Good times.
By the time 4pm rolled around we had to say goodbye to our little lagoon and make our way back to the house – we had a plane to catch :( On our way home we stopped to say goodbye to Valerio and Zio Elio, sad to have to leave them so soon.
It was then time for one last giant feed – another delicious BBQ followed by some gelato. We enjoyed our last meal with Maurizio and Nadia; a big shout out and a huge thank you for everything they did for us. We said goodbye to our basement home and loaded up the car with all our gear, and headed toward Olbia airport: Destination, Florence.
So far Italy has been good to us, and our stomachs, we look forward to more eating and more eating.....and more eating...... keep an eye out for Part 2 of domination Italy.
But it’s ciao for now as we make our way to Florence, Pisa, Siena and the Cinqueterre.
Say buongiorno to your Padre for us,
Kate & Ela
Xxx
Tuesday, August 10, 2010
Tuesday, July 27, 2010
Greek Island Hopper
Day 62 – 75
Athens
We arrived at about 1am on day 62/63 and after a minor fuck up with our hotel booking we checked into our flash hotel. Ah so luxurious – free wifi, massive plasma and great beds! After a awesome sleep in we decided to spend the day re-connecting with the world seeing as we were spending the next day in Athens on our Greek Island tour.
So...we stocked up on cookies, juice, chips and spent the afternoon relaxing and preparing ourselves for our greek island top deck tour.
At about 5pm we met and gret with our new TD team. Abundance of aussies and one American flying solo – brave girl! From the moment we met our group we knew it was going to be a wild ride – a lot more people our age and only one couple – not that our first tour group was bad (love you guys) but this one had a different vibe.
We started to spot similarities in characters from our first tour – for instance...Team Blasian (blonde and asian) were apparent on first sighting and Steph McGregor clone (except the original has better drooling skills)!
We all went to dinner together to enjoy some Greek cuisine. Whilst at dinner, these ethopian men were walking around our table trying to sell dvds – ofcourse we want new dvds. So, naturally Totti and I sat the ethopians down and sifted through their collections and walked away with Alice in Wonderland, Twilight (the new one), Sex and the City (the new one) and Karate Kid (again...the new one). We were THAT excited about our new pirated movies that we wanted to bail on dinner and head to our hotel to watch them. Sad.
Twilight was GREAT. The occasional mid-movie pee break appearance and the odd “down in front” comment but other than that it was pretty much the Cinemax experience!
Athens
We would just like to give a huge shout out to The Baby Grand Hotel in Athens for providing normal, human, consumable, edible and TASTY breakfast foods. BIG FAT NORMAL GREEK BREAKFAST. It seems like for ever ago that we were able to track down a slice of toast and a glass freshly squeezed orange juice. We would also like to thank them for cat free eating areas and clean chairs to sit on! Much appreciated!!
So with full tummies and a couple of muffins for the road (yes, we are thinkers, plus we couldn’t fit them in for breakfast, so we had to compromise and take them for snacks – much to everyone’s envy come snack time :p) we went on a brief walking tour (although the walk was brief, it was stinking hot and we sweated like we were running a marathon) up to the Acropolis. Our tour leader Nikki (soon became known as Mummy) took us on a LONG ass walking tour – can we just add, she was wearing heels the whole tour. Oh the pain. We walked up to the acropolis and saw some stuff and some other things of the oldish kind. It was nice but not as good as the slushies we inhaled – owiii brain freeze!
We then spent the rest of the afternoon walking through the flea markets – getting hassled by greek men...and hassling them back! My favourite quote by Totti “You – too expensive” in her best greek voice! Such a wog.
In between dinner it was time to head to Cinemax again and watch Sex and The City 2.....well Totti did.......somewhere between Samantha trying to hold onto her youth and Kerrie trying to rekindle her marriage to Big. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz. Lol.
We met back up with our tour group and enjoyed a nice traditional greek dinner complete with greek dances to which some of the girls were quick to join in on. You will all be pleased to know that we are both seasoned wine drinkers now. Yeyah!
We kicked on at a local bar where we dominated some Ouzo (barf!) and hassled more greek men (gypsies). One girl...Mel Ho whom we nick-named MyHo was getting so frustrated with the dirty gypsy men that she bought a megaphone and proceeded to yell into it at his face “GO AWAY!”. Needless to say Ela and I were both in stiches.
Just as a side note – we downloaded the Shrek 4 iPhone application and entertained us...and everyone else with the “Do the ROAR” kid. Too funny. We all headed back to the hotel for some much needed shut eye before our walking tour in the morning.
Paros
FML. 5am wake up call to head to the port to catch our ferry to the island of Paros.
Pool for bombing. Tick.
Quad bikes for hire. Tick.
Boat to awesome beach. Tick.
Sand for making funny images. Tick.
Sand for burying. Tick.
So our life was pretty much complete. When we arrived we were well chuffed that the pool was right outside our room so we quickly swapped our jean shorts for our swimmers and did bombs.
We had lunch at a local cafe with the group while we waited for our hotel rooms to be serviced. At lunch we were well amused when we witnessed someone with a very simular random humour to ours. “What did you order for lunch”...MyHo replies in a Tourettes like outburst “MOUSAKA”. Far out we cacked ourselves. Guess you had to be there!
Soon bored, we decided to rock the beaches with our fros so we headed to the boat and off to Krios beach.
After a nice refreshing swim we started to get an itch to do something devious – so we got a half eaten apple and proceeded to make it into a face...and then built a body....and then gave it a extra long body part...the photos are priceless! Filia and Steph we shall privately send these to you! LOL!
We then thought it would be fun to bury each other in the sand and take photos – little did we know that half the beach were watching us and probably thought we were re-TARDS. But we had fun being sand monsters.
That night...well a bit of a blur really but it was good fun which ended in a swim of some kind – a true bomb-a-thon! We achieved two things that night: 1. The nickname Team Canberra and 2. A drinking record – which later got broken in Santorini.
Paros
The hangover – probably still over the limit we decided to get a group of cool kids and hire a bunch of quad bikes and hoon around the island...our leaders – US! Ela navigated, Totti at the wheel and off we went map in hand with our 7 quad convoy!
Seriously the best day ever complete with in-tune honking and holding up buses because we were too busy taking group photos and videos, that plus getting lost and one of our quads breaking down. Our convoy however seemed to think we were amazing (naturally) they felt that we would completely dominate The Amazing Race. Look out!
We stopped at random beaches all along the island every hour or so and went for regular swims and practised out floating skills (which p.s we would like to inform you are now world class. Even Totti who used to sink like a rock has come so far since her first floating attempt in Cancun).
We were accompanied by an awesome group of girls and guys whom we shall now give a shout out too: MyHo, Wallbanger, Paris, Amy, LN, Matty, Andy, sexy eyes Antonio! Miss you guys x
We met back up with our group and went and watched a beautiful sunset by the water – heaps of pretty photos.
The need for speed soon kicked in and we jumped back on our quads and headed north to the town of Naoussa (pronounced Noosa) for a walk along the old port and some dinner. It was such an exhilarating ride in the dark through the mountains however we had a minor hiccup when Paris’ bike started sparking from the back...but we are all still alive!
TRAVEL TIP: If in Paros, hire quad bikes – they cost 15 euro for 24hrs of pure awesomeness. The best thing is that you keep them overnight.
Mykonos
We spent the morning bumming around Paros before we headed to the port to catch our ferry to MYKONOS – the party island. On the way we were informed about a little fuck up at the hotel we were supposed to stay at – the bad news: the hotel double booked with another tour so we couldn’t stay there. The good news: they paid for all of us to be upgraded to a 5 star (yes 5 star) resort for the night. This made the 4 hour ferry much more bearable. When we arrived, we were chauffeured to our luxurious honeymoon 5 star resort complete with fluffy slippers and robes!
Our resort was that big it came with a map – the pool was infinity edge – there were several bars – a restaurant and a cafe...and free wifi!
We spent the afternoon relaxing on our private balcony overlooking the water and ducked in for a swim. One of the girls had her own Jacuzzi on her balcony. We were very spoilt.
That night we watched the sunset by the windmills and enjoyed a flash dinner on the water. It was then time to see what Mykonos had to offer in terms of nightlife. We started the night at the Mex Bar where we were showered with napkins...and alcohol...oh and free t-shirts. There was tequila, flaming shots, shakers full of potent shots and much more. MyHo was quick to pull out her booty moves and gave Coyote Ugly a run for their money by dancing the shit out of the bar. We were well entertained. Favourite quote of the night, Wallbanger “I have a really high threshold for alcohol”...3 minutes later “Fuck, I’m so smashed”. Ah...FAIL! lol.
We finally dragged our butts away from Mex and headed to the famous Scandinavian bar where we were again showered with free shots and t-shirts. YEYAH! We love free stuff. There was a pole in this bar which MyHo and Matty dominated. Lol. More bar dancing. More alcohol.
We got home safely. That is all.
We decided it would be a great idea to make use of our fluffy robes and slippers and head to the pool for a late night/early morning swim. It was rather cold so we didn’t last long but our robes and slippers (which we stole) were rather comfy!
Mykonos
We wore our slippers and free t-shirts to breakfast and drifted around the hotel lobby until we found the breakfast room. Lots of blood shot eyes and ‘no-showers’....Andy – you dead mon?! Lol.
We decided there was no better way to spend the day than to hit Super Paradise beach for some sun and salt water. The boat took for frickin ages to get there but with Pringles, Coke and icy poles with tattoos in hand we didn’t really care. We spent the day on the beach...that is all.
Round 2: We hit up Paradise beach, Tropicana bar...sausage fest! YEYAH! Lol. We were well over dressed in tights and a t-shirt as everyone was practically naked by the time we got there but we enjoyed it. Mmmm...
Tropicana bar closed at 12 so we walked up to Cavo Paradiso to see what was happening. It costs 35 euro to get in and we both agreed we’d be well devo if we paid and it was shitty, so we left the group and headed back into town. We drank and danced some more at Mex bar and then enjoyed a white nutella crepe...mmm....
TIP: Apparently Cavo Paradiso plays really heavy dance music but is a awesome venue on the cliff overlooking the water – not really our cup of tea but keep it in mind if you’re in Mykonos.
Santorini
The most anticipated island of the tour – we had all heard so much about Santorini. The sea was really choppy so we managed to get our hands on some TravelCalm motion sickness tablets and zonked out for the whole trip. YEYAH!
We got to our hotel early evening, showered and walked down the road to the local taverna for dinner. We were still fairly drowsy from the trip so decided to have a early night and invited the girls and Matty back to our room for a cinema experience screening The Karate Kid. Great movie.
Zzzzz.....
Santorini
Sigh. Breakfast fail again. Warm milk in 30 degree heat = soggy cereal. Anyway, so we got picked up by our private bus and made our way into the main town: we had an action packed day to come, cable car ride down to the port, hiking up an active volcano and then a swim into the hot springs to play with some mud. Yehyah! Followed by a hilarious donkey ride up 500 steps.
TIP: thongs hiking up a volcano = fail and most probably face plant into the schmelting hot lava. So, hungy, complain, tired, hot, more complain, thirsty, no water, schtinky, complain – “But whhyyyyy-ya!” “Doooooonnnttt- uh” You get the picture. We finally made it to the top of the4 stupid effing volcano and enjoyed a lovely group photo (our tour guide payed us out – as she was standing there with about 10 cameras in her hand, she forcefully reminded us that it is in fact 2010 “you know guys....there’s a thing called facebook...you can tag people” shut down lol), some warm water and stale cheesy Pringles. Ah, the good life.
After making it back down the volcano, we took our private boat into the entrance of the hot springs and bombed off the side into the 30 degree water. Which turned into minus 2 degree water, which heated back up to 30 degree water – so strange!! We doggy paddled, floated, waded – any other form of swimming, to the mud. Ah, the mud – it’s a shame we couldn’t get photos here, basically we all looked like Shrek or The Hulk. Apparently this mud is meant to be amazing for your skin, so instead of just having a face mask, we pretty much coated ourselves in it lol. Unfortunately it was time to swim back to the boat and head back for our donkey ride.
Fucken stupid donkey – we have both appreciated having bruise free and uninjured legs, the stupid animal thought it would be nice to crush us into the wall numerous times up the mountain. The situation was NOT helped when the little greek man ringing up the rear whipped the donkeys, only making them pick up bursts of speed and merge into a giant donkey orgy of stink! FFS! It was very fun and our favourite donkey name of the day “Wallbanger JR.” LOL! That’ll do Donkey, that’ll do! Eh, eh! See what we did there?
Sooooooooooooooo..... the mud turned us into Oompa Loompa’s, we were radiating bright orange. Fake tan much? We couldn’t wait to get back to the hotel so we could have a bomb-a-thon.
- Side note: The perfect bomb shall henceforth be judged based on three criteria
1: air time 2: Facial expression 3: the size of your splash.
We also convinced MyHo and Matty to have bellyflop competitions - rather entertaining!!! Their pain was our joy lol.
So, sick of looking like oranges, we decided to leave the pool and exfoliate our faces off. Lucky for us, the mud all eventually washed off and we were back to our bleck looking selves in no time.
Since being named “Team Canberra” or Team Berra for short, we decided that because it was our last night on tour, that we should go out with a bang. We made arm bands from the ripped sleeves of our Mykonos T-shirts and accessorised our outfits that way. Coolest kids in school.
We decided to follow suit and get a roadie to take with us on the bus, so we went across the road and got a take away vodka lemonade in a paper cup (classy) and hopped on the bus. So it was pretty much a repeat of Berlin, the measure of Vodka to Lemonade was rather overwhelming, vom. We made it into town alive, and watched what was most possibly the most beautiful sunset we have had the pleasure of witnessing.
After that, we got a quick bite to eat and headed to our first pub on the pub crawl list: Murphy’s. Well.....where to begin....two for one cocktails till 10:30 and complimentary shots......more two for one cocktails......the sailor hat.....the roses.....rum and coke.....rum and coke....lady gaga...MyHo bar dancing.....more rum and coke.....good night!
Next morning. F.A.I.L. – well.... Totti punished the dunny. I feel that this stench has reached the top of her shit- o –meter. She was even surprised at how much it stank. We pretty much spent the day feeling sorry for ourselves, we just assumed the foetal position in the hotel lobby and waited for our bus to take us to the port. Stupid crack head kitten had to disturb our serenity. This little bugger was burning around the lobby – then it found us and took a liking to clawing our feet off. Yes, we are tough, scared of a little kitten.
We were not looking forward to the 9 hr ferry ride back to Athens – so we popped another travel calm and fashioned ourselves some beds out of our seats and extra chairs and passed out for a good four hrs. The rest of the trip was rather entertaining – we just watched MyHo and Ellen bicker and pay each other out. Wallbanger was about to hit the wall ( A thankyou) “I need to get off this effing boat – NOW!”
We FINALLY arrived in Athens at 1am and dragged ourselves back to our room and hit the pillow. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz!
After a nice solid sleep, we all went down to brekky and said our goodbye’s – the last ten days has gone too quickly for our liking and we were sad to see everyone leave so soon. We’d like to thank everyone for making this trip so memorable – we hope you all make it home safe, and keep in touch. And don’t forget “We love dance, do do, do do do do do do, we love dance”
We then spent the rest of the day strolling around Athens and finally did some shopping (by shopping me mean more dvd’s off our Ethiopian dealers, we now have shrek 4, toy story 3, Grown ups, and a couple of random ones), went up to the acropolis and came across a little boy taking out his revenge on the pigeons in the town square. This was the highlight of the day – the elation on Totti’s face “LOOK AT THAT KID, HE’S STEPPING ON THE STUPID BIRD’S WINGS (LOL). Finally, someone who hates them as much as her. Too effing funny!
We said goodnight to the ice addicts shooting up outside our hotel and finally updated our blog!
And so we are gearing up for three weeks of Italian domination – food, food, and more food.
Yamas, bitches. Say hi to your dad for us.
Love, Team Berra xxxx
Athens
We arrived at about 1am on day 62/63 and after a minor fuck up with our hotel booking we checked into our flash hotel. Ah so luxurious – free wifi, massive plasma and great beds! After a awesome sleep in we decided to spend the day re-connecting with the world seeing as we were spending the next day in Athens on our Greek Island tour.
So...we stocked up on cookies, juice, chips and spent the afternoon relaxing and preparing ourselves for our greek island top deck tour.
At about 5pm we met and gret with our new TD team. Abundance of aussies and one American flying solo – brave girl! From the moment we met our group we knew it was going to be a wild ride – a lot more people our age and only one couple – not that our first tour group was bad (love you guys) but this one had a different vibe.
We started to spot similarities in characters from our first tour – for instance...Team Blasian (blonde and asian) were apparent on first sighting and Steph McGregor clone (except the original has better drooling skills)!
We all went to dinner together to enjoy some Greek cuisine. Whilst at dinner, these ethopian men were walking around our table trying to sell dvds – ofcourse we want new dvds. So, naturally Totti and I sat the ethopians down and sifted through their collections and walked away with Alice in Wonderland, Twilight (the new one), Sex and the City (the new one) and Karate Kid (again...the new one). We were THAT excited about our new pirated movies that we wanted to bail on dinner and head to our hotel to watch them. Sad.
Twilight was GREAT. The occasional mid-movie pee break appearance and the odd “down in front” comment but other than that it was pretty much the Cinemax experience!
Athens
We would just like to give a huge shout out to The Baby Grand Hotel in Athens for providing normal, human, consumable, edible and TASTY breakfast foods. BIG FAT NORMAL GREEK BREAKFAST. It seems like for ever ago that we were able to track down a slice of toast and a glass freshly squeezed orange juice. We would also like to thank them for cat free eating areas and clean chairs to sit on! Much appreciated!!
So with full tummies and a couple of muffins for the road (yes, we are thinkers, plus we couldn’t fit them in for breakfast, so we had to compromise and take them for snacks – much to everyone’s envy come snack time :p) we went on a brief walking tour (although the walk was brief, it was stinking hot and we sweated like we were running a marathon) up to the Acropolis. Our tour leader Nikki (soon became known as Mummy) took us on a LONG ass walking tour – can we just add, she was wearing heels the whole tour. Oh the pain. We walked up to the acropolis and saw some stuff and some other things of the oldish kind. It was nice but not as good as the slushies we inhaled – owiii brain freeze!
We then spent the rest of the afternoon walking through the flea markets – getting hassled by greek men...and hassling them back! My favourite quote by Totti “You – too expensive” in her best greek voice! Such a wog.
In between dinner it was time to head to Cinemax again and watch Sex and The City 2.....well Totti did.......somewhere between Samantha trying to hold onto her youth and Kerrie trying to rekindle her marriage to Big. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz. Lol.
We met back up with our tour group and enjoyed a nice traditional greek dinner complete with greek dances to which some of the girls were quick to join in on. You will all be pleased to know that we are both seasoned wine drinkers now. Yeyah!
We kicked on at a local bar where we dominated some Ouzo (barf!) and hassled more greek men (gypsies). One girl...Mel Ho whom we nick-named MyHo was getting so frustrated with the dirty gypsy men that she bought a megaphone and proceeded to yell into it at his face “GO AWAY!”. Needless to say Ela and I were both in stiches.
Just as a side note – we downloaded the Shrek 4 iPhone application and entertained us...and everyone else with the “Do the ROAR” kid. Too funny. We all headed back to the hotel for some much needed shut eye before our walking tour in the morning.
Paros
FML. 5am wake up call to head to the port to catch our ferry to the island of Paros.
Pool for bombing. Tick.
Quad bikes for hire. Tick.
Boat to awesome beach. Tick.
Sand for making funny images. Tick.
Sand for burying. Tick.
So our life was pretty much complete. When we arrived we were well chuffed that the pool was right outside our room so we quickly swapped our jean shorts for our swimmers and did bombs.
We had lunch at a local cafe with the group while we waited for our hotel rooms to be serviced. At lunch we were well amused when we witnessed someone with a very simular random humour to ours. “What did you order for lunch”...MyHo replies in a Tourettes like outburst “MOUSAKA”. Far out we cacked ourselves. Guess you had to be there!
Soon bored, we decided to rock the beaches with our fros so we headed to the boat and off to Krios beach.
After a nice refreshing swim we started to get an itch to do something devious – so we got a half eaten apple and proceeded to make it into a face...and then built a body....and then gave it a extra long body part...the photos are priceless! Filia and Steph we shall privately send these to you! LOL!
We then thought it would be fun to bury each other in the sand and take photos – little did we know that half the beach were watching us and probably thought we were re-TARDS. But we had fun being sand monsters.
That night...well a bit of a blur really but it was good fun which ended in a swim of some kind – a true bomb-a-thon! We achieved two things that night: 1. The nickname Team Canberra and 2. A drinking record – which later got broken in Santorini.
Paros
The hangover – probably still over the limit we decided to get a group of cool kids and hire a bunch of quad bikes and hoon around the island...our leaders – US! Ela navigated, Totti at the wheel and off we went map in hand with our 7 quad convoy!
Seriously the best day ever complete with in-tune honking and holding up buses because we were too busy taking group photos and videos, that plus getting lost and one of our quads breaking down. Our convoy however seemed to think we were amazing (naturally) they felt that we would completely dominate The Amazing Race. Look out!
We stopped at random beaches all along the island every hour or so and went for regular swims and practised out floating skills (which p.s we would like to inform you are now world class. Even Totti who used to sink like a rock has come so far since her first floating attempt in Cancun).
We were accompanied by an awesome group of girls and guys whom we shall now give a shout out too: MyHo, Wallbanger, Paris, Amy, LN, Matty, Andy, sexy eyes Antonio! Miss you guys x
We met back up with our group and went and watched a beautiful sunset by the water – heaps of pretty photos.
The need for speed soon kicked in and we jumped back on our quads and headed north to the town of Naoussa (pronounced Noosa) for a walk along the old port and some dinner. It was such an exhilarating ride in the dark through the mountains however we had a minor hiccup when Paris’ bike started sparking from the back...but we are all still alive!
TRAVEL TIP: If in Paros, hire quad bikes – they cost 15 euro for 24hrs of pure awesomeness. The best thing is that you keep them overnight.
Mykonos
We spent the morning bumming around Paros before we headed to the port to catch our ferry to MYKONOS – the party island. On the way we were informed about a little fuck up at the hotel we were supposed to stay at – the bad news: the hotel double booked with another tour so we couldn’t stay there. The good news: they paid for all of us to be upgraded to a 5 star (yes 5 star) resort for the night. This made the 4 hour ferry much more bearable. When we arrived, we were chauffeured to our luxurious honeymoon 5 star resort complete with fluffy slippers and robes!
Our resort was that big it came with a map – the pool was infinity edge – there were several bars – a restaurant and a cafe...and free wifi!
We spent the afternoon relaxing on our private balcony overlooking the water and ducked in for a swim. One of the girls had her own Jacuzzi on her balcony. We were very spoilt.
That night we watched the sunset by the windmills and enjoyed a flash dinner on the water. It was then time to see what Mykonos had to offer in terms of nightlife. We started the night at the Mex Bar where we were showered with napkins...and alcohol...oh and free t-shirts. There was tequila, flaming shots, shakers full of potent shots and much more. MyHo was quick to pull out her booty moves and gave Coyote Ugly a run for their money by dancing the shit out of the bar. We were well entertained. Favourite quote of the night, Wallbanger “I have a really high threshold for alcohol”...3 minutes later “Fuck, I’m so smashed”. Ah...FAIL! lol.
We finally dragged our butts away from Mex and headed to the famous Scandinavian bar where we were again showered with free shots and t-shirts. YEYAH! We love free stuff. There was a pole in this bar which MyHo and Matty dominated. Lol. More bar dancing. More alcohol.
We got home safely. That is all.
We decided it would be a great idea to make use of our fluffy robes and slippers and head to the pool for a late night/early morning swim. It was rather cold so we didn’t last long but our robes and slippers (which we stole) were rather comfy!
Mykonos
We wore our slippers and free t-shirts to breakfast and drifted around the hotel lobby until we found the breakfast room. Lots of blood shot eyes and ‘no-showers’....Andy – you dead mon?! Lol.
We decided there was no better way to spend the day than to hit Super Paradise beach for some sun and salt water. The boat took for frickin ages to get there but with Pringles, Coke and icy poles with tattoos in hand we didn’t really care. We spent the day on the beach...that is all.
Round 2: We hit up Paradise beach, Tropicana bar...sausage fest! YEYAH! Lol. We were well over dressed in tights and a t-shirt as everyone was practically naked by the time we got there but we enjoyed it. Mmmm...
Tropicana bar closed at 12 so we walked up to Cavo Paradiso to see what was happening. It costs 35 euro to get in and we both agreed we’d be well devo if we paid and it was shitty, so we left the group and headed back into town. We drank and danced some more at Mex bar and then enjoyed a white nutella crepe...mmm....
TIP: Apparently Cavo Paradiso plays really heavy dance music but is a awesome venue on the cliff overlooking the water – not really our cup of tea but keep it in mind if you’re in Mykonos.
Santorini
The most anticipated island of the tour – we had all heard so much about Santorini. The sea was really choppy so we managed to get our hands on some TravelCalm motion sickness tablets and zonked out for the whole trip. YEYAH!
We got to our hotel early evening, showered and walked down the road to the local taverna for dinner. We were still fairly drowsy from the trip so decided to have a early night and invited the girls and Matty back to our room for a cinema experience screening The Karate Kid. Great movie.
Zzzzz.....
Santorini
Sigh. Breakfast fail again. Warm milk in 30 degree heat = soggy cereal. Anyway, so we got picked up by our private bus and made our way into the main town: we had an action packed day to come, cable car ride down to the port, hiking up an active volcano and then a swim into the hot springs to play with some mud. Yehyah! Followed by a hilarious donkey ride up 500 steps.
TIP: thongs hiking up a volcano = fail and most probably face plant into the schmelting hot lava. So, hungy, complain, tired, hot, more complain, thirsty, no water, schtinky, complain – “But whhyyyyy-ya!” “Doooooonnnttt- uh” You get the picture. We finally made it to the top of the4 stupid effing volcano and enjoyed a lovely group photo (our tour guide payed us out – as she was standing there with about 10 cameras in her hand, she forcefully reminded us that it is in fact 2010 “you know guys....there’s a thing called facebook...you can tag people” shut down lol), some warm water and stale cheesy Pringles. Ah, the good life.
After making it back down the volcano, we took our private boat into the entrance of the hot springs and bombed off the side into the 30 degree water. Which turned into minus 2 degree water, which heated back up to 30 degree water – so strange!! We doggy paddled, floated, waded – any other form of swimming, to the mud. Ah, the mud – it’s a shame we couldn’t get photos here, basically we all looked like Shrek or The Hulk. Apparently this mud is meant to be amazing for your skin, so instead of just having a face mask, we pretty much coated ourselves in it lol. Unfortunately it was time to swim back to the boat and head back for our donkey ride.
Fucken stupid donkey – we have both appreciated having bruise free and uninjured legs, the stupid animal thought it would be nice to crush us into the wall numerous times up the mountain. The situation was NOT helped when the little greek man ringing up the rear whipped the donkeys, only making them pick up bursts of speed and merge into a giant donkey orgy of stink! FFS! It was very fun and our favourite donkey name of the day “Wallbanger JR.” LOL! That’ll do Donkey, that’ll do! Eh, eh! See what we did there?
Sooooooooooooooo..... the mud turned us into Oompa Loompa’s, we were radiating bright orange. Fake tan much? We couldn’t wait to get back to the hotel so we could have a bomb-a-thon.
- Side note: The perfect bomb shall henceforth be judged based on three criteria
1: air time 2: Facial expression 3: the size of your splash.
We also convinced MyHo and Matty to have bellyflop competitions - rather entertaining!!! Their pain was our joy lol.
So, sick of looking like oranges, we decided to leave the pool and exfoliate our faces off. Lucky for us, the mud all eventually washed off and we were back to our bleck looking selves in no time.
Since being named “Team Canberra” or Team Berra for short, we decided that because it was our last night on tour, that we should go out with a bang. We made arm bands from the ripped sleeves of our Mykonos T-shirts and accessorised our outfits that way. Coolest kids in school.
We decided to follow suit and get a roadie to take with us on the bus, so we went across the road and got a take away vodka lemonade in a paper cup (classy) and hopped on the bus. So it was pretty much a repeat of Berlin, the measure of Vodka to Lemonade was rather overwhelming, vom. We made it into town alive, and watched what was most possibly the most beautiful sunset we have had the pleasure of witnessing.
After that, we got a quick bite to eat and headed to our first pub on the pub crawl list: Murphy’s. Well.....where to begin....two for one cocktails till 10:30 and complimentary shots......more two for one cocktails......the sailor hat.....the roses.....rum and coke.....rum and coke....lady gaga...MyHo bar dancing.....more rum and coke.....good night!
Next morning. F.A.I.L. – well.... Totti punished the dunny. I feel that this stench has reached the top of her shit- o –meter. She was even surprised at how much it stank. We pretty much spent the day feeling sorry for ourselves, we just assumed the foetal position in the hotel lobby and waited for our bus to take us to the port. Stupid crack head kitten had to disturb our serenity. This little bugger was burning around the lobby – then it found us and took a liking to clawing our feet off. Yes, we are tough, scared of a little kitten.
We were not looking forward to the 9 hr ferry ride back to Athens – so we popped another travel calm and fashioned ourselves some beds out of our seats and extra chairs and passed out for a good four hrs. The rest of the trip was rather entertaining – we just watched MyHo and Ellen bicker and pay each other out. Wallbanger was about to hit the wall ( A thankyou) “I need to get off this effing boat – NOW!”
We FINALLY arrived in Athens at 1am and dragged ourselves back to our room and hit the pillow. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz!
After a nice solid sleep, we all went down to brekky and said our goodbye’s – the last ten days has gone too quickly for our liking and we were sad to see everyone leave so soon. We’d like to thank everyone for making this trip so memorable – we hope you all make it home safe, and keep in touch. And don’t forget “We love dance, do do, do do do do do do, we love dance”
We then spent the rest of the day strolling around Athens and finally did some shopping (by shopping me mean more dvd’s off our Ethiopian dealers, we now have shrek 4, toy story 3, Grown ups, and a couple of random ones), went up to the acropolis and came across a little boy taking out his revenge on the pigeons in the town square. This was the highlight of the day – the elation on Totti’s face “LOOK AT THAT KID, HE’S STEPPING ON THE STUPID BIRD’S WINGS (LOL). Finally, someone who hates them as much as her. Too effing funny!
We said goodnight to the ice addicts shooting up outside our hotel and finally updated our blog!
And so we are gearing up for three weeks of Italian domination – food, food, and more food.
Yamas, bitches. Say hi to your dad for us.
Love, Team Berra xxxx
Saturday, July 17, 2010
France
Day 54 France:
Rise and shine! We left the hostel and made our way to the train station at 8am. Usually this would look normal to morning commuters, we found however that we were drawing more attention to ourselves – what looked to be two small mountains of luggage navigating their way down the London streets were really just Totti and I trying not to take people out.
So we finally made it to the train station and stole some free wifi while waiting for our train. We dragged ourselves and our 40kg in total luggage past the FAST train passengers to our dodgy SLOW train where we boarded only to be told we were actually on the FAST train – so back we went to join the richeys! 2hrs later and we arrived in Paris – to some sun-sun-sunshine, lollipops and blue birds!
A big shout out to Papa Totti who navigated us to our hotel via Australia – yeah we suck, don’t judge us! After briefly getting lost and realising the Frenchies DON’T speak English but will try to give directions in French (helpful!) we made it to Hotel Malar – literally around the corner from the gorgeous Eiffel Tower. YAY!
Now before we go on, we’d just like to mention that we absolutely LOVED Paris and this city has by far kicked the arses of every other city we have visited thus far...to find out why, read below :p
After a quick clean shower, with fresh towels (don’t ask) and a proper leak free shower-head, we headed for the metro – destination....unknown! A big shout out to FILIA for donating her Lonely Planet pocket guide to Paris to us – it became very helpful! We jumped on the metro and headed to the Latin Quarter – after reading the Lonely Planet’s creperie recommendation...we kinda felt obliged to test taste these crepes and provide our own analysis. We indulged in the ‘chef’s recommendation’ – full of roast veggies and fresh feta cheese. Yumo! We also marvelled at the many jars of Nutella stacked three jars high and two jars back...this time we both died and went to food Heaven.
So....the latin quater :p The Latin Quarter is a student hub – it is named so because way back when, in ye olde France, the university students used the traditional Latin language to communicate among one another. It now harbours great night life, cheap but delicious food, cheap shopping, cute lounge bars and pubs and easy going, laid back atmosphere. The main hub is a roundabout with a fountain middle surrounded by cute little pubs and cafes. Get the picture, good!
While strolling down the streets (well rolling – two fat ladies again! Well actually, Totti just eats and I put on the weight for both of us :p I blame the Italian genes) we have discovered that European guys are NOT shy – we were casually strolling past a bar looking at cocktail prices and were wooed inside by a cute Parisian, who spoke French, Spanish and some broken Italian, somehow they just seem to get more perfect. And so we were forced to drink, again. Sigh. One tequila sunrise and one strawberry daiquiri, thankyou!
What to do...what to do....Eiffel Tower by night? YUP! We strolled around the masses of people lounging around the lawns of the Eiffel Tower enjoying their picnics. The were never ending lines up to the observation decks, so we entertained ourselves trying to talk down the Ethiopian salesman for his little flashing/flying thing. Don’t get the wrong idea, and get your mind out of the gutter, it was like a little neon helicopter which you flick up into the air with a rubber band. Totti managed to talk him down from 10 euros to 3, then got bored, so we left – guess you had to be there. We people watched for a while, and took one too many photos – we have become really obsessed with taking photos of the Eiffel Tower, and of ourselves near the Eiffel Tower, so we did that, along with enjoying the atmosphere, being in amongst the people and the perfect weather.
Day 55:
After a schmelting shit of nights sleep in our non-air conditioning rooms (fail Europe) – we peeled our melted faces up from our sweaty pillows, cold showered and off we went to meet up with the Fat Tire Bike tour.
For anyone going to Paris, we HIGHLY recommend, in fact it’s really a MUST when you come to Paris to do the Fat Tire Bike tour – day or night, they are both awesome.
We were on the 11am day tour and met up with our guide Scotty at the Eiffel Tower. The bike tour went for 4hrs and covers most of the main attractions – the Louvre, Ecole Militaire, Eiffel tower, Napoleon’s tomb, Alexander III bridge, Musee D’Orsay, Tuileries Gardens (where we stopped for lunch).
Two things:
1. BIKE NINJAS live in the Tuileries Gardens...yes, ninjas on bikes. We kidd you not, we saw the ninjas – they exist. The story is if you ride your bike through these gardens, the NINJAs come and judo-chop you to the dirt...literally. We were well impressed by ninja employment at its finest. Totes.
2. 2. HOLD THE PHONE – we stopped for lunch at about 1 pm – we were all well dehydrated, sunburnt and sweating like pigs so needless to say we were starving as well. We sat with some people from the States who were riding together. Shortly after we ordered, they got their food – delicious sandwiches and such. They were also presented with a bowl of fresh bread to accompany their meals – THEIR bread...not OURS. Ela...quick off the mark, as soon as the waiter put the bread down, she leaned over a STOLE (yes....STOLE), a piece of their bread. I quickly said “uh...Ela...pretty sure that’s not our bread”, to which Ela responded “oh..well...that’s awkward coz now I can’t put it back”. The Americans were not impressed by my friends sloth-like behaviour and didn’t speak to us for the rest of the lunch. Fail.
And so we continued on our ride...Les Invalides, Grand and Petit Palais and Place de la Concorde followed by our grand photo finish at the Eiffel Tower.
After 4hrs riding bikes in the stinking hot, we headed back to our non-air con room and passed out.
We went on the 7pm night tour the same day – fail in planning! We decided that we had learnt some things from the day tour – we could get away with wearing thongs (to avoid stinky feet) and we didn’t need to take our bags (to avoid sweaty backs). This plan turned out to bite us on the butt (like most of our plans). The night tour took us to various landmarks – one key place of reference would be the best ice cream shop in the WORLD – Berthillion Ice Cream. Well...fail to us, because us dum-dums left our wallets at the office so we had to sit on our bikes and watch everyone else lick their frickin ice creams in front of us. We were well salivating and didn’t speak to anyone for the rest of the tour – it was all their fault! The night tour also took us to Notre Dame, Latin Quarter, the Islands (Johnny Depp’s house), the Louvre (action shots in the sunset), St. Chappelle, Academie Francaise, Pont des Arts.
The highlight of the night tour was the wine cruise – we parked our bikes and hopped on a massive ferry-like boat with hundreds of people. The ride went for about an hour – up and down the Seine river and the tour group received all-you-can-drink red wine. Now you all know that we just don’t do wine...well folks, now we do! We were all pretty tipsy as we left the boat and jumped back on our bikes – drink driving anyone. The trip home was quite hilarious – there were people running into each other, one girl sliced her toe open, one lady stacked it massively (we had to try and contain the laughter) but we made it home, however we have LOTS of mysterious bruises.
TIP: we have found that wifi in Paris is limited...however, Fat Tire Bike office offers FREE wifi. We literally sat in there for a good couple of hours and got in touch with technology. They also let you print. Get on it!
Day 56:
To the LOUVRE...yay! We love museums and art and stuff. Everyone has to go to the Louvre...so it was more of an obligation than a ‘want’ but anyways. We went and saw Mona, she was pretty cool – heaps of Asians taking photos – we wanted to pick her nose but we couldn’t get through the 6inch bullet proof glass. Venus had no arms, but Medusa had a pimped raft with heaps of dudes (boats n hoes). The Sphinx had lion properties – we made her roar and scared some kids. Totti found a ranga statue (well at least we envisaged him to be ranga) and fondled his beard. We admired numerous mini-genitalia and took photos. Ela liked the feet best. A fun day at the museum – we are all about making education fun.
One thing we did learn was that the Louvre was once someone’s house – it was kind of the running joke all day as to which room would have been mine. The place is effing huge – it would be way cooler if they turned it into a giant enclosed zoo – think of the possibilities.
So...missing out on the famous ice cream last night soon got the better of us, so we decided to ditch the Louvre and head to the ice cream shop. We got a little lost and ended up at a delicious Boulangeria (bakery type place) – we decided we should have savoury before sweet so we purchased some yummy quiches. Totti felt the need to sit on the river bed, I stayed on the bridge. Two seconds later, I checked in on her to see a random Frenchy sitting next to her – Totti looked well confused and seemed to be using a lot of hand gestures. I decided to watch on for entertainment value. Soon enough, Totti and her Frenchy boy come strolling up the stairs – “he doesn’t speak English”...great. Soon after, Totti pulled out the lonely planet book (thanks Filia) which we knew had some translation help at the back. The guy seemed to want to take us “touring” (I guess that’s what they call it these days....I thank you). Totti ended up telling the guy he was too expensive and that he looked like he was 40. Language barrier fail. Lol.
Back to the ice cream, we waited in line for about 5 minutes – but oh my, it was well worth it. The Berthillon ice cream spoils quickly so they make it fresh everyday which is why it is so distinct to France; they can’t export it anywhere. Now we have both eaten our fair share of ice cream during our years....let’s just say this ice cream SERIOUSLY is the best ice cream EVER. Even Ela admitted that it shat all over Italian ice cream – and that’s a huge statement from a wog.
Soooo... looking back on the whole day, we spent a majority of it eating :p So we decided to continue in that fashion and shop up a storm in preparation for our Eiffel Tower eating extravaganza. Which really was just Totti’s smoked cheese, ham, the best baguette in history and our A-MAZING desserts. One raspberry macaroon filled with custard cream and fresh raspberries (party in our mouth) and one strawberry/custard mini tart. Oh France, how we love you....along with our hips, and thighs, and ass. Food. The Eiffel Tower has to be #1 on any picnic destination list. We spent the evening feeding our faces, watching people eat yummy food, taking way better action shots than the girls next to us, laughing at people getting their pose on. Getting our pose on. Taking photos of us, with food – this has become a recurring theme in our ever growing photo library. We ended up spending a good few hours enjoying ourselves and our food, and decided it was time for more food; Nutella Crepes. After hearing me whinge about how amazing these are for about two years, Totti finally got to sink her teeth into this hazelnut delight. All she responds with, when I ask her how it was, is a squishy drool/ lip smacking sound, followed by a long satisfied sigh. That is all. With our bellies well satisfied, we attempted another schmelting sleep, before our super early rise the next morning .
Day 57:
FML. 6am. Moving luggage mountains through Parisian streets. Empty subways. Hungry. Tired. Hot. Thirsty. Feel sorry for us! We were making our way to the train station to catch our train to Nice. Totti reaffirmed that Pigeons (now known as Terrorists) really wanted to take her captive and hold her for ransom; they had somehow managed to invade the subway...which is underground. WTF! Thank god Totti had a mountain of luggage armour to hide behind – totes incognito. I see you pigeons, and challenge you to a duel!
5 hrs later and we were tired of playing shit head and listening to our ipods, we finally arrived in a schmelting hot Nice, which is actually really nice. I thankyou. See what we did there. We taxied to where we thought our hotel was...Rue Biscarra 18...FAIL. We finally found our hotel and were greeted by the friendly Pierre (how French!). Now...We’re really not sure how to describe this fellow – he was sitting at his little wooden table.....with documents.....NO COMPUTER....in a white killer outfit. He was erm.....a little too enthusiastic for someone sitting at a wooden table......with documents....and NO COMPUTER!!! WTF! He insisted we sit down, like really insisted, like drop your bags, and sit the fuck down. Ok. Please don’t hurt us! Totti later informed me that she thought we were going to be chopped into little pieces and fed to his poodles. To add to the oddity of this entire experience, she wanted us to pay cash, because he didn’t have a credit card machine..... WTF man, it’s 2010 – get on it! He actually did have one, just not plugged in. Well plug it in, ay! So it worked and we paid with plastic – THEN, yes there’s more, you will not believe this – leave your bags and follow me.......................................so by this stage we were both sporting worried/nervous/anxious/ trying to be casual facial expressions. We got finger printed – it’s the only way to get back through the hotel door. For someone who doesn’t have a computer or a plugged in credit card machine, this was a little too advanced for our liking. We were finally given permission to gather our bags, and we were escorted to our room; complete with a walking tour of the entire 2x2m space. It was a rather educational experience – did you know that there is a table in here, did you know it comes with chairs! And wait for it, we also have a fridge, to keep things cool! Don’t even – and air conditioning too! Do you know how to work it? And a television (which P.S doesn’t even work). Our couch that turns into a bed, that turns back into a couch. Now “zis is ‘ow you do eet – use your knees and you pull ‘ere, like zis, and zen you wait fore ze noise. Yes, zere it is, ze “click”, and viola! Ze bed!” Once he left we absolutely pissed our pants laughing . Ahh Pierre!
After our grand tour – which Pierre also explained to us on a map, he pretty much circled EVERYTHING and told us to go see it. Thanks. So we opted to go at it ourselves and just wondered off in the direction of the beach. Now, we are all for freedom of expression, but we feel that Europe needs to enforce some sort of breast etiquette, because we were forcefully reminded of Something About Mary at one stage. Supple and perky only policy, thankyou. We also noted that the French really do not like to remove hair. We have come across hairy face men, this time we came across hairy back man. I was like – nice t-shirt. So we took photos. We also noted that they enjoy wearing toight flamboyant budgie smugglers. Sooooo, we took photos :p We are yet to see a beach with sand – we are over these pebbles scraping our feet off! They are mighty comfortable to lie on. Not. It was a ‘Not’ Joke.
We strolled around a bit more and then headed back in the direction of our hotel. Surprise...we have a massive supermarket on the corner of our hotel street. So we decided it was time we saved some money and cooked for ourselves so we stocked up on oil, penne, diced tomatoes, garlic, salami, salt, bananas and OJ and went on our merry way. Ela got straight into the cooking and I sat on the couch, fed my face with salami and payed her out about the smell. We were very pleased with our savings though – 8 euro between us for all this goodness. Yeeyahhhhh! After enjoying a tasty home cooked meal (thanks wog), we headed out to watch the world cup final. So...about those savings...FML...2 rum and cokes later = 14.50 euro. Sigh. We got chatting to a Russian and Austrian boys...they were nice. We were really disappointed with the standard of the final – personally, we would have rather watched Belwest vs ANU. Lol! We did however get free coke horn-blower things to make lots of noise with....and noise we did.
Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz....
Day 58:
We decided to see what the Old Town had on offer – well renowned for cheap and delicious food, we didn’t need telling twice. A pretty little village with small streets and crammed with people. Sort of like Venice, but better, and without the smell :p It didn’t take us long to find the sweetest shop in the village - a lolly shop with barrels and barrels full to the brim with deliciousness – naturally we couldn’t pass up the chance, so we happily spent at least 15 minutes selecting each lolly carefully.
We spent most of the day just enjoying walking around and taking it all in – we strolled into the antique market and enjoyed some slushies, they are the new ice cream.
Well tired and sweating our faces off, we came back to our little hotel room and updated our blog for your perusal, aren’t we kind. It then occurred to us that our hairs were looking a little grey/ranga/ feral, so desperate times called for desperate measures. To the supermarket! We returned with some dessert, some hair dye, nail polish, cookies and effing “Clementine juice” WTF! The carton looked like it had oranges on it – stupid fruity pictures! It turned out to be mandarin juice, vom! Another meal of pasta and we decided it was time for a makeover. Our we totally destroyed our only remaining clean towel, fail. Seeing as we only had enough hot water for one shower, we devised a full proof plan of attack, using our innate cunning survival skills. So, it went as follows. Rise all hair dye out. Water goes off. Lather, shave, scrub, pee. Water goes on - rinse ALL. Mission accomplished. We now have pantene hair again.
With our makeover almost complete, we applied nail polish while enjoying some chocolate mousse and a screening of Inglorious Basterds. We didn’t make it that far into the movie, and passed out half way through. We decided it was probably best to turn in, as we wanted to get an early bus out to the village of Eze.
Day 59:
Plan to wake up early – fail. Totti got up to pee, turned the alarm off, and we both passed out again. 2 hrs later – “what time is it?” - “9am”. Totally missed the first two buses :p After our gourmet breakfast of a banana and foul Clementine juice, we got ourselves organised and made our way to the bus stop. So we recommend the bus, as it only cost 1 Euro and will take you all the way to Eze, Monaco, Monte Carlo or Cannes. Roughly a 15/20 min bus ride and we were in Eze – it’s a medieval village on a cliff face – it looks like the remnants of an old castle now occupied by modern little galleries and clothes shops. We paid 5 euro to get into the exotic garden and to get to the top of the hill. The views are worth the hike and calf burn, we took lots of pretty pictures (which will eventually get uploaded, we promise!)
We then devoured another delicious baguette and sat down to devise our next plan of action. We some how concluded it would be an amazing idea to walk to Monaco – it didn’t look that far on the map, just a thumb and forefinger space apart! ............. .............................................................FAIL! Sweat, chafe, burn, complain, cramp, wee, thirst, dehydrate, sunstroke, complain, thorny bushes...many disgruntled honks from cars. Why did we walk to Monaco? We did initially wait at the bus stop........ten minutes, still nothing, so decided to take our chances on foot, thinking it would be quicker....not so much!
All we could be bothered doing when we FINALLY got there was having a slushy...Exciting, we know.
We got sick of watching people doing bombs off the diving board in the town swimming pool, so we decided it was time for us to say goodbye, before we strangled someone for their bathing suits and dominated the pool with our amazing bomb skills. Another fail for forgetting our own swimmers. I think we left our brains back at the hotel that day. So upon revision of our little day time hike – the bus option is most definitely safer, less hot, quicker and takes the scenic route :p
We couldn’t have been more grateful to be home in our little dingy apartment – sporting brilliant sunburn, and Totti with some kind of fungal chest growth, we passed out on our sofa bed and enjoyed the air conditioning. We woke up rather hungry (as usual) and decided that a nice steak would go down a treat, so we went to the supermarket and bought ourselves a nice cut of meat and some veggies. We are finding that it really is a VERY small world – we ran into Kelly Grocock from Belconnen United at the local supermarket – WEIRD!
After a healthy and cheap feed, we retired to our dodgy sofa bed for a well earned rest.
Day 60:
2 month mark...skiddy woop woop!
Today we are feeling particularly sorry for ourselves – more than usual anyways. Looking like fried tomatoes, we decided to venture to the shops for some retail therapy to ease the burn. Its Bastille Day today – a commemoration of the French Revolution, independence day if you like – so nothing was really open....except for a effing H & M. This franchise is seriously taking over Europe. So as we casually strolled our crisp bodies through the clothe racks....ding dong...it was fucking Andrew Symonds and his misses. Totti was well tempted to ask him where the local fishing spot was but chickened out....so we called him a Monkey instead – jokes!!!
After spending a good hour in the change rooms, we ended up only buying a couple of t-shirts, body spray and sunglasses. Fail. Damn you Filia and Steph for buying all the good clothes from all the H&M stores!
We decided we needed a nana nap – so off we went back to our dingy cell.
Rash update: the cortisone cream that the lovely French pharmacist gave Totti seems to be reducing the swelling and redness. Watch this space – there is a reason for concern because the information booklet for the cream says “WARNING: This cream may cause excess chest hair, thrush or uncontrollable twitches”. Right............
We decided vego was the way to go for dinner - so we bought a shit load of vegetables, some soup and spinach & ricotta ravioli. Yum...food heaven x2. We had overflow of food so we packed a little take-away box for our train ride tomorrow.
As the night dwelled, we had heard rumours that there may be a “Vunderbar” show in the evening where all the Frenchies go and hang out and sing Frenchy songs. So we agreed that we must attend such event. We walked to the central hub of Nice – about 2 minutes away – and treated ourselves to a delicious ice cream. We people watched for a good halfa before deciding we should ask someone for directions to the “Vunderbar” show!
Well....Vunderbar my ass. The streets were packed with people as were the pebbly beaches – we came to the conclusion that it had to be fireworks. FAIL. Skyfire shits all over France. The fireworks was literally a little man lighting one firework and then running to the next one to light it. Sigh. No music either. Double sigh. But nevertheless we made light about to situation and made “oo...ahh” sounds to the shitty fireworks.
Day 61:
Packed up and said Au Revoir to our French mate Pierre and Nice and boarded our train back to Paris. FML. We were sitting patiently waiting to board when this fugly, fat, stinky lady (who looked like a man) boarded our carriage and sat opposite us. She stunk like cigarettes, sweat, ass and non-shower-in-1-month....foul. So we both agreed it was our duty to try and out stink her with our butts....mission fail but we tried.
About an hour in, Totti felt peckish so it was time to unleash our package of delicious leftovers for the train people to food stalk. All eyes were on her and she scoffed her face with stir-fry veges and ravioli.
That was about as exciting as our train ride got until we arrived in Paris. This young girl (about 18 or so) was pushing her way through the line of people waiting to get off the train...well she totally pushed the wrong lady. This big black lady gave her a ear full (in French) and lots of in-her-face hand gestures. At one point the black lady’s son was holding her back because she was about to hit the young girl. It was full on – it was times like these we really wish we had subtitles so we could understand what they were saying.
We checked back into our Paris hotel and chilled for a bit before heading to the Eiffel Tower to meet up with our Topdeck friends – Mel and Ilce. It was really good to see some familiar faces and reminisce about the tour which seemed like so long ago. We headed to the Latin Quarter where we enjoyed some cocktails at a little bar. Our night was made complete by a AWESOME nutella crepe from Nico’s Creperia....ahhh...the taste is still in our mouths – so frickin good.
We metro’d it back to our hotel and said farewell to Mel and Ilce again...but we will hopefully see them soon in Mykonos.
Day 62:
With a sleep in under our belt, we decided it would be best to have some clean clothes to start our Greek Island adventure so we motored off to the Laundromat. After packing and then re-packing, we checked out of our lovely Paris hotel and headed to the awesome Boulangeria for the last time. One last baguette, one last macaron – we enjoyed our last Paris eating experience by our friend Eiffel and his mate Tower. Ah...the serenity.
We parted ourselves from Paris central and headed for the airport in the direction of GREECE.
Au Revoir France
Say hi to your dad
Ela & Kate xx
Rise and shine! We left the hostel and made our way to the train station at 8am. Usually this would look normal to morning commuters, we found however that we were drawing more attention to ourselves – what looked to be two small mountains of luggage navigating their way down the London streets were really just Totti and I trying not to take people out.
So we finally made it to the train station and stole some free wifi while waiting for our train. We dragged ourselves and our 40kg in total luggage past the FAST train passengers to our dodgy SLOW train where we boarded only to be told we were actually on the FAST train – so back we went to join the richeys! 2hrs later and we arrived in Paris – to some sun-sun-sunshine, lollipops and blue birds!
A big shout out to Papa Totti who navigated us to our hotel via Australia – yeah we suck, don’t judge us! After briefly getting lost and realising the Frenchies DON’T speak English but will try to give directions in French (helpful!) we made it to Hotel Malar – literally around the corner from the gorgeous Eiffel Tower. YAY!
Now before we go on, we’d just like to mention that we absolutely LOVED Paris and this city has by far kicked the arses of every other city we have visited thus far...to find out why, read below :p
After a quick clean shower, with fresh towels (don’t ask) and a proper leak free shower-head, we headed for the metro – destination....unknown! A big shout out to FILIA for donating her Lonely Planet pocket guide to Paris to us – it became very helpful! We jumped on the metro and headed to the Latin Quarter – after reading the Lonely Planet’s creperie recommendation...we kinda felt obliged to test taste these crepes and provide our own analysis. We indulged in the ‘chef’s recommendation’ – full of roast veggies and fresh feta cheese. Yumo! We also marvelled at the many jars of Nutella stacked three jars high and two jars back...this time we both died and went to food Heaven.
So....the latin quater :p The Latin Quarter is a student hub – it is named so because way back when, in ye olde France, the university students used the traditional Latin language to communicate among one another. It now harbours great night life, cheap but delicious food, cheap shopping, cute lounge bars and pubs and easy going, laid back atmosphere. The main hub is a roundabout with a fountain middle surrounded by cute little pubs and cafes. Get the picture, good!
While strolling down the streets (well rolling – two fat ladies again! Well actually, Totti just eats and I put on the weight for both of us :p I blame the Italian genes) we have discovered that European guys are NOT shy – we were casually strolling past a bar looking at cocktail prices and were wooed inside by a cute Parisian, who spoke French, Spanish and some broken Italian, somehow they just seem to get more perfect. And so we were forced to drink, again. Sigh. One tequila sunrise and one strawberry daiquiri, thankyou!
What to do...what to do....Eiffel Tower by night? YUP! We strolled around the masses of people lounging around the lawns of the Eiffel Tower enjoying their picnics. The were never ending lines up to the observation decks, so we entertained ourselves trying to talk down the Ethiopian salesman for his little flashing/flying thing. Don’t get the wrong idea, and get your mind out of the gutter, it was like a little neon helicopter which you flick up into the air with a rubber band. Totti managed to talk him down from 10 euros to 3, then got bored, so we left – guess you had to be there. We people watched for a while, and took one too many photos – we have become really obsessed with taking photos of the Eiffel Tower, and of ourselves near the Eiffel Tower, so we did that, along with enjoying the atmosphere, being in amongst the people and the perfect weather.
Day 55:
After a schmelting shit of nights sleep in our non-air conditioning rooms (fail Europe) – we peeled our melted faces up from our sweaty pillows, cold showered and off we went to meet up with the Fat Tire Bike tour.
For anyone going to Paris, we HIGHLY recommend, in fact it’s really a MUST when you come to Paris to do the Fat Tire Bike tour – day or night, they are both awesome.
We were on the 11am day tour and met up with our guide Scotty at the Eiffel Tower. The bike tour went for 4hrs and covers most of the main attractions – the Louvre, Ecole Militaire, Eiffel tower, Napoleon’s tomb, Alexander III bridge, Musee D’Orsay, Tuileries Gardens (where we stopped for lunch).
Two things:
1. BIKE NINJAS live in the Tuileries Gardens...yes, ninjas on bikes. We kidd you not, we saw the ninjas – they exist. The story is if you ride your bike through these gardens, the NINJAs come and judo-chop you to the dirt...literally. We were well impressed by ninja employment at its finest. Totes.
2. 2. HOLD THE PHONE – we stopped for lunch at about 1 pm – we were all well dehydrated, sunburnt and sweating like pigs so needless to say we were starving as well. We sat with some people from the States who were riding together. Shortly after we ordered, they got their food – delicious sandwiches and such. They were also presented with a bowl of fresh bread to accompany their meals – THEIR bread...not OURS. Ela...quick off the mark, as soon as the waiter put the bread down, she leaned over a STOLE (yes....STOLE), a piece of their bread. I quickly said “uh...Ela...pretty sure that’s not our bread”, to which Ela responded “oh..well...that’s awkward coz now I can’t put it back”. The Americans were not impressed by my friends sloth-like behaviour and didn’t speak to us for the rest of the lunch. Fail.
And so we continued on our ride...Les Invalides, Grand and Petit Palais and Place de la Concorde followed by our grand photo finish at the Eiffel Tower.
After 4hrs riding bikes in the stinking hot, we headed back to our non-air con room and passed out.
We went on the 7pm night tour the same day – fail in planning! We decided that we had learnt some things from the day tour – we could get away with wearing thongs (to avoid stinky feet) and we didn’t need to take our bags (to avoid sweaty backs). This plan turned out to bite us on the butt (like most of our plans). The night tour took us to various landmarks – one key place of reference would be the best ice cream shop in the WORLD – Berthillion Ice Cream. Well...fail to us, because us dum-dums left our wallets at the office so we had to sit on our bikes and watch everyone else lick their frickin ice creams in front of us. We were well salivating and didn’t speak to anyone for the rest of the tour – it was all their fault! The night tour also took us to Notre Dame, Latin Quarter, the Islands (Johnny Depp’s house), the Louvre (action shots in the sunset), St. Chappelle, Academie Francaise, Pont des Arts.
The highlight of the night tour was the wine cruise – we parked our bikes and hopped on a massive ferry-like boat with hundreds of people. The ride went for about an hour – up and down the Seine river and the tour group received all-you-can-drink red wine. Now you all know that we just don’t do wine...well folks, now we do! We were all pretty tipsy as we left the boat and jumped back on our bikes – drink driving anyone. The trip home was quite hilarious – there were people running into each other, one girl sliced her toe open, one lady stacked it massively (we had to try and contain the laughter) but we made it home, however we have LOTS of mysterious bruises.
TIP: we have found that wifi in Paris is limited...however, Fat Tire Bike office offers FREE wifi. We literally sat in there for a good couple of hours and got in touch with technology. They also let you print. Get on it!
Day 56:
To the LOUVRE...yay! We love museums and art and stuff. Everyone has to go to the Louvre...so it was more of an obligation than a ‘want’ but anyways. We went and saw Mona, she was pretty cool – heaps of Asians taking photos – we wanted to pick her nose but we couldn’t get through the 6inch bullet proof glass. Venus had no arms, but Medusa had a pimped raft with heaps of dudes (boats n hoes). The Sphinx had lion properties – we made her roar and scared some kids. Totti found a ranga statue (well at least we envisaged him to be ranga) and fondled his beard. We admired numerous mini-genitalia and took photos. Ela liked the feet best. A fun day at the museum – we are all about making education fun.
One thing we did learn was that the Louvre was once someone’s house – it was kind of the running joke all day as to which room would have been mine. The place is effing huge – it would be way cooler if they turned it into a giant enclosed zoo – think of the possibilities.
So...missing out on the famous ice cream last night soon got the better of us, so we decided to ditch the Louvre and head to the ice cream shop. We got a little lost and ended up at a delicious Boulangeria (bakery type place) – we decided we should have savoury before sweet so we purchased some yummy quiches. Totti felt the need to sit on the river bed, I stayed on the bridge. Two seconds later, I checked in on her to see a random Frenchy sitting next to her – Totti looked well confused and seemed to be using a lot of hand gestures. I decided to watch on for entertainment value. Soon enough, Totti and her Frenchy boy come strolling up the stairs – “he doesn’t speak English”...great. Soon after, Totti pulled out the lonely planet book (thanks Filia) which we knew had some translation help at the back. The guy seemed to want to take us “touring” (I guess that’s what they call it these days....I thank you). Totti ended up telling the guy he was too expensive and that he looked like he was 40. Language barrier fail. Lol.
Back to the ice cream, we waited in line for about 5 minutes – but oh my, it was well worth it. The Berthillon ice cream spoils quickly so they make it fresh everyday which is why it is so distinct to France; they can’t export it anywhere. Now we have both eaten our fair share of ice cream during our years....let’s just say this ice cream SERIOUSLY is the best ice cream EVER. Even Ela admitted that it shat all over Italian ice cream – and that’s a huge statement from a wog.
Soooo... looking back on the whole day, we spent a majority of it eating :p So we decided to continue in that fashion and shop up a storm in preparation for our Eiffel Tower eating extravaganza. Which really was just Totti’s smoked cheese, ham, the best baguette in history and our A-MAZING desserts. One raspberry macaroon filled with custard cream and fresh raspberries (party in our mouth) and one strawberry/custard mini tart. Oh France, how we love you....along with our hips, and thighs, and ass. Food. The Eiffel Tower has to be #1 on any picnic destination list. We spent the evening feeding our faces, watching people eat yummy food, taking way better action shots than the girls next to us, laughing at people getting their pose on. Getting our pose on. Taking photos of us, with food – this has become a recurring theme in our ever growing photo library. We ended up spending a good few hours enjoying ourselves and our food, and decided it was time for more food; Nutella Crepes. After hearing me whinge about how amazing these are for about two years, Totti finally got to sink her teeth into this hazelnut delight. All she responds with, when I ask her how it was, is a squishy drool/ lip smacking sound, followed by a long satisfied sigh. That is all. With our bellies well satisfied, we attempted another schmelting sleep, before our super early rise the next morning .
Day 57:
FML. 6am. Moving luggage mountains through Parisian streets. Empty subways. Hungry. Tired. Hot. Thirsty. Feel sorry for us! We were making our way to the train station to catch our train to Nice. Totti reaffirmed that Pigeons (now known as Terrorists) really wanted to take her captive and hold her for ransom; they had somehow managed to invade the subway...which is underground. WTF! Thank god Totti had a mountain of luggage armour to hide behind – totes incognito. I see you pigeons, and challenge you to a duel!
5 hrs later and we were tired of playing shit head and listening to our ipods, we finally arrived in a schmelting hot Nice, which is actually really nice. I thankyou. See what we did there. We taxied to where we thought our hotel was...Rue Biscarra 18...FAIL. We finally found our hotel and were greeted by the friendly Pierre (how French!). Now...We’re really not sure how to describe this fellow – he was sitting at his little wooden table.....with documents.....NO COMPUTER....in a white killer outfit. He was erm.....a little too enthusiastic for someone sitting at a wooden table......with documents....and NO COMPUTER!!! WTF! He insisted we sit down, like really insisted, like drop your bags, and sit the fuck down. Ok. Please don’t hurt us! Totti later informed me that she thought we were going to be chopped into little pieces and fed to his poodles. To add to the oddity of this entire experience, she wanted us to pay cash, because he didn’t have a credit card machine..... WTF man, it’s 2010 – get on it! He actually did have one, just not plugged in. Well plug it in, ay! So it worked and we paid with plastic – THEN, yes there’s more, you will not believe this – leave your bags and follow me.......................................so by this stage we were both sporting worried/nervous/anxious/ trying to be casual facial expressions. We got finger printed – it’s the only way to get back through the hotel door. For someone who doesn’t have a computer or a plugged in credit card machine, this was a little too advanced for our liking. We were finally given permission to gather our bags, and we were escorted to our room; complete with a walking tour of the entire 2x2m space. It was a rather educational experience – did you know that there is a table in here, did you know it comes with chairs! And wait for it, we also have a fridge, to keep things cool! Don’t even – and air conditioning too! Do you know how to work it? And a television (which P.S doesn’t even work). Our couch that turns into a bed, that turns back into a couch. Now “zis is ‘ow you do eet – use your knees and you pull ‘ere, like zis, and zen you wait fore ze noise. Yes, zere it is, ze “click”, and viola! Ze bed!” Once he left we absolutely pissed our pants laughing . Ahh Pierre!
After our grand tour – which Pierre also explained to us on a map, he pretty much circled EVERYTHING and told us to go see it. Thanks. So we opted to go at it ourselves and just wondered off in the direction of the beach. Now, we are all for freedom of expression, but we feel that Europe needs to enforce some sort of breast etiquette, because we were forcefully reminded of Something About Mary at one stage. Supple and perky only policy, thankyou. We also noted that the French really do not like to remove hair. We have come across hairy face men, this time we came across hairy back man. I was like – nice t-shirt. So we took photos. We also noted that they enjoy wearing toight flamboyant budgie smugglers. Sooooo, we took photos :p We are yet to see a beach with sand – we are over these pebbles scraping our feet off! They are mighty comfortable to lie on. Not. It was a ‘Not’ Joke.
We strolled around a bit more and then headed back in the direction of our hotel. Surprise...we have a massive supermarket on the corner of our hotel street. So we decided it was time we saved some money and cooked for ourselves so we stocked up on oil, penne, diced tomatoes, garlic, salami, salt, bananas and OJ and went on our merry way. Ela got straight into the cooking and I sat on the couch, fed my face with salami and payed her out about the smell. We were very pleased with our savings though – 8 euro between us for all this goodness. Yeeyahhhhh! After enjoying a tasty home cooked meal (thanks wog), we headed out to watch the world cup final. So...about those savings...FML...2 rum and cokes later = 14.50 euro. Sigh. We got chatting to a Russian and Austrian boys...they were nice. We were really disappointed with the standard of the final – personally, we would have rather watched Belwest vs ANU. Lol! We did however get free coke horn-blower things to make lots of noise with....and noise we did.
Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz....
Day 58:
We decided to see what the Old Town had on offer – well renowned for cheap and delicious food, we didn’t need telling twice. A pretty little village with small streets and crammed with people. Sort of like Venice, but better, and without the smell :p It didn’t take us long to find the sweetest shop in the village - a lolly shop with barrels and barrels full to the brim with deliciousness – naturally we couldn’t pass up the chance, so we happily spent at least 15 minutes selecting each lolly carefully.
We spent most of the day just enjoying walking around and taking it all in – we strolled into the antique market and enjoyed some slushies, they are the new ice cream.
Well tired and sweating our faces off, we came back to our little hotel room and updated our blog for your perusal, aren’t we kind. It then occurred to us that our hairs were looking a little grey/ranga/ feral, so desperate times called for desperate measures. To the supermarket! We returned with some dessert, some hair dye, nail polish, cookies and effing “Clementine juice” WTF! The carton looked like it had oranges on it – stupid fruity pictures! It turned out to be mandarin juice, vom! Another meal of pasta and we decided it was time for a makeover. Our we totally destroyed our only remaining clean towel, fail. Seeing as we only had enough hot water for one shower, we devised a full proof plan of attack, using our innate cunning survival skills. So, it went as follows. Rise all hair dye out. Water goes off. Lather, shave, scrub, pee. Water goes on - rinse ALL. Mission accomplished. We now have pantene hair again.
With our makeover almost complete, we applied nail polish while enjoying some chocolate mousse and a screening of Inglorious Basterds. We didn’t make it that far into the movie, and passed out half way through. We decided it was probably best to turn in, as we wanted to get an early bus out to the village of Eze.
Day 59:
Plan to wake up early – fail. Totti got up to pee, turned the alarm off, and we both passed out again. 2 hrs later – “what time is it?” - “9am”. Totally missed the first two buses :p After our gourmet breakfast of a banana and foul Clementine juice, we got ourselves organised and made our way to the bus stop. So we recommend the bus, as it only cost 1 Euro and will take you all the way to Eze, Monaco, Monte Carlo or Cannes. Roughly a 15/20 min bus ride and we were in Eze – it’s a medieval village on a cliff face – it looks like the remnants of an old castle now occupied by modern little galleries and clothes shops. We paid 5 euro to get into the exotic garden and to get to the top of the hill. The views are worth the hike and calf burn, we took lots of pretty pictures (which will eventually get uploaded, we promise!)
We then devoured another delicious baguette and sat down to devise our next plan of action. We some how concluded it would be an amazing idea to walk to Monaco – it didn’t look that far on the map, just a thumb and forefinger space apart! ............. .............................................................FAIL! Sweat, chafe, burn, complain, cramp, wee, thirst, dehydrate, sunstroke, complain, thorny bushes...many disgruntled honks from cars. Why did we walk to Monaco? We did initially wait at the bus stop........ten minutes, still nothing, so decided to take our chances on foot, thinking it would be quicker....not so much!
All we could be bothered doing when we FINALLY got there was having a slushy...Exciting, we know.
We got sick of watching people doing bombs off the diving board in the town swimming pool, so we decided it was time for us to say goodbye, before we strangled someone for their bathing suits and dominated the pool with our amazing bomb skills. Another fail for forgetting our own swimmers. I think we left our brains back at the hotel that day. So upon revision of our little day time hike – the bus option is most definitely safer, less hot, quicker and takes the scenic route :p
We couldn’t have been more grateful to be home in our little dingy apartment – sporting brilliant sunburn, and Totti with some kind of fungal chest growth, we passed out on our sofa bed and enjoyed the air conditioning. We woke up rather hungry (as usual) and decided that a nice steak would go down a treat, so we went to the supermarket and bought ourselves a nice cut of meat and some veggies. We are finding that it really is a VERY small world – we ran into Kelly Grocock from Belconnen United at the local supermarket – WEIRD!
After a healthy and cheap feed, we retired to our dodgy sofa bed for a well earned rest.
Day 60:
2 month mark...skiddy woop woop!
Today we are feeling particularly sorry for ourselves – more than usual anyways. Looking like fried tomatoes, we decided to venture to the shops for some retail therapy to ease the burn. Its Bastille Day today – a commemoration of the French Revolution, independence day if you like – so nothing was really open....except for a effing H & M. This franchise is seriously taking over Europe. So as we casually strolled our crisp bodies through the clothe racks....ding dong...it was fucking Andrew Symonds and his misses. Totti was well tempted to ask him where the local fishing spot was but chickened out....so we called him a Monkey instead – jokes!!!
After spending a good hour in the change rooms, we ended up only buying a couple of t-shirts, body spray and sunglasses. Fail. Damn you Filia and Steph for buying all the good clothes from all the H&M stores!
We decided we needed a nana nap – so off we went back to our dingy cell.
Rash update: the cortisone cream that the lovely French pharmacist gave Totti seems to be reducing the swelling and redness. Watch this space – there is a reason for concern because the information booklet for the cream says “WARNING: This cream may cause excess chest hair, thrush or uncontrollable twitches”. Right............
We decided vego was the way to go for dinner - so we bought a shit load of vegetables, some soup and spinach & ricotta ravioli. Yum...food heaven x2. We had overflow of food so we packed a little take-away box for our train ride tomorrow.
As the night dwelled, we had heard rumours that there may be a “Vunderbar” show in the evening where all the Frenchies go and hang out and sing Frenchy songs. So we agreed that we must attend such event. We walked to the central hub of Nice – about 2 minutes away – and treated ourselves to a delicious ice cream. We people watched for a good halfa before deciding we should ask someone for directions to the “Vunderbar” show!
Well....Vunderbar my ass. The streets were packed with people as were the pebbly beaches – we came to the conclusion that it had to be fireworks. FAIL. Skyfire shits all over France. The fireworks was literally a little man lighting one firework and then running to the next one to light it. Sigh. No music either. Double sigh. But nevertheless we made light about to situation and made “oo...ahh” sounds to the shitty fireworks.
Day 61:
Packed up and said Au Revoir to our French mate Pierre and Nice and boarded our train back to Paris. FML. We were sitting patiently waiting to board when this fugly, fat, stinky lady (who looked like a man) boarded our carriage and sat opposite us. She stunk like cigarettes, sweat, ass and non-shower-in-1-month....foul. So we both agreed it was our duty to try and out stink her with our butts....mission fail but we tried.
About an hour in, Totti felt peckish so it was time to unleash our package of delicious leftovers for the train people to food stalk. All eyes were on her and she scoffed her face with stir-fry veges and ravioli.
That was about as exciting as our train ride got until we arrived in Paris. This young girl (about 18 or so) was pushing her way through the line of people waiting to get off the train...well she totally pushed the wrong lady. This big black lady gave her a ear full (in French) and lots of in-her-face hand gestures. At one point the black lady’s son was holding her back because she was about to hit the young girl. It was full on – it was times like these we really wish we had subtitles so we could understand what they were saying.
We checked back into our Paris hotel and chilled for a bit before heading to the Eiffel Tower to meet up with our Topdeck friends – Mel and Ilce. It was really good to see some familiar faces and reminisce about the tour which seemed like so long ago. We headed to the Latin Quarter where we enjoyed some cocktails at a little bar. Our night was made complete by a AWESOME nutella crepe from Nico’s Creperia....ahhh...the taste is still in our mouths – so frickin good.
We metro’d it back to our hotel and said farewell to Mel and Ilce again...but we will hopefully see them soon in Mykonos.
Day 62:
With a sleep in under our belt, we decided it would be best to have some clean clothes to start our Greek Island adventure so we motored off to the Laundromat. After packing and then re-packing, we checked out of our lovely Paris hotel and headed to the awesome Boulangeria for the last time. One last baguette, one last macaron – we enjoyed our last Paris eating experience by our friend Eiffel and his mate Tower. Ah...the serenity.
We parted ourselves from Paris central and headed for the airport in the direction of GREECE.
Au Revoir France
Say hi to your dad
Ela & Kate xx
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