Madison to Philly To Lisbon
6–7 nov 2023, Stati Uniti ⋅ ☀️ 63 °F
We found a great connection from Madison to Philly to Lisbon. It was the shortest and cheapest option. Sweet! This will be our third time in Portugal and we can't wait.
Cuenca
2 marzo 2023, Stati Uniti ⋅ ☁️ 36 °F
We took the direct van from Vilcabamba to Cuenca in the morning and arrived right after 1 pm. It was full of mostly retired Americans and Canadians. Peter was one of the Canadians sitting near me and mentioned he was renting an apartment in Cuenca for the winter.
After we arrived, we ate a quick lunch, and took a cab to the nearby town of Banos and tried a new spa. This one was a little more upscale, and by that I mean it cost $16 but included a robe, towel, free tea, and nicer facilities than the place we've visited next door. In the contrasto pool we met a Belgian guy. Contrasto is a room with a very hot pool next to a very cold one. Switching back and forth is a great feeling. I call it a free buzz.
While talking to Gregory, I asked him if he knew Francoise, our Belgian friend in town who's partners with Nathan and whom we had a drink with a month earlier. He said "She's my mom." As if that isn't a small enough world, he mentioned that he's a landlord in town and I said "Do you know a Canadian guy named Peter?" and he said, "Yeah, I'm renting to him right now." Crazy. This is a town of about 500,000 but the gringo network seems pretty tight.
Gregory gave us a ride back to town, which was quite gracious. He mentioned that Yaku Mama was having an open mic tonight, since it's a Wednesday. We walked over there later (it was only 2 doors down from our hotel) and grabbed a table for dinner. As we were starting to sit down, there was Peter from the van, and his wife Sharon. We joined them and mentioned the whole dealio with Gregory and shared a laugh.
Peter's a pretty good blues guitarist and took his turn on the stage. He was pretty impressive, considering he started at age 50. We saw about 8 acts. Each got about 10 - 15 minutes and most were great, playing a variety of music. There was a family act of parents singing and on guitar and a teenage daughter playing beatbox, a local rock duo, and a weird American guy playing songs on just a bass, but at least he convinced the beatbox girl to join in. But the big surprise of the night was a woman who had dinner alone near our table. When it was her turn, she tuned up briefly with an acoustic guitar and proceeded to blow everybody away. Her song started as a Spanish Flamenco style and she had this amazing voice. Then she changed to an Operatic style of singing and at the end of one song she pursed her lips and made it sound like she was playing the trumpet. It's hard to explain, but was a fantastic display of talent. After she was done, about half of the audience went up to her and asked for her name or just to tell her how amazing she was. Rumor has it she was from France, but living in San Francisco.
The next day was just a time-killing day for us. Our flight to Quito was scheduled at 6, so we walked around town and at the 10 de Agusto market, we ran into a German woman named Claudia we met at the open mic. She had lived in many cities in the US. lived briefly in Vilcabamba (hated it) and lived in Cuenca now. She played the harmonica and had sat in with Peter and a few others. We invited her to lunch at Tiesto's, our favorite restaurant in Ecuador, but she was a no-show. The meal there was amazing as always. I suppose we should order something other than their signature dish, Langostinos Tiesto, but for an inexpensive feast of delicious seafood swimming in butter with about 10 salsas is hard to pass up.
After more walking around, we spotted Peter and Sharon drinking coffee at a cafe and laughed at the coincidence and chatted a bit. When I told Peter that Claudia was a no-show, he said "Musicians. What are you gonna do?" Granted that we pretty only much hang out in the historic center of town, as many gringos do, but we were still surprised at how small-town homey Cuenca felt to us, even though there is a hustle and bustle vibe here. In Ecuador, everyone is out and about and walking around. A city of 20,000 here seems much larger than a city of 200,000 in the states because of that.
Given the vibe we got on this short trip to Cuenca, I emailed Nate and Francoise to get Gregory's contact info. He rents for $350-$550/month and we just might try out Cuenca for a bit longer next time. We've never liked the weather here as much as many others. It's not horrible, but you never know if it's going to rain or not. The good news is that after a cool rain, it might get hot and sunny right away. So weather isn't a real reason to not give Cuenca a real try.
Back at the room, I saw 2 texts in a row that our 6 pm flight on Latam is delayed, and then cancelled. Crap! We're flying from Quito at 1:30 am on a different airline and this is all happening a few hours from the scheduled flight. While I'm starting to panic and search for another flight, they sent another text saying we're booked on the 10 pm flight to Quito. It's only an hour flight and it's plenty of time for the later flight to Quito. Whew.
I paid the front desk at our hotel $15 more to keep the room until 8 pm. That's half of the room rate for a basic room in the historic center. That worked out great since we were planning on spending several hours at the Quito airport. It all worked out, as usual, and 4 flights later we landed in Madison at about noon. It's the end of another great trip. No wonder we can't wait for our next adventure.Leggi altro
Vilcabamba and Izcayluma
27 febbraio 2023, Ecuador ⋅ ☁️ 66 °F
This is our third time back to Vilcabamba and the Eco Resort of Izhcayluma (ISH ka looma). It's our happy place. As many of you know, a 3 day reservation here in March of 2020 turned into a 3 month stay during the Covid pandemic. So it's a bit of a reunion of sorts for us. The German owners Peter and Dieter are still here running the show, along with Raik, the manager. Vanessa, from Argentina is still in charge of the Yoga program. All guests get free yoga at 7:30 in the morning. Dennis, a local, is still tending bar here, along with Steve the Canadian, as a backup.
Madli and her young daughter came back from Estonia. Her bestie Emma, from Holland, lives in a mountain paradise she's built with husband Rob, a retired American soldier. Their daughter Ayan is good friends with Madli's daughter Nayara. Carolyn is back for the winter from Florida. Funny that she comes here for the winter when everyone else in the states is going to Florida. We were quarantined with all of these people and more and picked right up where we left off. And so it's not just the rest and relaxation of a temperate climate that brings us back. It's all the friends and the yoga and the amazing hikes also.
Compared to my other posts of other places, there's not a lot of interest to mention. I'm doing yoga about 5-6 times a week and hiking over 7 miles a day. I've worn the soles off my shoes. I estimate that I put over 2000 miles on them in 14 months.
We rented the same amazing apartment that we rented before and we have a kitchen. We eat breakfast here about half the time and the other times we go up to the main restaurant to eat fresh granola, fruit, and drink coffee from beans grown onsite. There's always someone new checking in and it's easy to make friends here. For dinner, sometimes we eat at the restaurant on site, or walk to town for local options.
Many people come to Izcayluma before or after Shaman ceremonies at neighboring places. That seems to be pretty popular with Americans. It involves a week or so of taking San Pedro, a mescaline hallucinogenic cactus. They then alternate that with Ayuhuasca, a jungle vine hallucinogen and then maybe another day is for Kambo treatments. That's a frog poison that's administered into the skin in small doses. No thanks! Except for the San Pedro that is.
We visited Rob and Emma's place for 2 nights for a San Pedro ceremony with them and Madli. They finished the house that was just starting construction 2 years ago and we stayed in their casita near the river. It was a mellow and relazing day where we just hiked up a mountain, relaxed on the rocky mountain river that runs through their property, toured the garden, and later ate a delicious meal with items from their garden. It's a great "back to nature" drug. For anyone that thinks that's crazy, I have to say alcohol is a much worse drug :)
Vilcabamba is the village down the hill from Izcayluma. It's growing still and there are several more restaurants now. Our favorite is a Korean place with homemade kimchi. I'm also eating a lot of the almuerzos for lunch at various restaurants. They're the set meals for about $3. All in all, we're eating healthy and exercising a lot and enjoying time in the evenings with friends. We even organized a game of Werewolf, a role playing game. I think we had about 14 people show up for that.
Our friend Louie joined us for about a week. He's a like-minded traveler without kids and has met us in Barcelona, Salzburg, Madison, and now here. He's a pilot for United so is more able than most to just pick up and go. We had some great times on our hikes and at the bar with him.
And we finally made it to the nearby Podocarpus National Park, named after the tree that is supposed to be abundant there. It was closed for Covid the first time we were here and closed for trail repairs the second time. We shared a taxi with Mercedes and Don, whom we met at the restaurant. We also met another couple, Claudia and John, and they hired another taxi to the park situated about 45 minutes north. It was an amazing hiking day. The trails are lined with mossy trees, ferns, and lots and lots of orchids. None of us was sure what a Podocarpus looks like, but I don't think we saw any. It seems to be a pine. We also met a German guy on the trail and together enjoyed the views of distant Loja and all of the amazing flora.
We've got 2 more nights here before heading to Cuenca for a night. Then we fly to Quito and will head towards home. We've had a full month here in Vilcabamba, and it's not enough for us, but it's time to go home. I can't say enough about Izhcayluma. It's so easy to meet new friends and reunite with old ones. I have a sneaking suspicion that I'll be back.
More photos and videos are here
https://photos.app.goo.gl/CiDo2nBJUvddj3K47Leggi altro
Cuenca, Ecuador
31 gennaio 2023, Ecuador ⋅ ⛅ 61 °F
Cuenca is quite a change from the beaches on the coast. It's at elevation and in the heart of Andean culture. It's a lovely city that most people love and it has drawn a lot of expat retirees. We thought about moving here but the weather is a little too cool for us. But it's a great place to visit. We spent a few days here seeing the sites again. A few years ago, we met Nathan and Francois in Vilcabamba and looked them up in Cuenca. He's from the Chicago area and she's from Belgium. They invited us to a party at their place and to a dinner and music show in that visit.
So we looked them up again and had a drink or two and caught up on things. Maybe we'll meet them in Argentina someday? It's on all of our lists of places to go. Besides that, we just sampled some of the fine restaurants in town and I had to get my Almuerzos in. They're the basic set meals at many restaurants and market food stalls. The soups are very hearty and worth the price alone. But with that you get a juice, a main dish, and rice/plantains/potatos for about $3.
We took a morning to go to a balneario, or hot spring bath spa. There are quite a few in the neighboring village of Banos, not to be confused with the much larger hot spring city of the same name. The water was warm, there were Turkish saunas, and a super hot and super cold pool to get the full treatment in. The next day, we went to a lab and got blood draws and ordered some basic tests. It's super cheap here and for about $100 each, we did about 9 or so tests each. We did this because you need prescriptons for many, or can't even get them done unless there's an indication of a problem, like knowing your Vitamin D or A1C levels. Everything checked out OK, especially the Cholesterol, which strangely seem to drop for me here :)
After a couple nights we were raring to go south to Vilcabamba. The eco resort we stay at has a daily shuttle bus that lets us get there a few hours faster for only a few bucks more. We can't wait to get back to the area and have a mini-reunion with friends we were quarantined with during the height of the Covid epidemic.
More photos and videos are here. https://photos.app.goo.gl/7y9J34DqNQi1uW8C8Leggi altro
Olon, Ecuador
22 gennaio 2023, Ecuador ⋅ ⛅ 82 °F
You're never alone in Olon. It's our version of a beach paradise, or close to it at least. We spent a month here 2 years ago but this time we found it harder to find reasonable long term lodging and settled for 10 days. We actually booked the same apartment even though it had been sold last year.
Our friends from Madison, Marc and Jo Brand are regulars and happened to be here at the same time as us. They met a few other Wisconsin couples and we were invited to a dinner party consisting of 8 people from the Madison area. Such a small world.
On weekends, Olon bustles with Ecuadorian working class families enjoying a weekend at the beach. Also the rich families form the Guyayquil area enjoy their beachfront mansions, and a few of those have private security.
During the week, it's pretty quiet and beachcombing gringos is the most exciting thing around. That's fine by me. Deanne and I picked up an almost daily yoga routine on our morning beach walks. We also sampled the many restaurants and enjoyed nightly sunsets.
The beach is about 8 miles long and runs north to south, so everyone gets a sunset view from the beach. Our favorite restaurant is now a South Indian restaurant with friendly staff.
We cooked dinner twice and made our own breakfast every day. The fresh seafood market is a bunch of people selling the daily catch on a side street. You can choose between farm raised shrimp or Ocean shrimp for between $2 and $4 per pound depending on the type and the size. There's plenty of tuna, Mahi Mahi and a few other species of fish.
The word is out on Olon for retirees as there seems to be even more that have settled here in the last 2 years. There's a new sportsbar in town and duing an NFL playoff game, we met antother guy from Wisconsin and there was a couple nearby from Wausau. It's Cheesheads everywhere here!
Counting our 10 days in Olon, we spent a total of 3 weeks on Ecuador's fine beaches. It was great but it's time to head to the mountains. We will stop for a few days in Cuenca before heading south to our favorite spot of Vilcabamba.
More photos and videos are here.
https://photos.app.goo.gl/ABHef1q6VQKsqrX68Leggi altro
Montanita
18 gennaio 2023, Ecuador ⋅ ⛅ 82 °F
Montanita is a surfer beach town in South West Ecuador. It's got a party vibe and lots of loud discos. We wanted to spend the rest of our beach time in nearby Olon, but couldn't find a place for more than 10 days. So we booked 3 days here in a nice place on the quieter side of the beach. It was actually pretty nice and not too loud. There's lots of international restaurants and the backpacker set. We had a balcony with table, chairs and hammock right on the ocean. That was a nice splurge. Other than beachcombing, reading, and watching sunsets, there wasn't much left to do except enjoy the food and a few cervezas.
Next stop is Olon, just north of town and around a rocky outcrop known as the "point" to the surfers.Leggi altro
Puerto Lopez
14 gennaio 2023, Ecuador ⋅ ⛅ 79 °F
We were in Puerto Lopez two years ago and stayed at the wonderful Hosteria Mandala again. It's a Swiss/Italian owned garden of Eden. For more than 20 years, they've maintained a garden paradise across the street from the beach, far away from the center with the food stalls and hawkers. It's reason enough to visit this little beach town. There's a great breakfast included, a large library of biology books in multple languages, a small musical instrument museum, games galore, billiards, garden paths, bird watching, and much more. Too bad the restaurant isn't open yet. Because of Covid, they're not fully staffed yet.
There's not much to say about hanging around on a beach and beach combing. It's been a wonderful week of eating great seafood, getting sun, doing yoga on the beach, and reading in hammocks. We went on a day trip to Isla de la Plata, sometimes called the "Poor Man's Galapagos." That's because for onlly $40, you can take a boat an hour and a half away to the small island and see Blue Footed Boobies, which are found also on the Galapagos. There's also crabs, sea lions, Frigate birds, Perigrine Falcons, and a few other species of Boobies. At the end of the tour, we got to snorkel for a half hour and saw lots of fish, incuding a large Puffer Fish.
The main drama this week was when Deanne got bit by a wild dog on the beach. I decided to jog home and Deanne was bitten right after that. And so was another guest at our hosteria. The same dog bit them within minutes! Georg was Edith's friend, and he took all of us to the health clinic in his car. We got right in and they fixed Deanne and Edith up and gave tetanus shots. It had been 9 years for Deanne and luckily, she's had Rabies shots. We were out of there within an hour with meds and no bill!
Apparently, tourists get free emergency medical care with the visa. On a down side, the doctor didn't ask Deanne if she was allergic to Penicillin, so we got home and realized that's the med she got. We went back and got a script since they were out of other antibiotics. So it cost us $4.50 at the pharmacy across the street. What would that have cost in the US?
We'll stay here for a total of a week and then move south down the beach to the party and surf town of Montanita. We booked a nice room with a private balcony on the beach.
More photos and videos are here. https://photos.app.goo.gl/ppe4A27QkjsrgjV28Leggi altro
Good to see that Deanne is going to be OK. It's also amazing (I really try not to overuse that word) that you didn't have to spend anything for all of that. Like you said, God only knows what that would have cost at home. I'm going to stock up on blood pressure medication before I leave, and I'll save several hundred dollars. Our for profit system sucks. [Matt]
Mindo
4 gennaio 2023, Ecuador ⋅ ☁️ 66 °F
If Quito is purgatory, then Mindo must be heaven. Lying just 2 hours west of Quito, but halfway down towards the coast, Mindo is a birder's heaven at least. Quito's elevation is 9,300 feet. It's the 2nd highest capital in the world, after La Paz, Bolivia. But Mindo is at about 4,000 feet, or 1300 meters. The warm and moist air from the Pacific make the Mindo area a cloud forest and that means lots of birds and warmer temperatures. We're not huge birders, mostly because we can't see them that well. But we're willing to give it the old college try again. We've seen some great birds in South Africa, Costa Rica, and Panama.
We immediately liked Mindo. It's warmer, it's easier to breathe with the lower elevation, and it has clean air. It's a typical small Ecuadorian town with a main street and a Plaza. But it's a tourist town offering bird tours, ziplines, waterfalls, horse-riding, etc. Given that, it still is quite charming. Our neighbors in McFarland have been here, along with a few other friends. We got a recommendation for the "Yellow House" on the edge of the village and we couldn't be happier. We rented a 2 story "cabin" on a rocky river with a full kitchen for $44/night or $54 with an amazing breakfast.
But it's the property that is the really amazing part. The lot is huge and boasts 5 long hiking trails with varied, lush terrain and lots and lots of birds and flowers. They charge people to hike if they're not staying here.
After checking in, we went on a 2 hour afternoon hike and within 15 minutes saw a juvenile Capybara, leafcutter ants on the march, Toucans, Tanagers, and many other birds we couldn't identify. It's lovely. Halfway through, a neighbor on a white horse rode by saying "Buenas."
The pleasant town has lots of local and foreign owned restaurants. We opted for an "almuerzo" or set lunch for $3 which is a hearty soup, main course of meat or seafood, 2-3 starches, and a juice. We both got the trout, because who the hell would pass up fresh caught trout for that amount? The soup alone was worth the price. That night we had a set dinner meal at a Persian place and the spices were amazing. Ecuador isn't known for it's cuisine and sometimes the food can be basic, so we tend to eat at the exotic places when we find them. We'll be eating lots of rice, chicken, and plantains soon enough.
The next morning we had a wonderful breakfast at the main house on the property. It's perched on a hill looking over many large treetops at eye level. There's 3 hummingbird feeders right in front of us, so we enjoyed seeing dozens of them feasting while we did the same.
Then, it was off to the nearby waterfalls and some freaky and creaky cable cars. A short taxi ride up the mountain is the "teleferico" an old ski resort cable car. This thing must be 50+ years old. I assume they bought the equipment from a ski resort in Chile or maybe even the States. But it worked. It had open air ski lift seats and they whisked up and over a large valley. The views of the trees from above were amazing, and to top it off, we saw another Toucan from up there.
At the other end, we started a trail that led to about 6 waterfalls. We met a couple from Holland that was on our bus and we did the hike together. It was their 2nd day of a 6 month trip and we gave them some good advice. They'd never heard of the Almuerzo, so I just saved them $200 on their trip at least.
Later, we took the "Tarabita" lift, which is kind of like a big basket that holds 4 people. We met a young couple from LA and shared the ride down with them. The funny thing about that lift is that it's powered by an old Nissan truck engine that sits in a concrete shelter. We walked back to town and grabbed some Venezuelan Arepas and a couple beers for dinner. What a great day. And we're just starting.
On our last 2 days in Mindo, we explored the trails on the property and paid for a night tour guide through the cloud forest. We did this once in Costa Rica and it's fun. We saw tarantulas, a scorpion, lots of small frogs, some sleeping motmots, and the only mammal, a Kinkajou.
The trails on our property are amazing and better than many trails I've been on in national parks in various countries. We didn't see a whole lot of birds, but the lush cloud forest starts about 35 minutes from our cabin. There are lots of mossy trees, grasses, and bamboo lining the trails. Right near the end I did get to see the fabled Cock of the Rock for about 2 seconds. It was raining pretty hard and he landed on a branch near us. They have a huge round red head.
Our next stop is Puerto Lopez on the coast. It will be a long travel day. To shorten it, we're hiring a driver to take us to Santo Domingo 2 hours away. That saves us a few hours of waiting for 2 buses. From Santo Domingo, it's an 8 hour bus ride. But Puerto Lopez is worth it. We were there 2 years ago and will stay at Hosteria Mandala again, where a quaint cabin awaits us in a lush garden setting across the street from the beach.
- Breakfast with the Colibri (hummingbirds) https://photos.app.goo.gl/h2Ps1rPJ1mJTdc1R9
- If you're into Orchids, check out this album https://photos.app.goo.gl/gYAanG523MoTY7j5A
- More photos and videos are here https://photos.app.goo.gl/73Y4V1oE49VMSzwc7Leggi altro
Latacunga
3 gennaio 2023, Ecuador ⋅ ☁️ 59 °F
Latacunga is a mid size colonial city in the "Avenue of the Volcanoes" south of Quito. That's the nickname give to the PanAm highway that runs south of Quito through a series of cities and near many volcanoes. We needed to do something since museums were closed and I though it would be nice to visit a town I had visited in 1995. I went there for the Mama Negra festival and had a great time. Too good of a time perhaps.
The Mama Negra festival occurs each November. While having a white man dressed in blackface is not too cool, the story behind this festival is. The story I heard is that the indiginous were treated so poorly by the Spaniards that they thought that God must be a black woman. Spaniards were the devil, and they were all white men. Therefore, god must be the opposite. So the story goes. They only select prominent white men in Latacunga to be the Mama Negra each year to be the parade host. I guess it's quite an honor.
All I know is that the cook and cleaners at my Spanish Language school exchange family talked a few of us into going to the party and parade. It was pretty crazy, kind of like Mardi Gras in New Orleans. The parade is huge and featured costumed dancing troupes, marching bands, and some floats. One guy walked around with a humongous BBQ pig hoisted above his head, wearing it on a harness. I asked someone nearby what that was all about. She just said "we like pork." As the float went by, people screamed "Senor Chancho!" or "Mr. Pork!" I almost forgot to mention that it's good luck to be squirted with milk from Mama Negra's baster. She's on the main float. I know. Weird, right? Oh, and there were lots and lots of guys in drag, a la Monty Python style.
I was offered many, many shots of some unnamed booze by mostly older women in costumes who thought it would be funny to get the gringos drunk. They did and I barely remember getting back to the Pan Am highway to get on a northbound bus.
Anyway, going to Latacunga seemed like a fun day trip. It took us 45 minutes to get to the main bus station, Quitumbe, on the trole (tram). Then it took almost 2 hours on the bus. The city is only about 100,000 but it was so busy with pedestrians, cars stuck in traffic, and vendors of all types selling all manner of wares on the streets. We walked about 10 blocks to the central plaza and grabbed some cash at an ATM. Then it was off to find a traditional Chugchucaras restaurant.
It's a mouthful to say, and more of a mouthful to eat. Chugchucaras is a pork lover's paradise. It consists of pork rinds on top of big chunks of pork, a side of hominy, a side of deep fried corn that doesn't pop (more hominy?) some potatoes, popcorn, and a deep fried little donut thingy. When we walked in, we were handed a huge pork rind as an appetizer. I made sure we only ordered one of the dishes. I saw how big the plates were. And thankfully, the waitress asked if we wanted the small or large portion. "Small, please!" We finished it, but barely. It was good, but probably a one-time deal for us. Our arteries are thankful.
After that we walked around the traffic clogged streets and finally found a nice area with few cars. There were LOTS of high school kids walking around. Apparenly school hours are 7-12:30 in Ecuador and kids don't eat lunch at school. They just got out. They all have uniforms and most of them are pretty cool, like track suits. I probably saw 5-6 different uniforms and over a hundred kids eating, walking around, practicing dancing, flirting, etc.
We went to a small museum that described the Mama Negra Festival and it had some costumed manequins. I totally forgot to take pics of the nice areas, so the street scenes below aren't going to sell Latacunga on anyone. Unless of course, you make it to the festival. At the end, I'm adding a few photos I took at the festival, including Sr. Chancho.Leggi altro
So cool! I am assuming that Mama Negra is their version of the Black Madonna? [Julie Hippler]
Quito
1 gennaio 2023, Ecuador ⋅ ☁️ 66 °F
Ahhh Quito. This is my 6th time in Ecuador and 4th time in Quito. I fell in love with traveling because of this city and country. It was my first time out of the US when I first visited in 1992 and I got bit pretty hard by the travel bug. But now I'm a bit of a weary traveler and the city has lost some of it's charm on me. The old town where we stayed is in much better shape than ever and there are police everywhere protecting tourists and locals alike. But it's still a huge Latin American city, and that means traffic and air polution.
It's cleaner than ever with its system of trolleys and a brand new underground Metro system should start service any month now. It's 3 years late and probably millions over budget, but building a subway system in a city this big and in the mountains was no easy task. I was amazed at how clean the Centro Historico, or old town is compared to my first time here. Man, it was grotty and the streets were full of buses spewing blue-black smoke. The pollution is better, but at this altitude, we still felt it. And I did notice that the "electric" trolleys were mostly gone and replaced by large diesel buses. The massive infrastructure spent on putting up the electrical lines seems to be wasted.
We landed just after midnight on New Years eve to save some cash and arrived at our hotel at about 2 am. Having a driver pick us up at the airport was a great idea. But most things were closed on New Years Day and then the day after that was a Monday. Most museums are closed on Mondays and/or Tuesday so we missed out on the Museo Nacional, an amazing museum with lots of Inca artifacts, incuding the famous Gold Mask. I've seen it twice, but wanted Deanne to see it.
It wasn't like we had a bad time, but we probably stayed a day too long. We found good restaurants and felt totally safe but there wasn't too much to do. At one point, I took a picture of a street corner plaza and counted 17 different types of cops from 3 different agencies! Two types were official police and the other group were like tourist police without arms. But still, that seems like overkill. Especially since most were just talking to themselves or were on their phones instead of looking for the myriad of pickpockets.
The old town is much safer than the Mariscal neighborhood in the new city. I know 2 people who were victims there of the old "mustard" trick where someone squirts mustard on you and another person shows up to clean it off. And in the process, they clean you out. We avoided that area except for a lovely New Year's Day stroll in the empty streets. The thieves and everyone else were sleeping.
I talked Deanne into taking a day trip to Latacunga, just for something to do. We didn't need to take a bus to the Equator for a photo and we didn't need to go to Otavalo, a wonderful market town. Who wants to buy souveniers at the beginning of a 2 month trip? After 4 nights, we headed to Mindo, an amazing bird watching paradise in a cloud forest. Now we're talking.Leggi altro
Home
6 novembre 2022, Stati Uniti ⋅ ☀️ 45 °F
Home at last.
Roma, Amor
4 novembre 2022, Italia ⋅ ⛅ 66 °F
This is our last stop on our 10 week trip. It's been amazing and ending in Rome makes a great bookend with Stockholm as our start. The first thing we noticed were the crowds. Lots and lots of other people want to see this magical city. It's by far the most crowded city we've been to on this trip.
We bought a 3 day transportation pass and headed to St. Peter's Basilica after checking in to our hotel room near the train station. In the late afternoon, the lines were a half mile long, and it officially holds up to 60,000 people. They certainly don't let that many in, but we decided to visit at 7 am the next morning to beat the rush. And we also found out that even though the website says all tickets are sold for the Vatican Museums this week, we checked the counter there and they told us they sell tickets at the gate up until 4 and close at 6. So we decided to do that a few days later after most of the people left and there were no lines. In the morning, lines for this can easily be a mile long and a several hour wait, even with "skip the line tickets." Everyone has to go through security, so there's no such thing as skip the line anymore.
On Friday afternoon at 3:30, we walked right in. Inside, there were still a ton of people and tours, so there was no elbow room at all and you kind of had to go with the herd. We did get a good 20 minutes or more in the Sistine Chapel though. We use Rick Steves audio tours, which are free on his app. We pretty much hate guided tours because they make everyone so clueless. Seriously, few things make people lose common courtesy or common sense than being led around a city by someone with a flag. His app lets you stop or start when you want and provides good details. You can easily pay hundreds of dollars for similar info from a guide.
Over the next 4 days, we did a lot of walking to soak up the sites: The Trevi Fountain at night and during the day, the Spanish Steps at night, St. Peter's Square at night and during the day, the Vatican Museums, etc. Exploring the neighborhoods was fun. Our favorite was theTrastevere, which means "across the Tiber." It was less crowded, had no tour groups, and had more locals. The food was good, as expected. There are gluten-free options in many restaurants now, so I had my fill of delicious pizza and pasta dishes. Meals with wine are still cheap for an American, even in a tourist-filled capital city in Europe. Many times we had a hard time paying $50 for a great meal with wine for 2.
One shocker to me was that you can't sit or party on the Spanish Steps. 22 years ago, that was THE thing to do. From pre-teens to the elderly, you could just open a bottle of wine and chill out for as long as you want. So we brought a bottle of wine and a new liqueur for me, Liqueur Strega, and settled in. An American busker our age sat behind us and started playing the soundtrack of our lives. It was pretty great, and some of the best music we've heard on the trip. And then the cops walked around telling everyone to get up and leave. What the hell?! Granted, it was a little sketchy last time I was here, but sketchy in Rome is like DisneyLand in America.
On our last day, we had seen all the "must see" sights and were pretty much burned out on being a tourist. No more museums! No more crowds! No more tour groups! So we walked to non-touristy neighborhoods and strolled through the pleasant cemetery for non-Catholics (their term, not mine.) It was a peaceful oasis and we saw the tombs of Percy Shelley, John Keats, and Goethe. I haven't read any of them, but this might motivate me to. Later, I did the math with my pedometer app. We averaged 7.7 miles a day over the 10 weeks. Not bad, considering many days were spent on a train.
Our Eurail pass was the best investment we made. I can't believe what a great deal it is if you travel more than a few weeks and visit a few sites. The stats on our app tells the tale:
- 7 countries visited by train (we hit 8 with Helsinki, but didn't take a train there).
- 8,900 Km of rail
- 43 cities stopped or started by rail
- 4 days and 14 hours of rail time
For about $16/day per person, we did all of that. The pass paid for itself within 2 1/2 weeks. We didn't miss a train, even though we did run through stations quite a few times. Every now and then I'd check a rail site to see what a ticket would cost if we bought it the day of the train. In Italy, one half of our route on one day would have cost over $200!
I'm in Rome's Fiumicino Airport as I write this, waiting for our plane home. And all I can say is, I need a vacation.
More photos and videos are here.
St. Peter's Basilica https://photos.app.goo.gl/n3WCBXypraMhqaSs8
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Pompeii
1 novembre 2022, Italia ⋅ ⛅ 73 °F
Sorrento is a great base for exploring the area. We hit the Amalfi coast yesterday and today, we took the circumvesuviana train to Pompeii. I gotta admit, I kinda like saying circumvesuviana. It's the private train line that links Sorrento with Pompeii and then onto Naples. There's a few tunnels between here and there and a few bridges with views of the Gulf of Naples. There were quite a lot of tourists on our trains since this is All Saints Day and the end of a 4 day weekend for Italians. The vast majority of tourists I heard were Italian.
What's there to say about Pompeii? You probably know the gist, but in 79 CE Vesuvius blew its top. The nearby port city of Pompeii held about 20,000 people and they think about 2,000 were killed by the gas or ash. The few bodies that were found left a perfect cavity in the ash that hardened and starting in the 1700's people poured plaster in the cavity and that's what you see in the pictures here. The bodies disintegrated into ashes after the volcanic ashes hardened. Ashes to ashes.....
It took 45 minutes or so to take the train near our apartment right to the ruins gate. The ruins are huge and there are lots of places to visit where there are hardly any people. We met an American physician named Tom who works for the State Department in Eastern and Southern Europe. He provides medical care for State Dept. staff and US citizens when needed. Not a bad gig. We had a lot in common as he was an avid traveler also, so we hung out together as we explored the sites. It was yet another great day.
Tomorrow, we check out of this amazing apartment. We've noticed the pollution getting worse in Sorrento over our stay. Today, we could barely see Vesuvius from our balcony, when the other day it was crystal clear. We have been smelling burning wood and plastic for 2 days. I'm not sure what that's all about, but it's time to move on. We'll take the circumvesuviana (I did it again) to Naples and then change to a high speed train to Rome, where we'll spend the last 4 days and nights of this amazing journey.
More photo and videos are here.
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Amalfi and Positano
31 ottobre 2022, Italia ⋅ ☀️ 73 °F
Whelp. We can't sit still for too long. There's a bus route along the cliff of the Amalfi coast that is pretty famous. It goes from Sorrento to Positano and Amalfi, two very famous towns. Why it's not called the Positano coast, I'll never know. That's a more popular tourist town these days. But from our balcony, I can see the train station and part of the bus station below and across the street. It's Halloween weekend, and that means All Saints Day is Tuesday. Italians get a 4 day weekend, and that's why it's been so crazy crowded here. I could see long lines for the bus from the balcony for a couple days, so we wisely decided to skip the bus route that hugs the coast and take an all day ferry cruise where we could stop at Positano and Amalfi for 3 hours each. Besides, seeing the land from the sea is better than seeing the sea from the land.
We left at 9:30 and were back by 6;30. It was again an unseasonably warm 72, which feels a lot hotter. Positano was absolutely packed with tourists. This was the last day for this boat tour. For the next month or so, the tour is shorter because the high season ends. And then the tourist boats pretty much stop, so our timing was lucky. We had no agenda in Positano, so we walked towards some stairs and walked up and up and up to get some views. Then we found the road, which is now a one way road, west to east, since it's so narrow. We walked down and past lots of tourist shops. You've seen one, you've seen them all..... But it was a pleasant experience, especially stopping for a dessert and wine. Three hours later, we were at the ferry port.
We hopped on the boat for the next leg down the coast to Amalfi. It was also crowded, but seemed to have a bit more room. We researched a place up a a few steps and near the church and grabbed lunch. It was delicious and not just a tourist trap like we experienced in Sorrento the day before. Afterwards, we climbed more steps and got wonderfully lost. At one point, we were in a tunnel and going up some narrow steps. A woman was doing laundry and looked surprised to see us? "Privado?" I asked. Yup. So we backtracked and circled around. And we ended up with the hordes of tourists on the main street and the requisite knick-knack shops and limoncello stores. We killed time as best we could and the sun set as we headed back to Sorrento on the boat. It was a great day. Tomorrow, we head to Pompeii. I was there in 2000 and it will be Deanne's first time.
More photos and videos are here.
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Sorrento, Italy
30 ottobre 2022, Italia ⋅ ☀️ 72 °F
From Verona, we took a high speed train to Bologna, where we changed to another one that took us to Naples. The first train was almost entirely in tunnels. That was probably about 90 miles of tunnels, the longest train tunnels I've been in. Both were very fast and at one point, we were cruising at 248 KPH, or over 150 miles per hour. When we got out of the train in Naples at lunch time, it was like we landed on another planet.
For 8 1/2 weeks we've been in North and Central Europe, where everything works and people are chill. Stepping outside, it was pure chaos. It was dirty and smelly and loud. But at least there was no garbage strike, and Naples is infamous for those. People honked to be heard over others honking. Ambulances were stuck in traffic and the siren just kept on going. Nobody noticed except us. Bike food delivery drivers screamed at each other on the sidewalk as we walked by. But the sun was shining.
We needed a bus to get to the ferry to get to Sorrento and you need to buy bus tickets at a tobaccanist shop and not on the buses. We walked quite a bit to find one and got bad info from Google maps and we never did find one. There was no place at the station to buy bus tickets either, so we went back to take a Metro to the ferry port. The lines to buy Metro tickets were long. Either there is no app, or locals don't use it because it wasn't just tourists standing in line. Long story short, there was no option to buy the Metro line 1 ticket on these machines. Finally, I went to a random store and asked to buy bus tickets and luckily the guy sold them. He was very nice about it. An hour after starting our search, we got on a bus that took us near the ferry. If we had taken the train, we would have been in Sorrento by then. E la vita.
I found a restaurant by the port with good reviews and it was amazing. We sat in the street which looked like an alley. It was a Saturday at noonish and families were out for lunch. Kids screamed at each other at the table behind us. Our waiters were good and fast and the bacalo (cod) meals we got were amazing. A bottle of Pinot Grigio settled us in.
From there, it was just a short walk to the ferry. Too bad we couldn't sit outside to get better views, but the ones we saw of the Gulf of Naples were pretty good. We hugged the coast until we got to the port of Sorrento.
Once there we hopped on a shuttle bus to take us to our apartment, at the top of the cliff and next to the train station. We REALLY wanted that boat trip. It would have been so much easier to take the train.
It's a steep city and there was no way we were walking with luggage. The bus only left when full, like in SE Asia or Turkey. We met our host at the apartment we rented for 3 days. Wow. It's definitely the biggest apartment we have stayed in on the trip, and probably the best. It's a 2 BR unit with a humongous balcony we have it to ourselves. It boasts great views of Mt. Vesuvius and the city and bay below.
The famous island of Capri is just a short ferry ride away, but this balcony is heaven. Who would come all this way and not go to Capri? Us. After 9 weeks of travel, we need to chill out in the sun instead of walking down another charming street. Capri will always be there, but eating breakfast, drinking wine, and reading on our sunny balcony is just what the doctor ordered.
We did get out and see the sights. We walked back to the port to buy ferry tickets to go to Amalfi and Positano. And we ate lunch at a restaurant. But this is the most touristy city we've been to on the whole trip. It sure looks like cruise ships dumped a lot of people here during the day. That's not our scene. So we went to the grocery store and bought food and wine for meals and enjoyed the balcony for the next few days.
More photos and videos are here.
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My paternal grandparents, who came from the Campobasso area in the Apennines, departed from Naples in 1911. They were glad to get the hell out of there. Another nice post. [Matt]
Verona
28 ottobre 2022, Italia ⋅ ⛅ 72 °F
The high speed train from St. Poelten whisked us west, towards Innsbruck, where we spent a few days just a month or so earlier. But the snow on the mountains was all melted when we arrived. It melted in 5 weeks in the fall! It was about 72 degrees when we arrived, which is well above average.
We grabbed a quick lunch and jumped on another high speed train heading straight south to Verona, through the Brenner Pass of the Alps into Italy. The mountain scenery was the best we'd seen since Switzerland.
It was smooth sailing with the apartment check-in. The hardest thing to do then was decide where to drink wine in the sun with a Roman Arena in the background. I noticed the cultural differences right away. Italians really do talk louder, often, and with their hands. Austrians, Germans and especially the Swiss are so reserved in comparison. It's not a bad thing, but very noticable when you were in a totally different environment just a day earlier.
We passed through Trento before arriving in Verona, home of the MYTHICAL Romeo and Juliet from Shakespeare. Someone decided that a particular balcony was the one where "Guilieta" received Romeo. It's a PLAY, people. We walked by the busy street it's on and peeked in to look at all the people clamoring to take pictures. For a few extra euros you could go up to the balcony for Instagram photos. The line was long.
Verona is actually a very touristy city, and for good reason. It's well-preserved and has a complete Roman Arena that is used for live operas still. There are lots of quaint piazzas, markets, and restaurants. We skipped all museums and churches and spent a wonderful day and a half just walking around and enjoying the cuisine, wine, and coffee. That's what you're supposed to do in Italy, right?
More photos and videos are here.
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Haunoldstein, Austria
27 ottobre 2022, Austria ⋅ ⛅ 66 °F
Before getting on our night train from Berlin to Vienna, we got a pleasant surprise from Bogdan, our Polish friend we were just visiting in Wroclaw. He was in Berlin for work that day and would take the train with us, which passed throgh Wroclaw at about 10:22 pm. We met on the platform. We paid for a 3 person couchette and there was another gentleman in our compartment, but we visited Bogdan in a first class seating area he was sharing with a young Amercian woman from LA. Of course he brought his homemade limoncello, so we all had a good time before we headed back to our compartment. But not before we exchanged gifts of a bottle of limoncello for some German chocolates we bought for Beata and Bogdan.
There's not a lot of room in a couchette, but we each get a bed for a $55 supplement per person. We rang the porter, who set up the beds for us. It wasn't the most restful sleep, with all of the starting and stopping on the way to Vienna through Poland and Czechia. The train even stopped near the Czech border for an hour and a half for us to sleep and so that we could arrive at 7 in Vienna.
We had planned to take about 3 of these on our trip, but they sell out early. After this one, we were glad we didn't because we're not 18 anymore and because first class day travel is just so much more comfortable. We weren't in the best shape possible for visiting our friends Angela and Charlie. Deanne was an exchange student with Angela's family in the nearby village of Wachberg. It had a grand total of 4 houses. Deanne lived in Wachtberg 4 for about 3 months in 1977. Eight years ago, we visited them and since we're in the neighborhood, we thought we'd stop in again. Deanne was looking forward to seeing her "mutti" or mother, as this might be the last time we see her.
Angela picked us up at the train station in St. Poelten, the largest city nearby. It's a lovely looking city and I'm always amazed at how big European cities look to me. I looked it up. It's only got about 54,000 people, but looks much larger. That's probably because Europeans are always walking around and going to and from bus, tram, and train stations. I think cars and roads hide a city's true population and let people live farther from a city and keep them from interacting.
It was just a short drive to their village of Haunoldstein from the train station. They fed us well, and often. We walked around and visited a friend who had just moved into a house they built. What a treat to see some new and smart architecture. Out here in a village, people have more living room. We're used to cramped city apartments and hotel rooms, so it's nice to see not everyone lives like that.
Afterwards, we visited Mutti and her daghter in law Petra, and her grandchildren in Wachtberg. They live on a working farm and we got the grand tour of the operation. They have a small dairy farm, raise pigs for slaughter, make christmas tree stands in their "spare" time and have a few other operations going on. The kids all worked on the farm doing the chores and acted as tour guides. Mutti has memory issues but remembers Deanne and they shed a tear or two at the reunion.
Later, we visited Angela and Charlie's son Jakob and his family at their refurbished house. It was a work in progress when we met him years ago. The 120 year old former bakery turned home was beautiful and his kids were intrigued at the American visitors. We called it an early night because we had been struggling to stay awake all day. What great hosts Angela and Charlie are. We were honored guests. We will keep trying to get them to come to Madison to show them around there and Chicago. Someday soon, I hope.
In the morning, we hopped on a train heading to Innsbruck from where we'll catch another one going south to Verona, Italy, home of Shakespeare's fair maiden, Juliet. We were going to take another overnighter to Rome, but they were sold out. Instead, we are spending 2 nights in Verona in order to break up the trip.
More photos and videos are here.
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Berlin
24 ottobre 2022, Germania ⋅ ☁️ 63 °F
This is our second visit to Berlin. We fell in love with it 8 years ago when we visited during the 25th anniversary celebrations of the fall of the Wall. It will be hard to compete with seeing the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra backing up Peter Gabriel singing David Bowie's "Heroes" with the Brandenburg Gate in the background, but we'll try.
We found an aparthotel near Checkpoint Charlie that had just opened and wasn't quite ready for visitors yet, but it worked well enough. It was near an Ubahn station, and that's crucial. We bought a week transportation pass and made good use of it. Even though we also bought a 3 day museum pass, this trip was about exploring neighborhoods and relaxing a bit. Berlin is such a chill place. It's got a great vibe. You see people drinking beer at all times of the day, and everywhere, including parks and subways. But nobody is ever loud or obnoxious or fighting. It's like having a coke here. I love it. I just feel like I'm getting away with something when we go to a kiosk and buy half liter cans of of good, inexpensive beer and walk around to enjoy neighborhoods. Certain ones like Kreuzberg and Prenzlauer Berg are vibrant with restaurants, clubs, art scenes, and bars.
We revisited a few museums on "museum insel" or museum island. There are 5 full of glorious booty from around the world. The Germans are really giving the Brits a run for their money here. Our favorite was probably the Ishtar Gate, a blue-tiled gate taken from Babylon and now housed at the Pergamon museum. Another classic was the bust of Nefertiti housed at the Neues museum. On our last day, we visited the free and powerful Topography of Terror museum, half of which is outside. It explains the rise of Naziism and is located on the grounds of the former SS headquarters. We've seen this information multiple times in multiple countries and it's chilling every time.
Deanne has a friend from Madison who's also in Berlin at the same time. He is visiting his daughter who lives here. Andre recommended a show that is similar to Cirque de Soleil and we weren't disappointed. It's like a Vegas show. I was astounded at the dancing, music, and yes, acrobats who performed death-defying stunts. The technology was pretty amazing too. The floor rose up, tilted, rotated, and receded, only to be replaced by a shallow pool with fountains and then the pool sank and dancers that were tapdancing in a rainy pool started swimming as the shallow pond became a deep pool. Then it all disappeared for the trapeze artists. Somehow the producers of "Arise" managed to weave a simple plot into this spectacle. We didn't see any punk shows like last time, but had a drink in a metal bar in Kreuzberg, across from S036, the music club we visited last time.
We met up with Andre for coffee in Alexanderplatz, a large, central plaza at the base of the huge radio and TV tower that is an icon of Berlin. He used to live here and left 17 years ago. This was his first time back and said it's changed so much since then. We've also noticed lots of development in the 8 years since we've been here. But it's still got that edge to it if you peek under the covers. We ate a variety of food and we tended towards ethnic. We even found a nice, cheap Indonesian place in an apartment block. And I realized that we're soon leaving Germany for good, so we went to Max und Moritz, a 120 year old classic German restaurant for my Sauerbraten fix.
We had 5 nights here and that gave us the time we needed to revisit favorite haunts and explore new places. I could spend weeks here I love it so much. We actually took most of a rainy Monday off to just chill out at the room and relax. That's not something we do too often. We've got less than 2 weeks left and are starting to think of home. But the next stop is some small villages near St. Poelten, Austria to visit Deanne's AFS exchange family from high school. We'll spend one night there before heading to Italy. We'll take our first overnight train on Austria's OBB NightJet. They've made overnight train travel in Europe popular again. Low cost airlines almost destroyed this class of travel, but the green alternative of night train travel is appealing more and more to Europeans and Americans alike.
More photos and videos are here.
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Hamburg
20 ottobre 2022, Germania ⋅ ☁️ 54 °F
We found an apartment in Hamburg's Altona area. This used to be considered a suburb when it was planned, but now it's just a neighborhood on the west side. Our train took us to the Altona station from Wroclaw, as it was the end of the line, so that was convenient. Hamburg is not too well known in the US, but it's Germany's 2nd largest city and largest port. It's where most Germans who emigrated to America left from. The Elbe flows through the city and down into the North sea. There are canals off of the river, so you're always crossing a bridge when you're near the river it seems. It's got a great transportation network, and once again, we bought a 3 day city card that allows all transportation, including the city ferries, and reductions on museums.
The Beatles honed their skills here working up to 6 hours a day for most days of the week. In the late 50's Hamburg was a gritty port city with a seedy side in the area of St. Pauli. Prostitution, hard drinking, music, money? That's what drew the Beatles here from Liverpool. Even though Britain won the war and fire-bombed the city in 1943, less than 15 years after the war, Hamburg was where the money was, and not Liverpool. That firebombing of Hamburg by the RAF was in retaliation of a Luftwaffe bombing of Coventry. The damage here and lives lost was worse than the better known Dresden bombing.
But that's all ancient history and there's hardly any mention of the Beatles in town. There's a pathetic statue area near the bars they played at and some song titles in plaques laid in the ground. One night, we walked into the Indra club where the Beatles had a regular gig. There is still music here, but not when we arrived. A few photos of the Beatles on the wall is about all the tribute you'll find. Instead, it's a New Orleans-like atmosphere nearby, but much tamer and smaller in area. Granted, we were here on Tuesday and Wednesday nights, but it wasn't too wild and nothing like Frenchmen or Bourbon St. in New Orleans.
We explored several neighborhoods and only went to one museum, a maritime museum. It was huge but mostly had collections that only a Navy fanatic would love. There were lots of model ships of all sizes. LOTS. And uniforms, and maritime art. The most interesting were model ships made of bone by French navy prisoners captured by the British during the Napoleonic wars.
There are several music clubs in the city and mid-week, there were a couple of bands each night to choose from. And lots of DJs of course, but that's not for us. We chose to go to the Knust Club. It's probably a spoof of "Kunst:" which means "art" in German. An american punk band called SamIAm was playing. We didn't know their music but went anyway since live music is so hard to come by in Europe, unless you're at a festival. The crowd was good and the music was OK. For dinner, we just split some CurryWurst at the stand out front. That's the famous Berlin ketchup mixed with curry powder on top of a sliced brat over fries. We've yet to find some that is as good as our first CurryWursts we had in Berlin 8 years ago.
We're getting a little tired of heavy German fare, so we opted for Vietnamese for lunch and Spanish tapas for dinner yesterday. There's no end of variety of cuisine here or most cities we've been in. In short, I'd say Hamburg has a lot to offer but we are definitely slowing down after 7+ weeks of travel and only scratched the surface a bit. That being said, we're still lapping everyone on the couch.
More photos and videos are here.
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Wroclaw, Poland
17 ottobre 2022, Polonia ⋅ ⛅ 72 °F
We met Beata and Bogdan Labaz at a festival in Madison this summer. They were surprised we had been to their hometown of Wroclaw before and we made fast friends. Beata is a soil scientist at the University here and was doing research in Madison. When we told them about this trip, they invited us to stay with them, so here we are.
Bogdan picked us up at the train station and whisked us away to his home. Beata had made gluten free desserts and bread for me. We'll be forever indebted for their hospitality. We were treated like a king and a queen. We went out to a jazz club for a Godfather themed night that night. The house band was really good. Afterwards, we walked around the hopping Market Square and had a nightcap of the local cherry liqueur.
Afer a huge breakfast, we drove south through Lower Silesia towards the Czech border to Ksiaz Castle. Poland has a long and storied history. This land was Polish, then Prussian, then German, then Polish again. The castle was built by a Prussian family, the von Hochbergs and the castle was their home for generations. It was furnished with period piece furniture and was perched high on a hill with amazing views.
Then it was off to the secret Nazi caves of Sztolnie Walimskie. The Nazis built a slave-labor camp here for prisoners and made them dig tunnels in the mountains through hard rock. Nobody really knows what the plan was. Was it a secret bunker for Hitler? A research lab for the V-2 rocket? The war ended before the tunnels could be finished. Afterwards, we got a taste of a delicious cheese that a woman was grilling and topped with a cranberry sauce. On the way back, we stopped in the town of Swidnica and had some humongous schnitzels at a Czech themed restaurant.
The next day, we had a Thanksgiving style feast at home. In the afternoon, we visited the Panarama painting celebrating the battle of Raclawice, where Polish peasants defeated an invading Russian force in 1794. It was led by General Kosciuszko, who 18 years earlier went to the American colonies to fight for Washington. He's the hero of the Battle of Saratoga, a crucial early battle in our revolution. Bogdan was pretty surprised to see a statue commemorating him when he walked through Lafayette Square in front of our White House.
We got to meet Michal and Kuba, the Labaz sons during our stay. Michal lives at home and works with Bogdan doing IT work and sound and lighting solutions for businesses. Kuba was on leave from the Polish Navy Acadamy on the Baltic Sea, near Gdansk. It was fun getting to know them and get their perspective on things. We sat around and talked about a lot of different things, which was fun and so different than what we've been doing for the last 7 weeks. Since Helsinki, we haven't seen any friends. But that will change soon. We're visiting Deanne's exchange family in Austria in another week or so. All in all, we had an amazing time with an amazing group of people. We hope to repay the kindness when Bogdan and Beata return to Madison next summer.
More photos and videos are here.
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ViaggiatorePolish proverb :Guest in the house, God in the house. We are glad ! but this is not the end, limoncello is already in preparation, see you very very soon :)
Leipzig
13 ottobre 2022, Germania ⋅ ☀️ 59 °F
We splurged a little bit on a larger apartment in Leipzig. It was a newly remodeled apart-hotel and had a sauna in the bathroom. Couldn't pass that up. But by splurge, we mean spending $150/night instead of $125. The neighborhood of EisenbahnStrasse where we're staying is a bit edgy. It's full of immigrants, graffitti on every wall, and lots of vegetable and kabob shops. It feels totally safe, but this is the immigrant neighborhood for sure. There are lots of Syrians and Turks, which means..... Great food!
We arrived at the massive Bahnhof (train station) in the early afternoon after a quick 2 hour direct train from Nuremburg on an ICE train. That's the Inter City Express train, the fastest in Germany. It's slightly slower than Spain's AVE trains or France's TGV. But wow, the station is majestic and humongous. There's a two-story mall underground and the usual eateries and coffee shops on the street level where there's a couple dozen or so tracks.
We bought a 3 day Leipziz Card at a kiosk in front of the tram line. For the same price as just transportation for 3 days, we get museum discounts with it also. After checking in, we found a Syrian restaurant that gave huge, delicious portions. We paid $15 out the door for 2 entrees. Then we trammed it back to the center and walked around, soaking up the sites. Leipzig won't win any beauty awards for its architecture, but they do have a few old-style buildings, including the Rathaus, or city hall. Today was market day, and we caught the end of that in the huge MarktPlatz, or central plaza. They've been having a market there since the early days of the Holy Roman Empire. Leipzig was at the crossroads of the Via Imperii and the Via Regia, which connected Rome to the Baltic coast and Western Europe all the way to Turkey.
Leipzig is famous for a few things, mostly musicians. Wagner was born here. Bach worked and composed most of his work here and ran a boys choir. And Mendolssohn worked here and "discovered" Bach's mostly underappreciated music and helped make him famous long after his death. Lepzig is also in the neigbhorhood where Martin Luther lived and worked (and hid for awhile). The city museum in the Rathaus was a fantastic place to get the full story of Leipzig from its beginnings through the Cold War. They had many original documents printed and written by Luther. This was a printing town, among other things. It's fun seeing the "95 Theses" and other pamphlets he wrote that were printed here. They were quite the bestsellers of the day. And if that's not enough fame for one city, Goethe also went to the university here, as did Angela Merkel, who liked to drink at the same pub where Goethe frequented.
Leipzig was behind the Iron Curtain during the Cold War, and was the 2nd biggest city of the GDR, after Berlin. It suffered during those years but the decades of neglect led to a lot of empty warehouses and factories and what usually happens then is that the hippies and artists move in. They don't call this town Hypezig for nothing. There's a large university and lots of young Germans and immigrants, which gives it a great, lively feel. They're saying that Berlin is "over" now and that it's been too gentrified. Rents and hotel costs are double from when we visited Berlin 9 or so years ago. But Leipzig sure seems on the way up.
The next day we went to the Stasi museum. The Stasi were the GDR secret service during the Cold War and the small museum showed how the Stasi spied on everyone and paid untold informants to spy on friends, neighbors, and family. To this day, German citizens can go here and look at their record, assuming it wasn't destroyed. Many don't want to see it because then they'd find out which people they trusted ratted them out. One of the interesting exhibits was the technology used to tap phones. They didn't have a lot of money, so they'd confiscate cassette tapes of rock music sent from the West and use that to record phone conversations.
We ended the afternoon by exploring the Plagwitz neighborhood. I found an art installation that had immersive light shows and this one featured a recent artist named Tubke and did this amazing 23 minute light show on just one of his pantings, a panarama painting. They digitized it and animated many parts of it. With the intense soundtrack, it was a great show. We've seen a few of these now and just love them. Our first one was in Paris at the L'Atelier Lumieres, where this technology premiered with the original Van Gogh show, which is now shown all over the world.
Tomorrow we're off to Wroclaw, Poland to visit our new friends Bogdan and Beata. We meet them at a fest in Madison this summer. It will be our 2nd time there, but our first with hosts. We can't wait to see them again.
More photos and videos are here.
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Nuremberg
10 ottobre 2022, Germania ⋅ ☀️ 59 °F
Nuremberg's got a nice feel to it. It's a large town but it's got a small-town vibe. It was mostly destroyed at the end of WW2. It was, afterall, the home of the large Nazi rallies before the war and along with Munich, pretty much home to the Nazi party. It's mostly known to Americans as the home of the Nuremberg trials for Nazi war criminals. But there's much more to it than that. It was rebuilt in a blended style of old and new and some buildings used old stones but look modern. It is an ancient city and has a large, rebuilt medival city wall. The former moat is a walking and biking path now. There's an old castle on the hill and lots of museums. We spent our 1 1/2 days here mostly walking around and soaking up the sights. We've been taking a lot of Deutsche Bahn (DB) trains lately and the DB Train museum was surprisingly huge and interesting. The first train in Germany ran from here to a nearby suburb in 1835. The highlight might have been the fancy train car used by Ludwig II, who built Neuschwanstein Castle in Fuessen.
We did go to the Documentation Center Nazi Party Rally Grounds on the SE edge of town. While it's undergoing a renovation, the temporary exhibit at the KongressHall was informative and well-done. They pulled no punches and did a great job of showing how the Nazi party took power by, among other things, bullying the opposition and disrupting town hall meetings and then forming huge propaganda rallies and bringing in Nazis from around the country until Naziism spread. They took control of the media also. Sound familiar?
We walked around the huge area where the rallies were held. It was initially a site for a large exposition, a park, and a zoo. We walked around a small lake to the Zepellin field, where the largest rallies were held and where Leni Reifenstal filmed Triumph of the Will, a propaganda masterpiece. She used 16 cameras and 100 staff when using 3 or 4 cameras was unheard of. Many of the buildings at the complex were torn down, but several, like this arena based on the Greek Pergamon altar, are preserved. The sites are a mix of history and modern usage, including a modern football stadium and a cultural festival, and the Documentation center. We even stood on the podium where Hitler gave his speeches at the rallies. It was chilling.
Unfortunately, the site where the trials were held is closed to the public today. We were going to go to the opposite side of town to see it, but Deanne called in advance and found out they still use the courtroom for trials and it's closed for that.
We took an S Bahn, or suburban train back to the city and walked some more and saw Albrecht Durer's house. He's probably Germany's most famous painter. Across the street was an Augustiner tied house, or restauarant/bar that sells Munich's Augustiner beer. I can drink it and it's delicious, so we ate more Nuremberger sausages there. Those are the tiny specialty sausages. We ate them last night also at Bratwursthausle bei St. Sebald, the most famous brat house in town. With kraut, potato salad, and freshly shaved horseradish, there's nothing better on a warm Autumn day, as long as you're downing it with an Augustiner Helles.
More photos and videos are here.
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ViaggiatoreThanks. But unfortunately, we're not gonna make it to Regensburg. We're heading north now....
Rothenburg
8 ottobre 2022, Germania ⋅ ⛅ 63 °F
Rothenberg is one of those picture perfect postcard towns. While it received some bombing damage in WW2, it was the 30 Year's War in the 1600's that did a lot more damage to it. A lot of buildings from that time period have survived intact and make it a living museum. That's why hordes of tourists flock here. It's early October, so the high season is over and most of the rest of the tourists are day-trippers on tours. We're spending 2 nights which is plenty of time to soak up the views.
Something about this town seemed so familiar, and then I found out it's the setting of "Vulgaria" in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, and the infamous Child Catcher! Yikes. I thinks some Madison 20 somethings are still having nightmares from when I dressed up as the Child Catcher one year for a Halloween party for kids. It was really me scaring the parents, which scared the kids.
Anyhoo, the photos will give you a better picture than I can describe. The weather is perfect, a sunny early Autumn day, and after a few walks around the well-preserved town walls, we're chiling out after another delicious lunch. We're staying in a zimmer (room) above a restaurant. It's about 300 years old and we've got a really nice room. The floor is slanted a bit, which gives it a funhouse kind of feel, but we're not complaining. We opted for dinner on the first floor last night, and Deanne had half of a very large duck and I opted for more pork, a humongous pork shoulder with kraut and potato dumplings. My god, the portions are huge here.
Breakfast below had the most fresh fruit we've seen anywhere on the trip and it was a welcome surprise. Of coure we also had the requisite cold cuts and cheese. Only a couple other people are staying here.
About 75% of the town works in tourism of some sort here, so I think everyone breathes a sigh of relief in late fall before business picks up again for Christmas. They sell a lot of cuckoo clocks and Christmas memorabilia. We went to a few museums and took the famous Night Watchman's tour around town at night. It was a humorous take on what living here during the middle ages was like.
More photos and videos are here.
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Freiburg, Germany
6 ottobre 2022, Germania ⋅ ☀️ 72 °F
Freiburg is one of Madison's sister cities, and it sure feels familiar. It's a mid-size univeristy town with lots of bicycles, students, and charm. We arrived several hours before the check-in time at our apartment, so we locked our bags in a locker at the station. These are so convenient when day tripping or arriving early. For $5, we can drop the anchors and explore.
It was the hottest and sunniest day of the trip since we arrived in Stockholm, so we spent it walking around the old town. It was market day, so the first stop was the large gothic cathedral, the Munster. Surrounding it on 3 sides was a weekly market full of goodies, including brat stands selling about 8 different types of sausages, including the Langer Rote, or long Freiburg sausage. When you order one, they fold it in half and put it in a roll that's wider and shorter than our traditional hot dog bun. The Munster is in pretty good shape and wasn't covered in scaffolding, like most ancient sites in Europe. Everything falls apart and Europe does a great job of preserving it's heritage, and that means scaffolding!
In Freiburg, businesses hire an artist to make a stone mosaic in the sidewalk in front that describes the business. There's beer steins, knives, jewels, books, etc. etched out of small Rhine river stones inlaid in the larger cobblestones. Very cool. Like many German cities, this one keeps vehicles out of the city center for the most part. It's a walker's paradise. Freiburg is home to Germany's Green Movement, and we saw climate protestor's in front of the Rathaus where there are mosaics of the sister cities' emblems in the sidewalk. Near campus, we saw students carrying bowls and silverware as they headed towards a restaurant. Is that a thing?
There are lots of sidewalk cafes and restaurants and we enjoyed a brat here, a coffee there, and even stopped into a small museum that was included on our 3 day city card, which included all transportation, museums, and a cable car to a mountain just south of town. After buying some cheese and olives at the market before it closed, we grabbed our bags and took a tram to our apartment, located just outside of the city center in a lovely neighborhood. It's chock-full of mansions, trees, parks, families on bikes, a nearby school (gymnasium) that looks like a castle, and an old cemetery.
The balcony from our second story apartment looks down onto a small intersection that's absolutely perfect for seeing a slice of life in Freiburg. It's very family oriented and we see lots of parents with their kids on bikes, a hybrid bus goes by every fifteen minutes. There's a small fountain at the edge of 2 angled streets that draws people in to read or rest or chat with neighbors. The old cemetery a block away is like a city park. It holds tombs from the 1500's through the mid 1800's only and is an oasis of tranquility. People come here to read and rest and walk and even do tai chi. And that reminds me that this city is so QUIET. There are so few cars and many of those are electric. It's wonderful. I still reel from the thought of the noise pollution of large Asian cities, and traveling anywhere in India was the worst for that.
We visited the Augustiner museum the next day. It houses a lot of the original stain glass and statuary from the Munster. It was well done. Lunch was at the Markethalle, an old food hall with a diverse selection of ethnic foods. We split a large fish soup that was hearty and filling for only 8 bucks. The variety of ethnic foods made us want to go back. Then it was a tram and a bus ride to the Schauinslandbahn south of town. It's the oldest cable car in the world with an enclosed cabin. On the top, we hiked on some trails, enjoyed the views, and had coffee in the sun.
After the descent, we made our way to an Aldi Sud for some food shopping for the train tomorrow. Long train days require a picnic. There's food on board often, but it's bread heavy and I'm gluten sensitive. It's not hard to pack a picnic, and the lightweight cooler I bought before the trip is worth it's weight in gold. It fits in my day bag. If we have an apartment, I'll freeze a water bottle the night before and that cools the cheese, meat, and wine we bring for lunch the next day.
For dinner, we went back to the Markethalle. Tonight it's Brazilian fare. I got the coconut shrimp and rice and Deanne grabbed the Fejuado, a classic rice, sausage, and bean dish. For some reason, we're craving rice and beans. We''ve learned to follow what our bodies tell us.
On the cable car earlier, we shared the tram with a local paraglider. He commented "You must think our food is cheap." Hell yeah. Dinner for 2 with wine is regularly under $50 in classic settings. We mentioned that vegetables in stores are so cheap, about half of normal prices and 1/4 of organic prices in the states. He told us that they are subisdized by the government. Can you imagine the US government subsidizing healthy food and taxing unhealthy food? I can't.
Afterwards, we went to the recommended wine bar on the Munsterplatz and sampled some German wines in the shadows of the cathedral at night. Tomorrow we go the Rothenburg ob der Tauber, a medieval town known for its beauty.
More photos and videos are here.
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Baden Baden
4 ottobre 2022, Germania ⋅ 🌧 61 °F
What a difference a day makes. We arrived in pouring rain to our apartment across the street from the spas. There wasn't anything to do EXCEPT go to a spa on a day like this. But the lines were over an hour long at 4:00 on a Sunday, so we decided to chill a bit and try later. We went back at 5, and the lines were now an hour and a half long and the negative reviews on Google Maps and Facebook were rolling in. Uh Oh. But we did arrive on the night before German Unity Day, a national holiday. And it was raining all day. I checked in at 6 and the lines were still too long at Caracalla spa, the new one. The reviews for the traditional spa, Friedrichsbad, were so horrible we decided against going there. They jacked up the price and took away the included brush and soap massage that has been standard for decades "because of Covid." But they didn't mind putting people in small saunas and steam rooms while charging 20 percent more.
So, we had dinner and drank some wine and decided to go early the next morning. And what a difference a day makes. The Caracalla spa opens at 8 and we made it in by 8:15. Hardly anyone was there until 11, and even then it didn't get too crowded. We paid extra to get into the sauna area, which like most spas in Germany is a clothes verboten area. No biggie. We're veterans now. We spent 7 hours there and moved between pools and saunas of varying temperatures and even cooled off outside naked as the sun came out. Lunch at the cafe in our suits was pretty reasonable and delicious. I had trout in a brown butter lemon sauce for the same price or cheaper as in town.
Next to, and behind the spa is a grade school on a hill. From their upper floors, they can see into the spa area. But given the average age here, why would they? I looked out and could see them playing ping pong, totally oblivious to us naked old people.
Since the sun was out for the first time in a week, we enjoyed a long stroll through town afterwards. And yes, we had our clothes on. Lots of rich people have vacationed here and many built mansions in the late 1800's. The heyday here was probably 1880. At that time, there were twice as many hotel rooms in town, and right now, there are a LOT. There are lots of Russians and Cyrillic signage also. Many Russians have settled here since a Russian Czar married a woman from Baden Baden 120 or so years ago. And so lots of businesses are now run by Russians, including the owner of our apartment. It doesn't hurt that this is the warmest spot in Germany.
Next door to our apartment is the Fabrege Egg museum. These exquisitely crafted jewels are pretty amazing to look at, but we opted out when we saw the price of the museum was about $27. Most museums in Germany are in the $10 range. We both ran for the door as I yelled "Last one out is a Russian egg!" Many people wonder how we can afford to travel so much. The big secret is to not pay for any bullshit.
So we strolled some more past the casino for the rich and famous and admired the gardens on the Lichtentaller Allee, and drank some mineral water from the source at the Trinkhalle, a fresco lined arcade.
Today, we went back to the same spa for the morning only and there were even fewer people. What a great feeling to go from a super hot wood-fired sauna to the 'ole bucket of cold water on the head. They have one rigged up that auto fills with water and has a handle on the side to tip it. Then it's off to the cold pool and the next thing you know, you're blissed out.
And we finally took part in one of the Aufguss ceremonies. There are signs posted in spas with starting times for certain saunas that will have particular aroma ceremonies. It's a bit of a deal. The Aufguss master opens the doors to a sauna 15 or so minutes early to cool it off and then at the exact hour, he closes the doors and adds the water scented with the aformentioned oil to the sauna in a great display. Then he waves a huge fan around the room and in front of each person a few times to reallly stir up the new heat. It's exhilarating. I started counting bodies when we were doing this. It was me, Deanne, and 10 old dudes! They must have loved it. At the end, everyone claps and jumps in cold water.
It got even warmer outside today, so we walked through a residential area to a small mountain/ large hill just outside of town. We walked to the funicular and paid our 6 Euros each for the round trip ticket that saved us a few hours of hiking. After getting off, we went up to the top of an observation tower and had amazing views. To the west was a flat plain, the Rhine River valley and beyond it, France. To the south was the start of the fabled Black Forest, a protected hilly area covered in trees. That's a rarity in Europe. North Woods Wisconsinites would say "meh" but from this vantage point, it's pretty impressive.
Tomorrow, we head south to Freiburg, one of Madison's sister cities.
More photos and videos are here.
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Augsburg
1 ottobre 2022, Germania ⋅ 🌧 48 °F
Augsburg was pretty much a rest stop for us. There's not a lot for tourists here. But staying in the namesake of a former favorite beer or mine (Augsburger, or "Augie's") did have a certain appeal. That was made in Monroe, Wisconsin and not here though. Augsburg is about the same size as Madison and is also a university town.
I booked a 4 star hotel using credit card points, so it was effectively free. The weather was rainy and cold, so we mostly chilled out and read up on the next few sites we will visit.
The hotel did have a sauna and we found an amazing pizza place in town that served gluten free pizzas. We were on the 11th floor of the only tall building in town and had a balcony, so it wasn't all bad. And we needed the rest.
Tomorrow, we're off to Baden Baden, one of Europe's premiere spa towns.
More photos and videos are here.
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