Ode to a Board Game

I can't believe it's taking me this long to finish recapping my trip to Europe, almost a year-long process. It's like school is busy or something! It's great to look back and remember a fabulous summer, although I think the details are slipping me a bit.

Being the nerds that we are, upon discovering a board game that my sister and I like to play called Carcasonne, was based on an actual place in France, we had to go there. I don't feel like explaining the game right now, but it's based on a medieval city in the south of France, and it turns out this place has a pretty interesting history. We (and by "we" I really mean "I") made a bit of a travel oops on the way to Carcasonne - rookie mistake I guess. With most of the places we went, I didn't need a reservation for the train because I had a global Eurail pass. Apparently France is different. Catherine had her own ticket, so I just sat beside her and figured I'd stay there until someone else claimed the seat as their's, in which case I'd find another vacant one. I happened to slip over to use the washroom just at the time the ticket-checker was checking tickets, so my pass didn't get checked. Later along the trip, some guys came on the train with tickets for where I was sitting, so I just got up and went into a dining car to find an empty seat. It was there that a ticket checker came to check my ticket and started yelling at me in French, speaking really fast. My French is not so good anymore. I can still read it pretty well, but having a conversation is a lot harder. Anyways, turns out you need to buy a reservation on all French trains even with a train pass. Oops.

Carcasonne

Carcasonne is an old fortified medieval city in the south of France. We only spent a day here, but were able to explore the city and eat some delicious French food. We also met a teacher from England there travelling by herself, so she joined us for this part of our trip. We all stayed at a tiny hostel about 20 minutes outside of the city (the closer ones were super expensive), and so the hostel owners gave us rides to and from the city and train station for a small fee. The hostel was converted from an old castle. It was really small, had a narrow, slanted staircase, and a bit of an ominous look about it, but they also had cheap sangria, so we enjoyed a good nightcap each night.

In the city of Carcasonne, they had a jousting show, which I thought was going to be lame. It wasn't cheap, so I reluctantly went with Cath and our English friend because they really wanted to go. It was AWESOME! Well worth it! They made it really authentic (as far as I know) and it wasn't as fake looking as I expected. The guys were super talented on their horses, doing different stunts. The dialogue was all in French, but you could still kind of understand what was going on for the most part. Very cool. If you are as crazy and nerdy as us to visit this place, go to the jousting show. It is not lame :).

This is a cool place to check out, but one full day was definitely enough time here. I don't know what else we would have done here. We are a bit fast-paced, especially with museums, but I think 2 days would be plenty to see everything, even if you're slower.

See you in Paris!

Mexicali 2012

I was so blessed to be able to go with Fleetwood CRC to Mexicali, Mexico again this year, for the most unique Mexicali trip of my life (out of the 4 times I've gone). I got to be part of Peter Neumann's worship team leading worship for about 1200 people in a dirt field in Mexico. It was one of the most amazing experiences of my life.

Check out the blog on Peter Neumann's page to see what we were up to. A bunch of the photos were taken by me, including the crowd shots when I wasn't playing.

God is good, all the time!

Cinque Terre

We have finally made it (slowly due to intense busy-ness of life) to one of my absolute favourite places in Europe!

We took the train from Rome up to the north coast of Italy, close to the south of France, to visit yet another UNESCO World Heritage Site, Cinque Terre. Cinque Terre is a series of 5 villages on the Italian Riviera that run along the Mediterranean Sea. They are pretty remote and there are massive cliffs surrounding them, so a pathway was constructed so that goods can be passed from village to village. To get from one end of the Cinque Terre to the other is about 10km. I don't remember exactly how long it took us, but we also stopped in each village for a dip in the sea. Several hours for sure. There's a train you can take from village to village if you don't want to hike, but Cath and I are always up for outdoor adventures, especially when we can save a bit of money that way.

There are not a lot of cheap places to stay in the area, but we managed to find a campsite at a village not too far away that had these little canvas cabins. Our was just a wood floor and 2 beds and there were bathroom and shower facilities on site as well, so it worked out great for us.

Our aunt had been in Italy not long before us and she had gone to the Cinqu Terre. We perused through some of her pictures on facebook, which gave us the wrong impression of what it's really like. I know now that my aunt opted to take the train from village to village. She was dressed all nice and wasn't all sweaty. We were definitely shocked when we saw what we were up against. There's something to be said about mental preparation when doing physical tasks.

Anyways, Cath and I both put on our swimsuits and just shorts and a t-shirt overtop. Cath decided to wear her hiking boots, partly because her sandals were not great for walking, but I chose to wear my birks. Let me also mention now that it was the beginning of August now and HOT outside. When we got to the trailhead, we had to pay at a booth to walk the trail - a small fee mainly for maintenance of the trail. There were signs all around the booth that if you weren't wearing good shoes, they won't let you go. My sandals were good enough, but they warned us to be careful. Immediately, we head into a steep descent up to the top of a cliff. The pathways were narrow and dusty along the edge of a cliff, and then sun was beating down on us already early in the morning. 

We did the hike backwards, so we started with the longest distance between towns first. We figured that way when we're tired in the heat of the day, the worst would already be over. By the time we reached the first town, we were ready for a swim and some lunch, so we had lunch on the beach and cooled off in the Mediterranean. 

Houses along the water where we had lunch

The heat was intense! We downed our large water bottles quickly. The views were incredible! This is one of the most gorgeous places I have EVER been. I would love to go back. As the day went on, I was feeling more and more fatigued, hot, and my head started hurting. Cath asked me if I wanted to take the train for the rest, but I didn't want to give up, and we had to finish what we started, so I fought through it. By the time we made it to "lovers lane" in the last village, I was ready to collapse. Heat stroke had taken over my body and I felt awful! I was pissed - we wanted to have a nice Italian dinner on our last night in Italy, but I didn't feel like eating anything.

We ended up going back to the campsite with some crackers and 7-up, and Cath went out to spend the evening watching the sun set on the Mediterranean, while I slept in the canvas tent. 

In spite of it all, this place was fantastic. I highly recommend taking the hike rather than the train, but be prepared for a good workout - it's no walk in the park, and the heat of summer doesn't help. Take time in each village to explore a bit and enjoy the refreshing blue waters of the Mediterranean. Make sure you wear good shoes! This doesn't exactly capture the steepness of the trails, but gives you an idea of what it's like.

There was a wall along the last path - "lover's lane" - where people wrote little messages, and we came across this little gem...

When in Rome...

The past few weeks have been crazy busy, so now I finally have time to continue my journey of blogging my Europe trip.

Colosseum by Day...

We have finally made it to Rome! We only planned to spend 3 days there, hit up the main sites, and move on, for several reasons. First, Rome is expensive, and this trip was intended not to break the bank. Second, Rome is HOT! in the summer, and me and extreme heat don't always see eye to eye. Third, Rome is crowded with tourists in the Summer. Although we would be considered tourists, I like to believe Cath and I are a different kind of tourist. Tourists drive me crazy! We like to go off the beaten track and try to live like the Romans do, but that's hard to do when the streets are crowded with photo-crazy groups of people.

Colosseum by Night...

We didn't realize how long it would take us to get from Croatia to Rome, so we ended up losing a day from travelling. We took a ferry from Dubrovnik Croatia to Bari Italy, and then had to run from the ferry terminal, grab a cab, and race to the train station to catch our overnight train (which we didn't have reservations for yet). It felt just like The Amazing Race! We made sure to be at the front of the line of ferry passengers and ran off that ferry with our backpacks as soon as the ferry employees would let us.

It was in Bari that we ran into our first issues with all the financial crises going on in Europe. Roads were blocked off by police, and journalists with camera crews were everywhere. Our cab had to take the long way around to get us to the train station. We managed to get on the train just in time before it left. Our train was just a small cabin with seats that reclined a little bit, so it was a bit of an uncomfortable night. Plus, there was one of the most smelliest men ever in our cabin. Cath and I both had to cover our faces with sweaters to muffle the smell. Ugh!!

We arrived in Rome at 6am, then went straight to the hostel we had booked to get a bit of sleep. There was a little drama involved in this that was frustrating, but it would take a while to tell the story, which is more annoying than interesting anyways :). We slept for a few hours, took showers, then went out to explore a bit.

With only 2 full days in Rome, we saw the main sites like the Colosseum, the Forum, and the Vatican City, the Spanish Steps, the Trevi Fountain, and our usual wandering the streets. We also made sure to get our fill of Italian eats and delicious Gelato!! Yumm!!

Pizza!

The only thing we didn't get to see that we had hoped to was the Catacombs, but there is a reason for that which I will get to...right now. Since Rome is hot in the summer, we were recommended by someone to check out the Catacombs in the afternoon at the heat of the day. We figured that was a good idea, so on our second afternoon in Rome we jumped on the subway and attempted to navigate our way there. Here's the problem. The subway line that would get us closest was closed that day, so we picked the next closest subway line. Our subway map however did not have streets on it, so we had to combine the subway map with another map we had of the city. The problem with this other map was that the catacombs were not clearly on it, actually I don't think they were even on the map, and the map only had main streets. It was intended for tourists who would go to the main sites and stick to main areas, but we are wanderers. Anyways, we ended up getting hopelessly lost because none of the streets were on our map. We walked for so long and couldn't find it. We ended up going into a local hair salon to ask for directions, and they pointed us where to go. We ended up close, we knew we were close because we saw a group of Asian tourists, but we were too late, they were already closed. So we ended up just going all the way back to the subway and returning to the main part of the city. The one good thing that came out of this excursion, besides character, was the best gelato we have ever had. The gelato places in the tourist centers make it to be more like ice cream, but this place was in a random neighbourhood and its gelato was legit. It was made with real fruit and they had so many delicious flavours. Fantastic!

 The Vatican City was another good story. I'll keep it short since this is getting long. A lot of vendors try to sell tours of the Vatican  and St. Peter's Basilica. They all claim to give the best rates and have the best guides with the best English and that you can skip the 2-hour long lines. We're not much of tour people since we like to go at a faster pace than large groups and we don't like being stuffed with historical information about everything. If we want to know something, we'll look it up for ourselves. Anyways, I used it as an opportunity to barter a little bit. The first tour said they would charge 40 Euro. After talking to several others to see if they could beat each other's prices, I talked someone down to 20 Euro. When I tried to get it even lower, one girl got angry at me and stormed off. So, word of advice, if you want a tour of the Vatican, don't settle for anything more than 20 Euro. They're ripping you off for more commission. But, to save even more, don't take a tour. The line-ups were not 2 hours long. I think the longest we waited was 30 minutes, at the peak time in season.

Next we head off to one of the most beautiful places I have ever been, and one of my new favourite places in Europe...Cinque Terre, Italy!

Journeying On

"Let the treasures of the trial

Form within me as I go
And at the end of this long passage
Let me leave them at Your throne

 May this journey bring a blessing

May I rise on wings of faith
At the end of my heart's testing
With Your likeness let me wake"

It's that time of year again. Time to reflect on the past year, contemplating what went well and what we wish could have gone better. Time to anticipate the future with excitement and wonder at what the coming year will bring. Time to appreciate the present for what it is, and to use our time well. 

2011 has been a big year for me. Looking back on it brings a lot of joy, but it also brings much sorrow. Through all the highs and the lows in the journey of 2011, God has been walking alongside me, guiding me through the tempests, and blessing me with once-in-a-lifetime opportunities.

The year started with applications to grad schools for worship music. Actually I only ended up sending in one application for a program suited mostly to what I was looking for - at Calvin Seminary of all places. Never would have thought I'd end up there. There were a few hiccups along the way with parts of my application missing, and worries of not receiving financial aid, but everything has fallen into place and I'm enjoying my time in Grand Rapids so far. Not necessarily the classes always :) but I'm having fun, which is the most important part, right?

In February, I was in a car accident and totaled my first car. A lady in a minivan ran a stop sign in the snow, so it wasn't my fault, but the damage was bad enough that the car wasn't worth fixing, so it was replaced with a satisfactory cheque from ICBC. Two days later, my uncle was in a serious head-on collision with a truck, which put my small accident into perspective. God protected him and it's a miracle he's still alive. It's even more miraculous that he's walking and has no brain damage. It has been a long year and long recovery, but things are starting to look up.

I finished my degree officially in April, but ended with a coop job anyways, so the school work was done last August. I was able to have my first cap and gown experience at SFU and graduated in June. Before this happened though, another tragedy struck, and a friend, coworker, and classmate (all one person) committed suicide just before his final exams. As part of my grieving process, I found release in donating my hair to make wigs for cancer patients. It was something I've always wanted to do and I was able to cross it off the bucket list. I did it as well in support of a friend who had lost her mom that past November. She had shaved her head for donation, but I was not bold enough to do that. I had enough to give 10 inches and still have some left for me. After that whole experience, it felt like a weight had been lifted off of me, and now every time I think of haircuts, I remember Wakhile and Caitlin.

Ever since traveling to Europe in grade 12 with the school, I have wanted to go back and do things my own way. I found out in that trip that I'm not much of a tour person. I'd rather plan my own holiday and do the things I want to do and have my own adventures without someone telling me when I have to go to this museum or explore that old building. I love The Amazing Race, and planned my own trip with that in mind. My sister was able to come with me, which was exciting, and we're both pretty adventurous and spontaneous, so our travel styles work well together. We spent months figuring out where we wanted to go, but left ourselves with enough leeway to make changes on the fly. It was one of the most amazing experiences of my life and probably the thing I am the most grateful for in 2011. See previous and future blog entries for more specifics on my travels.

3 days after returning from Europe, I was on my way to Grand Rapids Michigan, with only 2 suitcases and a box of winter clothes. My roommate is fantastic and I'm having a great time and meeting great people there. I can't believe I'm already 1/4 of the way done!

In November, I had to say goodbye to my Grandma. I miss her so much, but at the same time I know she is in a better place and a better state. In a way, we said goodbye 4 years ago as Alzheimer's wore down her memory. Every time I would see her, I'd say goodbye as if it were the last time. That's 4 years of final goodbyes. It is a mercy to know that she is in her Father's hands and that she is completely herself, as she was meant to be, in heaven. 

And now the Christmas season. It's great being home, even though I had dental surgery a few days ago to get my wisdom teeth removed - just something that had to be done.

Here's to the coming year, with all the excitement it will bring. Even in good times and bad times, God is here with us, walking alongside us, picking us up when we fall, and carrying us when we lack the strength.

Blessings on 2012.

Croatian Heat - Dubrovnik-style

 It's nice to be remembering beaches and hot sunshine as I see rain pouring down outside my window. We took a gorgeous ferry ride from Hvar Island to Dubrovnik Croatia, which also happened to be the hottest ferry ride of my life. There wasn't a lot of seating inside, and we wanted to be on the deck anyways, so we carried our packs out to the deck to find somewhere to sit. I insisted on something in the shade since it was already boiling outside and still early in the morning, so we sat along the side of the ferry on the ground with our packs and layered on the sunscreen. It was so intensely hot it wasn't even funny. Cath was loving it but I was dying and wanted it to be over. By the evening we had arrived in Dubrovnik and got a ride from our hostel owners from the ferry terminal to our hostel which ended up actually being about 20 minutes outside the city. It's what you have to do to save some money :).

Boats in a Dubrovnik Harbour

 We didn't have much time to spend in Dubrovnik, so we made the most of the time we had. We went out early the next morning to explore the old city, relax on the beach and swim in the beautiful blue water. It was a scorcher of a day. By 10am I was already feeling fatigued from the heat. We walked around the old city for about an hour and I couldn't take it anymore, I needed to cool down, so we went to the beach. After changing into swimsuits, I ran straight into the water for the ultimate refreshment. It felt so good. We spent about an hour in the water, then ate some lunch while we dried off on the beach, then were ready to explore again.

There's a small island off the coast of Dubrovnik that we took the ferry to. Most people go there to spend time on a different beach, but being who we are, my sister and I had to explore the whole island. We walked around for a while then discovered there's an old fortress at the top, so naturally we hiked up the island to see the fortress and the view from above. You could see all of the old city walls of Dubrovnik, so definitely worth the photo opportunities. We decided to take a different way down so we could get a different view on the way back. As we were walking, a French couple came out of a clearing in the bush, and the wife told her husband she was proud of him in French (Cath translated for me). We found that a little odd but figured they had spotted a shortcut, so we decided to sneak through the bushes as well. Cath made me go in front because she said she was scared. It was a wild bush adventure as we got a little lost and had no idea how to get out, so we just kept walking. As we walked we figured out why the French lady said what she did - it was definitely a rough trek. Catherine told me after we made it back to a path that she spent the whole time thinking of the story of Paul in the Bible on the island of Patmos, which would have been in this general area of the world, and the snake that jumped out a bit him. She had been worried a snake would jump out and bite us. Which is funny because I spent the whole time worrying a peacock would come out and scare me. (We had seen a lot of peacocks on the other side of the island and I have an irrational fear of birds.) I do have to admit though that a snake would have been much more troublesome than a peacock.

The View from the top of the Island

 After our bushwhacking, we found ourselves a little rocky private beach area and went for a dip to cool off. We walked around and swam at various points around the island, then headed back to Dubronik for more exploring.

It was a little expensive, but we felt we had to check out the old city walls, another UNESCO world heritage site. The views from the walls were stunning! We cheated a bit and located an English-speaking tour guide with a group and followed closely behind them to learn a bit about the city and the walls without having to pay.

Travel tidbit of the day: Find tour groups that speak your language and follow at an inconspicuous distance so as not to be found out. This way, you glean a lot of useful information without the added pricetag.

Dubrovnik City Walls

Hibiscus in the Old City

Dubrovnik

Taking a Refreshing break

  

I'll let the pictures do the rest of the talking. The weather was fabulous although the heat was intense, but well worth the trip. So glad we included Croatia on the itinerary. You should go.

We took another ferry the next day to Bari Italy as we continued our journey to Rome.

Saying goodbye to Croatia on the ferry to Italy

Croatian Island Hop

The photos I have don't really do justice to the beauty that is Hvar Island. The weather was a little stormy when we arrived, but it was still quite warm. This island is one of the main party islands in Croatia, actually there's a small island not far from here actually called Party Island, but since our trip was already pretty physically grueling and we were only halfway through it, we decided it probably would be wise not to go too crazy here. Plus we were only here for one night, but we made the most of the full day we spent exploring.

We both really wanted to go swimming in the Adriatic Sea (part of the Mediterranean) so as soon as we dropped our stuff off at our hostel, we geared up in swimsuits and went to the "beach". Our hostel by the way was very cute and had this sort of romantic honey-moon appeal to it. Maybe too romantic to be there with your sister :). Anyways, we went to the beach which was really just big rocks that touched the water with ladders attached to them so you could climb in and out. The water was a little cold, but so salty that I could lay on my back and float no problem.

We got a little cold, so we decided to stop swimming and warm up by hiking to an old castle/fortress at the top of the island. As we were walking, the sun started to come out and it warmed up a lot by the time we made it to the top of the island. We explored the fortress and took some pictures along the way, and then decided we were too hot and sweaty, so we ran back down to go back to the water.

View from the Fortress

We spent the rest of the afternoon swimming and lying in the sun. Our hostel had mini kitchens in every room, so we cooked a nice little meal for ourselves, showered/cleaned up, and went out to enjoy some night life. We explored the town a little, looked in shops, and saw a sweet street-side concert of a group of French guys playing African fusion music. It was pretty sweet.

Here's a couple more photos of the island...

The "Beach"

Harbour Sunset

Next stop - Dubrovnik!

"Split"-Second Decision

Our journey continues to hot, sunny beaches for a little rest and relaxation...or so we thought. We woke up in our little guesthouse in Korenica to thunderstorms. As in full torrential rainfall thunderstorms. We were so grateful for the gorgeous weather we had for our hike the day before. We left early in the morning with our Belgian friend to catch a bus to go to Split and our friend was headed to Zadar (on the way to Split). The buses are very inconsistent in Croatia, but oddly more reliable than the train, but they are also quite cheap. Apparently a lot of people choose to travel Croatia by car rental, but you can save a lot of money taking the bus.

Anyways, we found the "bus stop" which was really just a patch of pavement on the side of the road. We had to be there 30 minutes early because you never know what time the bus is going to be there. Finally a bus showed up, but since they're not very well labeled, we had to run up to the driver and ask if he was going to Split. He was, so we hopped on. 

The trip was supposed to be about 4 hours, but ended up taking 6 because our bus broke down in the middle of nowhere. We were well outside the last city, up on a hill with no civilization in sight and the bus just stopped. The announcements over the intercom didn't help us at all either since they spoke no English. So we just had to wait and wonder what was going on. 

The thunderstorms followed us to Split, but it stayed dry for our walk to our hostel. We put our stuff down in our room at the hostel and looked through the information we brought with us on Split to see what we wanted to do there. The Lonely Planet suggested one of the most beautiful trips in Europe that goes by ferry from Split to Hvar Island to Dubrovnik. We hadn't intended on visiting an island, but the owner of the hostel highly recommended it. We were swayed and decided to book a night in Hvar and go there the next morning. We spent the rest of the evening checking out a highly recommended local restaurant - Fife - and exploring the old town in Diocletian's Palace from Roman times with a guy we met from...actually I don't remember where he was from, somewhere in the States. The restaurant had delicious fresh-caught local fish and was delicious. Diocletian's Palace is quite small, so only spending an evening exploring it was enough for us. 

Fresh Fish!

We geared up after only a few hours in Split and got ready to go island-hopping the next day.

Diocletian's Palace

For the Beauty of the Earth

In the midst of these travels blogs, life still goes on around me. It's been taking me a while to document my whole trip while still keeping up in school, but it's fun to remember everything that happened not too long ago. Over my American Thanksgiving break, I had the opportunity to return to BC for a not so pleasant reason. I was very happy to go home, but it was for my Grandma's funeral. My Grandma was 89 when she passed away and she had been struggling with Alzheimer's for years now and was in the later stages of the disease. She was having seizures and we all knew she was suffering. She caught pneumonia and within a day, she was taken home to be with her Lord. My Grandma's life was a testament of God's faithfulness. She had such a servant heart and a warm personality. I look up to her so much and will miss being welcomed by her smile every time I came. Welterusten.

My Grandma would have loved to hear all the stories of our wild travel adventures, so I continue with our next destination: Croatia.

Catherine discovered a National Park in Northern Croatia called Plitvice Lakes (Plitvicka Jezera) National Park, I googled some of the images, and we both knew we had to go there. We both love nature and beautiful places, so this was a must-see. Here's just a teaser picture to whet your appetite:

The plan was to travel about 6 hours by train from Budapest to Zagreb Croatia and then take a bus from Zagreb to the town we were staying at about 10km outside the park. We had heard the train system in Croatia was slower than buses, plus the only way to get to where we were going was by bus or renting a car, and the bus is significantly cheaper. Anyways, as we were on the train, it pulled into this rail yard/train station and stopped for an abnormal amount of time. We were by no means ahead of schedule, in fact we were running late, but that's normal for trains in Eastern Europe. After waiting about half an hour, not know what was going on, some officials came onto the train. Turns out they were customs officers and we had crossed the border into Croatia. I thought they were cops and something more serious was going on. The Croatian officer came to our seats, looked at our passports, asked a couple questions, stamped them and moved on. Then another guy came, a Hungarian customs officer, and did the same. A third guy came in and asked if we had any alcohol etc that we were taking across the border with us, which we didn't :). Finally we were on our way again, but our Croatian train problems were not over. A little while later, the train stopped again. One of the train workers came to our compartment and said 4 words to us in English - "change train bus baggage". I'm usually down for a good riddle, but this was not the time. In trying to piece these words together, Cath and I determined 1 thing, we needed to get ourselves and our stuff off the train. There were befuddled tourists from all over Europe gathering on the platform. I heard a guy speaking English, so I asked him if he knew what was going on. He said he'd been to Croatia before and this sort of thing happens all the time there. Great.

We ended up following the crowd of people who seemed to know where they were going and we ended up by 3 big tour buses. Everybody was putting their bags below and climbing on, so we did the same. We figured the bus would take us to Zagreb, but it ended up stopping at another train station and they kicked us all off. At this point, we were way later than expected. Another train came to that station which took us the rest of the way to Zagreb. From Zagreb, we walked to the bus depot and caught a bus to the small town of Korenica where I had found a cheap guesthouse to stay within a short bus ride from the park.

The guesthouse was run by an older couple that spoke very little English but kept a very clean house. We met a girl from Belgium who was also staying at the guesthouse and she was travelling alone, so we all went to the park together. She spoke perfect English as well as French and German, so having her around proved to be quite useful as well. I'll let the photos speak for themselves and attest to the beauty of this place. Definitely a must-see. It was quite busy, but Cath and I were some of the only North Americans there. It attracts a lot of European tourists. The weather was perfect as well.

Raised platforms to protect the landscape

One of many waterfalls

The water was so clear and clean!

Having the time of our lives

At the end of the day, after having some nice showers and resting up a bit, we went for dinner with our Belgian friend. There is almost nothing to do or see in the town of Korenica, but there was this delicious little restaurant (called Dalmatica) that was serving fresh caught fish. It was some of the best fish I have ever tasted in my life, and it was reasonably priced for the quality. Because food pictures are a necessity, here's something to salivate over...

Croatian tomato soup and the fish of the day - with a garlic sauce

The Best Place to Take a Bath

Budapest, Hungary would put your best bathing experience to shame. Even better than a hot, bubbling jaccuzzi, surrounded by flaming scented candles and quiet music, are the Budapest bath-houses. This was not originally on our Europe itinerary, but after a recommendation from a friend, I googled it and decided we had to go there. It helped that Budapest was on the way from Krakow to Croatia, so no detour needed there.

Unfortunately, the weather was not the greatest when we were there, but we made the most of it. We spent most of our time soaking up the mineral waters of the bath houses. After hiking in the Alps, biking, hiking, and walking constantly in Austria, and walking for 3 days in Krakow, we were ready for a little relaxation and made the most of it in our time in Budapest. 

Over the course of 2 days in Budapest, we probably spent about 7 hours in two different bath-houses. When we got to Budapest, we walked 30 minutes to our hostel, but when we got there, the guy who was working the "front desk" said there had been a mistake with the bookings. I say "front desk" because this hostel was basically somebody's apartment where they just rented out the rooms. This is pretty common in Eastern Europe, but it was weird to get used to. On the plus side, it's cheap. He apologized that he had to upgrade our room to the private double bed with our own bathroom instead of the mixed 6-bed dorm we had booked. Cath and I had no problem with that. It was like the honeymoon suite of a low-cost Hungarian hostel. The beauty was that it only cost us 50 euro for both of us for 3 nights. So cheap!

As I said before, the weather was not fantastic, so we spent most of our bath time in the warm thermal baths to heat up. The first bathhouse we went to was the biggest one in Budapest. It had 3 larger pools outside, with old men playing chess and jets that spurted up sporadically. The were also a whole bunch of baths inside, ranging from 8-40 degree water. I tried going into the cold plunge 8 degree pool for after the saunas, but made it to my waist and chickened out. It was way too cold! The thermal mineral water was so relaxing, and you just feel so clean after it.

Cath and I under water

Catherine's digital camera is waterproof, so naturally we took it to the baths with us and got some candid underwater photos, like this beauty above....

Wave Pool at bath house #2

The second bathhouse we went to had a wave pool outside which was awesome, but it also had separate men's and women's sections inside. Catherine was excited to go in those, but I was a little more wary. I know what "women only" means - there's a good chance people will be naked in there! Europeans have no shame like North Americans do when it comes to stripping down in public. Thankfully, most people chose to keep their tops on in the female section. By the end of the whole trip in Europe, I definitely got more used to seeing people "bare all" in public - the beaches of Croatia will do that to you.

Capturing the sunset along the Danube

Budapest Parliament building

We took a free walking tour in Budapest as well, which ended with a large portion of the group going out for a cheap Hungarian lunch together. It was delicious, and only a couple bucks. I'm trying to remember the name of the restaurant (it was more of a cafeteria), I'm sure I'll think of it later, but for some cheap, authentic food, it is a great find. On our last night in Budapest we watched the sunset on the famous Danube river.

Great city!

Next it's off to our adventures in Croatia!!

Aushwitz and Birkenau: Emotions Running High

I have been putting off writing this post, and I think it's because it's still difficult for me to process everything I saw that day in Poland. I do not regret going, because it was a very meaningful experience, but it is hard to describe it all in words. This post will be mostly pictures instead, since a picture says 1000 words. Hopefully this gives you a taste of what I saw that day

It was cloudy and cool that day, which set the tone for a somber occasion. I'm not trying to put anyone off of visiting concentration camps in Europe, just be prepared if you go, to feel overwhelmed.

Entrance to Auschwitz

The wooden structure on the right is where the Nazi guard would stand for roll call each day. The photo is taken from where the prisoners would stand.

Sleeping quarters for prisoners. 6-8 people would sleep on each level.

The killing wall. This is where countless prisoners were shot. It is now a memorial to those who died.

The view from the shooting wall

The Auschwitz museum had collections of different items that were seized by the Nazis when prisoners entered the camps. This photo shows some of the many crutches and prosthetic limbs that were taken. This one hit me hard just trying to imagine the physically disabled losing their crutches and aids. It was basically just a death sentence to them all since they could not work.

Some of the shoes that were collected by the Nazis. These used items were of more value to the Nazis than the people who once owned them.

Birkenau toilets.

 The photo above shows the bathroom facility for the prisoners of Birkenau. Auschwitz was a work camp, but Birkenau was more where people came to die. Prisoners were given 30 seconds to use these washrooms only twice per day. A lot of prisoners were sick and would have the runs, but they could only use this twice in a day. It was heart-breaking to see this. Some of the prisoners' jobs were to clean out these washrooms, with their bare hands. They were only given a short amount of time to wash their hands in running water, no soap.

Living quarters at Birkenau

These bunks would each have 8-10 prisoners, each prisoner sleeping on  a plank of wood. Before the war this building was a horse stable. Just goes to show what the Nazis thought of the Jews.

In between these tracks is where the sorting would take place. One side of the camp was the death side, the other side was for the fit and was the work side, but both lead to eventual death.

Before the camps were liberated, the Nazis attempted to hide the evidence of gas chambers by blowing them up. This is the rubble of one of the 4 chambers found at Birkenau.

A part of the memorial set up at Birkenau in remembrance of  those who suffered and died in the camps.

At the end of an emotional day, Cath and I decided to debrief and bring in some light and enjoyment to close off our Poland leg. Seeing as we both love the piano and Chopin, we found a cheap concert that included wine and this guy playing piano for us in a small, intimate setting. He was fantastic, the wine was delicious, and we were able to get over what we had seen that day and move on to our next destination with renewed vigor. I think we will always carry a piece of this experience in Poland with us. It is one thing to read the stories in books, but to see for yourself where the mass-killings took place is a whole other experience.

Take-home message: We are blessed.