Ahh, there's no place like HOME!

Reporting to you back at the dining room table once again, we made it home, safe and sound with only a few items lost along the way, no major injuries, and only 3 colds (the only trip I haven't gotten sick on!!) It's so nice to be back on American soil, which we totally take for granted, and even better to be back in my comfortable little bubble that is Gates.

Yesterday was spent unpacking suitcases, getting food, and most importantly, checking out the new Chili Target! Caught up with the Klock's and had a lovely Italian inspired dinner. It's nice to be home.

Today will involve much laundry, mail, catching up on the news, and getting the blog in shape ~ time to get digiscrapping! (better trademark that word!) The details will escape me if I don't get them into the computer. So with that in mind, much like the post card that arrives 2 weeks after you are home from your vacation, I will be going back to previous posts and updating with more info, including probably scans of maps and tickets, adding the days that I missed due to various "blackouts", and of course posting more photos.

If you're still interested in reading about the travels, I invite you to come back and visit, or sign up to get an email message when a new post is added.

We look forward to catching up with all of our friends and family!

The Amazing Race - Finish Line

This is it, the final hours of our Amazing Race, and it was amazing. It really did go by so fast, with a new adventure around every corner, the experience is bound to fly by. I only ever started to get homesick on the last day of the cruise, when I think the routine of the week reminded

me of what I've been missing at home.

The excitement at seeing the Eiffel Tower as the train came into the outskirts of the city brought me back. This last packing of the suitcase feels like we're just on to the next town for the new adventure, but even better because it's home.

You learn many things afer traveling 31 days together. One thing I can say is that this family has tenacity. Travel Boot Camp was the pace of this trip, and after all the bickering between the kids is said and done, they did very well keeping up with a pace that most adults wouldn't dare to attempt. With that being said, a couples only trip is next on the agenda!

Our last and first whole day in Paris was very exciting. We woke up and got out a little later than expected, which is bound to happen and you just have to go with the flow. The day was cloudy and much cooler, thank goodness! We decided to head to the Louvre first. Emma said she was so excited she was going to barf - not really of course, but I took that as the ultimate compliment, considering the source!

Walking through the courtyard to the pyramid entrance was like walking through a kingdom. The buildings are so ornate and commanding.

Of course the first item to see on the agenda: The Mona Lisa! Finding it was easy, trying to see it was not. It was crazy inside the museum! Shuffling shoulder to shoulder to see Mona was nuts. Although you are not supposed to use a flash on your camera, they were going off everywhere. You would've thought it was a Hollywood movie star and we were the paparazzi. After 28 days of traveling and getting over the "personal space invasion", Emma had no problem making her way to the front for her FaceBook picture.

We perused a few more DaVinci paintings, then made our way to the Venus DiMilo, known as the Gummy DiMilo made famous by Homer Simpson when he ate it (thus the connection between real life and art, and that includes for Mike!)

Paris -

The trip is winding down. We made it to the Eiffel Tower for a quick peek, but we're heading back today for the climb, as it was scorching hot yesterday. Today is cool, no sun, but that's alright with all of the walking we're going to be doing today.

We went up the Arc de Triomphe, and the view is stunning!

We all had our first crepe, and they were huge and yummy! Mike had ham and cheese, I had cheese, and the kids both had Nutella and banana. I finished Emma's because it was so big!

A Quick update, while I have the energy...

Sunday, August 16, 2009 – Milan to Paris

** Posting this quick snippet from the window of our hotel in Paris, getting free WiFi off of one of the apartments. I hope to post more later, including some pictures, but now we're off for the hunt...Crepes! **

It’s the last hour of a 7 hour train ride to Paris, and I finally got up enough energy to do some writing. I’m anticipating a quick update to the blog today, if I’m lucky. What usually happens is that by the time I find the internet, I have time to upload anything, or I’ve had no energy to document the previous day’s escapades. I have, however, been able to keep up with the archiving of the photos, (even though I haven’t been able to post any!) probably because I’m taking less and less pictures as the trip wears on – my patience and level of tolerance for the heat being the cause. Observations and random thoughts are about all I can manage at this point.

Things that I wish I’d packed:

Talcum powder – that small bottle I hemmed and hawed over would’ve fit perfectly in my purse for a quick pick me up and to cut down on the stick-factor. There’s only so much that a make-up towelette can do for you – it may eliminate the stench, but it does nothing for the stick-factor.

More shorts – I only packed one pair of real shorts, meaning the legs fall at mid thigh. I did bring 3 pair of Bermuda shorts, but it was waaaay to hot to wear them. Trying to buy shorts over here is like trying to make a snowman in Jamaica – it ain’t happenin’. Even if the stores were OPEN, all the clothing is LONG! Do they even need boots in Italy? Maybe if you’re going skiing…in the winter! What gives?

Which leads me to the list of things I’m going to do when I get home, just BECAUSE I CAN:

Drive my car! - This mass transit thing is over-rated and getting OLD.

Drive my car…to the MALL! - I’m giddy at the thought of a collection of stores all in one place, and open past 6 pm! And I’m even going to go all the way to the ‘fancy’ mall….BECAUSE I CAN!

Milan was crazy hot, and it didn’t help that we stayed at Hotel Hades – in the only room without air conditioning. The hotel Demo is right by the train station – a great thing when you’re leaving on a train at 6:40 the next day. NOT a great thing when you need sleep, and as you may have seen a movie or two, not the best type of people hang outside the train station past dark. When the kids start singing Aerosmith's "Duuuude looks like a lay-day!" then you know it's a dicey spot...

Tunisia - North Africa

Tuesday, August 11, 2009 – Tunisia, North Africa Today was probably one of the most amazing days we’ve had on this trip yet, as we had Ali as our personal chauffeur for the day. Mike had booked Ali online, who came highly recommended via travelers on Trip Advisor.com. He picked us up right outside the port terminal, and started his tour with the ancient city of Carthage, with the modern day city of Carthage being built right on top of the original Roman ruins. During the 15 minute trip to the first site, a coliseum built by the Romans in…a long time ago BC, he gave us a quick history lesson on the establishment of the Phoenicians, the pillage and take over by the Vandals (of Viking origin, which is the origin for the word vandalism), and the eventual domination by the Romans until modern times when the French took over. Cathedral built to replace the body of King Louis ?? when the French took over in ?? Hasn’t been used as a Cathedral for 20 years, but is still used today for theater shows.

Roman baths - ruins Shopping street – local money is dineri, but will take Euros. Typically you can offer then ¼ the price they give you for an item. Very aggressive and touchy if you try to walk away from a price offer. Carthage is white buildings with blue shutters and iron railings – illegal to use any other color

Day Two – Marseille, France

Today we got up and off the ship by 11. The shuttle bus took us the 7 km to the Vieux-Port for 10 E each. After a little wandering, we found the tourist information center and asked what are the best things to see in 2 hours, and by the way, where are the closest WC – Water Closets (bathrooms!). Off we went to check out City Hall, the Cathedrale De La Neouvelle Major, and Vielle Charite. City Hall had the bathrooms, but also a very interesting exhibit on a famous aviator and author whose name escapes me now. The exhibit was small, with a few displays of items such as the gloves he wore while flying, and pieces of wrecked airplanes, but the most interesting part of the exhibit was learning about this aviator/author’s adventures and the true story of how he and a friend survived 4 days in the dessert after his planed crashed during a long distance record attempt. The story is so compelling, that I decided I’m going to have to read his book, The Wind, The Sand and the Stars. Winding our way up the streets and trying to follow the signs for the Cathedral, we found instead the Vielle Charite, a series of buildings originally built as an orphanage and hospital for the poor, designed by architect Pierre Puget. (Can you tell I’m reading the tourist brochure now…?). The many doorway arches three stories high reminded me of a smaller and refurbished Coliseum.

In our continued search for the Cathedral, we happened upon an adorable soap shop. It was filled with lovely hand made soaps, some cut in big cubes of 3x3 inches, and stamped with the percentage of ….not sure, fat? We bought one on a rope in the shape of a fish for our “Cape Cod” bathroom. Searching for the Cathedral still, we came across a tiny grocery store where Mike purchased limes, a 1.5 liter diet Coke, a few cans of tonic water, and two Monster drinks for the kids. The fresh fruits and veggie were set up outside, and the inside was absolutely packed to the ceiling with other food stuffs (and not good smells, I might add). STILL searching for the Cathedral but figuring we were closer because we could hear the bells ringing noon, I found the internet café, and for a measly .50 E per 15 min, me and the kids hopped onto the net; I had some blogging to catch up with, while they played some app on Face Book. It didn’t take them long to figure out the keyboard, as it’s not a QWERTY. Luckily for me, I had lappy and just plugged in the Ethernet cable – although the browser still came up in French. Oui! In our last attempt at finding the Cathedral, as it was really heating up outside and breakfast was wearing off, we finally found it. How we didn’t find it sooner escapes me, as we passed it on our bus ride in. It’s a ginormous building, striped with dark and light colored stone, the huge front doors painted red with black ornate hinges. The foundation stone was laid by Napoleon Bonaparte himself in 1852 – thusly why it’s considered and called “The New Major Cathedral”. The inside was gorgeous, with 3 different domes, stained glass, inlaid tile flooring and marble galore. You can’t help but be awed by the presence of such a building, regardless of your religious background. We caught the bus back to the ship in time for the lunch buffet and for some hanging in the sun. Laura would be so ashamed to hear that Austin and Mike tried but lost in the very first round the foosball tournament (see Laura, you and Amanda really did need to be here!). However, later on in the day, Austin won first place in Wii bowling, while Mike placed third. Way to go team Baxendell!

Sunday - Marsaille France

The view from our veranda as we pulled out of port last night was so amazing! To sit and have quiet time with Mike while sipping Limoncello was the moment I've been waiting for!

Found an internet cafe today at a reasonable price, so trying to furiously update. Good thing I brought the lappy! That's the extent of this quick update now.

Today we got off the ship for supplies, internet, and to see a couple of sights real quick. We'll head back to the ship for some time in the sun and pool.

Posting as many pics as possible, much more interesting than any story anyway!

It's Sunday and most shops are closed, but we managed to find a soap shop that was open. Wonderful!

Tomorrow it's off to Barcelona! Looking forward to visiting Gaudi's houses.

Saturday, August 8 - Genoa and start of cruise

Day 1 – Embarkation in Genoa In order to stick with our original one-carry-on-each plan, we planning to dump some of the old cold-weather clothes in our trek to warmer climes. Having already gathered so many treasures, I suggested that maybe we should purchasing a little suitcase for the last leg of the trip, to avoid the cram factor (we had already pulled out the duffle bag that I packed for that…) As luck would have it, Austin and I spotted a cast-away suitcase on our last night in Vernazza. It was a huge, black and red monstrosity, with chrome (yes chrome!) piping. After Mike and I scoped it out again, he dragged it back home in the cover of the night. However, it must not have been dark enough, since as he was dragging it away, a woman approached him speaking only Italian and giving him the impression she thought he was stealing someone’s luggage. He had to demonstrate to her how it was broken before she would leave him alone. Upon closer inspection, we could see it was severely disabled - with one wheel worn to the plastic and the retracting handle decapitated; thus the reason it was left for dead next to a restaurant garbage bin in the first place. But being ever resourceful, a little bit cheap, and even more desperate, Mike was able to bend the wheel rod back into place, and replace the broken wheel with one of the surviving 5. As far as the two handle poles poking out the top, the luggage strap I insisited on purchasing at the Pound Store worked perfectly to cinch it into place. Viola! I was giddy at the thought of the purchases I could now make, what with all the room we’ll have! Saying goodbye to Vernazza with our new find and hoping no one decided to claim it back, we sheepishly dragged The Monster up the road to the train station and hopped on the 11:30 train to SL, transferring to Genoa Principale. You can get glimpses of the famous Portofino from the train, and we saw our first rain since arriving in Italy. The MSC ship dock is right off the train station, and we rolled right up with all of our bags, plopped them on the check in trolley, then headed inside for customs and boarding. It couldn’t have been any easier! It was certainly the easiest embarkation we’ve ever encountered. The ship we’re on is the MSC Splendida, and it is splendid, indeeda. Our cruise is only the 5th sailing of the ship. It is HUGE, and decorated beautifully - not all corny cruise style. After taking care of some business, such as our seating and the trace of smoke smell in our room, we made off to the lunch buffet. After stuffing ourselves, we headed back to the room to change for the pool. Our luggage was waiting, and I couldn’t help but open The Monster to see if my Limoncello made it through…yea! And so did Mike’s Gin. Now if we had only had time to purchase some pop before checking in today, we’d be all set! (pop even costs extra).

Saturday, August 1 – day trip to Stirling Castle

“Slept in” a bit today, making our way out of Marietta’s at 11:30. After a short 40 minute train ride, we wound our way up the cobbled roads to the castle, and had a very Olde World feeling to it – stucco buildings, cast iron fences, walled driveways and the occasional painted sign hanging over a doorways to announce the contents. It’s a picture takers heaven, and it’s a good thing the road is steep because it gave me many opportunities to stop (with Emma!) and take a snap. Stirling Castle is so far my most favorite of the castles we’ve visited. There are so many different nooks and crannies, peaks and walls for which to frame a panoramic of Stirling City below. The hills seem to go on forever and you can see the rain moving across the land, allowing you to predict just how long you have until you need to pull out your umbrella.

There is a lot of history at the castle, and the debate among some Scottish is that Stirling Castle, and not Edinburgh Castle, holds the true heart of Scotland. William Wallace, of Braveheart fame, fought and won the battle of Stirling; I’m going to watch Braveheart as soon as I get home! The Palace buildings are currently under restoration, so we couldn’t go inside, but the outside had amazing statues that at one time were painted with bright colors and gold paint, carved during the reign of Charles the 4 (or 5th, not sure…anyway they’re REALLY old!) The castle has only been under restoration for the past 40 years, which sounds like a long time but is merely a second in the history of the castle. There is a current exhibition showing the weaving of tapestries that will eventually hang in the Palace when completed. It is a fascinating and amazing undertaking – each tapestry, made as a replica of the ones that hung in the Palace, will take 4 years to complete. WOW! There is a series of 6 tapestries, with 4 finished tapestries currently hanging in the Great Hall, awaiting their new home when the Palace restoration is complete. We watched the weavers on the giant loom, and the tapestry is actually made from left to right, on its side, and not top to bottom or bottom to top like I'd assumed.

Friday, July 31 - Urquhart Castle day trip

**I'm dreadfully behind on getting info and pictures posted. It takes a bit to get the pictures downloaded, organized and resized for uploading - then there's that wrangling the lappy away from the kids...oh yeah, and being so tired by the end of the day that I don't have the energy...!**

We were up at 5:30 for the 7:06 train from Queen’s station to Inverness, arriving at 10:30. The weather was clear and beautiful, and dare I say, even a little warm! I packed breakfast, lunch AND snacks, just to cut down on the Hunting and Gathering for half a day - many thanks to our very gracious host, Marietta, lending us her soft-sided cooler.

From there it's a short drive to Urquhart castle. Our brand new black Ford Focus was ready and waiting at the rental place when we arrived, thanks to Mike’s pre-booking the night before. During our walk-around the car to note any previous damage before we took it out on the road, the poor chap checking us out was saying they’ve had an increase in the number of accidents with the cars in the last two weeks (I won’t tell you what nationality, but it wasn’t Americans – I had to ask!). Once I told him we had already been driving in Ireland, he laughed and said he wasn’t worried anymore. NO kidding.

The way out of Inverness is easy, when you have a GPS. “Thank you baby Jesus!” that I insisted we get one before our trip, as I don’t know how we would’ve navigated the insane amount of roundabouts, not to mention back roads, without it. Unless you already know where you’re going, there is no way that your average driver would have enough time to actually read the signs to know which spoke of the wheel to exit, if British Jill wasn’t telling you to “Enter the roundabout and take the second exit to A82”.

Of course we all know that Mike is not your average driver, which is not a bad thing, except that he doesn’t like to backtrack and so cut off two different people going through some of the roundabouts today, once even eliciting a honk – unheard of! I just grip and close my eyes. Twice we also did a Griswald - that’s when you ride around the entire roundabout to get back where you started, just so that you can try taking the right exit without crashing, or worse, causing someone to honk.

The ride to Urquhart Castle is a rather short one, on a wider road, so less teeth gnashing on my part (a good thing, since my nubs would be down to gums…) The road takes you along the gentle shores of Loch Ness, sprinkled with pull-outs to steal a view of the castle from a distance as you approach.

The castle is a ruin, which is lovely in the sense that you get to climb in and amongst certain places that you wouldn't be able to were it not. The views from each vantage point are all spectacular! There could never be one perfect picture here.

After leaving the castle, we decided to find the Highlands Winery. The GPS would tell us right where we need to go, and when we headed up the first 45 degree hill, I thought twice about it! We found it and it was lovely - they give you a little aperitif glass and you help yourself! They made wines with local fruits and flowers, like elderberry, sloe berry, ginger and the like. I loved the ginger wine! I wish there were a way I could get it home. It was so yummy!

Deciding to squeeze in one more place into our day, we headed for Fort George. See next post for info and hopefully pictures!

Thursday, July 30, 2009

Our weather has cooperated more in Scotland than anyplace, and other than a short burst of rain this morning (thankfully I snagged two of Marietta’s umbrellas) the day was cool, but dry.

We got on the hop on tour at stop #7, right at George’s square, where we had left off yesterday. We took the bus out to stop #13, the tall ship. There was hardly anyone there. It’s only 1 of 4 left in operation in the world. It’s been around the world 4 times. The kids had a “mouse hunt” game while on board, to which they got a piece of white chocolate at the end if they had the right number of mice.

Next stop: #16 – Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum Your typical museum with stuffed animals and rocks, but with art also. There was a Salvador Dali (Christ on the cross) and a VanGoh, among others. I was most impressed with the work of Charles Rennie Mackintosh, his wife Margaret MacDonald, and her sister Frances MacDonalds' work, which instantly reminded me of Frank Lloyd Wright’s work – art nouveau. They predate Wright by a little, but the work is beautiful, and I like it just a touch better.

Transport Museum – you don’t get to climb on any, but you can see all types of old cars, trams, and trolleys. Got chased out of there just before closing time.

Headed back towards home – Mike was tired and not feeling great – his back is hurting – so he took the kids back to Marietta’s to find out about golfing and I went over to the info center (gifts). Mike had made a wonderful dinner of chicken and bacon flavored tortellini, beef and white wine tortellini with a tomato sauce, backed spiced chicken breast, and green peas. It was heaven! Marietta had a work dinner, so wasn’t there to enjoy it. She didn’t get home until very late – almost 10, but we were able to spend some time chatting and she gave us many wonderful suggestions on what to do for our day trips.

Scotland - Glasgow day one

Wednesday, July 29
Slept in – we crashed big time, and we welcomed the slower pace. Austin is either fighting a cold, or allergies.

Marietta is very close to George Square, so we made our way to the tourist information center and found out some information on trains and passes and such. We decided to do the hop on hop off tour, which was only 22 pounds for the family, and you could use it for two days. All of the state owned museums are free in Glasgow, so you can hop on and off and spend some time in each of the museums. Since it was already 3pm and everything closes at 5, we decided to at least stop at the oldest house in Glasgow for a self tour. There is a cathedral across the street, but we didn’t go in it.

With time for one more stop, we made our way out to the People’s Palace, which is really just a museum on Scottish life. It has a nice botanical green house, and to be in the warm temperature was enough to lift anyone’s spirits! They chased us out of there at 4:45, so we took the bus back to Marietta’s, stopping at Tesco for supplies – food! Mike made pizza for the kids for dinner.

In the apartment, we could hear a bag piper coming from somewhere, so Mike and I went out to investigate (the kids wanted to hang and watch tv and be on the computer), and we found him playing for guests arriving at the BBC Hall which is right next to Marietta’s building. That was pretty cool to see, and I was bummed that the kids weren’t with us to see it – especially Emma because she wanted to see if there was a place you could try bagpipes.

I took an HD video of it, but of course it’s the one time I didn’t have either of the other cameras with me. All the guests (it looked like a conference of some sort) were walking up and having their picture taken next to him. He was wearing blue Tartan. Mike and I continued for a short walk around to get oriented, mostly on the way to the Central station to get information about trains to Inverness. They don’t have those schedules there, go figure.

On the way back, Mike found a fish and chip hole in the wall (literally) and we had our first authentic fish and chips – it was good! By the time we got back to the apartment, Marietta was home form work – turns out we missed her by one minute when we left! Just hung out that night with Marietta, making plans and letting the kids call home (she has free international calling and invited us to use it – I talked to Mary, Emma to Brynna and Erika).

The sun sets so late here, it was 10:30 and literally still light out, which makes it even harder to get the kids and ourselves to bed. Marietta’s flat is on the top (4th ) floor, and has great views and wonderful late day sun. The space is amazing! Many picture taking opportunities up there.

Scotland - Glasgow

Scotland – Glasgow arrived Tuesday July 28, 2009: 10 pm
Marietta is the finest and most gracious of hostesses! She made the 30-40 minute trek outside Glasgow to pick us up at Prestwick airport, and we got to help her break in new brand new Lexus - hope we didn't get muddy!

She had all sorts of breakfast food for us in the morning – juice, bagels, eggs, cream cheeses. Her flat is unbelievable, with 2 lofts, 2 full baths, ½ bath, washer dryer, and a view to kill for – including a terrace. The kitchen is open, with these cabinets made from some knotty wood; the doors being all scrolly in shape, with scribbly handles. She has this amazing stove, an AGA, that stays on all the time. It has these ovens that you don’t control the temperature – I love it! The top has two “burners” with lids. One side is for boiling, the other side is for sautéing. Tea towels dry on the handle in no time – I’d love to have this stove at home and just stand by it to warm myself up on those cold days.