This last month has flown by very quick, showing us crazy weather, excellent foods, hundreds of sites, amazing people and family, and leaving us with memories that will last forever. So many things we will miss in Europe, until next time like the great beer, amazing coffee, family, meeting new friends, brilliant fresh food, as well as the history and sites that are all over here. As always there are a couple of things we won’t miss from our travels like the lack of sleep, and security check points at airports, museums, and churches theres no easy way to put it other than they suck.

With each country we visited and each new person we met, our trip was enriched. It helped broaden our perspective and open a new point of view in which to look at things and cultures, which at times can be quite a contrast for us in Canada.

Waiting here in Frankfurt for our conecting flight to Calgary we are already discussing our next trip and look forward to having a more relaxed agenda. If you haven’t been to Europe we highly suggest taking a trip; the food, people, culture, scenery, history, is simpling amazing. Or if you have been to Europe, go again, there is literally years of travel, culture, history, to be experienced and seen.

B & L

Travelling well over 10,000 kilometers, 7 countries (Canada, Germany, Italy, Ireland, France, Holland, Denmark) in 4 weeks can definitely wear on you. We have done just that and our first World Journey together is near the end. So many things we’ve seen – cultures, food, all the different ways you can flush a toilet, start the shower and washing machine and many many sights we will take home with us and remember forever. This definitely won’t be the first of the travelling Clausens and I’m sure we will think of our next trip within days of returning to Canada.

Now that we are with family in Denmark and have left the bustling city of Paris first to Holland and then onto Denmark, we definitely have found it very relaxing and just the most beautiful countryside we’ve ever seen. There are so many things to stop and see that when we are driving to one destination, we stop at least 10 times in an hour for a photo op (which you will see in the Gallery soon!)

In our remaining days we will visit with some more family, tour an awesome Viking museum in Roskilde, and have 2 days in Copenhagen (yay shopping!!!) before flying back to O’ Canada on Saturday.

Ciao, L&B

During our stay here in the belle ville de Paris we have fully experienced the metro and underground transit lines…. Complete with smells, crazy people, little dogs, shaking & speeding trains, connection tunnels and buskers. What a wonderful (and mental) system here and it makes me wonder why other cities (uh hello Calgary) hasn’t adopted this type of transit system. If you miss a train, there’s another in 2-4 minutes. There’s always a seat for you to rest your aching feet (and if not, just wait 2 minutes for the next unpacked train).

I have to say when taking these trains, do a little research, theres a wonderful iPhone app called Metro Paris and you can see all the lovely coloured lines that help you navigate from stop A to B to C…. can you say Chatelet, Rambuteau, Mairie des Lilas?? We recommend buying 10 tickets at a time, they are little so we kept our unused tickets in a special zipped pocket in our coats and took them out when needed, Be sure to keep your little ticket until you leave the station (even after transferring) – sometimes you need your ticket to exit (silly I know)

Questions? Feel free to ask us – we can help you navigate your way around le Metro.

Paris… ahh the city of lights… and pigeons… and people (crazy might we add). Since we arrived here last Thursday we have done an insane amount of walking whilest seeing some of the worlds most amazing sites. After arriving from Dublin on our flight, we purchased our train ticket to get into the city centre and voila! they striked! So Lindsay got to really test her french and get our train tickets refunded and get a bus into the city centre.

Next we got into our cute little apartment, which was on a quintessential french street complete with creperie right next door, fresh produce, bread, pastries, deli, and many many corner bars close by! By this time it was about 2:30 and we had been up since 4:00 so we just took a little walk around our neighborhood, bought some groceries, had a bite to eat and were off to sleep…. zzzz

Since arriving we have walked at least 10 kms a day around some amazing sites (Eiffel tower, Champs Elysses, Arc de Triumphe, Concorde, Notre Dame, Saint Chappelle, the Louvre, Napoleons Tomb, Montmartre (Moulin Rouge!), Paris Opera – just a few I can name). We are now resting up (literally have put our feet up to ease the burning and aching) and are ready to hit Versailles tomorrow.

Au Revoir, Bonne soir, Bonne nuit…

L&B

We have just arrived in Paris after an incredible visit to Ireland. It was true to everything that we had heard in regards to its natural beauty, rainy weather, Guinness, great pub music and food, and most of all amazing friendly people. We started our journey after we landed in Dublin, this was where we hired a car and then drove to Dingle. We stopped often along the way checking out anything that looked like it they might be interesting or just to catch our first Pub experience and pint of Guinness at Delaney’s. Getting lost a couple of times and learning to drive stick on the other side of the car and road made the trip very interesting, add narrow roads and high posted speed limits it was a very interesting trip.

We stayed at a sheep farm owned by an amazing couple Janet and Seamus who went out of their way to make sure our visit was good and also that we wouldn’t go hungry either feeding us a massive Irish breakfast each morning. Lindsay got to feed the baby lambs and was in all her glory there. From there we went around the Ring of Kerry seeing some amazing scenery and sights stopping for lunch and having a grand time at a restaurant called The Stone House with the Owner David. That day ended in the local pub listening to some great traditional Irish music with a pint. After Dingle our short trip led us through the Connor pass, a beautiful and narrow stretch of road over the mountains and onto the amazing Cliffs of Moher and onto Dublin.

Dublin is a very pretty city and there we stayed with a couple Robert and Kevin who where super friendly and full of great conversation which a couple drinks of Jameson Irish Whiskey helped along. In Dublin we toured around stopping at at the Trinity College, St. Patrick’s Cathedral, Christ Church and of course The Guinness Storehouse were we learned how to pour our very own perfect pint of the the dark red stout.

We have a bit more time here in Paris and are now heading out to take in the sites.

B&L

Three days and we haven’t had internet until now in Venice, but it has been awesome here. With the odd sprinkle of rain through out each day, the partial flooding of St. Marcos Square, or the fact that we are on an island surrounded by water has left us perpettually damp this whole time. The streets are very narrow, don’t match the maps, and sometimes lead absoluteley nowhere, and one is gauranteed to get lost at least once a day. This said, it leads to a great experience with a bit of adventure thrown in. The food is still awesome here and the fact there are no streets has left this City very quiet without scoooters racing by and cars honking or the ambulance that seems to drive by just at the point where you are about to fall asleep.

We have visited some of the surrounding islands as well Burano where they are famous for thier lace and very vibrantly coloured housing and Murano famous for thier glass blowing. In Murano, our host from which we are renting out the apartment, actually owns a glass blowing factory and gave us our own private tour which was amazing. The amount of work and time that goes into some of the sculptures is mind boggling.

This is our last day here and then we fly to Ireland where it has been sunny and dry seems odd i think cause it is.

B & L

Buon Giorno! Just a quick post here…

Yesterday we ventured to Siena to see the rolling hills of Tuscany and it poured rain. More than previous rainy days. It was amazing to see, but the rain & hail deterred our view immensely. It would have been beautiful and we would have loved to spend more time there. Compared to the renaissance-ness of Florence, the medeival streets of Siena are just gorgeous! The SITA bus (different than all the other bus carriers here) got us there and back with a small detour into a town called Poggibonsi – awesome to see little towns after being in the larger centers of Rome & Florence!

With being just a little waterlogged, we trekked back home, picked up dinner once again at the amazing deli and headed back to the apartment to dry off. Still this morning, our clothes are not fully dry.

Ciao and on to Venice!

L&B

Well we’ve arrived! after a long long flight to Frankfurt and a short short flight to Rome, we are here!

Our wonderful Rome Hostess Marys met us at the train station and guided us very easily to our apartment. Once settled, we found our way to the CentroMercado (central market for those non italians) and bought our goods for the next couple days. One important point we can share is when you buy your produce, you are responsible for weighing and tagging your bag. After watching a few people print & tag their oranges, tomatoes and garlic, I adventurously asked the young produce lad “parle anglaisy” and he graciously assisted (with very few words of english). Very important to at least know your numbers here for when they tell you the total grocery bill (for tons of groceries) comes to 60euro.

After the best cappuccino in the WORLD (Bowen wasn’t kidding), we headed home, made our proscuitto, genoa salami, spec and mozzarella baguettes, we were very early to bed for an even earlier rise.

Awake at 5:30 this morning, and we were off on the bus to Termini bus/rail station. With just a little walking (haha just kidding) we saw: St. Peters Basilica, Vatican Museum (by your ticket online, we’ll explain below!!!), Castello St. Angelo, Piazza Navona, Fontana de Trevi, Pantheon, Spanish Steps, Villa Borghese, and Square de Popolo. Sorry to those who asked us to say hi to the Pope, I’m sure he was out of the rain prepping for his sermon tomorrow. All I can say is what an overwhelming feeling to be in Rome during Easter. It is quite the cultural melting pot and tons of people everywhere. We actually thought there would be many many more people there than there was, so that was nice.

For the Vatican, we are so glad we listened to Rick Steves and bought our tickets online before leaving Canada. The line was RIDICULOUS and we just breezed past everyone and just walked right in. Do NOT listen to the street vendors trying to coax you to “skip the line”.

One last thought, gelato, gelato, gelato. Oh My Goodness. Mango, Lemon, Tiramusu, Fruitti de Bosci, Zabalone.

Until next time…..

Cheers, L&B