back in NL

we are back where it all began, well for john at least. our tour de europe has ended :( we flew out of nice this morning at 8.15, which meant getting up at 4.45 (i haven't been up that early since my last day at starbucks). we flew into brussels, belgium then took a train into rotterdam, holland where paulina met us at the train station. john and i were so excited for the belgium waffles we had planned on getting for breakfast at brussels central station, but didn't have enough time... so upsetting. the stoop waffles on train slightly made up for it though (i'm bringing home a crap load of stoop waffles!!! so tastyyy). then to top it off paulina (who had just been in poland for a wedding) brought us home made perogis!!! so upon our arrival to her apartment she made us a delicious lunch!!! we will celebrate my birthday here in the netherlands (don't worry, you can give me my gifts when i get home;) ) then fly home the following day... while we are here in NL we have a lot of work to do in terms of gathering all of johns things, repacking them, and shipping them back to the US...

it's so nice in Nice...

from genoa our next stop was menton. it is an adorable coastal city just across the french boarder. we found a cheap hotel, showered, then went out and explored the city. we figured that since we were now in france we had to get crepes, so we asked around then were guided by a local (she seemed to be a local celebrity, she knew everyone in this small town) to the best creperia in town and got us a table! it was magic. the following morning we rode through monaco and into nice! our first stop as tourist information... we needed to get the location of a few bike shops in town so that we can take apart our bikes, box them up and fly then to holland. well the woman at tourist info was a life saver! not only did she find and book us a 48 euro a night hotel, she also called a few bike shops for us and inquired about boxes. this women saved us hours of work!!! nice is a beautiful city. yesterday we layed on the beach for a bit, hit up some museums then, walked around the city, then found the perfect restaurant for our celebratory dinner. i mean we have just completed le tour de europe. the location, the ambiance, the staff, everything was great... the meal was intended for dads credit card, his treat to us after almost three months of hard riding (hahah, love you dad). after a fantastic meal we throw down the plastic only to be told they don't accept credit cards!!! but this was our celebratory dinner, didn't he know what we had just accomplished and what our father was going to treat us to!!! the nerve. today we will go into monaco and rub shoulders with the rich and famous. tomorrow morning we fly to belgium then take a train into rotterdam where we will see paulina!!!

pisa, cinque terre, genoa...

after our time in florence we rode in to pisa the following day. i hate to say it, but i wasn't that impressed with pisa. i mean they have a tower that leans (actually quite significantly to my suprise) but besides that, there isn't a whole lot to see in the city. it's a big college town, so i guess that makes it fun.... but otherwise it's a bit shady. we did stay at a guesthouse with the most peculiar host. his name was michelle and he loved talking to us.. the next morning we left pisa and made it to levano, a city just north of the cinque terre national park. we left our bikes at our hostel and hiked 4 of the 5 villages. cinque terre was so beautiful!!! we had a lot of fun there, and tried to imagine what it was our parents did and talked about when they were there less than two months ago. much to our surprise there was a religios prosession in the 4th town with fireworks and all. i think it was a little treat the city planned for us. the following morning we started to make our way to genoa. the first 10km of the ride out of levanto was all uphill!! it was the hardest ride we've had yet. we had no idea italy was so mountainous. it was beutiful none the less. from the mountain top we had beautiful views of the coast. we are now in genoa. we were so tired last night fromm the days ride we got some pizza (pesto pizza/ pesto anything is my new crack!)and went to bed. today we will ride through the city a bit, see a world herritage site and continue our ride towards nice. from nice we fly to the netherlands... our trip is coming to an end :( it is so strange, we've been traveling for so long yet it has all gone by so fast. it wil be so strange to be back at home... ( the top photo was taken on our ride towards france... much of the ride had views like this!!! the bottom photo is cinque terre)

florence to vinci

so we actually made it to florence in one day (i know, we're that good). we found a hostel right in the city and went to bed. the next morning we went to town! i don't know if you know this, but florence has some good stuff to see ;) we've also never seen so many tourists on this trip. we spent the whole day walking around in the heat (100°F, perefect biking weather), and enjoying the beauty of the city. i also enjoyed a visit to the docter!! it's bronchitis. i'll tell you what i didn't enjoy though.... florence is one of the best places to shop in the world, and it would be impossible for me to carry anything else on my bike. talk about tragedy. being in shoppers paradise, and not being able to purchase. i know, heartbreaking! we had an overpriced dinner next to the duomo where we could people watch then went back to our hostel and hung out with our flat mates. this morning we began our ride west in the direction of Pisa but are spending the night in Vinci... as in Leonardo de Vinci. i think i'm a bit more artistic having just slept in the city of his birth. the ride here today was hot and hilly and because of the antibiotics i'm on for my little bronchi (that's what we named him) i can't be in the sun...so my body is fully covered in this 100 degree heat. i've never looked or smelt better!

riding through tuscany

after rome john and i started our ride through tuscany. this is by far the most beautiful region we have been in. this area is rolling hills and vineyards with these spectacular little villages perched on the mountaintops. it's been some hard riding, but the beauty makes up for it. we stopped at some hot springs the other day in satunia where we stayed at the most charming b&b. how often do you get kisses from the owner when you check out of a hotel?? i wish we had more time to relax in some of these cities rather than just stopping to eat and sleep, what can you do. another bonus of being in italy is that costs are so much less than they were in northern europe! the food and wine is so cheap here. john has been drinking his chianti every night, another reason i'm enjoying italy so much... johns more enjoyable after a half a bottle of wine!! haha. only slightly kidding. today we toured siena and tomorrow morning we will start our ride to florence which should take two days.

we're in ITALY!!!!

i know, the suspense must have been killing you!!! yeah.... it was pretty cold riding around the north sea, so after our little visit in poland we flew into rome! one of the most beautiful cities in the world!!! we spent two solid days in rome. i don't know if you are aware, but the obama's were in rome when we were! john and walked up to the panthoen to find it completely blocked off by police. michelle and the girls had just walked in along with all the other wives of the leaders apart of the G8 conference. everyone cheered when they came out. it's amazing how much europeans love and support obama. yesterday we biked out of the city and headed towards the coast. we are now going to ride through tuscany. things have been pretty great here except i've had a cold and my camera got run over by a car! hahah. it's okay though, he's still working!! it was just a little nick by a tire, close call though. so yeah... now we are heading through tuscany towards siena, florence, pisa, cinque terra, and then southern france. a little change of plans, i know... all i can say is "when is rome".

heineken open'er 2009

well, the festival is over and paulia has left us :( john and i leave poland tomorrow evening. as i mentioned, we came here to see paulina and for the heineken open'er festival. this is polands largest festival of the year. friday night there was an estimated 60,000 people, over the weekend there must have been over 100,000 people. it was insanity!!! europeans know how to throw summer music festivals. the four day event was incredible. the line up wasn't that impressive, but none the less we had a lot of fun. we saw moby, pendulum, duffy, basement jaxx, lily allen, placebo, kings of leon, faith no more, and prodigy to name a few. from where we were staying in sopot we took the tram to gydania central station. just outside the station the festival provided busses to the show. the first two days of the festival we didn't arrive until 9 or 10 pm so getting on the tram and bus was no problem. by the third and fourth day (also this was saturday and sunday so there were twice as many people attending the festival just for the weekend) getting there was much more of a hastle. on saturday we left our place at 4:30 and arrived at the festival three hours later! the tram station was packed, four or five trams passed us and they were completly full! there was no use in waiting so we ran across the street to try and get a cab but ended up hitchiking instead and got a ride from Thomas (lovin you) who took us all the way to the show! it was fabulous. poland has been a blast. our next destination is....

Poland, Paulina, and Pierogis....

(this photo is taken at the WWII memorial where the first shots of the war were taken, paulina and I are in the back)
WE'RE IN POLAND!!!!! hahah. i don't know how we got so far off the North Sea Cycle Route, but somehow we are all the way in eastern Europe?? Johns girlfriend Paulina whom he met while working in the Netherlands is Polish, and right now in Gdansk Poland there is a huge festival going on. So John and I decided that is was just too darn cold riding along the North Sea... so we flew into Poland to see Paulina and enjoy Polands largest music festival of the year. The three of us are staying in a city called Sopot. Sopot is a part of what is called the tri-city of Poland. these three cities that make up the tri are Gdansk, Sopot, and Gdynia. Gdansk is where the very fisrt shots of WWII were fired in 1939. this is also the city in which the Solidarity movement began. this summer they are celebrating 20 years of freedom in Polnad... it's quite an exciting time to be here. It's been an amazing experiance to be here... Of all the countries in which WWII had an impact, it's safe to say that Poland took the brunt of it. past generations have been through a lot. eastern europe is a very different perspective than western and central europe... so this trip here is very unexpected yet amazing. Paulina (aka bananna face) is pretty awesome as well!!!

kristiansand!

kristiansand has been so amazing!! we arrived here on the 27th and met elin our host. she manages a fabulous restruant in a really great part of town. with elin we went into sentrum and had some pizza and beer then went to her house. a large fixer upper she and her boyfriend recently purchased. three of her coworkers are living in the house for the summer while working at her restruant. john and i showered, while elin went to work then took our bikes downtown and to the island where elin works. the following day we BBQed with elin and the group (swedish meatbal style burgers!) then went to a local norwegian lake in the forest. it was so beautiful and refreshing to swim! we stopped in sentrum and watched a free concert for a bit while eating some tikka masala, then went to her restruant and hung out in the bar with a great a bunch of her cowerkers. a lot of sweeds and other europeans come to norway for the summer to work (thwe icelandic drunks may have been the highlight of the night). she has some really great people/ friends working for her and it was so great to meet hang out with them. around one am four of us went to another bar to play darts. kristiansand is the 5th largest city in norway, yet this is a small country and it has a very small town feel to it. we've had a really great experiance here and it was so wonderful to meet elin and her roommates (vlad, patrick... we love you too ;) ) the two nights here have been truly momorable. but now we must carry on like the vagabonds we are.

well... got out of my tent this morning overlooking the water, removed the tick on my stomach, then changed my second flat tire of the trip. yeah, i'm becoming a pretty good bike mechanic. john and i then got on a train to kristiansand Norway. we are coachsurfing here for the next two days. due to some stops along the way we could not quite make it there in time, there fore we are taking the train. one of the cool stops we made along the way was preikastolen (the picture is of us at the top!!) we hiked almost two hours to get up to this cliff overlooking the fjord. it was so breathtaking. the previous day we had met some really cool aussies biking throughout europe and eventually biking to south africa (yeah biking the entire continent of africa, makes john and i feel like wimps!) so we hung out with them in stavanger norway. norway is such a beautiful country.. they have such beautiful forests, beaches, great rock formations... truly beautiful. and lucky for us... the weather here has actually been warm! i know... i thought it would never come. soon you'll be hearing me bitch about how hot it is and how much i miss the cold!

our norwegian-scottish bagpipin gangsta

john and i have tons of great pictures and stories... but here is one i just have to put up. when we were in oslo we came across this norwegian playing the scottish bagpipes. he was playing along side the road, facing a wall, as if the town had refused his playing and that was the only area he was allowed to play? it was quite peculiar. when he finishe his song we clapped, and he was surprised to see that he had an audiance. he wore a picture of himself in a scottish kilt holding his bagpipe. also, notise his hat... it's the kind of flat bill hat that a rapper would wear? (or someone trying to be ghetto). he was hilarious. we told him we were american, and he played amazing grace for us! john placed his righ hand over his heart in respect? i got it on video.... good times

kayaking through the fjords

for those of you that don't know anything about norway, they are most famous for their breathtaking fjords. john and i took a bus from bergen to the fjord where we we pickued up our kayaks, wet suits, life jackets, and all that good stuff and headed out into the fjord! it was beautiful. and like my mom commented, you do feel quite small in your kayak going through the fjord. we kayaked the entire length of the fjord, then took a hike, then found our campsite were we built a campfire and recounted our favorite memories of the trip thus far while eating carrots. the next morning we just paddled back to the harbor. as beautiful as it was, we decided that two days of kayaking is plenty!! you really don't make too much distance on those things. so know we are back in bergen and have 9 days to ride back to oslo. so for all those who battered us for taking the train to bergen, we're just doing things a little backwards! also...note to self: never drink fjord water again, it upsets the stomach.

bergen

so oslo was one of my favorite cities so far.... except for norway being super expensive, it was great. taxes are very high in scandonavia, and the people are well taken care of. we actually asked a woman working at a store the other day if she makes anyu kind of commision and she said no way, we don't need it, and waiters don't need tips either! hah! that must be nice. the nobel peace prize is given in Oslo. john and i spent almost 5 hours at the nobel peace museum. we just sat in their theater and watched the videos on all the prize recipients. it was very powerful. that night we took the 11:30 train into bergen arriving at 7:30 in the morning. after figuring out where things are in the city we found a park and took a two hour nap on the grass under the sun. we then played in the city and saw a nother world herritage site. this city was one of four offices for the hanseatic leauge in the late middle ages, so theere is a lot of history here. we couch surfed with a man named roger who is SO involved with couch surfing. he has had at least one surfer a week since he joined last february!!! he deserves a medal. we are leaving out bikes hith him for two days and heading north to the fjords this afternoon were we will rent kayaks for two days. there are two fjords that are actually world herritage sites, so we will just float around in the fjord and be one with nature! it's been raining on and off since we got into bergen, so hopefully the weather will be nice up north in the fjord.

paulina.... it was him!!

this is john standing in norway and farting in sweden (what a boy)!. i just wanted to clear my name... it was he who would do such a thing, not I. and if he tells you any other gross stories about me, he's most likely covering up his own idiosyncrasies!!!

Oslo

this is john crossing the sweden, norway border!!! we ended up having great weather the last two days in sweden (thanks for the magic paulina!) the ride into norway was quite nice... a lot of rural countryside. we arrived in norway at about 11pm so we found the closest spot we could to pitch our tents. that spot just so happened to be in the parking lot of a park, right behind the restrooms. there was some grafitti on the wall...most likely gang territory, but they must have run off whe they saw us. the following day we rode into a city called fredrikstad where we took a train into Oslo. today we have been biking allover the city seeing all the sites. we will spend tomorrow in Oslo as well, then take a train to Bergen...

skål

you know that typical scene in a movie where a character is standing on the sidewalk and a car drives by/ right through a puddle causing a tidal wave to splash the poor innocent victim on the corner... i was the victim!!! i was just riding my bike when a truck going the opposite direction soaked me! it was great. i was laughing out loud. i was already soaking wet anyways (it rained aaallllllll day) i just wish had been caught on video! to make up for our freezing and wet day of riding through the swedish countryside (we decided we are true cycling bad asses for putting up with the weather today) we are staying in a great little hotel. the receptionist was very excited about our bike ride and really wants to come to california. he asked our names and when we asked his he said Purr. then to make sure we understood he said "like a cat, puuurrrr" while making a hand gesture... funny guy.

skål means cheers in swedish.

pictures!!!

bonjour! just incase you haven't seen/found them...there are a few pictures on our "and we're off" website. ju´st click on the slideshow to view some of our favorites so far...

wet and cold in sweden

john and i left gothenburg this morning. we actually stayed an extra day with inga and ulisess because it was just too hard to leave them! haha. they are such amazing people. it felt as if we were staying with old friends for a few days. the two days john and i were in gothenburg, we didn't get into the city until late afternoon becasue our breakfasts with the two of them would turn into hours of talking and laughing. it was really such a blessing to have met them. plus inga cut my hair which i didn't have time to do before i left....jackpot. when we left this morning it was cold and rainy (paulina, get on it!!!). it was awful. we were quite wet all day. i literally rung the water out of my socks when i took then off this evening...that's the worst! so we are treating ourselves to a stay at a hostel rather than our cold tents. this way hopefully most of our clothes will dry so they can just get wet again tomorrow! yeah it's supposed to rain in sweden until friday :( the west coast of sweden is actually gorgeous, it's unfortunate the weather is so lousy. the country is made up of many small islands in the north west... but i'm too mad that my toes are cold to appresiacte the beauty ;)

thanks for the comments!

i love reading them!!! also we had no idea if anyone would even be reading the blog... so thanks. keep commenting.

we're in sweden!!!!!

i haven't been able to get to a computer in a few days. i'm sure you have all been bitting your nails in suspense, so here's the update. john and i spent two days in copenhagen couch surfing with jakob and marie. the city was great(and carleen of course we saw the little mermaid, she says hello and loves you as well). the most impressive thing in the city which i was not aware of, nor had ever heard of is Christiana. look it up for more information, because it will take me too long to explain, but basically it is an old military camp that hippies have inhabited and been living in rent free since 1971. it's a whole different world once you walk intop the walls of Christiana! absolutely one of the most interesting experiances i've ever had!! after copenhagen we rode north into helsingor denmark were we camped for the night. the next morning we took a ferry into sweden. from helsingbor sweden we had well over 200km to ride and two days to get to gothenburg, the next city in which we would be couch surfing. it was two extremely intense days of riding. yesterday we rode almost 12 hours! we rode about 160km yesterday and 130 the previous day. my legs hurt!!! we had and extra 30km of riding because we are also hitting up every World Heritage Site along the way. we'll have seen 4 after sweden. so now we have two days in gothenburg sweden to rest a bit! we are couch surfing with Inga-Theraesa (who we refer to as mother theraesa, because she is so sweet!) and her boyfriend Ulysess who is equally as kind! couch surfing has been such a great experiance!!! i highly highly recomend it to anyone who ever travels. you get a perspective into a city and a culture that you just cannot get from a city tour. it's been so enjoyable so far. so john and i are going to go see the sites for a bit then meet up with our hosts for dinner!!!