The Hills are alive...I guess..

So we are in Austria after another AMAZING trip to Switzerland. Seriously...I love Switzerland. We went canyoning for Nancy's birthday which is torture but oh so fun. You repel down cliffs, jump off of them into water, climb, slide (in my case, fall) and swim through essentially melted snow. It was so cold and so awesome. We had to gear up with a wetsuit, boots, 2 wetsuit jackets, lifevest, helmet, harness and all of them were still cold from the day before. It was so cold and so fun. It was also the last day of the season so it was probably colder than usual. The guys that take you are incredibly strong. One guy picked Nancy up with one had by pretty much a flick of the wrist. Then later when we saw him in the bar, he picked me up too. I am not a small person and he did it with one hand. Canyoning makes you strong apparently...I know I'm sore. Anyway, point of the story: Switzerland is my favorite country.

We got to Salzburg last night and got some food at our HUGE hostel. We even saw a guy that was at the same place as us in Rome. Kinda funny. This morning we are at the train station and found a semi cheap internet cafe and so we're just here til our train to Munich arrives. We should get to Munich around 10:30am or so and then hit up the tents at Oktoberfest...Hopefully we get in. You have to be seated in order to get served so we're going to do our best.

Anyway...I guess that's all for now.

Sorry these aren't going the right way..I don't understand Italian Computers.

Sorry for these going the wrong way...but you're lucky to have them...the internet is expensive. Haha.... (Also, theyre out of order.)


Before running off the mountain in Switzerland. Kinda scared.

Paris...at the Eiffel Tower.

Nancy and I before going Paragliding. At the Base camp.

In the Sistene Chapel

With some giant Head

The cars are sooo tiny! Its awesome. (In Rome)

Tea for 2 in Venice. So Awesome.

1.50€ fruit cup! Delicious. (Venice)

Heading back to Switzerland..

So, Nancy and I have some time before our train to Switzerland so we stopped at an internet cafè we found and we get to catch up on stuff before heading out. You might ask why we're going BACK to Switzerland and there are two answers to that.

1. Switzerland is absolutely beautiful and we LOVED our hostel when we were there. There's a bar IN the hostel that has an awesome happy hour and the staff was awesome. Also, Nancy wants to go canyoning for her birthday since we didn't get to go last time. We went paragliding instead.
2. Finding lodging anywhere within 100 miles of Munich on a weekend during Oktoberfest is impossible. We're going to stay in Switzerland for the weekend and then head for Salzburg on Monday and go to Oktoberfest from there. Nancy doesn't get to spend her birthday AT the festival but it will be celebrated by going TO the festival. It works out.

Let's see.... Highlights that I might have skipped out on recently.

Paris: Went to see the Arc, Eiffel Tower, etc. Didn't go to the Lourve but that's ok. Paris is very pretty and very expensive. We did a lot of pedestrian sightseeing and it was fun.
Switzerland: Met some awesome people at the bar in our hostel. We hung out with them both nights and had a great time. We went paragliding over Interlaken and then went to Bern (the capitol) to walk around. Switzerland is beautiful
Bolzano/Nova Levante: The place was beautiful. We had to hike to it and there was this amazing view of the mountains but it wasn't near anything so we went to Venice and Rome for during the week. We did spend 3 nights there though and cooked some delcious pasta there last night.
Venice: We didn't have a place to stay but we found a place and it ended up being really nice. Like I said before, the reception man made me tea and let me use his video player. I paid way too much for coke there though. Oh well.
Rome: When we go to Rome, we just thought it looked like LA meets Mexico. Kind of disappointing. We walked to the Colosseum on the first night and then walked around a bit more and then went back for dinner. Free dinner at a hostel is a brilliant idea. On the next day we walked to the Trevi fountain, made wishes...got some gelato and then made our way over to the Vatican. We walked through St. Peter's and then got lunch before going to the Sistene Chapel. You can't take photos of that super famous fresco...but its small. After, we headed back and had dinner. A bunch of people in the hostel were going to go on a pub crawl and Nancy and I decided by literally thr flip of a coin that we would go too. We went to a total of 3 places and got as much beer as you could drink at the first place for an hour, then a shot at the next and then just went to a club. It ended up being a lot of fun. You got a free tshirt too! We went with 2 Aussies, 2 girls from Spokane, Wa and a guy from Norcal. I think I speak for both of us when I saw it made Rome a hell of a lot more fun.

Now, we're just waiting for Switzerland, like I said. If anyone is willing to donate to the "Mallory wants to go canyoning but also wants to eat for her last weeks in europe fund" please let me know. Haha.

bounjourno from italia

ok, so i'm really bad about the pictures thing but i might be able to get some on later. We're in italy right now. we went to the timeshare that nancy's auntgot us...it was absolutely beautiful but it was in the middle of nowhere. so we stayed there for 2 nights and then headed off to venice and then rome. we're in rome right now. venice was pretty awesome we stayedin this hostel and had our own room. i'm getting sick and on the second night we had nothing to do so we asked the front guy what to do and he loaned us his dvd player and the devil wears prada. it was aweosme. then he actually brought me tea! amazing. today, we're in rome and our hostel feeds us dinner! we got salad and pasta and wine. AND we get breakfast!! Friday we travel back to nova levante to the time share for the last night and then we are going to head to salzburg and use that as our base for oktoberfest.

sorry that these entries arent enthralling but i've only been getting about 15 min total of internet usage and ive had to use it for booking hostels and such. we're halfway through the trip though. i really do miss everyone and the foodof california. i need to get me some late night in n out or del taco. everything closes early. its killing me! also, i have gotten better at climbing tons of stairs and running with a 30lb pack on to catch a train. painful...but good since my diet is pretty much bread and currently gelato is replacing beer...probably only because im sick and beer sounds bad when your nose is running. gelato always sounds good though.

til next time! yay.

switzerland...yay

just leaving switzerland to go to italy this morning. Yesterday we went paragliding...we run off one of the mountains and then floated down to interlaken. it was pretty awesome. pricey though. we have an 830 train that switches about 5 times before we get to italy. hopefully we dont miss anything. no pictures as i cant plug my camera in, but i did get a lot from the paragliding. perhaps better interweb in italy.

Bonjour from Paris!

ok so im on some weird french keyboard and so the letters are out of order and the punctuation is in wierd spots.

anyway... today we went to the eiffel tower and such.. no lourve though. this is a pain in the ass trying to type on the keyboard so im going to make this short. we are going to go to switzerland tomorrow if we can make it on the train.

we have now been gone a month now though! 5 more weeks. i am beginning to miss everything but i am still looking forward to everything. nancy and i have a nice room in paris though. we were booked for a 6 bed dorm but we got our own room with shower! pretty cool. i cant take any more of this keyboard though. sorry.

Glasgow by foot

Band playing in city centre, the one guy had crazy arms!

On the way to Glasgow University

Inside the University. It's beautiful and people still go to school there!

Look's like a scene from Harry Potter! I wanted Ron Weasley to magically appear---Didn't happen.

The view of Glasgow from the University. I believe that is an art museum...It was actually really clear! I don't think we would be able to see that much on another day.

So Yesterday was our second day in Glasgow, but we did nothing on the first day so it was our first day exploring. We started out he day heading to the city center (the picture on the last blog of glasgow). It is this big pedestrian area where there's a mall, shops, restaurants, etc. It was pretty neat. One of the "bargain" fashion stores with really cute clothes actually had a tall section! I *almost* bought some new jeans. They were £25 which is about $50 so they wouldn't have been too outrageous, but I stopped myself. Boy, do I miss all my clothes/shoes at home and shopping. One month without them and I'm kinda going nuts! After leaving one of the stores, I heard some drumming so I went to investigate. There was a Scottish Band playing in the streets. Drums, Bagpipes, Kilts...It was awesome. We stayed for a bit and watched them and then headed off to get a snack. After getting some cookies and diet coke (my now usual £1.20 snack), we tried to find Glasgow University. It was a bit of an uphill (beautiful) walk but we finally got there. The school is unreal. It looks like something straight out of Harry Potter and people still go to school there! We hung out there for awhile and sat in the sun. It was actually sunny and kinda of warm! The first day without rain, cold and wind since we got here! We walked to go look at museums but fond out they closed at 5pm so we went to the grocery store and bought some dinner and headed back to Stevie's flat. After awhile, we went to the pub for a couple drinks, came back, and waited for Stevie. I think today we are going to go to the museums and then I don't know. Eventually he's going to take us to the countryside where his parents live and some other things. Should be fun!

Photos from London...Update: Dublin to Scotland

On the tube to London after our redeye...I was tired

Big Ben and houses of Parliament in London

Changing of the Guard or something in front of Buckingham Palace

Having a pint with Duncan in London

Our Hostel in Dublin. There were a ton of bed, but it was clean and cheap!

At The Temple Bar in Dublin

Certified Jameson taster. I have a certificate to prove it!

Outside of Dublin Castle...SUPER GREEN grass.

Some swans in a channel that we found while lost in Dublin...We made it back though.

Glasgow...on the way to get some dinner..

So there's a couple pictures from London. I'm in Glasgow, Scotland right now at Stevie's flat. We haven't really done anything today except get up really early to catch a bus, plane and then train to get here. Anyway...

The rest of London was fun. We had a traditional Roast dinner made by Duncan's Stepmom and we all ate together at the table. It was really nice. Good food and then we had apple crumble for dessert...mmmm. On our last day, we went to Buckingham palace and saw some sort of commotion, I'm going to assume it was the changing of the guard but Duncan didn't know either. We walked through the mall, saw Trafalgar Square, had a couple pints, then went to the tube to head back to his dad's place. We played a nice mix of games including but not limited to guitar hero and pass the pigs. We also played a drinking game around 3pm and then went to the pub. We had some really good curry for dinner and then had and early flight the next morning to dublin.

Dublin was nice. It was rainy and cold, but the city is beautiful and the grass is an unreal shade of green. I don't quite know how it gets so green. We stumbled upon a castle after checking into our hostel and then walked all around Temple Bar and ended up getting a couple pints at THE temple bar and listened to some awesome Irish music. Some Hungarian guy bought us half pints of Murphy's and then we ditched that place. The next day we walked around a lot, went to the Jameson Distillery and then went to another pub. Nancy and I are official Whiskey tasters. We volunteered to sample the whiskeys and give our opinions on Jameson, Johnny Walker and Jack Daniels. Then we got another drink. Nine Euros well spent. We watched the tail end of a soccer game in a pub and then headed to bed for our flight to Scotland this morning. We haven't done much here but nap and cook dinner. We are waiting for stevie to get back from work. He's got some good plans for us though so I'm looking forward to it.

LONDON!

I'm not quite sure on days right now, but on Friday we got up early and went to the limo place to get our shuttle to JFK. We spent a long time in the airport listening to a bunch of coeds talking about going to spin for their years abroad... Our flight was supposed to leave at 6:15, but we didn't take off until a bit after that because there was even traffic on the tarmac in NYC. Our plane was nice, we each had our own tvs, toothbrushes, eyemasks, socks, blankets and towels. Trouble set in though when the man in front of me wanted to lean his seat back and then got mad at me when my knees were sticking in his back. He wanted me to somehow shrink. Whatever. He kept telling me to move, but I couldn't really do anything for him. (I made it a point to stand up really tall when next to him..he was tall, but not as tall as me.) We got to london at about 6:30am London time. We walked around the airport, igured out the currency (exchange rate is AWFUL) and then got tickets to the tube. We got to Duncan's around 9:30am and then watched to British TV before heading out in the cold, wind and rain for our personal tour of london. We took the tube into town and then saw the London Eye (Its cool, but too expensive!) and then houses of parliament, bridges, the tate museum, and plenty of other things I can hardly remember because I was falling asleep. we got a couple pints and then headed back to take naps. After getting up, we ordered pizza, had some cider and watched an american movie classic, Volcano...such a bad film. We heded to bed around 11 and then didn't get up until 10:30 this morning. Its about noon now and maybe we can survive without a nap today! More sightseeing later. I don't feel like putting pictures up, sorry.

One Last time in the US

Since getting back from DC, we haven't done too much but it has been nice. Yesterday we went to Gillette Castle. Its a place in Hadlyme, CT where the guy that played Sherlock Holmes in all the stage productions through the 20s lived. It was a sweet castle...Not nearly as big as hearst castle, but it had an awesome view and looked more like some of the stone ones I'm hoping to see in Europe.

Today, we didn't do a whole lot of anything during the day. We went to WalMart and the Grocery store to get the treats for Duncan and Stevie. We also FINALLY got Quiznos. Tonight we went to see A Midsummer Night's Dream in Hartford. It was a fun production of it. One of the fairies creeped me out but they put a 1950s twist on it with the costumes and the actors were great. It was fun. Now, we're just doing laundry and preparing for leaving tomorrow. We are leaving the house early tomorrow even though our flight isn't until 6. We have to get to the Limo place by 11 to that the limo to JFK which could take up to 3 hours. Then we have to check in and such. Our flight leaves at 6:15pm Friday (Eastern Time) and arrives in London at Heathrow at 6am (London time). We are planning on taking our time getting to the tube (the subway system in London) and then going to Duncan's house. We willl be in London until early Tuesday morning when we fly to Dublin. The on The 11th we fly to Glasgow.

I don't know when I will get another post in, but we'll see.

DC and Philly

Pictures completely out of order:` Mr. Bacon and Monsieur Tofu battle for the White House
City Hall in Philadelphia
Not me, Not Hermione, YOU!! (Playing Wizard's chess in Philly)

In front of the Capitol in DC...So Humid!!
In Case you didn't know, I think Lincoln is creepy.
Apparently Kevin often gets mistaken for being a Baldwin. Who would have thought??
Me, Brittany, Nancy and Anne after and evening at Tom Tom's in Adams Morgan
National Monument

So...this weekend we went to DC. It took FOREVER to get there. Apparently the US open is going on right now and everyone and their mom was in NYC trying to drive over the bridge. It took us nearly 5 hours to get out of Manhattan. REDICULOUS! We were going kinda nuts in the car. But, Nancy had fun driving in the city. Haha. We left at 10am and didn't get to DC until 9:30. (It's only about give or take 350 miles between Norwich and DC). Anyway, we got there and Kevin showed us his homeless shelter. There were cats and mice everywhere. It was gross. Not really, he has 3 cute cats and they have toy mice and his place is really nice. We went out to dinner that night and then the next day we nearly died in the humidity. We went to a market and then to the capitol, air & space museum, natural history museum, some art museum and then took the metro back to his place before going out to dinner with Anne & Brittany and then to Adams Morgan to get drinks. The next day we walked around for a bit, got lunch and then Nancy and I went to see the Lincoln Memorial, Vietnam Memorial, WWII memorial, National Monument and then White House. Then we walked back to Kevin's he cooked us dinner and then some of his friends came over and we went to a club to go dancing. Although, I think we waited in line longer than the time dancing but it was fun. We got some food at like 2am (Kevin wanted to go to bed because he's old so he was whining) and then went headed back. Yesterday we left DC around 1pm and headed to Philadelphia. We walked around for a bit. Saw city hall and some cool sculptures and got some dinner. Traffic wasn't nearly as bad on the way home. Yay!

Today we are laying around and doing nothing. We got Grinders earlier and we're going to get some dinner with Carl and Elaine later. We might go to the pool...I don't know. Kinda nice not to do anything. Also, we got replacement tickets on british airlines and so we are staying a week longer but we still dont know if we are going to get a refund and we need to find flights back from NYC but we're happy with it for now.

For your viewing pleasure... This first is after 30 minutes in Traffic in NYC. We didn't know we would still be stuck 4 hours later. The second Video is me complaing about more heat in DC. Apparently I talk about how hot it is a lot.