- USA
- Ireland
- France
- Belgium
- Back in France
- May 30, 2005Mexican Princesses
- May 31, 2005Versaille
- June 1, 2005Last Day in Paris
- June 2, 2005Coast of Marseille
- May 3, 2005Callanques of Marseille
- June 4, 2005Leaving Marseille
- June 5, 2005Busted Ankle
- June 6, 2005Healing in St. Raphael
- June 7, 2005Bongos on the Beach
- June 8, 2005Goodbye, St. Raphael - Hello Cannes
- June 9, 2005Antibes Daytrip
- June 10, 2005Chilling in Cannes
- June 11, 2005To Nice with the Finns
- Monaco
- Switzerland
- Germany
- Austria
- Hungary
- Poland Fun
- June 29, 2005Zakopane
- June 30, 2005Hiking in the Tatry Mountains
- July 1, 2005Trail of Wooden Architecture
- July 2, 2005Krakow Jazz Festival
- July 3, 2005Kazimierz
- July 4, 2005Goral Burger
- July 5, 2005Ciupagi
- July 6, 2005Czestochowa
- July 7, 2005Trainhopping
- July 8, 2005Happy Birthday Mom!!!
- July 9, 2005Happy Birthday Jack
- July 10, 2005Banana Riding
- July 11, 2005First Russian Embassy Visit
- Poland Family
- July 12, 2005Family, at Last
- July 13, 2005Mom's Schoolfriends
- July 14, 2005Muddy Ponds
- July 15, 2005Partying in Poznan
- July 16, 2005A Relaxing Day
- July 17, 2005Sheeshah Bar
- July 18, 2005Five Souvereign Lands
- July 19, 2005The Good News
- July 20, 2005Another Family Function
- July 21, 2005Just Chilling
- July 22, 2005The Best Bike Ever
- July 23, 2005Looking for a Home by the Baltic Sea
- July 24, 2005Copernicus and the Boyscouts
- July 25, 2005Visas are Set to Go
- July 26, 2005Luxury
- July 27, 2005A Day at Work
- Russia
- July 28, 2005Back in St. P Looking for 1UP
- July 29, 2005Peter's Pimpin' Palace and the Neverending Nights
- July 30, 2005Big Bad Moscow
- July 31, 2005Beating Birches
- August 1, 2005Off to Siberia
- August 2, 2005Drinking with the Guards
- August 3, 2005Big, Rolling Trans-Siberian Party
- August 4, 2005Pack up, Only Six Hours Left
- August 5, 2005Irkutsk
- August 6, 2005Swimming in Lake Baikal
- August 7, 2005Drenched
- August 8, 2005Partying with Uzbeks
- August 9, 2005I Love You Omul, I Heart Baikal
- August 10, 2005Pushed out of Russia
- Mongolia
- China
- August 26, 2005Chasing Buses
- August 27, 2005Looking for the Opera
- August 28, 2005Sleeping on a Wall
- August 29, 2005Trying to Find the Opera Once Again
- August 30, 2005Forbidden City and Searching for the Opera
- August 31, 2005The Opera Sucks
- September 1, 2005Hutongs and Strange Food
- September 2, 2005The Peking Ducks Incident
- September 3, 2005Beijing Shopping
- September 4, 2005The Dirt Market and Tiger Penis Vodka
- September 5, 2005Temples, Temples, and More Temples
- September 6, 2005The Amazing Summer Palace
- September 7, 2005Goodbye Asia
- Back in the USA
World Trip
Monaco
After getting a good night's sleep in a much more private triple room in a proper hotel instead of a hostel, we went to the beach. Since it was Sunday we did have a little problem finding a place to buy baguettes and food, but we managed. After breakfast we swam in the cyan waters of Nice, hurt our feet on its pebbly beaches, and soaked in as much sun as possible. No day seems like it would be complete if Tunisian Fred did not show up, and indeed he did. We eventually headed off for Monaco.
On the train there we met another yachtie, Pam. She has been doing this for quite a while and gave me lots of great information. It looks like it is not going to be as easy as just walking into a port city and getting a job. People who hire you as a hand seem to want to make sure that you will be cleaning the yacht instead of making it dirty after becoming sea sick. She also gave us some great tips about Monaco, and we decided to go to the Jaques Custeau Museum of Oceanographie and Aquarium. I split off from the girls because I wanted to make sure I could do my souvernir shopping before the stores closed, and ended up taking the scenic route to the museum. In other words, I was lost for a while, but I managed.
Since I only had one hour to explore the museum and aquarium, I decided to see the aquarium first. It was more than I expected. I saw great big sharks, sea turtles, fish that walk along the ground almost like lobsters, a few nautili (I thought these things were extinct), and various other forms of exotic and colorful marine life. After a whirlwind tour of the aquarium, I had a whole five minutes to spend learning about Mr. Custeau's journeys, and was kicked out of the museum because it was closing.
The girls and I walked over to the prince's palace. I don't know how to say it but it was a bit disappointing. However, the view from an overlook point was superb. You could see the entire main harbor and the areas surrounding it, which comprise half of this country. In this harbour was the most amazing yacht I have ever seen, named Lady Maura. It is huge and has a helicopter pad on its back. I am just guessing but I thing that instead of using a zodiac to land on a beach they just use a smaller yacht.
We were sitting here overlooking the city, wishing we had a bottle of wine to drink. It was really a nice time. Suddenly, a group of really well dressed Americans showed up. They were taking photos, drinking champagne, and looked like some sort of tourist group, except really well dressed. I started talking to some of them and actually met someone from Rochester who was on this trip. They were taking part of an organized bus trip around Western Europe with Kontiki Tours. When they packed up, I noticed that they had one more bottle of champagne unopened, and it looked quite heavy. With some talking, their guide was relieved not to have to carry the weight of a champagne bottle and glad to exchange it for the weight of a five-euro bill. We sat around some more laughing, drinking, and realizing how unreal the moment was.
Monaco is really difficult to describe. You can see the entire city / country from the top of one hill, as it pretty much only occupies the hillsides of a harbor. From the other side of the hill you can see the other half of the country, but it is less interesting. This place reeks of opulence. It really has a strange atmosphere. The architecture is quite modern and mostly uninteresting. What makes it unique is how it is built on a very steep hill and how the buildings interact with each other. The train station is inside of the mountain and you can exit it in three different places that will put you into three quite different areas of the country. To add on top of all this, they are so unoriginal that instead of coming up with their own flag they just took the Polish one and flipped it upside down.
We went back to the train station to catch a train, but it being Sunday, we had to wait for the last one at midnight, and had an hour and a half to kill. Off to the Monte Carlo casino it was. When I said that Monaco reeks of opulence, then I have to tell you that this place is just absolutely unbearable of the same stench. Cars were pulling up that I have never heard of, but looked fast and expensive. An Enzo passed by. Rich people in rich clothes came in and out.
The train ride back was interesting. Aija-Riika and Heine were saying earlier how they do not run into many Finnish people while traveling. Well, sitting right next to us was a Finnish guy and girl, also backpacking. They were headed from Italy to Nice, to spend the night and then catch another train for Barcelona. The four of them had a great conversation of which I understood nothing. In front of me people spoke American, and behind me Russian. My head was full of Polish thoughts. French was nowhere to be heard.
We continued hanging out at the train station until it got locked up at 1 am. Since the plan of Harry and Jenny (the two Finns we met on the train) was to sleep at the train station, they now had nowhere to go. It was a bit after one. Our plan on the other hand, was to get back to the hotel, grab two bottles of wine we had, and head down to the beach. We invited them along.
When we got to the beach we were greeted by the sight of five naked bodies frolicking in tithe crashing waves. They were obviously pretty drunk and decided to go skinny dipping. We were way too sober to join them. We went down to the beach and set up our camp. On the beach we sat around and I listened mesmerized to the four of them speak Finnish. The language has completely nothing in common with any of the ones I know and I was not able to pick out any words. Yet I sat there and it seemed like I could understand exactly what they were saying. Once in a while we would interlude into English, but I let Aija-Riika and Heini get a fill of their mother tongue in a foreign land. I know what it is like and so I let it be. Anyway, once the naked people put some clothes on I went to talk to them since they were American, Canadian, and German.
We sat around this beach until almost four. Harry and Jenni had small packs and from the conversation I gathered that they were traveling really light. They had their sleeping bags in their packs, which even further reduced the amount of clothes they could carry. Yet somehow Harry had the foresight to bring a CD played with a normal speaker with him on his month long trip, so we had music. We sat around, drank the wine, and built towers out of pebbles. Got to sleep at about five thirty in the morning. We were half expecting Tunisian Fred to show up one more time on the beach, but he did not.
