LIFE IS NOT A CONTIKI TOUR

It sounds like a fairly obvious statement but after spending 15 intense days of travel through 8 countries (5200 klms) with thirty people in a coach I had to remind myself today to slow down and remember how to live normally, whatever that is! Rachael and I are relaxing today in London after dropping Jodi off at the airport this morning. I’m not exactly sure how to explain our last two weeks or even that the words would come close to describing the experience so I’m just going to put in heaps of pictures and say a few things. They are basically in chronological order as we went in a clockwise direction from London up to Amsterdam, around through Germany, Austria, Italy, Switzerland and France.

Contiki is kind of like summer camp when you’re a kid. At first your not sure that you want to be there or exactly what you have gotten yourself into, then before you can blink you become really attached to people you just met, have a great time then its over and everyone has gone on there way and you feel a bit…empty. Sorry to be on a downer but I’m missing my new friends more than I thought would be possible. Having said all of that it could be just me.

RACH AND THE CONTIKI LOVE BUS
We started off in London. All got on a coach and headed for the port of Dover for the crossing to France. The first day was mostly travel but it got us to Amsterdam for the evening. It’s a good time to travel as the sun doesn’t go down until 10:30.

THE WHITE CLIFFS OF DOVER

THE GRASSHOPPER - RED LIGHT DISTRICT AMSTERDAM
Interesting…The whole red light district thing. Its kind of like putting the seedy side of town that is in every city in the world in the centre of the city, putting up big signs that point to it and flogging corny merchandise that somehow includes puns on marijuana and sex. Not really the place for me but interesting all the same.

AMSTERDAM CANAL CRUISE

AMSTERDAM BIKES – DON’T PARK IN THE WRONG PLACE!
Bikes are everywhere. Apparently you cant just park them any old place though.

ANNE FRANK

VIEW OF AMSTERDAM FROM CHURCH SPIRE


WINE TASTING – RHINE VALLEY

We headed from the Netherlands into Germany and down through the beautiful Rhine Valley for the night. The next day was Munich. Beer is a big one in Germany and the 1 litre stein was a challenge but we all rose to the occasion. Even Jodes managed quite well and she does not usually drink beer. For the guys who think this is great you would enjoy hearing even more that dinner was a half kilo pork joint and a potato. I couldn’t have it every night but one night was great.
GERMAN BEER HALL – 1 LITRE STEINS IN MUNICH

JODES, ABBY AND COURTNEY
Jodes, Rach and I loved these girls. They are from Virginia. If your reading this girls…we miss you and hope your well.


CONCENTRATION CAMP - MATHAUSEN (AUSTRIA)
Not much to say here since I had already seen one except that it is a very confronting experience and it for the second time it has made me wonder how stuff like that can happen. Then I realise that there is probably things going on right now that we are letting happen and my children will wonder what the rest of the world was doing.



NEAR SALZBURG – AUSTRIAN LUNCH VIEW

THE HILLS ARE ALIVE (RACHS TITLE)


VIENNA CHURCH – ST STEVENS
OK. Now it could just be me but it appears that every major building in Europe currently has some type of scaffolding attached. The pictures may look arty to you but it was probably because I was trying to keep the ugly scaffolding out.

VIENNA VOLKSGARTEN – THE PEOPLES GARDEN. 7000 DIFFERENT TYPES OF ROSES

VIENNA SCULPTURES.
Vienna is difficult to describe except to say that it has sculptures everywhere and is just a classically beautiful city. The home of Motzart of course, so we went to a classical concert which was fantastic.

CLASSICAL MUSIC CONCERT

SCHNAPS TASTING

OLD ROYAL SUMMER PALACE

THE PRINCESSES


VENICE – ST MARKS SQUARE
I know that we have done Venice before but it is always great. I feel relaxed when I’m getting lost through the streets and it is Rachael’s favourite city.

BRIDGE OF SIGHS
I heard two possible reasons for the name but I like the one that says Cassanova was led across here to the cells and all the women sighed as he walked across. I thought I heard someone cough as I walked near it…does this count?

BEN AND JODI – THE GRAND CANAL

JODES GOING ON A GONDOLA RIDE


THE COLESSEUM
It was a hot day in Rome when we arrived but we all loved the Colesseum.

THE ARENA FLOOR

BEN LOOKING NOTHING LIKE A GLADIATOR

TREVI FOUNTAIN

MAKING A WISH

MISDIRECTED TOURIST STUNT – THE PANTHEON
Kat the tour manager told us that it was tradition to hug the columns of the Pantheon (which she made up) so we all did and before we knew it every tourist around was waiting to get a shot holding onto the columns.

SOME OF THE GANG ON THE SPANISH STEPS

THE VATICAN

INSIDE THE VATICAN COURTYARD

THE OLD VATICAN CASTLE

KICKING BACK ON THE BUS
There was a fair amount of bus time on the tour so I thought I’d put the picture in for a proper balance.

VIEWS OF FLORENCE

THE BIG MAN DAVID (ONE OF THREE COPIES)

A CAR THAT IS NOT BUILT FOR COMFORT OR SPEED (SO WHAT IS IT FOR?)

BEAUTIFUL LUCERNE - SWITZERLAND

THE LARGEST FLAT ROOF IN THE WORLD (AND ABBY(RIGHT)WAS MOST IMPRESSED!)
OK! Now personally I wasn’t all that thrilled but she wanted a picture in front of the world’s largest flat roof. I thought it was cool that they have buses that ran on electricity and were connected to overhead lines like trams. You can all judge the wonder of the flat roof for yourself.

VIEW FROM A LOOKOUT

CAMPING GROUNDS – LAUTERBRUNNEN
World’s best camping ground. At night they “turn off” the waterfall and redirect the water for reservoirs. Still it was a great background for our stay in Switzerland.

GIRLS ON THE COG TRAIN
Rachael went with some of the girls on a trip around the countryside to see some of the great waterfalls. They took a cog train up the mountain and a cable car back down. One of the waterfalls was inside a cave in a mountain. Beautiful. Jodes and I went up to Jungfrau which is a building they have placed 3500 metres up the mountain. It snows all the time there and it was great because it was Jodes first time in snow…and we all know how excited Jodes gets.

WATERFALL WALK

MOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

TOP OF THE WORLD – 3571 METRES

VIEW DOWN FROM THE TOP OF THE BUILDING

JODES FIRST TASTE OF GOOD SNOW

ICICLE MAN

ICE TEMPLE (JAMES BOND STYLE)
Insert your own James Bond theme music to get the full feel here. One of the movies (Tomorrow Never Dies I think) was filmed in the ice palace. Very cool…literally.

REFRESHING

EVERY BIG CITY HAS A BIG SYMBOL

VIEW FROM THE BOTTOM

VIEW FROM THE TOP

NOTRE DAME – GRISELLE AND RACH

THE LOURVE

HANGING OUT WITH FRIENDS AND ART – NOTHING BETTER

IT’S A LONG WAY TO COME TO GET ONE DODGEY, BLURRY PICTURE BUT THERE IT IS.

INVERTED PYRAMID (FOR THE DAN BROWN READERS)

ARCH DE TRIUMPH
I didn’t get a good photo but you will all have to check out my video from when we drove in the bus around the Arch. It’s a massive roundabout with twelve exits and NO lanes. Apparently there is on average an accident every seven minutes (although we didn’t get to see one). Also, we were told that you can’t get insurance that covers this place, they wont honour a claim involving the thing. Its crazy to watch!

VIEW DOWN THE CHAMPS ELYEES

ESCARGOTS – THE FINAL DINNER
Snails. What else can I say. They weren’t bad, they just weren’t that good. People say they taste like chicken but there was too much garlic to tell and anyway maybe it’s the chickens that taste like snails.

THE LOVELY LADIES DRESSED UP FOR THE DINNER PARTY

KAT AND LUKE (THE CONTIKI DRIVER AND MANAGER) WITH US AT THE MOULIN ROUGE

DEPARTING – SEE-YA JODES. WE LOVE YOU!


That is as short an explanation I can give of the last two weeks. I will kick myself in the future for not writing more as the memories fade fairly quickly when there are so many within such a short space of time. We miss everyone, new friends and old. Tomorrow we head to Spain and after that Austria, which should be interesting. We will try and do a Blog for Spain when we get back into London on the 26th June.

Take Care friends

Ben and Rach

PS: Hi Jenny. Looking forward to seeing you on the 27th June. Do you have our London number? (+44) 0791 068 1049. Anyone else can feel free to send us a text although it is difficult for us to receive voice calls because of the cost while we are in Spain.