barcelona day 1

So we got into Barcelona last night after a too-long train ride which left us feeling tired, dirty, and grumpy. We slept almost 12 hours, though, and are now delightedly waited for our laundry to finish washing. We´ll start exploring the city after that. Only thing we´re definitely seeing is La Sagrada Familia.. I know it´s only two weeks into the trip, but Lisa and I are already quite tired of the constant traveling. As long as the hostel situation is good in Paris, I´m looking forward to sleeping in one place for 5 nights in a row..

in brief.

Well, we're in Nice, after a whirlwind stay in Rome. I did not care for Rome, no idea why all roads lead there. Within five hours of being in the city, some punk cigarette-smoking 10-year-old tried to pick-pocket Lisa, and when I pulled the bag away from him, he just seemed to have absolutely no remorse. The next day, we did a whirlwind tour of the place - Colosseum, Palatine Hills, Spanish Steps, Trevi Fountain, Sistine Chapel, St. Peter's, and more, all in one day. It was exhausting, but we got the requisite pictures. Our hostel was ok, but that night one of the girls managed to throw up, some of which landed on some of Lisa's stuff and the cover of my Al Gore book. Had to sacrifice the cover, but luckily there was no lasting damage. But it was gross. Obviously. Anyway, we've decided to keep our stuff super close now, especially since we're going to be staying in some 8-10 people mixed dorms.

After Rome, we stopped in Cinque Terre, which was great but a bit too touristy for my taste. We rented a private room which I thought was a) too expensive and b) had a semi-crazy landlady who forbid us to use the kitchen and the washing machine. The kitchen, fine, but that laundry machine would have been so nice..

We're in Nice now, we got in last night. Our hotel isn't so great, and the city isn't quite what we expected, but at least I get to practice my French a little. It's rusty, though. I need to spend more time in a Francophone country if it's ever going to improve. We wandered around a bit today, but then it started raining, so we spent the afternoon asleep. This morning, however, we went to the Marc Chagall museum. That was definitely amazing. I've always loved his work; so colorful and rich. This is a museum filled with biblical paintints, and it was interesting to see his interpretations. In many of them (at least in one room), the overarching theme is just love. It's also interesting going with Lisa, since she knows some of the stories and can explain them to me. I've found, though, that in addition to many religions sharing the same overarching message, they also share similar stories. Makes you wonder why people have to make things so divisive.

Tomorrow we're heading to Barcelona. There promises to be some crazy architecture there, and if we can manage to stay awake past 10, maybe some interesting night life. And hopefully a laundromat.

By the way, thanks for all of your messages. Sorry I haven't been able to respond individually.

the laziest tourists.

So I've decided that Lisa and I are among the laziest tourists you will ever encounter. Not that we don't see the major things, but seeing that it's the last vacation we take before we start the 9-to-5 grind, we've been pretty relaxed this trip. Keeping this in mind, I think you'll find we had a rather productive day today.

We started off the morning by waking up at 6 to go stand in line at the Accademia, home of David, among other things. I know it's cliche to say that it was amazing and breathtaking, but in all honesty, it really was. All the postcards and reproductions you see don't do it justice. I suppose that it helps that it's situated under a domed skylight at the end of a hallway with other sculptures, and that it's a gajillion feet tall, but hey, still counts in my book. It's more detailed than I'd ever imagined, down to the veins in his forearms and the traces of a ribcage. The museum also has some other nice paintings, and there's even a musical instrument exhibit, although I found the one at the Met more impressive. We kind of rushed through, though, to get back in time for the breakfast being served at our hostel. It was totally worth it. The hostel owner serves eggs (DC-style, yum), cereal, yogurt, and toast to your room in a little wicker basket. Perhaps this isn't so exciting to you lovely readers who currently have the option of eggs on a daily basis, but to deprived egg fanatics such as Lisa and myself, this was heaven in a hand basket, literally. We're looking forward to a repeat of the same tomorrow morning.

This afternoon we went to Pisa to take the requisite pictures by the Leaning Tower. We spent a good deal of time jumping up and down in the square, trying to capture photos of each other midair. And Lisa stumbled around a bit. (Ok, tripped once.) The other tourists probably thought we were slightly crazy, but then, everyone was taking ridiculous poses pretending to be holding up the tower (us included), so I don't mind. Pisa was surprisingly fun and the baptistery and cathedral were beautiful, but I think our slap-happiness enhanced the experience.

This evening we went to a nearby restaurant where we actually splurged on dessert, and now it's 2 a.m. and we're sitting in our hostel waiting for photos to upload (much thanks to Jon Goldman for assistance in this endeavor - look, now you're famous!), which is why you are all reading my second post in two days. We've taken 200 pictures in 5 days. Sounds unbelievable, I know, but you have to remember that Lisa is an AziAN girl in disguise as just a regular Asian girl. I don't know how I deal..

No other thoughts for now. We're heading to Rome tomorrow where we're going to try to see it all in a 1.5 day marathon. My sore throat is mostly gone, just some residual sniffles. And I think some guys hit on us tonight, so my last post title is no longer valid.

Oh, and one last thing. I finished my book about Al Gore (The Prince of Tennessee), and it was fabulous. I've started rereading it again, actually, because I don't have anything else to read in my bits of free time and because I love Al Gore that much. I highly recommend that somebody starts, or joins me in, a letter-writing campaign to convince him to run for president again in 2008.

But we still haven't been hit on..

So we got into Venice a few days ago after a rather uneventful flight, and we expected our trip to the hostel to be similarly uneventful. There was no clear address listed on our hostel reservation, but that didn't bother us, since we figured we'd be able to ask people fo directions. Unfortunately, when we got to the district where our hostel was located (Dorsoduro), no one had any idea where it was. Thankfully, one guy at the American Hotel guessed the general area, and after 2.5 hours of walking in circles (carrying our backpacks), we were able to find it.

Upon arrival, we got worried because the outside looked gross, but the inside turned out to be gorgeous and very clean. We slept for a few hours, and that evening we wandered over to a little square. Apparently, our hostel was right by a university, and there were lots of students and young childrens (and drunk Americans) hanging out there, in addition to amazing pizza. We met a guy from CUNY with whom we bonded over our mutual dislike for the frat boys who give Americans a bad name. In fact, Lisa and I spent most of our time in San Marco (the top tourist spot in Venice) speaking in British accents.

The touristy things have been ok, but what I liked most in Venice was hanging out in that little square and wandering through the towns. The first night we were there, there was a voice recital on the second floor of our hostel, a beautiful Italian soprano.

On Friday we spent the day in the train station because we had to wait for a train out to Florence. Lisa wandered around a bit, but I'd managed to get a bit of a sore throat, so I dozed in various awkward positions.

We're in Florence now. Our hostel is amazing, and the owner gave us a detailed overview of the city when we got in last night. We got up at 6 today to avoid lines at the Uffizi Gallery, and we spent the day wandering the city. Uffizi was totally worth it; the paintings are obviously gorgeous, but the coolest thing is walking down long hallways filled with ancient sculptures. I really like Italy so far - it's amazing to walk down the streets and randomly run into beautiful architecture.

Tomorrow we make a day trip to Pisa, and after that we head to Rome.

Itinerary

Tuesday, June 6: Fly out of SFO at 8 a.m.

Wednesday, June 7: Arrive in Venice at 8:20 a.m.

Friday, June 9: Depart midday to Florence

Saturday, June 10: Take a day trip to Pisa

Monday, June 12: Depart midday to Rome

Wednesday, June 14 : Depart midday to Cinque Terre

Friday, June 16: Morning departure to Milan, spend some time there, later afternoon departure to Nice

Sunday, June 18: Morning departure to Barcelona

Monday, June 19: Day trip to Ibiza

Wednesday, June 21: Morning departure to Madrid

Friday, June 23: Evening departure to Paris

Saturday, June 24: Morning arrival in Paris

Thursday, June 29: Afternoon departure to London

Sunday, July 2: Morning departure from Heathrow to New York