Barcelona

I was very sad to leave geneva and I have some more pics and video to post but the Barcelona hostel has free wireless (yay!) but nowhere to plug in my computer cord (boo!).
The train from geneva was very quick, or at least felt like it; it was a solid ten hours though. We were in sort of a big train car with regular seats that are a bit wider than usual and can also recline; it was ok I actually slept quite a bit. The man sitting behind me kept sneezing (apparently the sneeze/cough into your elbow thing hasn't quite caught on in Europe yet) and another lady was hacking up who knows what. Gross. Anyway made it to our hostel with no problems and then went on a tour of the FC Barcelona soccer stadium; I thought that was cool. After that we headed to La Sagrada Familia to check that out but of course they're doing renovations so much of the inside was blocked off!
We waited to go to dinner until the normal dinner time for locals, around 9pm, and no exaggeration people were still coming

Switzerland

Hello from Switzerland! I have a bunch of video to upload, I didn't think pictures were enough. It is sooo unbelieveable beautiful here, I kind of want to move here. I'm sad that we're really only here for one full day and then off to Barcelona, but I know I will be back to Switzerland for another visit!!

Karoline and I went on a one-hour boat ride around the Lake Geneva...above is a picture of some of the stores along the street facing the Lake. Fancy stuff, Rolex, Mont Blanc, Harry Winston, other watch companies that are famous and I can't think of right now. As you can see the Lake is nice and blue and the sky was blue today as well! Soo windy though it was crazy. The big Jet d'eau thingy that is usually going was turned off b/c of the wind. I hope it's on tomorrow b/c it is on like every Geneva tourism thing and I really want to see it! It's a big stream of water that goes something like 150meters into the air.

BIG PUPPY!!! He was chilling at a little souvenier stand waiting for his owner. So cute. And huge. Apparently the dogs here either have to be microscopic or gigantic, no inbetween! And the people speak at least 2 different languages it's so cool. I got to use my limited French "Parlais vou Englais?" (I know that spelling isn't even close) and watch whoever I spoke to recoil in horror at my pronunciation. Whateves dude at least I'm making the effort!!!

On the lake, I love the laaaake and the mountaiiiins they're so beautiful.

Another view from by the Lake...

Mountains around the lake...and these aren't even the big ones. On the other side you can see snow on the tops of the mountains and everything.

So below is a short video of some of the sights from the train ride and another one of Geneva from the boat ride we took today...so pretty. These videos take forever and a day to post on here or I would post more...if I do this kind of trip again I'm bringing my own computer with me!! This hostel only has two computers that you can hook USB cords into and I don't want to hog it for too long...plus internet is expensive here.

So that's all for now...I might post again quickly tomorrow if we get bored waiting for the train but we'll see! Overnight train to Barcelona tomorrow night, booo. But I think Barcelona will be really cool :)

This is the metro in Venice.

Gorgeous day, gorgeous city.

Another driving in Poland video.

More driving in Poland. Oh, Karoline's grandfather is driving, the roads are barely big enough for one tiny European car, and there are potholes like no other road I've ever driven. BUT they're very strict about seatbelt laws, so that's nice.

Driving in Poland

Ok so I've taken a couple videos while on my trip and I wanted to share them! Here is one of what it is like to drive in Poland. Vicky, you might want to take a dramamine before you watch.

Milan...meh.

I have some seriously mixed feelings about Milan. I'm really not impressed with it, I think I was expecting some fancy, glamorous city, and really it's kind of dirty and boring.

This is a fountain in front of the Castello Sforzesco. Apparently the castle was turned into barracks by the Austrians back in the 1700's so it wasn't the pretty castle I was imagining. Sigh.

The Galleria, this place is pretty and interesting to look at, I think it is the oldest shopping mall in Italy? Or something like that.

Ok the Duomo I was impressed with. I really loved the inside of this church, it is gorgeous and amazing. All the pillars, I love that.

Me outside of the Duomo, it is an impressive building though, right? I think I enjoyed that the most, and unfortunately that was the first thing we did yesterday so everything else was sort of blah after that. We saw a bunch of other churches and whatnot but I'll post those pictures on facebook when I get back, they aren't too exciting. Our hotel here is very nice, the most like a real hotel out of any place we've stayed so far. And breakfast is included in the price so that was sweeeeeeet this morning.

Milan doesn't seem very Italian to me though, but I don't really know what I was expecting. I know it's a very different city from Venice but...I dunno. Plus yesterday was Sunday so a lot of stuff was closed, and today is a holiday so a lot of stuff is closed, maybe that has something to do with it? But the train ride from Venice to Milan was verrry pretty OH and we stopped in Verona!! (Suzy you can imagine how badly I wanted to get out and walk around and recite Romeo and Juliet lines like a total geek). Apparently the train ride from Milan to Geneva is absolutely gorgeous so I'm really looking forward to that!! Ok that's all from Milan. I think we're going to try and go check out the stadium where AC Milan play and then check out the fancy shopping districts (Alex I can't make any promises about the Louis Vuitton wallet but I'll do my best!).

Ciao!

Venice Update!

Hello! I'm actually writing from Milan but I need to backtrack and post pictures from Venice! Venice was truly beautiful and kind of amazing. Everything on boats! Need to get something delivered? Well it will be delivered via boat. So neat.

This was the view from our hotel room window. I wasn't overly impressed with this particular hotel, but it was right across the street from the boat station so that was convenient. After riding on the boat for a long period of time, you still feel like you're on the boat for like a solid 20 or 30 minutes afterwards. It is very bizarre. Oh also! If you can see that little like...post thing sticking up out of the middle of that circle, it was actually a water fountain! Water just constantly dripped out of it and you could just go grab a drink.

Oh and did I mention it was windy the entire time we were there? It was. Here I am in Piazza San Marco (or something...is that right, Vicky? I know it is San Marco and I think Piazza is Square...I miss the Platz' of Vienna!) and it was insanely crowded here and there were a ton of pigeons. Someone please explain to me the obsession people have with pigeons. I think they are disgusting, and yet, people were trying to get them to eat out of their hands. Ew.

This was on Murano, the island where the Italians do a lot of the glass blowing, this little structure was in one of the little piazza's, it is pretty impressive. I loved Murano, we got to see a glass blowing demonstration (which hopefully I can upload the video at some point but I'm having trouble reading Italian youtube and figuring out how it all works) and pretty much spent the entire afternoon there. It was gorgeous and definitely one of my favorite things about Venice.

This was...near C a'doro I believe. We spent a while walking around there as well, very nice little shopping district. I seriously loved how people were just like 'la la la I'm driving my boat around like it's a car' it was so fun.

Another view of Venice.

Oh this was at the top of the tower in San Marco Square Piazza. SO WINDY! But it was pretty from up there. Overall I truly enjoyed Venice, we had some delicious Italian food (and Bellinis!) and it was pretty amazing to see that part of Italy and experience the culture. Also I love gondolas. They're awesome and I love the gondola guys, some more than others though, I like the ones that go all out and are singing and wearing their striped shirts and little bolero-type jackets and the big straw hats with a ribbon tied around them. Loved it. OH and our hotel had functional shutters!!!! LOVE THAT SO MUCH! Seriously even though that hotel was kind of crappy, the shutters made it so much better.