Audrey's Blog

Day 3: Livorno (Pisa & Chianti)

Our first day in Italy was gorgeous and amazing! (That word "amazing" keeps coming up. Maybe I need to check the thesaurus for another word, but it's just so right. Anyway …) This was our first day going ashore with some of our Keller Williams compadres - JR & Linda Russell, Jack & Donna Thomas, Randy & Amy Mosier, Joe & Alyse Cloud, and their friends Adam & Nicole.

We left the port in Livorno and drove inland to Pisa to view one of the Seven Wonders of the World - The Leaning Tower of Pisa. Dubbed one of the biggest architectural mistakes in the world, it was fascinating to wander around the grounds surrounding the Tower. It was definitely an oddity and snapping the requisite photos of Chris holding the tower up (cheesy - I know, but he insisted) was amusing. But, truly it was even more fascinating to get to see the incredible detail in the other buildings on the grounds. I'm really pleased with the way the photos turned out. We couldn't have asked for a better day for picture taking!

After hanging out in Pisa for a little over an hour, we headed further into Tuscany. Our destination was the Chianti region of Tuscany. We stopped for a few minutes at a little village called Greve along the way where I had REAL hot chocolate - oh, man was it good! I got some great photos of a local Catholic church and the cobble stone streets.

From there we were headed for La Locanda di Pietracupa, a small restaurant in Poggio, for lunch. I got to experience things like wild boar tortellini and grilled rabbit (sorry, Bugs!). Lunch was a long and drawn out affair assisted heavily by multiple bottles of wine. The food was incredible, the wine was excellent, and the company was stellar. I'm not sure if we ran off all the other patrons with our boisterous conversation or if we just outlasted all of them, but by the time we were finished, we had the whole place to ourselves. Hah!

As if we needed anymore wine at this point but our next stop was at the Casa Emma vineyard & winery next door for a wine tasting. I should be able to tell you the name of the very funny gentleman who conducted the wine tasting for us (he was very good and extremely amusing), but quite honestly I can't remember. Probably not surprising, right?

The only unfortunate thing about the whole day was that our drivers didn't keep us on schedule very well. By the time we finished with the wine tasting, we were probably an hour later leaving that we should have been to get back to the ship on time. Once the drivers figured that out and that they would be driving us to Rome if indeed we did miss the ship, they put the pedal to the medal. We were probably a reasonable hour and half's drive from the port. Their motivated driving got us back to the port in closer to an hour. Yikes! Chris and I were in the last seat of 10 passenger van, and let's just say it was a bumpy ride.

It really was a relaxing day filled with friends, food, and wine-enhanced-fun! Check out the photos at: http://www.audreyreed.info/photoGalleries/Day-3-Livorno/.

Day 2: Villefranche

Our first port of call was Villefranche - the port for Nice, Monte Carlo, & Eze.  We started off the day with a jog on the 12^th deck of the ship overlooking the Mediterranean Sea and the French coast.

Our plan was to spend the afternoon checking out Nice and Eze - (and, yes, we did say “nice and easy” and chuckled every time).  We took the tender to shore right after lunch and hopped on a local bus for the 10 minute ride to Nice.  We were off to a pretty good start, but that’s as far as it got.  We ended up getting of a couple of stops short of our final destination.  You would have thought it would be a simple task to get back on a bus and get back on track.  Hah!  As far as I can tell, nothing is that simple for an American in France - especially if you don’t speak a lick of French.  We ended up spending the rest of the afternoon getting back to the bus station so that we could get back to Villefranche.  Originally, we would have taken the bus back through Villefranche on to Eze, but we didn’t want to risk not getting back to the ship before it left port that evening.  The major complicating factor was that it was Sunday, and the buses run a shortened schedule on Sundays (which I guess is to be expected).  Ultimately, we got back to Villefranche with plenty of time to spare.  We did get to explore a little and got some nice photos.  And, we did get some great exercise! 

So, what did I take away from our time in France?

·         The parts of Nice we saw - not so fabulous.  I’m sure there are some great parts of this town, but we didn’t find them in our quest for the bus station.

·         The French really do see us as entertainment when we’re wandering around their country trying to figure out their bus system.

·         Europeans in general have no sense of personal space or of an orderly line.  When we tried to board the bus, we almost didn’t get on - even though we were the first ones there waiting for it.  As soon as the bus driver opened the door, it was a crush of humanity to get on.  NOT what we’re used to!  Thanks to a pair of super friendly Scotsmen, we finally figured out what was going on.  On the ride back to Villefranche, they clued us in to the way things are.  After that, I wasn’t afraid to shoulder my way in where I needed to be!  Grrrr ....

In case you missed the previous post, here's a link to the photos.  All in all, it was an interesting day.  Yeah - that’s how I’ll put it.  :-)

That evening was the 1st of 2 formal evenings.  We clean up pretty good - if I do say so myself. 

Check out this link for a couple more photos: http://audreyreed.info/PhotoGalleries/Day-2-Villefranche-Evening/index.html.

Day 2: Villefranche - Photos

I'm not going to get to the write up of our day in France, but I have gotten the photos sorted. Enjoy!

http://www.audreyreed.info/PhotoGalleries/Day-2-Villefranche/

Day 1: Barcelona

Finally … We made it! 

After landing at Barcelona’s airport, having to load up like sardines into a giant bus to be transported from the plane to the terminal (no fancy sky bridges through which to deplane directly into the terminal, no-sir-ee, not for the American airline company!), and surviving the crush of people in the baggage claim area, we were met by travel staff and whisked off to the Hotel Palace Barcelona for a yummy brunch of mini foods (if you don’t believe me, I took a picture).  I suppose we should call them finger foods, but they were just so darn cute that I have to call them mini foods. 

Anyway, after eating a few bits, we had about an hour to wander through the streets of Barcelona near the hotel.  Barcelona is a beautiful city, and we were disappointed not to have more time here.  It’s definitely a place we’ll have to come back to.  The streetscapes were so different than what were used to here in Texas.  Apparently, it’s much more like what you’d find in New York City where the shops are on the ground floor with lofts and apartments above. 

We did have one goal during our stroll … to find toothpaste (since ours had been confiscated by security at DFW).  Chris has a good working knowledge of Spanish, and I’m not sure what we would have done without that!  We found a farmacia (pharmacy) around the corner from the hotel.  As was to be expected, it wasn’t exactly what we were used to.  No CVSesque stores here.  But fortunately, we were able to pick up a tube of their version of Crest in a mostly-mint flavor.  Not too bad.  And, I might mention that it was a good thing that we didn’t want to get on the ship and assume that the sundry shop on board would have toothpaste - because they didn’t!

After our stroll, we loaded back onto the bus to be taken to the ship terminal to board the Voyager of the Seas and commence with our cruise.  The process of “checking in” wasn’t too bad and very soon we were scoping out our stateroom and wondering when our bags would show up. 

(For anyone who hasn’t cruised before, during the check in process you leave your bags in the terminal with airline-like tags on them indicating your stateroom number.  Over the next several hours, bags are delivered to their respective rooms.  There just isn’t enough public elevator capacity to have everyone dragging their 150-200 lbs of luggage onboard themselves.) 

While we were waiting for our bags, we took care of one significant piece of business - purchasing our Coke pass.  This pass entitles the holder to unlimited soft drinks for the duration of the cruise.  And compared to paying $1.50/each, the ~$50/person charge for the pass is a steal when you have a Diet Coke habit like mine. 

After having checked out the ship, gotten re-caffeinated (which was vital considering we were clocking in at almost 30 hours without sleep), and found our way back to our stateroom, we were delighted to see that 3 of our 4 bags had arrived.  Chris and I both needed to shower (badly) before the Welcome Reception and dinner - all scheduled to begin at 7pm.  Unfortunately, the missing bag contained all of my girly stuff - shampoo/conditioner, hairdryer, makeup, etc - all the stuff necessary for me to freshen up for the reception and dinner.   At 6:00 and as the ship was setting sail from Barcelona, I was beginning to panic that for some reason my bag hadn’t made it onboard.  By this time, I was tired, cranky, and feeling nasty.  I NEEDED my bag. 

At 6:15, there was a knock on the door and our stateroom attended (who knew I was desperately waiting for my bag) stood there smiling, holding my bag.  Hallelujah! 

That was one of the best showers I’ve ever taken in my life! 

After a dash to get dress, we headed down to the reception, got to have a few drinks and meet all of the other people on the trip with us.  After that, it was off to dinner.  Even being as tired as we were, we seemed to have caught a second wind and were thoroughly enjoying ourselves.  But, by the time we finished with dinner, it was 11pm and we were past the 36 hour mark of no sleep, and it all caught up to me.  It was all I could do not to take a snooze in the dessert.  We headed back to our stateroom to let the sound of motion of the ocean put us to sleep.  It was an incredible day … Zzzz …

Here’s a link to the photos of the day.

Home, Sweet Home

Sometimes it seems like the best part of the vacation is coming home.  Sounds weird, huh?  But after traipsing through 3 airports, spending 2 hours on the tarmac in Barcelona, and suffering through an hour delay in our final flight from Newark to Dallas, we finally made it home around midnight last night and fell into OUR bed a full 27 hours after we got up on Saturday morning in Barcelona. 

Today has been about getting unpacked, trying to recoup, and getting ready for the week ahead of us.  Suffice it to say that I haven’t had a chance to work on sorting the photos or writing the blog posts to share what we got to see and experience during our 7 days in Europe.  But, stay tuned … I’ll be making my way through it all this week. 

Have a great week!

From the middle of the Mediterranean Sea

As I type, it’s 11:46pm on Friday night, we’re in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea on our way back to Barcelona, and our bags are packed to come home …

This trip has been absolutely amazing.  And, absolutely exhausting .  We knew when we planned this trip that it wasn’t going to be a “relaxing” vacation.  This vacation fell firmly in the “site-seeing” category.  Little did I know how physically taxing it would be.  Between the ALL day excursions - all of which started at 8am and most of which required miles and miles of walking over less than ideal surfaces, the LATE dinners - finishing around 11pm, and the endless hours of socializing with my fellow Realtors and hosts from David Weekley, I AM BEAT!  I’m going to have to come home just to get some rest. 

I know I didn’t make good on my promise to blog while I was here.  Between the above mentioned exhaustion and the seriously crappy internet connect (for which I’ve been paying 50-freaking-cents-per-minute), I’ve barely been able to keep up with the few work related items that needed my attention - although I have to give major props to my new assistant who has been taking incredible care of my business while I’ve been gone.  God bless her.  However, I do promise that full recounts of our days are coming along with the 650+ photos I’ve taken this week.  Since I have an utter inability to sleep on planes, I’m hoping that I’ll be able to get out my laptop and make some progress while airborne for 13+ hours tomorrow. 

On that note, I’m going to crawl into bed and try to get a few hours of sleep before we have to get off the ship at 7:10 in the morning to catch our flight home.  Good night!

I HATE flying …

As I type, it’s just after 1am CDT (8am Western European Daylight Time).   We have just about an hour before we land in Barcelona and will begin a full day of activities - and I’ve barely slept an hour.  Ugh!

I hate flying.  Over the years, I’ve figured out how to manage my fear enough to make the moderate amount of travel I’ve done manageable.  But, I’ve never had to do an overseas flight before, and that has proven to be a bit tougher to manage than I would have hoped. 

I tried.  I really tried.  I prepared and hoped that would make it better.  I brought the appropriate neck pillow, wore comfy almost-PJ clothes, and even took a Tylenol PM in hopes of sleeping knowing that I NEEDED to sleep on the plane.  But the fact that I HATE flying leaves me almost unable to relax enough to do much more than doze.  I am hugely jealous of Chris and Angie’s ability to sleep pretty much anywhere under any circumstances.   Chris sacked out pretty quickly.  Almost as soon as I felt drowsy enough to try to fall asleep, we hit some nasty turbulence.  So nasty that they flight crew felt the need to not only turn on the fasten seat belt sign but to also came over the loud speaker to announce the need to return to our seats and fasten our seat belts - which was telling since they had turned out the cabin lights to allow people to sleep and are usually hesitant to make announcements unless absolutely necessary to avoid disturbing and creating cranky passengers.  It was at this point that I looked out the window and came to the full realization that we were over the Atlantic Ocean at a cruising attitude of 33,000+ feet. All of that pretty much ensured that I wasn’t going to be relaxing enough to get any meaningful sleep.

Oh, well.  We just finished a light breakfast and are getting very close to landing.  And, thankfully, the air has smoothed out for us.  Of course, Chris finished his breakfast and has gone back to sleep.  Again, so jealous!

They just handed me the customs form to fill out.  I better shutdown and get it filled out.  TTFN!

Departure Day

T-minus 33 minutes and counting …

We made it!  We and our bags got to the airport, through security, and are now waiting to board our flight.  So far, the only casualty has been my toothpaste out of my carry on.  It was a small tube but still over the 3oz limit.  Crap!  I didn’t even look at it.  Oh, well.  I’m sure a new tube will only cost about $10.  <grimace>

On the upside, we found the one place in the entire DFW airport that has Diet Coke - Burger King.  So, we’re camped out here waiting to board.  (Jim, you’re probably in Mountain Dew heaven when you flight out of here!) 

T+plus 55 minutes and counting …

We hit our first delay.  Due to “congestion” at the Newark airport, we’ve been delayed by 55 minutes.   They’re promising that none of us are in danger of missing our connecting flights.  Keep your fingers crossed!

We made it!

… and without a minute to spare.  We landed in Newark just in time to walk briskly to our departure gate to border our flight to Barcelona.  No worries about getting bored during what was scheduled to be a 2+ hour layover.   Phew!

Here’s a link to a couple of photos. 

Packed and ready to go!

T-13 hours and counting ...

I can't believe it - we're done packing.  Well, except of course for those last minute toiletries that we'll need in the morning.  But, freakin' a ... we're goin' on a cruise.  Whoop!

The other almost unbelievable thing - none of our bags are over 50 pounds.  In fact the average is closer to 35.  Holy cow - planning pays off!  So, foo on any of you who laughed at my OCD list.  :-p

Pretty Money

One errand I had to run today was to pick up our Euros.  We learned over the last week or so that exchanging currency is definitely an art.  There are so many ways to do it when you're traveling overseas that your mind spins trying to not add insult (up to 7% commissions) to injury (a terrible exchange rate - 1.5:1).  Since our bank, Chase, doesn't charge a commission, we decided to go ahead and get some Euros before we leave tomorrow.  I never really thought about it, but I was a little surprised to find out that you couldn't just waltz in an get Euros.  You literally have to order and pay for them in advance.  We ordered them yesterday, and I picked them up today.  I was also a little surprised at how pretty they are:

It almost makes me not want to spend them - almost.