Venice: A City for Many, But Not Us

Another update for you all, on the same day.  Yes, we have been busy little bees over here in Budapest, but the price of the internet is quite affordable, so why not play catch up.

Ah Venice, what can we say about this city?  It sure had its moments, observe exhibit A:

Venice and one of it's lovely canals

Seeing canals like this definitely impressed us.  Never have we seen a city so unique.  The entire thing is on a lagoon, without any roads for cars.  Everyone uses boats or their feet to get around, including the ambulances.

Don't worry, just adding flair to the pic

Seeing querky little things like this ambulance and canals like the one above, tipped the scale in favor of Venice for us.  In addition to these things, we saw St. Mark's Square, flooded and unflooded.  Both were impressive.  When St. Marks flooded, everyone took off their shoes and walked barefoot through the square, or strapped on a pair of rubber boots.  The fancily dressed waiters did this as well.  It was a great sight to see, all those nicely dressed Italian waiters in their white tuxeudos, bowties, black slacks and brown rubber boots. 

St. Mark's, barefoot style

Fording the flooded streets of Venice on our way to St. Marks

If only the coffee that they served did not cost 6 euros a cup.  Which leads us into our real opinions of Venice.  Readers beware, at this point our entry is not going to be bubbly and feel good anymore like the stuff you find in the guidebooks.  Or like this pose Jessie is striking on our first day in Venice, before the grim reality set in.

Venice wooed Jessie at first, if only she knew it made for a really bad second date

Ok, for all those still with us.  In our opinions only, and not of the people, or anyone from the area (Jessie's Italian relatives), because all the people we met in Venice were great, but the place itself straight up sucked for us, and our budget.  Everything is overpriced, crowded, flooded half the time, and seems about 75% abandonded.

It took us forever to walk to that bridge in the right upperhand corner

More crowds, and a headache waiting to happen

Both Jessie and this dog were not fans of the flooding or the crowds

To illustrate how much we disliked this place, on our last day in Venice, our train to Budapest did not leave until 9PM, but that did not stop us from choosing to march 40 minutes up to the train station in the middle of a horrendous downpour 8 hours before our train left.  We did not even have books or cards to entertain us at the station, just walls to stair at, and yes, that was fine with us.  At the train station, we made a friend who had been waiting since 11 that morning for her 9PM train, because she too was sick of Venice and decided that her book was better.

Waves attacking Nathan on his way to the sights

A lot of the city, in our opinions, does not look anything like the calendars or guidebooks depict it as. 

Jessie is looking for the Venice of the guidebooks, but is not having much luck

Graffiti is everywhere.  Many first floors are abandoned because of the regular flooding.

No one is home

And at night, it looks downright creepy in places.

The guidebooks never mentioned this canal

Jessie and I both thought Dracula was about to pop out

So sorry to say all this if any of you have a love affair with Venice, but hey, that is wonderful that you found beauty out of something, and next time you return there will be two less American tourists to get in your way.  Different strokes for different folks.  For us, Venice just didn't do it.  On our last day, the universe gave us a sign showing that this place is not our cup of tea, in the form of pigeon shit, on Nathan's head.

Damn you, you little pooping pigeon

We like Budapest more.

Ciao,
Jessie and Nathan

Basking in the Mediterranean Part 2: Cinque Terre

Hello everyone. Time for our post on our time in the Cinque Terre. We stayed in Monterrosso, the village with a beautiful beach. We spent our time eating pizza and pasta, swimming, enjoying the warm weather, and just relaxing.

Monterrosso, our humble abode for the week

Jessie's so excited to finally have arrived in her motherland of Italy

Traveling has its ups and downs, thats for sure. I, Jessie, was stung by a jellyfish on our third day. This was not the polite jellyfish I've dealt with in Puget Sound. This guy was a real invasive asshole. The pain was terrible, worse than when I've broken bones or really anything else painful I think I've experienced. Nathan got me out of the water and I started sobbing. He got me through the town and into a pharmacy, where I was standing crying in a towel dripping wet. Usually this would be a little ackward, but I didn't even think about that. The pharmacist didn't speak English, we showed her my arm and she opened some medicine and put it right on the sting (something that wouldn't happen in the states). The skin on my arm was full of welts from all the tentacles that touched me. The pain stayed for a long time, by the night it became more dull and by the next night I was able to bend my arm without feeling pain. I took a picture of the marks left from the welts today to show how bad that jellyfish got me. Its been 8 days since, but its still pretty red and visible.

My burn eight days after the jellyfish incident

Nathan here.  I must say, the Cinque Terre region is a paradise.  If any of you plan on going to Italy make sure you visit this little region, it will not dissappoint.  The combination of the warm weather and water with the delicious Italian food gives you a little slice of heaven on earth. 

Monterrosso = sunnier than Seattle

Every day was spent waking up to a delicious cup of coffee then slowly making our way down to the beach to swim and sunbathe or explore the other four towns that make up this region. 

The warm water in our town, Monterrosso

Corniglia, another town in the region

Vernazza, again another town in the region

During our days when hunger kicked in we filled our bellies with foccacia, bought by the kilogram, pizza, or pasta, and of course the regions local white wine to wash it all down.  In the evenings the main activity was watching the sun set while eating our dinner on the beach and then figuring out which was gellateria served the best gellato.  It was quite a chore we set up for ourselves, but in the end we pulled through with much success.  Each day we averaged two servings gellato each.  My favorite flavor was pistachio and Jessie's, like always, was chocolate.  We hope all this sampling will give us a good baseline to compare to the food we look forward to consuming in Florence and Rome.  Below are some examples of things we ate and where we ate them.  Nice right?



Jessie on her first night in Italy with one of her favorites, pasta with pesto.  Pesto is originally from this region BTW.

Our favorite focaccia store

A slice of our favorite focaccia on the beach

One last thing of interest we discovered, this town is loaded with Americans.  It is for sure no secret paradise.  Rick Steves has exposed this place for all its worth.  Not that we minded this, but it sure was a different vibe we got here than anywhere else we went.  I said to Jessie one day a good way to describe this region is a beach town in America that accidentally speaks Italian and only serves Italian food.  One of the American couples we met turned out to be the former vice president of our alma mater, Western.  Small world.  Go here for the beauty, not to escape the American tourist crowd.  On that note, we will leave you with a couple more pictures of our adventures in Monterrosso, our favorite of the region.

The clifftop with the castle above Monterrosso

Just had to post this one to showoff Jessie's wonderful photographic eye, nice framing job.

Jessie's non-American friends



Long live Italia

Ciao,
Jessie and Nathan

P.S.  Watch out for the jellyfish here.  They are quite the annoying little invasive shits.  In Italian, Jellyfish are called Medusa for a reason.



Basking in the Mediterranean Part 1: Barcelona

We're back in buisness, in Budapest! The internet here is finally afforable. Like really affordable, two hours is only 60 cents.  Gotta love favorable exchange rates.  We'll give you all an update on Barcelona, then Cinque Terre and Venice in three lovely installments.  Hopefully one each day too.

Barcelona. It was beautiful. Palm trees, beaches, a vibrant late night scene, and of course tasty tapas. We saw some sights, drank some sangria, and dipped into the Med.  Also, no pesky pickpockets got us on the Ramblas, the main tourist strip, which is always a plus.  Just like Amsterdam, all of you need to make visiting this city a priority.  Sun and fun can be had here, even in the fall.  Now, since we are in Budapest, and this place has internationally known nightlife, we are unable to write any more of  a trip report for you all on our adventures in Barcelona.  Our minds are just on where we will go clubbing tonight.  The pictures will have to do the rest of the talking for us, and since they are worth a thousand words, theoretically you are getting your word fix from them instead
.
Cheers,
Jessie and Nathan





Jessie's birthday breakfast, chocolate con churros

Clubbin on Jessie's birthday.  They all stayed open til 6am!!!





Meat market





Despite all this European fun, dirty laundry still happens



Look at all the palm trees



Gaudi's Sagrada Familia Church.  Been under construction for decades now and more to come

Gaudi's Parc Guell, not under constuction anymore

Tapas







Getting set up to enjoy the beach. What an upgrade from gloomy Seattle.

Splashing in the waves



One last time, Barcelona's beauty



Venice

Hi Everybody,
We have been greatly enjoying our time in Italy. Venice is so expensive, internet is 800% more in cost per hour. So, we will not put up another post until we get to Budapest on Tuesday.  Until Tuesday, take care.

Jessie and Nathan

Cinque Terre

Hi Everybody,
We are in the beautiful Cinque Terre region of Italy.  It is amazing here.   Barcelona was also beautiful.  Who can complain with high 70's and sun in September.  The internet here is ridicuously expensive, 1.50 euro per ten minutes, so dont expect much from us until at least Saturday of this week (when we are in Venice!!!).  Until then we will keep livin the dream.
Ciao,
Nathan and Jessie

Prostitutes, Marijuana, and Beautiful Scenery, Amsterdam Oh My!!

Amsterdam, where do we begin??  With the amazing food?? The beautiful scenery???  The abundance of sinful outlets (marijuana cafes, and prostitues to name a few)?  Or all the fun little quirky things we discovered that were vastly different than you see in the states??

First off, Amsterdam was a lovely place and all of you should try to visit it once in your life.  The atmosphere is so laid back.  Many of the streets were small and lined with canals, trees, people riding their bikes, and shops selling you delicious dutch food and espresso.  Some of our fondest memories of this place include strolling along the canals, stopping off at a restaurant to grab a coffee and some Dutch Pancakes, and riding through the Dutch countryside on our bikes.

Pretty canals

Dutch Pancakes, yum

One of the most memorable and informative sights we saw was the Anne Frank House.  The museum provided such a good context of Anne Frank and her family's life during and after the war, and what has been done since the house opened to help promote human rights, tolerance, and understanding of others throughout the world.

The food as well was quite scrumptous.  The Dutch sure are onto something with their cuisine, or at least what we tried.  For instance, Dutch Pancakes with bacon or apples in them, good.  French fries with mayo.....good!!!  

Gotta love that mayo on your fries

These prepackged Dutch Pancakes tasted like sugar, bread and bugspray, gross

After we got sick of strolling the canals and sampling the food, we decided a trip to the countryside was needed.  So what not a better way to do this than by bike.  Everyone else rode their bikes, and as they say, when in Rome.  Weird here though that no one cares to use helmets, maybe because they all ride so slow everywhere none are needed.  Jessie looked all over the place and could not find one.  Our excursion into rural Holland took us past some random farms, and of course lots of windmills and canals.  Perfecto.

Dutch countryside

Came across these little guys on our ride

Look at that windmill

Combining all this lovely stuff with the random things we found: urinals at canal corners, itsy bitsy little cars, tiny water bottles, and shopping carts you can pull behind you, and Amsterdam is one great city.  However, add in to this mix sex shows, cafes that sell all the marijuana you can buy, and hundreds of legal prostitutes and it becomes the most unique city we have ever been to.  Like mentioned earlier, you all need to experience this place for yourself at least once.

Cute waterbottle 

Cute car

Convenient urinal

Yes, this is the Red Light District

And thats the way the cookie crumbles,

Jessie and Nathan

P.S. For a further breakdown and discussion of our opinions of Amsterdam´s more sinful things, talk with us in person.

P.P.S  Tomorrow, Sunday, is our last day in Barcelona.  It is supposed to be sunny and in the high 70´s.  Don´t worry, we will bask in the sun and swim in the sea extra long for all of you stuck back in gray and rain of Seattle (heard the weather is turning back to sucky as usual for the next eight months).