Buen Camino...



In Zubiri... 12.5miles after Roncesvalles. Tired feet at end of the day. From left to right Martin (German), Tebo (Belgian), and I



From right to left: Tony (Italian German), Robert (Aussie), Ivo (Belgian), and I

So it has been a little difficult finding an internet connection as most places are close after a certain time here in Spain. I apologize.

I made it to St Jean Pied de Port (Northwestern France) 2 days ago after taking a train from Paris. It was finally nice to get away from the city life and come to a quaint town such as St Jean. The place itself is beautiful and is right by the foot of the Pyrenees and close to the Spanish border. I immediately met another Australian by the name of Robert who currently working in the UK. He has quite the sense of humor and we immediately hit it off. Once I got into the Hostel near the Pilgrim´s office I met Tony and Ivo (both who completed the Camino last year).

We started as 4 people and then grew into greater than 10 people from all different countries (mostly in Europe). I am the only American in the group so far. It is just amazing the difference in each of us and from the difference of culture but we all share one goal... That is to finish the Camino for our own personal reasons (spiritual, religious, person, health...). It has simply not have been to just walk and enjoy the beauty of the Basque country side but to also develop comradery and enjoy each others company. Comradery like the military.

The first trip from St Jean to Roncesvalles was greater than 15 miles. It was with 21-22 pounds on the shoulders traversing through the snow covered trach of the Valcarlos path. It was my intent to begin on the Route of Napolean but from the warnings of the locals this much more scenic and mountainous path was covered in very high snow. You have to listen to what the locals say otherwise you get into trouble... It of course broke my heart because I was dead set on beginning on the Napolean.

On way to Roncesvalles after Valcarlos. Track covered in snow and alot of uphill walking.

Anyways I would like to write more (I know Tamara dont want to read) but there are other Pilgrims who want to use this single computer. It has been great so far and look forward to our walk to Pamplona tomorrow (city of the running of the bulls). 

Yup 490 more miles to Santiago. From right to left: Brian (English), Ian (English), and I. Taken after we left Roncesvalles.

Buen Camino.

Ooo La la

Jake and I

Aaron and I in Bruges at an African  underground  (physically)  themed bar

You know Paris is a pretty neat city! On my first day I discovered a free walking tour. Not really free but they work on tips. I got to learn alot of general information and manage to see most of what a tourist needed to see in about 3 hours. I hanged out with an American named Jake from New York after the tour and we got to see the Eifel lit up at night. Unfortunately the photo of him and I look like crap.

(Side note in Bruges that I wanted to shout out)
Met an American from Wiscounsin studying
in England and his name is Aaron. Me and him hanged out and enjoyed ourselves to some really good Belgian beer at this really cool African themed bar filled with kids probably as young as 16. You know I been drinking quite a bit of beer in this whole vacation. More so than what I drink at home. I am cutting down.

Anyway back to Paris... So yada yada I did not go to the Louvre museum because I know it would have bored me to death ;) Nope I feel like I did not miss a single thing! Hey look at least I have a picture standing right to it....

Center of the Louvre

It is respectful to the dead to be put on display like this?

Went to the catacomb and saw a million dead people for 8 Euros. It was rather interesting to see such a massive collection of human remains! Just to think they were once breathing living human beings now entombed forever in this dark tunnel for tourist to gawk at everyday... Take my organs just dont put me on display.

Tamara and I

Alex and I

I met up with Tamara in Paris who I first met in Rome at the hostel. She is a really wonderful lady who just loves to create art and very passionate about it too. She took the time to show me around Paris and I am grateful she did because I would have not discovered some of the things she showed me. Thank you Tamara. I hope to see you again in the near future!

I just love meeting all these people. This Alex kid from California have been travelling for over a year now. He just came from East Asia and we spent the night shooting the breeze with some wine. Yeah I know I need to not drink for a bit but being in Europe I think it is mandatory to do so. Really cool guy. He is what I call a drifter but with money to spend haha.

Camino here I come..

Brussels and Bruges

Drinking cup of delicious Belgian coco at the famous brussels market

Yongmin and I at the market square

So I made it to Brussels after a short trip from Amsterdam. Originally planned on staying in Bruges but a couple I met in Amsterdam Gina and Jeffrey recommended I stay with this guy who host "couch surfers". This is an online community that have members from all over the world and participate in hosting people that travel to their hometowns. For free in return for companionship and making new friends. This man Rudy lives in Brussels and was kind enough to open up his penthouse for 2 nites. Such a wonderful person who cooked us dinner and had a fridge stocked up with GREAT Belgian beers. Got to meet Yongmin a Korean who is traveling Europe and have stayed with Rudy for over 3 weeks now. Great guy who is at a very difficult situation in his life at this time.Unfortunately I forgot to take a picture of Rudy and I but I hope he makes it back to Africa his homeland so I can one day visit him there. Overall Brussels was nice but was actually eager to visit Bruges also.

So on the way to Bruges I met this very lovely lady name Francine. I accidently sat in first class when the ticket guy notice this and kicked me to 2nd. I am very glad this happened because there happened to be an empty seat by Francine. She and I had a great conversation about her life and mine. So affirming how many great people you meet out of the blue. One moment they are strangers the next they are lifelong friends.

Made it to Bruges and immediately started exploring. First thing you notice is that it has that quaint old European town feel to it. Kinda like from the movies. Very small town that can be explored in one day.

Alot of old looking buildings and I am sure filled with great arts however I am not so interested in that as you know. Made it to a brewery called Brewery De Halve Maan. They make 4 kinds of beers that are just that typical amazing Belgian beer. Paid 6.50 Euros for a 45 min tour giving the old history of this brewery. I got a free blond beer at the end of the tour but I preferred the double pictured on the right. Anyways this is for now. I leave for Paris tomorrow.

Aussies do travel around (and Amsterdam)

In the first of five towns in the Cinque Terres, Riomaggiore.



So getting out of Rome was fairly exciting and was a welcomed changed as I got tired of how busy Rome was. Sure it was filled with great history to the bream but walking throught the Basilica Museum did not excite me much. Filled with enormous amount of art but I soon discovered museums are not my thing. I did get to meet a French girl name Tamara who is a graphic artist hoping to live in California so she can work more hours...but of course because it is a passion not "work" :) We had a pretty nice conversation and hope to see her again when I come to Paris.

Squid. Delicious but alittle too salty.

A view from La Spezia's boardwalk

I took a comfortable train ride north of Rome to a seaside town called La Spezia where nearby a place called the Cinque Terres (translated to the five lands) was situated. I was fairly excited when I got there as I got a room to my own. A plus to this was the possibilities for new types of food aside for the sandwiches and pizza. Immediately got recommended a mom and pop catch-of-the-day type of restaurant  by the water and only 5 min away. They had squid in the menu and immediately ordered it. For the price and a big change from what I been eating it was good.

Fast forward to the next day I took a simple 15min train rain to Cinque Terres. At first I insisted that I will hike from La Spezia to Cinque Terres to the hostel manager but he pointed out that there was a mountain in the way... That made me laugh.

Riomaggiore

They had this awesome path built right on the side of the cliff to be able to hike from town #1 to town #5 but unfortunately there was a recent mud slide that desvated the towns so only a partial path between town #1 to town #2 was available. I know this sucked!! I was hoping to be able to just stroll to all 5 towns in one day.

View on the path going to Riomaggiore (first Cinque Terres town)

To my surprise (haha) I met a newly wed Aussie couple Dave and Lean on the cliff path and we hanged out for the rest of the day. Very cool guys. (I haven't placed names on previous blogs of people I've met so I made the extra effort to do so now!)

Felix, Anthonio, Dave, and Lean

Since most of the paths were shut down we three decided to take the back road for soon we found out why not too many tourist went that way. Along the way we met up with two more tourist Anthonio and Felix, a father (from Brazil) and son (from London) sitting on the side of the road looking a bit lost. We decided to bring them along with us. The trek in total probably took us 3 hours as it really led to some rather cautionary path up on the mountain side. With snow and ice on the unpaved path walking took longer than advertised. But in the end it was totally worth it as we all bonded as a group. Time after time it has proven that making friends along the way was easier and makes discovering new places greatly special.



Dave, Lean, and I taking a coffee break before taking train back to La Spezia at end of the day



Dave and Lean invited me to their hometown in Adelaide, Australia that I can't think of the name right now (and it is not Melbourne or Sydney haha). I will have to take up the offer in the near future! 

In the end my trip to La Spezia was fine however meeting Dave and Lean made it much much more special. I definitely could not wait to get out of Italy and onto Amsterdam.

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Amsterdam

While biking on the bike tour through streets of Amsterdam.

So I made it to Amsterdam after taking a short plane from Milan. Found my boarding and got placed in a room filled with 3 Romanians. Kinda shady looking group but nice enough. They are good people. Eugene is a body builder and the other 2 are good friends of body building Eugene :) One of them caught up to me after I left my scrarf in the common hall yesterday!

Carl and I

First stop with the bike tour by some of the famous museums in Amsterdam (ie Van Gogh)

Today I took up a great bike tour from Mike's Bike shop close to were I am staying. The tour lasted approx 3 hours and included 8 other tourist from USA and 2 students from France. Our guide was Carl who is a pot head and a great entertainer :) Truthfully it was hard to keep up with the guy as he knew so much about the places we stopped at and he simply liked to talk.





On one of our stop we made was a coffee shop called the Grey Area. They call these places coffee shop but they are simply places to buy marijuana. Didn't find a coffee. Some of the people in our group legally
bought some samples and we went on our way.

Part of the tour went through the red light district. Enough said.

Christine, Me, and Jeff

I met a couple from Boston: Christine and Jeff. Jeff is a famous chef ;) and I forgot to ask what Christine do for a living. Very cool people.

Anyways I am tired and that is all I have for today. Much more happend but the nice lady at this computer let me use their employee pc to let me upload pics and I should get going. Three more days in Amsterdam and I am already enjoying this place more than Italy. Hell they got all kinds of food here!

Roma

Constantine Arch and the Colosseum

Sorry for not posting anything recently. This entry is a combo of last 3 days. Arrived in Rome on the 8th. I was not really feeling the ride to the city. Snow on the ground (first since 1980s) and grafitti all over the place. Traffic was crazy and incompareble to DC. Could not check in to my room until noon as they were cleaning them so I hanged around the train terminal falling asleep. Otherwise uneventful first day and I slept from noon till 2000.

I cant say I am really liking the food here. Not only are they expensive for what you get compared to Barcelona but mostly pasta and sandwiches (duh i know haha). Never was big into Italian food. So I been getting food from the grocery store which are cheaper and alright in taste haha.

Met some more Aussies last night. They do get around.

I had a late start on my 2nd day. First walked around the Colosseum. Pretty impressive monument however I enjoyed the Arch outside the Colosseum much more. The details of sculpting and the fact that there was alot less tourist (such as myself) around the Arch made it more enjoyable. For anyone visiting Rome you have to know that it is extremely focused on tourist and hawkers are everywhere trying to sell you this and that. After this I walked around the Roman Forum just a close proximity to the Colosseum. 

Got lost after for a bit and indervently ended up at the Trivi fountain. Yup was pretty crowded. I thought February was suppose to mean alot less tourist??

My favorite of the day has to be the Pantheon. Not only was it free to come in but a much impressive monument (in my opinion) and wonderful arts inside.

The great thing about Rome is most of the places a tourist would want to visit are within walking distances if your willing to simply walk and follow a map.
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Went to visit the Basillica by Vatican City today and was quite daunting how enormouse the place was to visit. I mean the amount of arts (sculptures, paintings, Egyptian artifact) was just mind blowing. I met some Moroccans today and ended walking around with them. A daughter and a mother. I only went to the Vatican courtyard and did not have time to see inside the buildings. Today's weather was a mix of snow and rain. Pretty miserable for everyone but who cares when you spend most of your time indoors. I've learned that museums and religious artifacts are not my favorite things to look at and rather prefer walking around and meeting the people. (And enjoy the food but that has not happened here yet). I can't wait to get out of here and take a train to Cinque Terres. A much smaller place and more intimate look at the Italian culture. You can guess that Rome is not on my top list of all time.

The Pantheon. The flags are from a party of senior Italian citizens who want their needs heard.

Front of the Pantheon.

Moroccan family I met and decided to walk around with them. They speak French.

Japanese english students living in Ireland staying in same hostel. We had to do the peace sign because it is compulsory to do so when taking pics of Asian people :)

Vatican. Rain and snow.

Up the way to that monastery mate

New Aussie friends. This is what travel is all about. Making new friends.

Decided to go see what the hoopla was all about with Montserrat yesterday. A monastery located in the town close to Manresa, Spain which is still in the same Catalan province as Barcelona. Finding the right train to take you to Monserrat was a challenge in itself and took me about 40-50mins. Plaza Espanya is quite a big underground train station with few English speaking employees. Only way to find it was to ask the locals several times until you get someone who can help. Succeeded in the end.

Only an hour train ride from Barcelona costing 17.10 Euros. The cable car was out of service that day so I had to take another train once I made it to the base of the mountain. Despite that it was scenic going up. It just started snowing when we got up and this added a nice touch to the experience.

Met some nice Aussies on the train who I ended up hanging out with all day. All three have been traveling Europe for approx 2 months. Good people. They invited me to Australia so maybe in the near future I have to accept that offer. I extended the offer back to them as well.

The monastery is called the Santa Maria de Montserrat. With according to legend holds the Holy Grail....

Courtyard to the monastery

The place had a moderate amount of Christian paintings, sculptures, and history (including the tomb of a bishop?) without giving you a sensory overload. Most of the writing were Spanish/Catalunyan so interpreting the descriptions were challenging or impossible at best for the Aussies and I. For the scenic ride, making new friends, and enjoying the arts of this adventure it was worth the 17 Euros I paid.   

Tomorrow visit the Picasso museum.

Dude in the leather Jacket

view from Jardins del Mirador

Dusk before dawn I am walking by the Palau Nacional de Montjuic (one of many museums here) alone. Some sun coming across the horizon. I cross underneath a small bridge. A guy in a leather jacket approx 6 foot tall in his 20s looking like a typical native crosses my path going the opposite way. He catches a glimpse and slows down. I notice this and sends my adrenaline pumping. Minding my own business he stops as I pass him and looks back at me. He looks around and back at me. I continue to walk and he starts following me slowly. (I of course had my ipod on with my insulating earphone playing some music). For all I know he could have been asking for direction and thought I was ignoring him. Oh shit moment... I start walking faster as I remove my earphone making a detour down the steps on the left with goal in mind to find a more public area. He continues to follow me as I find this older gentleman across the street. The guy in leather stops on top of the step looking down at me as I feel a sense of relief... He disappear back into the darkness... Sounds like a novel but damn I thought well you know.

Going back to the beginning: I heard about this place called Jardins del Mirador by the coastal area of Barcelona from which it provides a 360 view of the city. Also a place to watch sunrise and sunset. A walk approx 40 min from where I am staying now. I made the goal of going there this morning to watch the sunrise. Had a late start as I was sleepless last night. Sounded like a great idea to do this early. Anyhow I got all twisted when I had to make the unexpected detour from the man in leather. Walked around not knowing exactly where I was now. The older gentleman did point out where to go but he spoke no English. I went up the path-street until I met this other gentleman who at first I thought did not hear me when I tried to get his attention. Turned out he was extremely intoxicated with snot running down his nose and slurring his speech. He was walking like a zombie. Not knowing this until I got close to him he insisted to help me find my way. Sense of direction, command of the english language, and alcohol don´t mix well I suppose... He looks at map for a good 5 minutes as i tried to break away nicely. He was nice enough to try but failed. He lives in the area too haha.

It was a treat in the end when I found the place 25-30 min late. Felt like below zero with strong winds at the top. Further up the path is a castle probably built to protect the harbor as you can tell from the picture below.

Oh yeah according to Noel the guy was probably a male prostitute or was looking for one.. That area supposedly known to have those up there. Yeah freaking right... He wanted to rob me. (Note to my parents: I am unharmed and doing well). Overall it was a pretty exciting morning! Just wished I had my handgun.

harbor at the bottom

view from Mirador de l Alcalde (the castle)

statue of a soldier on the castle

WW2 canons I think on the castle

My meal after a pretty exciting morning!

Barcelona - Catalunya

Landed in Barcelona (4 hours late) feeling like it was Washington State. You can guess what I mean - cold and gloomy. I was quite surprised how cold it was but supposedly this is unusual for the region. I was sitting in the plane about to land when it dawned on me that 1) I did not have my cousin's number 2) I did not have their address. How typical. Luckily Grace and Noel were in the airport waiting for me since 0700! Approx 5 hours not knowing exactly when I was suppose to arrive. It all worked out in the end. Always does.



Slept for 9 hours last night. This morning remains to be cold but at least it is sunny! Noel and Grace graciously took me around downtown Barcelona in an area known as the Catalunya.

A monument of Christopher Columbus (pointing to the west?)

This area have the famous Mercat de La Boqueria.  A wet market much like the Farmer's Market in Seattle. I travel not only to experience the culture but the food. Most importantly eating what the locals eat. This is where Pinotxo Tapas comes in...

In front of the famous Pinotxo Bar. With probably only a dozen chairs this little gem keeps busy!

Enjoying a draft in the late morning and waiting for my meal.

This old guy is the famous owner known to a lot of foodies for masterminding some of the most original Tapas plate around. He has the aura of a celebrated chef. I mean look at that winning smile.

It is famous but I can't recall the name right now...

 

A well known cathedral in renovation.

P.S. washing underwear or any article of clothing in a typical Spanish bathroom is no fun...