Yesterday Scott and I started our morning off with breakfast at the hotel before we ventured out for a bike tour of Florence. The bike tour was lead by a women born and raised in Florence who taught us about the area. It helped us really appreciate Florence and all that is here. We saw the church in which Michaelangelo and Galileo are buried and learned that Michaelangelo’s nephew had to steal his body from Rome to bury him in Florence in the middle of the night! Crazy! We also had the chance to go to Piazza della Repubblica and see where the Dukes used to rule Florence and where the original David once stood (now there is a replica in its place). We ate dinner at an outside restuarant in this piazza the first night, and it was beautiful! One of the best features of our bike tour (other than it was just Scott and I because the other people canceled at the last minute) was that we got to stop for gellato! We sure have been loving this cool and tasty treat.

After the bike tour, Scott and I walked around the market square where street venders are working hard at selling you anything that says Italy on it. It was fun to see what everyone had and how they want to bargain with you. All I bought was some stationary that has a beautiful print to it (I know, not very exciting). Scott saves his money for the food!

We chose a fanatastic pizzeria to eat at for dinner. We both got different pizzas not realizing that 7 euros buys basically a whole pizza. So we had plenty to munch on and brought some back to our hotel for a midnight snack.

Today, we are leaving for Rome a little after noon. This will be our final destination before returning home. We have had such a wonderful time and look forward to our last days in Europe. We woke up early this morning so we could tour Florence one last time and go to the Accademia to get a glimse if Michaelangelo’s work including the statue of David. Luckily, our hotel had made reservations for us, so we didn’t have to wait in the long line. It’s was crazy to think that we were standing in front of something that Michaelangelo created! After looking at a few other sculptures and photographs we headed back to our hotel through the center part of Florence where the cathedral stands. It is said that the florence cathedral is the fourth largest cathedral in the world. I can’t imagine what we are about to see at St. Peter’s in Rome. The size is overwhelming and the outside is completely covered in marble. It’s quite a sight.

Well, hopefully we will have access to a computer in  Rome. If not, we look forward to seeing everyone once we get back to the States! Thanks for posting so many comments. It’s a good feeling to know that even overseas we are still connected to our family and friends. Ciao!

Our first night we took a walk to the top of a hill that overlooked Florence.  We stopped at the Piazzle Michelangelo which had a copy of David and went up further to San Miniato whih was a huge church that was even higher up.  Making our way down we were hungry.  Trying to find the perfect spot that would feed our Italine appetiite we settled upon a outside restaurant near the city center.  We ordered big and left being full.

The rest of the night we bounced from cafe to cafe landing among all places an Irish pub.

Making it to the Rialto bridge (one of the only two bridges that crossed over the Grand Canal), we stopped for a needed rest!

We popped into a small restaurant and ordered some of the food they had on display.  Without being able to sit down we devoured our petite Italian cuisine.  Monica enjoyed here first Italian meatball and Scott enjoyed whatever they served him.  We think it had cheese in it.

Feeling parched we wanted to stop for some wine.  We saw a shop that said Vin with a tiny sign that said Take-Away.  We entered under a little red awning and found nearly a dozen wooden barrels with tubes running from them.  Each wine labeled with its style and price £1.5, £2.5, ….  we ordered a Rose.  Suddenly the man behind the counter pulled out a plastic litter of what used to be water and filled it to the top with wine.  Our eyes popped out at him as we handed him a £2 coin and we walked away with liter full of wine in a recycled water bottle.  Gulping our wine through the canals we thought we looked pretty funny.

We finished our night we a slow gondole ride down some of Venice’s quietest canals.  The gondolier was nice enough to point out major landmarks, like were Marco Polo stayed among others.  I’m sure he could of told us anything and we’d believe it we were floating on a gondole floating past 500 year old buildings somehow still standing on water

After only two nights in Venice we thought we’d had our fill and were ready to head south to Florence.

Venice seemed like a fantasy world. Leaving the trainstation and taking a water bus down the grand canal you felt that you were either survivors of a huge flood (where everyone partied) or you were on the set of a giant movie set. After every stop, we were amazed at how old the building were and that the still managed to stay above water.

Arriving later in the evening we stopped and had a delicious dinner with some local wine. Strolling through the alleys you easily feel lost but behind every turn was a little square to walk through. We made our way to Saint Mark’s square and stopped for a brief dance where one of the six tiny orchestras were playing.  We eventually made our way back to our hotel and called it a night.

Hope all is well back home.  We enjoy reading all the comments you have been writing.  See you in a little over a week!

We learned quickly how to forward paddle, back paddle, GET DOWN and HOLD ON!  With nerves in our stomach we started down the class four rapids.  A couple of bumps off of some big rocks and some dips over some big waterfalls we were able to take a quick float out of the boat before hopping into the raft.

Below are some pictures from our trip.

After the trip we celebrated with some beer and cheese provided by our guides.  Sven took us back to Lautenbrunen where to took our bus back to Stechleberg and another cable car back up to Gimmewald.

Stopping for a quick bit to eat we wanted to head back up to Murren one more time before we leave tomorrow.  We found some shortcuts, but when we got there nothing was open.  A nice trek none the less, we made our way down.

We’re here enjoying Gimmelwald for one last nice, hearing some good jokes and seeing some great pictures from the Irish folks that are staying at Ester’s.

It’s hard to think we’re leaving for Italy tomorrow and leaving this great scenery!  Onward and upward!

Click on images for more information.

Guten Tag from the Swiss Alps! You can’t believe how beautiful it is here. The videos and pictures we will download hardly do it justice. Yesterday was a long day of travel but exciting at the same time. We took our first rail ride from Paris to Basal. We had no idea what we were doing, but luckily we got on the right train and made our way to Basal. We had to transefer at Basal to Interlaken and then in interlaken we got on a small Swiss train that traveled part way up the mountain to Stechelberg. We passed by clear rushing rapids that were so loud we had to talk over (very cool). Once we hit stechleberg we arrived at Scotts biggest fear, the gondola or cable car up the mountain to Gimmelwald. He took one look at it and said, I can do it! Although he was the only one holding on for his dear life, standing in the middle of the rather large size cable car, he made it up and was relieved once his feet hit the gravel floor at the top. I was a bit nervous he was going to pass out, but he did great. Once we got off the cable car we couldn’t believe our eyes or ears! This place is something out of the movies. With waterfalls in the far distance, snow covered mountain tops, sounds of cow bells ringing, and houses that are built of dark brown wooden planks with red shutters (and gnomes all around) and beautiful gardens, we already know that 3 nights isn’t going to be enough here. We quick brought our luggage to our room at Esther’s Guesthouse. We share a kitchen space and bathrooms with others on the floor. As we walked in I said to Scott, I feel like we are on Real World about to meet our roomates. There was a couple cooking in the kitchen who seemed nice and offered for us to stay and eat with them, but we were to excited to go see Gimmelwald, we declined and were off hiking about the small town. Every step we took we would stop and say “Can you believe we are here”. We need to be pinched because it truly is an amazing sight!
We ended our night at a local pub/resturant were we enjoyed some food from the area, weinerschnitzel, cheeses, sausage, beer, etc.

We woke up this morning to a cooked breakfast for us in guesthouse. It was also delicious. Our room has large windows that mountains peak from in every angle. If you listen carefully you can hear the bells of the cows. Otherwise, it is silent and peaceful.

We are off to hike along paths to nearby Murren and possibly the “North Face Trail”. The weather is beautiful today (a bit cooler, since we are half way up a mountain), but very clear, blue sky and shining sun! We are fortunate to have internet again at this guesthouse and as you can tell by the length of this e-mail we have a normal keyboard that has the letters in the right spot!

Auf Wiedersehen!

Tour de Louvre by Scott

The best of Paris happens at 10:00 p.m. and every hour after! Take a look!