hej all
so we are in stockholm right now, on the 10th day of our adventure, and coincidentally it is also the 10th day on which we have experienced RAIN! booo! i understand the rain in dublin, but come on. yesterday it was pouring when we woke up and it poured all day without letting up once, until we went to bed at night. on the plus side we watched old school before bed. :)
when we woke up this morning it was sunny and bright and there was not a cloud in the sky. so, we got overzealous and went outside in nothing but shorts and t-shirts and bright hopes. an hour and a half later it was raining and we were pretty cold. oops!
besides all of the rain, stockholm is a beautiful city. i know we keep on saying that about the places we are going without photographic evidence, but you will just have to trust us until we have the means to upload. stockholm is a fantastic archipalego of like 2000 islands, although there are maybe 5 or 6 that comprise downtown. we explored the old medieval city today, with narrow cobblestone streets - one of the streets is only 90 cm wide! crazy!
still, everywhere you go you have to cross a bridge, which can be inconveninent when you are trying to go in a straight line across the water but you have to walk 2km around to the nearest bridges. i think we stopped on every bridge to take pictures though, its just so cool. canada has nothing like this that i know of.
we went to vasamuseet today, which is the best museum i have been to in some time. there was a poorly engineered boat built in stockholm in 1628 and it sank less than 1.5 km into its maiden voyage... yeah. i know. so its kind of funny that this huge museum focuses on such a catastrophic failure. but anyways, the thing is wooden, 69m long and so incredible. it was salvaged in 1967. they pulled it out, emptied the mud out, and actually floated the thing into dry docks. now a museum is built around it, with really cool exhibits. AND, there are 2 other boats that you can go on and explore. lisa and i went on one from 1914 and i think we were the only people on it. it was wild! we went down into the engine room and crawled around all the pipes and gears and valves. so cool!
tomorrow we really hope that it is nice out, although by now we will assume at least some rain. we are going to go to an architectural museum and then we are going to explore the vast parklands near to downtown stockholm. should be fun.
OH YEAH!
i almost forgot!
on monday night, right after we got to our cozy and nice BOAT HOSTEL we went to the GLOBEN theatre (google it!) and saw the arctic monkeys play in a pretty small venue with the coolest swedish people we have ever seen! woo! so that was fun. lisa danced! and i danced!
i know that this one is getting long so sorry. its just exciting stuff.
lisa: "write that we have learned two words: ham and cheese". yes, its true. skinske and ost. lol.
okay i'll stop now. lisa is bugging me to stop. she thinks that people don't care about what i have to type. j/k, lol.
bye bye!
simon
Thursday, June 28, 2007
Sunday, June 24, 2007
Copenhagen!
We are now in Copenhagen, the most beautiful city in the world. It is really gorgeous here. It is surrounded by canals and ocean and has beautiful buildings and cobblestone streets. Our first hostel is very nice. It is very clean and in a great location.
Copenhagen is full of danish people! they speak danish! we do not. it is confusing! luckily, everyone we have met has spoken english as well. this country is full of talented people... who have silly letters like ø and æ.
We arrived late last night and found our way okay on the train from the airport. As we were flying over the countryside we saw bonfires everywhere from the plane! it is midsummer's night here so all the danes went to the country and lit large bonfires! they celebrate because it is light for about 18 hours of the day right now. crazy!
on the train we met a man who gave us some key tips and pointed us in the right direction. we got up early today and went to a few museums and saw a lot of stuff! all of the museums are closed tomorrow so we had to get it all in today. tomorrow we will go up the tower and explore more, and go to one of the many parks for a picnic. we may even partake in a tuborg or two!
the day after tomorrow we are training to stockholm, so although the visit in copenhagen is short we are both very glad that we came because the city rocks!
oh yeah, and i should note that dave decided not to meet us afterall so it is just the two of us here. silly dave, you are missing a fun time!
we are writing our blog from the irish pub around the corner from the hostel. random. therefore there are no pics from today or from before. hopefully we will find a kick ass computer in sweden.
cheers!
lisa and simon
Copenhagen is full of danish people! they speak danish! we do not. it is confusing! luckily, everyone we have met has spoken english as well. this country is full of talented people... who have silly letters like ø and æ.
We arrived late last night and found our way okay on the train from the airport. As we were flying over the countryside we saw bonfires everywhere from the plane! it is midsummer's night here so all the danes went to the country and lit large bonfires! they celebrate because it is light for about 18 hours of the day right now. crazy!
on the train we met a man who gave us some key tips and pointed us in the right direction. we got up early today and went to a few museums and saw a lot of stuff! all of the museums are closed tomorrow so we had to get it all in today. tomorrow we will go up the tower and explore more, and go to one of the many parks for a picnic. we may even partake in a tuborg or two!
the day after tomorrow we are training to stockholm, so although the visit in copenhagen is short we are both very glad that we came because the city rocks!
oh yeah, and i should note that dave decided not to meet us afterall so it is just the two of us here. silly dave, you are missing a fun time!
we are writing our blog from the irish pub around the corner from the hostel. random. therefore there are no pics from today or from before. hopefully we will find a kick ass computer in sweden.
cheers!
lisa and simon
Thursday, June 21, 2007
An Photo Post
I'm pretty sure that An is irish for 'the'. But i could be wrong...
Before when I posted there were no pics on the computrice so here we go with a few to show just what has been going on. but they are not working, so strike that. i will try later.
(pic of lisa and i in the rain)
This pic is (suppost to be) of me and lisa in a field in the rain at glendalough, a nice site with a couple of lakes and some ruins of churches that were built in the 12th century! it rained all day today, but it was cool because of all the fog - you can't even see to the top of the Dublin mountains!
(pic of cool waterfall)
We arrived at the waterfall just as it stopped raining... so then we got even more soaked from the mist from the falls. they were pretty spectacular.
lisa and i both fell asleep on the way home with nicole. we're probably the worst passengers of all time but she puts up with us, what a sweetheart.
tomorrow we are going into the city on the bus with Nicole, who has to work tomorrow. we are going to tour around and then meet her after she is finished and go into temple bar at night, which is the buisness at night.
ttyl!
Before when I posted there were no pics on the computrice so here we go with a few to show just what has been going on. but they are not working, so strike that. i will try later.
(pic of lisa and i in the rain)
This pic is (suppost to be) of me and lisa in a field in the rain at glendalough, a nice site with a couple of lakes and some ruins of churches that were built in the 12th century! it rained all day today, but it was cool because of all the fog - you can't even see to the top of the Dublin mountains!
(pic of cool waterfall)
We arrived at the waterfall just as it stopped raining... so then we got even more soaked from the mist from the falls. they were pretty spectacular.
lisa and i both fell asleep on the way home with nicole. we're probably the worst passengers of all time but she puts up with us, what a sweetheart.
tomorrow we are going into the city on the bus with Nicole, who has to work tomorrow. we are going to tour around and then meet her after she is finished and go into temple bar at night, which is the buisness at night.
ttyl!
Okay so we got to europe
On Tuesday we landed in Ireland after a 6 and a half hour flight. we were picked up at the airport and chauffeured to our guesthouse, where we are staying with the nicest irish family ever! and, we know them! Nicole and the Egans have been just super at putting us up and showing us around. We have spent a couple days touring around and have learned a few things:
1. The Irish have a reputation for drinking... This is not an embellishment or an exaggeration. You can't walk more than a few steps without coming across a pub.
2. Ireland is incredibly green! Everything is so lush here, probably because...
3. It rains all the time. The 4 seasons can be experienced here in about 15 minutes... cold hot, rain, sun, wind, calm, everything. its wild!
4. Mom and Dad you were right about the roads... they are narrow, the speed limits are high and a lot of the time there are brick walls on both sides of the road. (there are brick walls everywhere! who had the time and the rocks needed to create all of these walls?) and when an 18 wheeler is coming at you you feel like you are about to die.
Lisa is having fun too.
Today we both had electric showers. Think about that one.
So to sum things up, we got to Ireland okay, had a nice flight, and are having a blast in Dublin and the surrounding areas!
Cheers,
Simon
1. The Irish have a reputation for drinking... This is not an embellishment or an exaggeration. You can't walk more than a few steps without coming across a pub.
2. Ireland is incredibly green! Everything is so lush here, probably because...
3. It rains all the time. The 4 seasons can be experienced here in about 15 minutes... cold hot, rain, sun, wind, calm, everything. its wild!
4. Mom and Dad you were right about the roads... they are narrow, the speed limits are high and a lot of the time there are brick walls on both sides of the road. (there are brick walls everywhere! who had the time and the rocks needed to create all of these walls?) and when an 18 wheeler is coming at you you feel like you are about to die.
Lisa is having fun too.
Today we both had electric showers. Think about that one.
So to sum things up, we got to Ireland okay, had a nice flight, and are having a blast in Dublin and the surrounding areas!
Cheers,
Simon
Saturday, June 9, 2007
Takeoff in 9 days!
So this is our blog. Interesting. Hopefully having this means that Lisa and I do not have to spam everyone while we are in europe and so if you are really that interested in what we are doing you can look it up here! So for this pre-europe post I guess I will just introduce the characters and let you know what's coming up.
This is Lisa.
This is Lisa.
She is 22 years old and likes llamas, uranium and Heroes. She is excited to go to cities that are called different things in English because it is confusing!
This is Simon.
Simon is 23 years old and likes pineapple, baseball and slinkys. He is excited to go to Perpignan because it is fun to say!
We have an itinerary because if we didn't we would be stressed out:
June 19 - 23 - Dublin
June 23 - 26 - Copenhagen
June 26 - July 1 - Stockholm
July 1 - July 4 - Amsterdam
July 4 - July 5 - Gent
July 5 - July 8 - Brussels
July 8 - July 13 - London
July 13 - July 19 - Paris
July 19 - July 21 - Barcelona
July 21 - July 25 - Mallorca
July 25 - July 28 - Barcelona
July 28 - July 30 - Arles
July 30 - Aug 2 - Marseille
Aug 2 - Aug 5 - Nice
Aug 5 - Aug 7 - Milan
Aug 7 - Aug 10 - Venica
Aug 10 - Aug 13 - Florence
Aug 13 - Aug 19 - Rome
At this point I am leaving Rome for home via London and Lisa is staying, and meeting up with her father and sister. Coincidence that they decided to arrive as I am leaving? I think not.
I would also like to say that we are very excited to visit with our gracious host Nicole in Dublin, and to meet up with Dave in Copenhagen and Sarah and Julian in Paris!
If you want to get in touch with us, email is the best (and probably only) way to do it. I think that all of the places that we are staying have internet.
Cheers!
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