Flying solo...

Like a bird firstly spreading it's wings, leaving the safety of it's nest, I left the safety of my fabled wolfpack companions- Dan and Pip.

IN BRIEF
First stop on the last legs of this adventure was

Milano
to see my friend Angelo (a guy that I met whilst in Edinburgh). This was quite a whirlwind adventure as I arrived was whisked back to Angelo's apartment, taken in to see the Duomo, Castle etc etc... before jumping in a car and driving out to Pavia to see Franco Battiato in concert!!! What, I hear you say? That means nothing to you, well, me neither. But he was HUGE in the 70's, 80's and 90's. He is like the John Farnham of Italy... This is the song where everyone went nuts! Of course, I have no idea what it's about, but it was definitely my favourite...

Wandering myself around the art museums/galleries of Milano I was just astonished by how fabulous everyone was. Walking around in pressed stream-lined Italian suits, drinking expressos, smoking cigarettes and I swear that Italian women have something to do with funding the entire high-heel shoe industry... It's all so alluring that it almost convinces me to buy a packet of Camels and reduce my diet to only calorie-negative celery. Though this thought may have also occurred to me when my host Angelo described me as both 'liking food a lot' and 'eating like a man' (actual quotes).
Other then that I managed to get to the Milan Film Festival and see a documentary called You Don't Like the Truth: 4 Days in Guantanamo Bay, which left me so angry and furstrated about 'the injustice of it all', but was also super well done... Check it: http://www.youdontlikethetruth.com/
Anywho, moving right along. I said goodbye to Angelo and made my way for...

Venice

where I was kindly given my key, walked up to my room, swung open the door and screamed! Those who know me well will know that I have an irrationally large fear of birds (it's just their beaks, you never know what they're going to do... poke your eye out!?). Nevertheless, I was greeted by my two new roomies, two pidgeons, who had been bunkering down in my room for a while now as there was shit everywhere...I think pidgeons are out for me. First food poisoning, now this... nevertheless, various bird-flapping/pointing to my room hand gestures later, the hostel staff had given me a new room... So anyway, Venice... the museum of a city, where I spent most of my time at the Venice Biennale (one of the largest art festivals in the world), but more on that later. I also managed to get seriously lost a fair few times, get myself out on the town in Santa Margherita, taste some mean pina coladas and fall asleep on late night buses (so nothing new).

Next up I subjected myself to a terrible night-train which found me lying on the ground underneath some seats for nigh on 6 hours. But all in order so that I could get to
Munich 
where I had a day in which I think I experienced every emotion. Let me break it down:
Exhaustion: arriving at 6am in the morning and remembering straight away it's the first day of Oktoberfest, so everyone is walking around in leiderhosen and sucking back on their morning beers. I head straight for the waiting room.
Panic/Great Distress: As I realise that I've lost my Eurail Pass, a document that is possibly worth hundreds of euros.
Embarrassment: As I begin to cry when the Lost and Found Officer explains to me that they can't get anything off the train until Monday.
Elation: As I realise an hour later that I just left it in the waiting room.
Excitement: At seeing all the opening Oktoberfest Opening Ceremony in the main square of Munich.
Despondency/Heavy Heartedness: As I made my way to Dachau concentration camp and learnt about it's history.
Awe/Excitement: As I wandered around Oktoberfest, making friends with those who were in the 'too hard too early' basket (see below, picture taken 3pm).

Nevertheless, time was a ticking and I didn't have any accommodation in Munich, so I caught the train to

Vienna
in order to meet up with the one and only Pip McIlory, your friend next door from the company Elevate Education.
Finally realising that Europe does actually get cold, Pip and I rugged up and braved the elements. And yes, I loved Vienna-how typical. Loved wandering the markets. Loved seeking out all the architecture from the Viennesse Succession. Loved the Museumsquartier. And LOVED the free concert tickets Pip and I managed to score from a home connection. Yes please!

At the Viennesse Secession building.
All too soon our little honeymoon was over. I said goodbye to Pip who was off to Siena for University whilst I was heading further north and getting down Czech Republic style in...

Prague
rockin' up at my hostel at around 12 midnight, I was quickly whisked away to the oldest pub in Europe (supposedly), where I delved into the finest of Czech beers. Three days later I've seen a few more beverage establishments, eaten some seriously good Goulash, had a run in with the Czech postal service and fallen for the comincally ironic art of bad boy Czech artist David Černý, who makes works that look a little something like this:

Anywho, Prague-that's where I am now! So I'm finally up to date and about to munch down some breakfast and make my way to Berlin! Can not wait! Hope all's well in your land. Thanks for reading.

 POINTS OF INTEREST
Venice Biennale

Finally, I was there, the Venice Biennale. Ticket in hand I readied myself for a serious few days of art.
And it was... ok. Whilst I had expected to be absolutely blown away, I only found that there was just a few things that I really liked.
Furstrating was my slight death wish towards contemporary art and it's obedience to Barthe's Death of the Author. No, didactics aren't cool, but yes, sometimes contemporary art needs a bit of context and just throwing someone in to interpret in their own way sometimes makes everything into an indecipherable mess. ESPECIALLY the Italian Pavilion... I could have cried at how terrible that was. This was actually in the exhibition:

yes, a globbular red Italy shaped crucifix, need I say more.

Triennale's Options of Luxury exhibition, Milano
This was the most ridiculous exhibition I have every seen. I actually thought it was a joke. It describes itself as following the 'evolution of luxury goods'. I'm not even sure if words can actually describe what they presented you with. It was just like this huge journey, which didn't really make a great deal of sense... but you walked through all these rooms, where computer graphics screamed slogans at you like 'Food is Art' and 'Luxury surpasses the ordinary'... Different rooms included an elaborately reconstructed designer dressing room, a hall of masks where you looked in to see potential 'desires' (see below) in front of you (embarrassingly, these desires included such steroetypes as 'travelling to South East Asia' and 'buying that designer handbag') and a make-shift island which showed the 'luxury of the future' compelte with folk rolling around in orb balls and having rave parties in caves...

There was actually one room where you got an ipad and wandered into a GIANT handbag and pretended like you were going around in this persons handbag whilst they walked around... what!? I am not sure if I have done this justice, but I am still bewildered about this.
ART-WANK
-Museo Novecento, Milan: Glad to finally get into an Italian Art Museum for free, this place was well done. All modern Italian art. Favourites included Boccioni.
-Triennale Design Museum- What is Italian Design?- And awesometeractive exhibition where you got to lounge around in all the fabulous furniture... so many famous pieces such as the Lips Sofa, Spaghetti Chair etc. example:

-Venice Biennale (see above)
-Peggy Guggenheim Collection-really well done museum, which highlights an important part of the art industry that is often overlooked. Collectors and gallerists have played an instrumental role in defining the direction for art (money is power). So great to walk around Peggy's old digs and see not only her collection of mostly abstract expressionist art, but also pictures of her lazying around next to the grand canal, looking fabulous.
-Palazzo Fortuny-TRA- still undecided about this one. This was a very new and innovative curatorial approach which blended together East/West contemporary art, artefacts into a house-like museum.
-Leopold Museum- Biggest collection of Egon Schiele in the world. Fanstastically explained and well put together. Nice one Vienna.
-MUMOK-Vienna's Modern Art Museum. Intense explanations for explaining the tough topics of minimalist and conceptual works.
-Museum of New Art, Prague- an art museum that I randomly just walked into and was super impressed. Just opened in Jun 2011, this is a professional space not only for their collection but for various higher education organisations to show work. Up and coming and exciting, nice one. It also houses Cerny's Shark and Guns. Nice.
-David Černý sculpture- it covers Prague, so gives a really nice feel to all the public spaces and shows off a bit of Czech humour.

Heading East (or getting out of the Schenghen Zone)

IN BRIEF

So from Italy (as I take it where my last update left off) we headed the call of the East, where even the non-smoking rooms smell like nicotine. First stop:

Belgrade
for the Belgrade Beer Festival, or the Poor Man's Oktoberfest, as we liked to name it.
Now there's not actually a lot that I can pad out about things that we did in Belgrade... because, well, there's not a lot there to do. Seriously, we tried. But being there from the 16th till the 21st of August, all we managed was to see the military museum, decide against viewing some serious breaching of Animal Rights at the Serbian Zoo, attempt to find a book about Eastern Europe, make scrambled eggs, drink lots of coffee and attend the beer festival. Sorry Belgrade.
But the Beer Fest was still pretty good... Picture a free-entry fair ground with over 75 beers on offer (all around 1 euro for a pint), beer pong, show rides and a HUGE stage which is graced by the likes of Serbian's best rock music, the drummer from the Ramones (can anyone say old, drug-abused looking over the hill musician....?) and a Blues Brothers Tribute Band (my personal favourite, who managed to stay on till 4am... crazy Serbia)... anywho, here's a visual.

So after all this song and dance we went Bosnia-ward... venturing right into the heartland, firstly through Sarajevo to
Mostar
Famous for its bridge which was destroyed in the 1990's conflict. We were only there long enough to stand in awe at the beautiful mountains and rivers surrounding the town and to realise that Bosnia is Beautiful... or as Dan liked to express it 'Bosnia ticks all the boxes' or 'Bosnia-Underrated and Most Improved Award'. Leaving there we headed for
Konjic
a small town inbetween Mostar and Sarajevo. Getting off the bus we were greeted by a man who spoke no English, but some how managed to explain that he would take us to our lodging, which just happened to be situated right on a beautiful lake, where NO TOURISTS GO. What a luxury. The next morning we were picked up in a van and taken to Neretvera River where we donned the wetsuits they gave us for our White-Water Rafting Adventure! Meeting our shirtless (read sexy) guide Selcuk, we jumped in and were off. Here's Dan and Pip on our Badzo Raft adventure:



So after a cruisy day down the river, some rapids and compulsory screaming on my part, we went for a lake swim ate some Bosnian pie and swapped opinions on whether this was the best day of our trip thus far... mutual decision concluded it was definitely up there.
Driving to the bus stop the next day, we were on the way to

Sarajevo
and this was where the history lesson really begun. Obviously we were all interested in the 1990's conflict, but didn't really understand it, and Belgrade hadn't really offered up a lot of information... But here we really got into history AND food. Bosnia dished up both in great spades. The most eye-opening experience was a war tour we went on, organised through the hostel... More on that in the 'Points of Interest Secion'. Other then that we went to the Tunnel Museum. This places houses the Tunnel that was built underneath the airport (the only neutral space during the Siege of Sarajevo) which was used to get supplies in and out of Sarajevo.

With only a limited time frame in Sarajevo, we ventured back through Belgrade (which was a very different experience the second time around, understanding the history quite a bit better only a week alter) and right on through to

Timisoara, Romania!
Where we started our ROADTRIP BABY!!!
Picking up our Skoda the next day, the first few hours of driving had us questioning the full extent of the insurance policy we had got... Did it, for instance, cover us for collisions with horse and cart/cattle/old woman/other crazy Romanian drivers who overtake up to 10 cars around corners, on a single lane highway when it's dark (this is no joke).
Our first night was spent camping out and crapping ourselves for fear of what lay behind the distant yelling, dogs barking and other strange Romanian noises. We concentrated around Transylvania where the mountains are high, the valleys low and the roads are rough (well actually, I think that's all over Romania). Hitting up Sibui, Bran (home to Dracula's Castle), Sinaia, Brasov, Sighisoara and Cluj-we had a fair few car hours under our belt. We managed to drive up the Tranfagarasan (see the In Detail section), which is an absolutely mental road up the side of a mountain range, camp climb some seriously steep hills (including the 'Seven Steps to Death', which left us literally clinging via a chain to the side of a mountain), get some great views and get lost on the dreaded 'white roads' (all in only a few hours). Here's a picture of our lunch spot:

Ending up in Cluj-Napoca a student town in the North West, we did some couch surfing (in detail below) and then separated ways as I left the Roadtrip for Pastures in the land of Hungary... namely

Budapest
Where I was for not nearly long enough, but where I managed to hit up the main sites... The House of Terror to learn about the Nazi and Communist years, Buda and Pest, The Palace, Ruin bars and, of course, the baths (below) where you shake off that groggy feeling from the night before and have fun switching between the 80 degree sauna and the 16 degree plunge pool (freezing!)

Quick stop, gotta go, off to...
Ljubliana (capital of Slovenia)
and yes, Slovenia is probably not regarded as Eastern Europe (as a book shop lady so rudely pointed out to Pip in Belgrade), but for ease of writing, it is for this blog.
There I met up with Dan and Pip and we all met a crazy guy called Maryn (see further details below). We ventured out to Lake Bled, which must seriously be made for tourists- a beautiful lake with a island with a church on it in the middle. We fitted in some bike-riding in the Triglav park, some casino-ing, some winning at roulette and some self-congratulatory cosmopolitans (Dan's favourite) to wish Pip and goodbye as she left for Croatia the next day!
Back in Ljubliana for a day or two we checked out the Hippy Commune and managed to run into Julia Walsh AND see a concert of the Wombats and the Editors (which just happened to be playing! Crazy)...

Wishing Dan a goodbye as I got my trainto Milano, and started flying solo... but more on that in a few days... Bye for now. This has been a long one. Thanks for listening

POINTS OF INTEREST

 War Tour-Sarajevo

It's hard to explain this tour without putting in a totally frustrating didactic explanation of the confusing history of the conflict. Leaving that, I'll just explain that Sarajevo was in 1984 the host of the Winter Olympic Games and by 1992 under seige from Bosnian-Serb troops.

 The hostel we stayed at was owned by a Sarajevan war veteran. Now, his English wasn't so great, so he told his son, who was 20 and much better at English, all of his stories from the war, and his son took us on the tour. He drove us up into the hills around Sarajevo and showed us the barracks that the Serbs used, as well as the old bob-sled course which was then used as a second-front-line by the Serbs and was now left in total disrepair (below).

Everywhere we walked Jan told us stories of where his father and his father's friends had faught, and gave us a run down of the hardship and history surrounding the whole battle.

Everywhere we went he pointed out landmines which were just left littering the countryside and told us about some of the cruelest war crimes committed during the 3 year seige. He also walked us through a huge minefield, the no-man's land, between the two front lines, warning us not to step off the path for the surety we would step on a still-active mine.

So obviously it was pretty harrowing to hear all these stories, and unimaginable to think that such a thing could have occurred in Europe, in the 90's, in the age of the internet... but there's no use dabbling in hind-sight..

I think the most interesting message that Jan left us with was his complete lack of belief in patriotism, nationalism or religion. From what he'd seen, it had only been used to divide people, to urge them to commit crimes upon one another and to allow him to grow up in a war zone. As he put it 'There's no use in patriotism, everyone runs when they see a tank coming towards them'.

The Transfagarasan

So whilst flitting around in Romania's Dracula country we managed to stumble on what Top Gear has voted to be 'The World's Best Road' (no biggy... watch below)... The Transfagarasan... or as we liked to call it, 'The Transfag'...

So this is what the road looks like on a map:

And here's how it turns out in real life:

Now this spaghetti-like piece of bitumen is the brain-child of the one and only Romanian Communist Dictator Nicolae Ceaușescu. He wanted to be able to see the top of the mountains, but didn't want to have to climb them. So in a typical beaux-art 'Man overpowering Nature' type megalomaniacal effort he ordered the building of this road... One of many crazy things he did before the 1989 revolution. So no buses go down this route, and because it gets cold in winter, the road is actually only open between July and August, perfect timing for us! Lucky ducks. So the road was pretty much empty when we ventured and Dan had a bang-on time trying to navigate the corners in our little Skoda, whilst we all just made brrrmmm brrrmmm noises in the back and looked out the window with expressions of 'Oh my God'/'woahhhhhh'/'holy cow' passing our lips infrequently. So, because the Skoda did so well, I thought I should put up a glory picture of it.

Nice one Skoda.

Couch-Surfing with Akos, Anna and Agnes!

Another experience of note was our most enjoyable stay with our new adoptive Romanian Family, inclusive of Akos, Anna and Agnes. The warmly welcomed us into their house in Cluj-Napoca (North-West Romania) for three nights. It was so nice to jump right into a family and do everything together: drinking beers in town, going to a salt mine, eating watermelon, gorge walking and our big day of hiking (25 kms). Here's us all at the top!

And of course, indulging in the 11kg watermelon Akos presented us with! Romanian specialty.

Mostly I think we were all just astonished at the generosity of strangers. For so many reason, couchsurfing shouldn't exist, but it does, and it's so dependent on blind trust. A fantastic opportunity that seriously made our time in Romania!

That Crazy guy in Ljubljana...

So here's how we arrive in Ljubliana. I travelled from Budapest on a night train which was supposed to arrive in at 2am, unfortunately I missed my stop, leaving me waiting alone for an hour in a random station in Slovenia for a train back to Ljubliana, where I eventually arrived-sans sleep- at 6am. Dan and Pip arrive at around the same time after some awesome awesome awesome guy on their bus into Slovenia decides to hop on without a passport... story said, everyone is totally tired, drained and exhausted. We locker our bags and head in for a look at old Ljubbers (without doubt the most difficult to pronounce city I have been to thus far). Meandering around the market and trying to buy figs we hear this 'YOU WANT TO BUY FIGS!???!' yelled in English. We turn around for our first glimpse of Maryn Simcic, a grey-bearded fellow, with studious glasses and a love of yelling things to unsuspecting English-speakers (pictured below). Making polite conversation we ask what his suggestions are for stuff to see in town... his answer is 'I'll show you'... and for the next two and a half hours we were his. We had no idea what we were in for as we were led around town by this Food Science Professor.

  

Here is just a brief list of places we went/stuff that happened that we were not expecting:

-we collected unpasteurised milk from a machine

-we stood inbetween three birch trees in the centre of town and felt the 'energy' of the town, which centred on this spot, where both lines of feminine and masculine met according to Vladic's plan of Ljubjana...

-we 'felt the machine of the building' by being allowed into the National Library (Vladic's design) reading room (for students only) and the archives

-we met the head of the communist party of Slovenia

-we just hopped on into the schmickest hotel in Slovenia and sat in their courtyard and were served juice

-we went through all the back passages of the Ljubliana University and saw the balcony where Bill Clinton was declined speaking rights from.

-we were given postcards and a book by the famous Slovenian poet Perseveran.

Yes, a ridiculous array of happenings, and all whilst Maryn continually grabbed my camera and took photos from ridiculous angles in front of this or that monument or with random people... Exhibit A and B:

Where did he get the artistic license for these angles?

No, we do not know that woman on the end... but yes, she does have a bottle of milk that we just gathered from the machine behind.

Needless to say, that was the most spontaneous, crazy and ridiculous tour I have ever been on. Afterwards, when Maryn had left, we all sat there stunned, unable to take in the extreme babble of information, words, paparazzi-type picture taking and absurdity of it all... Who was that guy?

ART-WANK

Like Morocco, I think our interests in the East lay elsewhere, therefore, nothing to add here... sorry.

 

Romance in Italy

Flung from Africa to the boot-shaped country and into the waiting arms of Miss Phillipa Brumby, we started our Italian Romance. A two-week love affair. Here we kindled a bond beyond any other, bound by our mutual love of art, coffee, Italian food and Italian police officers (see below).

Florence

Our first day in Florence was well spent, I must say. We went truely Italian, spending the morning at l'Accademia, getting close with Michelangelo's David, drinking espresso, picking out engagement rings on the Ponte Vecchio (see below) for when Pip finally decides to pop the question, strolling up to the Piazza Michelangelo (yep, everything sounds significant and arty in this part of town), napping in a park and thoroughly enjoying a beer and pizza combo to finish off the day... Well they say that Italy is about indulgence right? Personally, Paris has been pipped for me as the city of Love...

But other then that we spent a few glorious days eating gelati, ending up at a random Latin American music festival held in a fortress, looking at markets, eating gelati, visiting Siena-Florence's biggest rival, and spending a mere 4 hours in the Uffizi- one of Italy's finest museums, although shoddily organised.

Next our lover's holiday took us to

Cinque terre National Park

Which is nothing like anything you could imagine from an Australian National Park, but in fact an area on the North-West coast of Italy, which covers five towns set amongst stunning coastline, hills and cliffs. Or for a more visual description:

There's a walk that goes between all five towns and takes approximately 5 hours. On the day we did it, we stopped half way, bought grapes and went to the rocky cliffs and swam around with all the beautiful Italians. Man, I love Italy! The final streach of the walk is a rather easy meander called Lover's Lane or Via Dell'Amore... Need I say more... Italy you've done it again.

Our last destination on our very short stint in Italia was the infamous

Rome

A city where you wander around and everything just looks a little bit familiar, because almost everything is of some kind of cultural significance, importance, Julius Caesar did this here or that there... blah blah...

But I was surprised to see such a pairing of tacky tourism, crappy food, too much history and fantastic art... an instanct that led us to believe that the only viable (cheap) food option was getting Chinese... a tourist sin, but one we indulged in anyway.

So our days were spent sniffing out monuments. Easy to see them coming because there's suddenly a huge increase in tacky tourist shops, annoying hawkers, terrible food joints and McDonalds... and BAM, there's teh Trevi Fountain/Colesseum/Vatican/etc. I also had a brief couchsurfing stint with the one and only Mexican designer living in Rome, Pepe. Greatly enjoyed wandering around the city and seeing what you find, free Opera on the Spanish Steps, vintage stores behind the Pantheon, taste testings on the street... there is always something going on.

And now I've already headed East-Europe-wards, so will be back with an update about travels around that way soon!

Wishing you all the best from over here.

IN-DEPTH

The Vatican

I can't help but bang on about the Vatican Museum... Sorry, but woah, this place has more art... then, well, anywhere. So I was left awed and absolutely arted out after a six-hour art nerd bonanza in this set of museums... yes, I am a loser. Absolutely loved it. But what I also found interesting was how such a collection was created. This guy:

 

Pope Julius II just decided that Rome had lost it's touch, that it wasn't as important or culturally significant as it used to be. So what does he do? Get his buddies, only the most famous artistis of the time (Raphael, Michelangelo etc) to come down and make some works specifically for the Vatican Museums. Now if that isn't a fantastic display of the power of the Church, well then... I'll eat my typical Arts-student moleskin that I've been tauting around everywhere.

ART-WANK

This could well be the longest art-wank of the entire trip... so here goes.

Florence

Made me fall in love with the Renaissance again.

• L'Accademia- Michelangelo's David is HUGE. Pretty awesome in the true sense of the word.
• Uffizi- I joined in with the throngs of Japanese tourists for a four hour, self-guided tour of this building. Seriously ridiculous how many famous works are housed in this shambled museum. Adorned by computer print-out didatics and little information for the non-art-versed visitor, you can catch a glimpse of Botticelli's Birth of Venus and Primavera, douse it down with some Carravaggio (including his Bacchus) and fit in Gentileschi's Judith and Holofernes. The weird thing about this museum is that it was recently bombed in a mafia related incident, so heaps of the museum is being renovated, and some works were destroyed, leaving a really higgildy-piggildy (for want of a better word) museum with no clear guidance or sequence of the major works in sync with surrounding ones.

Rome

I'm pretty sure Rome is some set competition for Adelaide's title as the 'City of Churches'. Apparently if you visited Roman Churches at the rate of 3 per day, it would take you 3 years to see all of them! Anywho, if you know where to look, it means you can find lots of amazing works for free! Or they have this weird thing where you have to pay a nominal fee to turn the lights on and actually be able to see the painting!

• Santa Maria della Vittoria. A small chapel in the back streets of Rome, about 5 minutes from our hostel. And what do we find there? Only one of Bernini's most controversial sculptures- The Ecstacy of Saint Theresa. A work made famous because, well... her 'spiritual enlightenment' looks like she's having an orgasm. Reportedly one of the first viewers commented: 'If that's enlightenment, then I want some', or something to that affect. The first few minutes of this BBC episode portray it pretty well http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HsC5W-brbAo
• Santa Luigi Di Francesci-Caravaggio's St Matthew series
• Borghese Gallery-gorgeous. Show stopper's have to include all the works by Caravaggio and Bernini.
• THE VATICAN. Favourites include Raphael's Stanza, Michelangelo's Sistine Chapel and also the Picotera (painting collection), fabulously housed after the Sistine Chapel, so delightfully empty and housing great works such as Raphael's Annunciation.

A little place called Morocco...

So going back a few steps from now, I thought I should just write a few words to get up to date on my little jaunt to Morocco... See this is how it all happened...

Meet Dave:

This is Dave (and Me). He was my travelling partner for my Morocco days.
Important facts include that he is a banker from Melbourne who likes to weigh up the idea of buying kite-surfing equipment and can speak Russian. Cool huh?
So whilst everyone in our post-Benicassim festival had meandered off to other parts of the Spanish land, Dave and I found ourselves still in Granada, sitting by a pool on the 26th of July.
Dave, sunning himself beside the pool asks:
'Where are you going to next?'
Amy, pries her eyes from her books and replies:
'Well, I was going to go to Morocco, but I'm not too keen on going on my own...So I don't know.'
Dave replies:
'Yeah, me too'
A moment of silence ensues before Dave says:
'We should go together...?' with a half question, suggestion casualness.
'Sure'. And a trip was destined.
On the 29th of July we found ourselves, at 8pm at night, passing through the border from the Spanish enclave of Ceuta to Morocco. To most the chicken wire, portable buildings and distinct lack of any bar one police official seemed distinctly non-border-like, but hey, this is Morocco.
Walking through the border and trying to find a taxi, I immediately thanked those gruelling hours of high school French class for being able to lodge some sense of the Francophile language in my brain. Something I would do time and time again during my visit with Morocco being colonised by the French and all.So luckily we were able to do some bargaining for our first 245 km taxi ride (25 euro each! what a steal... read: rip off in Morocco... oops)
Arriving at our first destination, Chefchaouen, at night, we woke up the next day to see this:

An absolutely blue medina. Everything is painted blue and if you ask anyone they are pretty clueless as to why that is... but for some reason it was done by a small Jewish community that used to live here. Nevertheless, after browsing markets, dining on fine Moroccan cuisine (including the must-have taste of Mint Tea-the 'Moroccan Whisky') and being offered hash more times then you can count (Chefchaouen, apart from trying to fit every vowel into it's name, is also set in the hills amongst Morocco's biggest Marujuana plantation!) it was time to leave.
To Fes, the old capital of this nub of Africa. Which was also a lot harder to get to then we first thought, but a cramped bus ride into rural Morocco (baby spew included) and a grand taxi ride (literally a taxi ride with 7 people in the one car that only leaves for the destination when it's full) and we were there. And Fes is the best. It has a huge maze-like medina filled with markets and craft shops and is the largest area of car-less city centre in the world. Picture a maze, now times it by a thousand, make any street signs barely legible or non-existent, add in your frequent donkey carrying large load of hay/wood/bottles/anything, stray cats and you're getting close. There is no way you can not get lost. But it is fun to wander around the stores, the tanneries, leather markets for hours having absolutely no idea where you are. Then asking a small child to please lead you back to your hostel. After fun times and making friends in Fes we headed for the big mumma... Marrakech.
Which really turned out to be a non-event as I was hostel-ridden after a (sad to say) voluntary run-in with a pigeon tajine in a Fes restaurant.Whilst my new friends ran around and told me of the square with the monkeys and the snake charmers that I had only briefly seen, I hounded myself mentally for the thought process that provoked me to chow down on Melbourne's only native animal urban dweller.
Anywho, off to Essaouira (on the west coast of Morocco) for some small town for some sun, sand and WIND. My gosh, it was windy. So really good for kitesurfers, hence Dave's quest for kite surfing gear. But really, just a relaxed place to hang around, lay on the beach and watch Ramadan unfold. Which was quite an experience. Everything was pretty quite for the whole day, but when it got to around 7pm the street markets were madness as people went food crazy in readiness to all break the fast together... But whilst I wasn't joining in on the religious festival I was enjoying the freshly caught seafood that you got to pick from the market and have served to you in minutes.
Nevertheless, after a couple of days here I was back in Marrakech and away to Italy (a two week venture I will have to write about in a later adventure), and from there I'm now hanging out in Eastern Europe (another installment that still awaits publishment.
But on leaving the designated 'African' segment of my European trip, I must say I was glad to touch down in Pisa, Italy. Where, whilst busses may not necessarily run on time, at least they run, frequently, and have air-conditioning, toilets and seat covers that don't stick to you. Morocco was such a vibrantly differently place to anywhere else I've been and so it was exhausting to just exist there. I met some great people and had a ball and am already incensed to plan more trips further Middle East.
Ciao

Other things that are interesting...
I got a new camera! After mine was sadly stolen in Valencia.
Cadel Evans won the Tour. Yes, this is technically old news, but still something of note I thought I should write down.
I lost one of my big toes hiking (not again)
And I'm currently dealing with the idea of buying my own toothpaste... Being the daughter of two pharmacists I have been spoilt for dental hygienic choice throughout my upbringing. Now I face the grave day, a kind of coming-of-age travel moment.

ART-WANK
Nothing, nada, nothing in Morocco to see! As in, no museums open! Relax time away from art.

It´s not you it´s me...

So it´s been a while... I´m sorry. It´s not you fault, it´s just I´ve been busy... It´s not you, it´s me. Let me cheer you up with a picture of a Walrus playing an instrument... everyone loves Walruses... More on them later...

IN BRIEF
So I left off in Dubrovnik, when the girls said adios and I was chilling on my own. After another day in D-brik, I travelled to the small island of Korcula... a memorable bus trip which involved meeting Alice, a poor lost Sail Croatia girl who had woken up on the wrong boat, heading in the wrong direction, with no shoes, money, identification or idea what was going on (needless to say this seemed to be a running theme with all the Sail Croatians I met henceforth). Nevertheless, arriving in Korcula I propped myself up in Dragan´s Den and quickly met and befriended some Kiwi, Canadian, English, Irish people. A few days of beach, cliff-jumping (insert photo)

 meeting Australian-Croatians, fold-out couches and devilment (see: breaking into trampolines) it was time to say good bye! Back to Zagreb and onto a plane to fabled France...

Paris

The old Francophile capital, known for bad customer service, fierce protection of the French language and snobbishness in general... Luckily I was staying with a local, Phoebe, who has been on exchange for six months and conveniently has an apartment just off Champs Elysees, which we managed to sardine-style bed down 8 or so people in. Whilst we werent there for long, Phoebe made sure we saw all the sights, including Montmarte, Champs Elysees, the Marais, Villa Savoye, Musee Dórsay, George Pompidou Centre, Sacre Couer, drinking on the Seine etc etc. Cultural highlights included realising that Paris really is the city of love, as everyone makes out, everywhere!  And also that time that I whipped out my old highschool french and managed to tell one of Phoebe´s French friends that I was a dog...hmmm...Low lights included realising that what they don´t tell you about Paris is that it smells like a urinal because there are virtually no public toilets anywhere!
Leaving after a depressingly short amount of time I realised that Paris was a place I would have to come back to again, with more time and more money.

Our next leg of the trip involved a bit of camping. Moss, Condo and I ventured West to Normandy visited Bayeux, saw the infamous tapestry, hired bikes and rode to the see side to see the D-Day beaches and picnic like we´ve never picnicked before.
After this short jaunt, everything got a bit messy, with trains and needing to get places so simply put we managed to end up in the Loire valley in Tours, meeting Grace and Phoebe along the way. We camped in the Loire and discovered the many ways of picnicing in a park and the like... I visited Leonardo Da Vinci´s house and only then realised how much of an absolute genius he was. Condo said goodbye and headed off to follow the tour de France (come on Cadel you champion), and we attempted to go Spain-ward (something which we didn´t realise would be so incredibly difficult, more on that later).

Spain

We unwittingy found ourselves taking a detour through Spain via Bilbao, see the Guggenheim and then end up in Madrid, stay there for less then 24 hours, or long enough to meet an annoying Australian who claimed to have learnt Greek in 5 weeks and also fit in seeing the Prado-hello ´Velazquez´s Las Meninas and the Reine Sofia-Guernica baby. Another night time bus took us to Barcelona, where we allowed ourselves to actually indulge in Spanish lifestyle... something I think suits me quite well. Wake up late, big lunch, siesta, late tapas dinner, drinks and then late to bed. Spot on.

Heading to Barcelona-the cultural capital of Spain- I got stuck into some serious museum going, walked the Mercat de Bocquerie, got lost in the medieval streets and ended up finding myself alongside some Spaniards, rummaging through bins for clothing (some things never change). Highlights woud have to be all the Gaudi architecture (see below), the Joan Miro Foundation, stumbling across the Museum of Textiles and the flea markets! Barcelona feels a lot like Melbourne as there´s tonnes of alleyways, winding streets with street art (see below, Dali work found in the medieval part of Barcelona), cafes work their way into small boutique shops and book shops stock art guides to the city.

Saying goodbye to Barcelona we headed down to Benicassim for a little festival featuring the likes of The Strokes, Brandon Flowers, The Streets, Arcade Fire, Noah and the Whale, Crystal Fighters, Arctic Monkeys and many more... 8 days of camping out in a bur infested dust patch made me realise that we are spoilt at Australian festivals with our healthy dollopings of green grass and camping space. That said, the music didn´t start until around 6pm every night so days were spent chilling out at the beach (not a bad option). Festival finished (yes, I´m rushing over things, but this is supposed to be brief right?) and we headed back to Valencia, the official home of paella, but for us a well needed rest spot.
I didn´t realise before I got there, but Valencia is home to a massive arts and science museum, and all the architecture is in this futuristic style of Santiago Calatrava (current architect for Ground Zero).

And for my birthday I got a ticket to the largest aquarium in Europe! in the Ciudad! I mean they even had a 10 mete deep dolphinarium... ! Crazy stuff.
My birthday came and went and I tried not to think about how much older 22 feels then 21 by appropriately escaping reality and seeing the final Harry Potter film! Amazing!... and we got grande popcorn and everything. Thank you. We also went out for what was possibly the most amazing meal I´ve ever had. I´m talking white truffle lasagne, four cheese gnocci and homemade dips... foodgasm thinking about it.

After Valencia we trained to Granada where I stayed at the best hostel I´ve ever had, Makuteros Hostel where they have their very own bar, chill-out zone hammocks and tree house. Nothing could be more relaxing, and whilst I only booked 1 night, I´ve now been here for  nights.

After leaving Grace, Phoebe, Dan and Grace I had a small bout of food poisoning which embarrassingly left me surpris vomiting in a pot plant, much to the horror of the hostel staff. Despite this have befriended another Australian called Dave and we´re making plans for Morocco! yeah boi!

POINTS OF INTEREST

Getting to Spain via train-or the day that everything screwed up

So. The stuff up. My god, I can´t believe how wrong this went. When we were in Tours, we wanted to get to Barcelona to meet Pip, but found that there was absolutely no trains that we could get on! Eventuly after spending many hours in the train ticket office our helpful customer service officer suggested that we could get to Madrid instead, but would have to take 3 different trains and wait 2 days. Fine.

We came back in two days time to board our trains. It wasn´t until we got on the train that we realised that we´d been sold not only Eurail tickets (tickets we didn´t ask for) but 1st class tickets! Which we didn´t have a Eurail Pass for. So we were ordered off the train in Bordeaux to fix the problem, only to our dismay we realised we were going to have to pay the full price for a return ticket, thus, we sneakily bought whole new ones for an extra 30 Euros.

Then we arrived in Irun to find that the third and final ticket we had purchased for 50 Euros, from Irum to Madrid, was actually for the next day!!! Crap. We weren´t allowed on the train and as we saw it pulling up Grace speedily tried to negotiate in Spanish, but to no avail. Our only option was to disregard our train tickets and take a 30 euro bus to Bilbao, and then to Madrid (quite a scenic detour). Arriving at around 1 am we immediately treated ourselves to awell deserved beer.

So all in all, probably the most stressful 48 hours of our trip thus far.

Gaudi

Park Guell entrance

Battlo House

Sagrada Familia

Absolutely one of my stand-outs for Barcelona was seeing the architecture of the one and only Antonio Gaudi... typical tourist, I was drawn in by the sinous line, absurd sculpture of his Barcelonian Modernisme (see Spanish version of Art Nouveau). Amazing to see his Sagrada Familia (above), probably his most famous work, a MASSIVE church with incredibly intricate design details, which is hoped to be finished by 2026, the 100 year anniversary of Gaudis death-so it´s a bulding a long time in the making. Another great place was Park Guell (google image that), a Dr. Suess-esque park, which was supposed to be a housing development, but failed. Still, lots of fun to walk around all the crazy mosaics.

ART WANK

• George Pompidou Centre-I wish I had had longer in this place. Luckily I looked enough like Phoebe to get in for free. Very stoked to see my first ever Felix Gonzalez-Torres
• Villa Savoye- The Modernist masterpiece of Le Corbusier, was, kind of a bit disappointing. Very few of the original furniture was in the building and the pamphle guide explained little.
• Musee D´´Orsay-I enjoyed this museum immensely, once we finally managed to get in. Huge lines and strikes making it very difficult. I especially loved the Art Nouveau furniture, but felt that the museum didn´t make itself very decipherable for an English speaking audience-typical French.
• Reine Sofia- Obviously Picasso´s Guernicaas a highlight as I don´t think I´ve had an emotional reaction to an artwork in a while. Other highlights were a commissioned Richard Serra and seeing Dali´s The Great Masturbator. On top of that there was a fantastic retospoctive of Yayoi Kusama´s work. Involved in the New York Factory Day´s, it was great to see so many of her works together after having seen individual ones in Moma, Fruitmarket gallery etc.

• The Prado Museum- Like watching slides in my Baroque art class, except that they were the actual paintings. Las Meninas, Goya, Ribera all highlights
• Miro Foundation

Sorry about the length and lack of funny info or interesting things. I think I just had to get this one out... I swear the next one will be better.

Thanks for reading and he your safe and sound.

Amy

Hello non-English speaking countries...

TURKEY

 The IN BRIEF...

So Daniel William and I made our hearty way from mother England to Turkey at the end of May (yes, that was a while ago and no, there is not a lot of internet over here... or readily accessible for long periods of time internet).
We flew into Bodrum (South-West Turkey), a small little port town that looks like this:

There we saddled up and awaited the beginning of our cruise... an eight day epic adventure with our crew and other shipmates (who could be described lavishly as a couple of Swisse, four Swedes and two Turks, but which is probably more accurate in saying, some Swisse dentists who enjoyed hypotheticals, Turkish people who adorably sometimes wore matching outfits-made cutier by their inability to speak English and a Swedish foursome). The choices of activities included: swimming, having a nap, light reading, eating, drinking beer/wine, napping, sleeping... you understand the picture. Little to say on this point other then it was a lovely break from the running around in the UK, the water was clear, the food amazing and we managed to read up extensively on the history of both Istanbul and Croatia.

Istanbul

Flying into Istanbul for five days of high-intensity touristic activity. A city that I still cant (please excuse any missing apostrophes as I cannot find the apostrophe key) quite pin down. The only place to have been ruled by three empires (Roman, Byzantine and Ottoman), truly intercontinental, where the call to prayer marks time passing and you can find anything on the streets (including a guy trying to tell your fortune through the fool proof method of a rabbit or coq). Istanbul is a contradiction I wish I had more time to explore.
So much time spent wandering and possibly purposefully getting lost, as well as cursing all the hills that just dont appear on the map in front of you. In amongst that there was of course the sight seeing- the galata tower/bridge, funicular, galleries and museums (of course), the Bosphorus (the huge river that Istanbul hugs), Topkapi Palace (home to the Ottoman Sultans and some seriously nice jewels-86 carat diamond nonetheless), mosques, grand bazaar, spice bazaar, an ancient Roman cistern.... etcetcera... I think you understand the point. So busy. After the whole thing we felt like we needed another cruise. Everything is so busy in a city that houses 13 million people. Seriously, you can drive for two hours on highways both east and west and still not reach the edges. So everything was action packed, which meant that when we found a little bit of serenity we certainly appreciated it... Also Condo now has a fabulous story to tell about an Iranian mystical dance performance he saw and the blind guy who led him there... but thats for him to let out...
Also.
Nothing. Absolutely nothing, is better then Turkish food. Turkey turned me into one of those picture taking tourists, who must get visual record of every meal they eat for fear that it could be their last.
Also.
Upon leaving Istanbul, we went to the wrong airport... apparently Condo made bookings without realising there was more then one. Condo almost all his nails in the -nail biting incident- of the 11th of June 2011 when Amy and Dan rocked up to Ataturk airport to find that they needed to be 60km, over the other side of Istanbul in under and hour... crunching stuff.





Then there was Croatia...

 Official birthplace of the Cravat (later to be re-modelled by the French into the infamous `tie`, Croatia has been a lovely trip that I jumped on board with Phoebe Harrison and her fabulous Frenchy exchange-o friends. Rockin up in Split I was ill-prepared. Sure I could tell you the history of the country and its various regions, but how the hell did I get to Plitvice Lakes! Finding my feet and eventually sorting out where I was supposed to go I was met by a walm and welcoming kind of environment on my arrival to meet the clan...

You see, Plitvice Lakes looks a little something like this...

Dozens of waterfalls tumbling into crystal clear water, which houses various types of fish in its folds... Five hours walking took us around the upper and lower falls, through the caves and was enough time to have ensure much happy-snapping and gasps at ``the beauty of nature``... mmm sublime.
Split and Hvar
This journey was not a slow paced on in even the slightest sense of the word. Away from the islands we moved to the transport hub of Spilt... no sooner could you say ``Why is everyone here Austrlian` before we`d immersed ourselves in the culture, finding myself having to inexplicably rub Bepanthen into the back of a Native Canadians recently tattooed back, everyone loving the markets and trying to learn Croatian phrases and then realising that everyone speaks English anyway.
Away to Hvar for three nights and I counted my lucky stars on being involved in this trip as the planning wasa seamless... we had managed to snag ourselves an apartment for our stay... Days of great seafood, laughter, getting to see Phoebe again (yay!), sun, more and more pebbles and a sad infatuation with a John Grisham novel ensued....
Obviously getting restless, we moved to Dubrovnik ((with a short stop over in Serbia on the bus trip)... D-brik (as Ive started affectionately calling it) actually took my breath away and then I found I just couldnt breathe because there were so many damned tourists...
Another graphic:

And yes, I am shamelessly taking these photos off the internet. Id totally take my own and theyd be just as good as this, just in pure Amy style, I dont have my camera cord (lost, typical) and its quite crapola anywho.
But seriously this ancient walled fortress (as in the old town) is littered with little galleries, coffee shops, restaurants and shops that sell only white and blue striped merchandise. Our last day all together meant a trip to Lokrum (the island just off Dubrovnik), sunbathing, avoiding nudist beaches, boring people with our book reading, museum visting, wall climbing, wine-drinking, dinner and an exhausted getting into bed. Bon voyage to the rest of the girls and now I am flying solo in D-brik.

POINTS OF INTEREST

Ipod Death

 

 

 Yes. My ipod did not stand the test of time and was henceforth accidentally thrown into the sea just off the Turkish coast by persons other then myself. Whilst I have settled myself down now, I was quite riled up... a message wrote shortly after the incident can probably enlighten yout o what extent

I'm currently ın an ınternet cafe ın Turkey, frustratıngly tryıng to grapple wıth a Turkısh keyboard that keeps hıdıng key Englısh letters etc on me... please note my lack of 'enterıng', I have not found the ENTER button yet, or at least ıt does not work. Also, why ıs the god damn apostrophe the shıft key of the number 2! I swear, what were they thınkıng. Anywho, as you may have noted (maybe you saw my profıle status update)... I have lost the fabulous ıPod touch to the fabbled land of 'got wet broken Apple electronıcs' as ıt was accıdentally thrown ınto the GOD DAM AEGEAN SEA by persons other then myself... You may have notıced that thıs has me quıte rıled up. You would be correct. Dammıt. all my (actually some of) my musıc was on that... now all I have to look forward to are long haul Eastern European bus trıps wıth lıttle blastıng ınto my coclear then some hıghly twanged foreıgn (albeıt exotıc) tones... boo... 

The upside to this may be that I managed to start using Condos ipod and therefore find the beauty of the game Adas Hospital, a raring game where you set up your own medical clinic and treat serious illnesses such as depression by rubbing all over the face of the patient to remove their tears. See Graphic.

Couchsurfing

A couple of different couch surfing incidents popped up their head in Istanbul. Firstly I had many a random request from -people who were near me- including this hunk...

 who kindly offered to share not only his apartment, but also his bed. Selcuk you old dog.

But seriously, Condo and I scored the couch surfing jackpot. We met up, just upon arrival with Kai, a Turkish accountant who had lived in Canada for a few years! He walked us around Istanbul and let us grill him with questions about the upcoming elections, Turkish baths and appropriate protocol, history, geography, food... everything under the sun. He also showed us a fantastic coffee shop five floors above the city. Peace and quite just before we departed.

We also lucked in staying with Burark and his brother for a few nights. That were such funny guys, great music, great night out in Taksim hanging out at bars frequented by movie stars and the like, making full use of the sauna, spa, pool and table tennis... Fabulous fun. Definitely suggested for all travellers.

ART-WANK (finally)

Not sure how much more I can write, but here goes:

• Borusan Culture Centre, Istanbul- Five floor installation exhibition. Highlights being a work which involved an orchestra of printers who had been programmed to type so as to create melody, beat, rhythm.
• Sanralistanbul, Istanbul- free shuttle bus to a privately funded museum connected to one of the Universities here. Though my penchance isnt necessarily for modernist painting, I was impressed with the space and the generosity of private investors.
• Istanbul Modern- free on a Thursday and seriously good. Guy Madding was great. Rivane Neuschewander made an appearance#...
• War Photo Limited, Dubrovnik- very good exhibition space highlighting war photography. Harrowing tales of war photographers and their journey on the front line.