Well, this is to be our last blog post; we never actually made it to Seville, or Malaga or Cordoba, and the only time we were in Madrid was to board our flight home. Just after I finished writing the previous post we decided we needed to return home for some family reasons. It was all very sudden, and return flights were booked within thirty minutes.

Around four hours away from Sydney, we received a message on Alison's phone to announce that we were the proud grandparents of Xavier Evan Williams. I think the exact words were, 'there is a baby'. Actually, Xavier had been born eight hours earlier and both Elizabeth and her sister Imogen, who was by her side through the entire birth , had conspired to keep it from us, not wanting to worry us. Unfortunately, Xavier's dad, Pete, did not make it back from Perth in time for the birth, but was there shortly after.

We knew nothing of this when we left Madrid, somewhat reluctantly, cutting short the last ten days of our trip. However, the news of Xavier's arrival certainly dissolved any regrets we may have had about coming home early.

All in all, it was an amazing trip. We did not really want to go, at one stage coming up with an exploded gallbladder to avoid it (lol), but in the end we never wanted it to finish. Once more, its not really just about the buildings, or the gardens, or even the cathedrals, beaches or restaurants. It's about the experience of living a richer life for having seen the incredible diversity in us humans. And, of course, it's about doing it with someone like Alison. Without my traveling companion, it would have been neither possible or anywhere near as much fun.

So, until next it's antio, auf weiderschen, sbohem, zbogom and adios.

Little tiny Xavier

Adios Barcelona, hola Seville

We’ve certainly worn down our shoe leather exploring Barcelona. In addition to looking at all the tourist ‘must dos’, we’ve also continued our ability to seek out those things most tourists don’t bother with (which we often find to be the most interesting). We’ve traveled on virtually every line of the Metro and criss-crossed the city from one end to the other. The weather has generally been very kind to us, with completely sunny skies today, although the temperatures are only low teens at best. We’ve seen all the Antoni Gaudi stuff, even some of his buildings many tourists don’t know about; beautiful gardens; castles; cathedrals and then some more cathedrals.

Antoni Gaudi's residence for many years - he was such a cool dude. It is in Parc Guell

One of the best things we’ve done here is to visit the National Museum. It was two floors of Spanish history, from its earliest inhabitants in stone-age times, to Spain under General Franco. We were there for close to three hours and really only left as we were tired of standing on our feet (that, and a couple of school groups were running riot – I’m pretty sure the supervising teachers were off having coffee). I found the Franco stuff particularly interesting, and it is hard to comprehend modern-day Spain was a military dictatorship as recently as forty years ago. It also prompted me to reflect on Australia’s history, albeit short, of parliamentary democracy and how lucky we are never to have had to take to the streets to fight to defend these rights. Perhaps the price we’ve paid for this is complacency and apathy.

Yep, that's me on my trusty stead off to fight for the holy crusaders

Quite by accident, we came across a remarkable set of buildings, Sant Pau Hospital de la Santa Creu, which used to be one of Barcelona’s major hospitals until the last ten or so years. There has been a hospital on the site since 1401, but the modern building was erected in the first few decades of the twentieth century. It was built in the unique Catalonian style of architecture, known as Catalan Modernisme, which features beautiful mosaic decorations on the ceilings and walls. In actual fact, it looked more like a cathedral than it did a hospital. These days, it is an Art Nouveau Site, recognised by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site.

Part of the old Sant Pau hospital site

Everywhere we have been around Barcelona we’ve been amused, entertained and astounded by the focus on design and architecture. Barcelona’s buildings are very different to what we’ve seen in other places, although you could imagine yourself being in Paris or Rome in some parts of the city. We’ve managed to cover a huge geographic area, between the extensive metro network and the buses, and this has really allowed us to experience Barcelona as the locals would.

Looking back from Barcelona's port district

We have found a really great Turkish restaurant not far from our hotel which makes just the best doner portions. Tonight we had a beef and a chicken washed down, of course, with cold beers. Just in case you’re thinking this is not very Spanish, I would remind you that there is a strong Islamic culture in Spain as the Moors at one stage ruled most of the country. Although today Spain is largely Catholic, you can still find evidence of Islamic culture everywhere. That’s our official explanation, the reality is that this restaurant just served the yummiest of food.

Tomorrow we reluctantly leave Barcelona for Seville, Malaga and Cordoba. These cities form the part of Spain known as Andalusia, and have a very long tradition of Islam, being quite close to northern Africa. We are also expecting some slightly warmer weather, particularly once we get to Malaga on the costa del sol; we may even be able to get those bathers out that have been in hibernation since Mykonos. 

Never mind him, he's from Barcelona

Today was our first full day in Barcelona. We arrived late yesterday after an almost three hour flight from Prague. We expected the weather in Barcelona to be rainy, as the forecast had predicted, instead it was reasonably warm, well compared to Prague anyway. It was quite a nice day, lots of sun and around 14 degrees, but it felt a little warmer.We are staying in a very lively part of town with lots of restaurants and bars. It is also very noisy, but that doesn’t worry us too much. Today, we used our public transport tickets to explore lots of the city by both train and bus. It is amazing how much of a city you can cover in just one day, but we do manage to pack in pretty full days.

Barcelona is a very cool place. Being on the coast, we decided to travel down to the port area and were surprised by the number of people on the beach, mind you not that many were braving the water to go swimming. If the weather holds, I’ve told Alison I’m going to brave it before we leave.

We have visited many beautiful cathedrals in our travels, and Barcelona’s is certainly up there with the best of them. The main cathedral here is so beautiful, so awesome it almost made me consider converting (but then I came to my senses and we bid a hasty retreat). Of course, Spain was also once part of the Holy Roman Empire (those Romans certainly got around) and there is no shortage of ancient reminders of their presence. Like most cities we visit, there is a younger part and a very old part to it. Both of them are great, but there’s certainly nothing quite like exploring the oldest streets and uncovering some historic relics.

Part of the Roman walls in Barcelona

Barcelona Cathedral - very beautiful, inside and out

This evening we decided to eat like some locals and sought out a few restaurants nearby which specialize in Spain’s two most well known dishes, paella and tapas. I thought it might be nice to try the paella, after all, we can always do the tapas tomorrow. We decided on a place that was really packed, always a good sign we figure, and ordered one mixed meat and one vegetarian paella. Although we waited well over twenty minutes for it to be served, we weren’t at all concerned as we knew this meant it was being cooked from scratch. In any event, we both had some cold beers and the match of the day between FC Barcelona and Seville FC on the big screen to keep us occupied. When the paellas finally arrived, they were incredibly good, served directly in the pan they’d been cooked on. 

This is a typical Barcelona street - not unlike Rome or even Paris (yeah, I know, what a bunch of name droppers)

We also made friends with a couple of local guys and their girlfriends, who were there to celebrate one of the guy’s birthdays, and of course to watch the game. Birthday boy’s English wasn’t great, but good enough for us to keep a basic conversation going, while the other guy and the two ladies had almost no English. Despite the fact that Spain is host to many English tourists, this is by far the worst city for English language we’ve encountered. Almost nobody here speaks it, and English in its written form is noticeable by its absence. It has been a challenge for us to work things out, but this is part of the fun of travel. Anyway, the guy was very friendly, and we left shaking hands as we wished him a happy birthday.

Castell de Montjuic, a fort dating from around the seventeenth century (I think)

Tomorrow, it’s up early to continue our exploration of this great city. There are so many ‘must sees’ it’s hard to know how we are going to manage to fit them all in, considering we only have two days remaining here; which means I’d better sign off and get to bed.

Beautiful, beautiful Prague

I never thought I would find a city we loved as much as Paris, but I think Prague might be this place. From the moment we stepped off the bus, I fell in love with this place. This is a medieval city like no other, with historic and beautiful buildings that go on and on (a bit like this blog actually). Prague is elegant, Prague is chic, Prague is sexy, oh to hell with it, Prague is marvellous.  Just when you think you’ve seen everything, you turn a corner and there is something even more unbelievable. To be very honest, it is easy to suffer from sensory overload here, there is simply so much to see.

A typically Prague street, with beautiful street facade

We have been really fortunate with the weather in Prague. Although bitterly cold, the sun has been out for most of the two days. The temperature yesterday was 6 degrees, but the wind chill brought that down to 4. We have on our beanies and coats, but most of the locals get around in pretty short skirts (and that’s just the blokes) and don’t seem to notice the cold. Maybe six degrees is actually pretty warm for getting on to winter. Whatever the reason, I don’t think I’d like to be in Prague on a ‘cold’ day.

A view to Prague Castle - lovely, isn't it

We went to a lovely little Czech restaurant on our first night here for dinner, serving mainly local dishes. I had Czech goulash while Alison had pork with sauerkraut. Both dishes were served with what they call bread dumplings, although we’d simply call them bread slices. Europeans have a love affair with food, I’m absolutely convinced of this. Restaurants, street vendors, supermarkets serving hot food, whether you chose to look there is something to eat. Prices for food in Prague, and the Czech Republic in general, seem very reasonable. Our restaurant meal the other night came to around 570 Koruna (around $28 AUD), including our main dishes, two 0.5 litres of beer, and two lovely desserts.  Many of the restaurants in Prague are so nicely decorated and so cosy you feel like staying there all night (obviously, a great marketing ploy).

The beautiful Vltava River runs right through Prague

Yesterday we visited the Museum of Communism, which I absolutely loved. It was so well set out and so informative. The museum chronicled the dark days of Cold War Soviet Stalinist administration in Czechoslovakia, and how the Czech people rebelled against this administration, culminating in the Velvet Revolution of 1989. Amazingly, there was footage of the daily demonstrations in Wenceslas Square with up to 100,000 people protesting for the end of the communist regime. This square is less than a few hundred metres from where we are staying, and it’s almost impossible to imagine how it must have looked a mere twenty-five years ago. There were also a couple of VIPs drop into the museum while we were there; some guy by the name of Lenin, and another chap who went by the name Marx (no relation to Groucho).  I’m not certain who they were, but they seemed pretty important so I did what all good tourists do and asked for a photo. They were happy to oblige.

Some guy by the name of Karl Marx, who kept going on about the proletariat and how workers on the world needed to unite. I have no idea who he was, but he seemed happy enough for Alison to snap this photo of us together

Staromestska Nam square, with the Tynska ulicka in the background, which dates back to the 13th century

Today we took one of the lovely trams (Prague does remind me a lot of Melbourne) to Prague Castle, which is so grand, so imposing that it almost defies description. I understand Prague Castle is the largest coherent castle anywhere in the world. It’s also one of the oldest, dated back to the eighth century, although it has been modified and redesigned many times (thanks, no doubt, to shows like Better Homes and Gardens and The Block for the ideas). Something which we are finding very testing after over four weeks on the road is the sheer quantum of tourists everywhere we go. I don’t question their right to be there, but I would bet my next Budweiser that ninety percent of them have next to no interest in learning about what they’re seeing, they just use the venue as an excuse to shoot either selfies or snaps of the boyfriend/girlfriend in ridiculous poses.

St. Vitus Cathedral, part of the Prague Castle

I’m going to end the post now, as anything more I say about Prague will not really do it justice. I’ll leave a selection of photos below which will hopefully do a much better job of conveying the beauty of this city than I ever could. We leave Prague tomorrow for the final leg of our journey, Spain. I’m going to be talking about Prague long after the plane has left the airport, in fact, long after our homeward bound plane touches down in Sydney in a little over two weeks. I just love it.  

Gate tower at the opening to Charles IV bridge

Prague from Petrin Hill

Inside St. Vitus Cathedral

Let's all have another beer and a cigarette

Today was our only full day in Ceske Budejovice; it was also our only day spent in a place we were staying where we had sun all day. Not sure whether it was just the sun, but we really like Ceske. It is a pretty small city, only a little bit larger than Albury-Wodonga, and you can just about walk the entire old part of the town, which I think we must have done today.

Like almost every European city of this era, it has a river running through it, and lots of nice park land to enjoy. The buildings in our part of the town are very old, some six or seven centuries old, but they are really beautiful. In case you didn’t realise, beer is a very popular drink over here, and people consume it by the half litre. In fact, Ceske Budejovice is the home of the original Budweiser brewery, and its beer is very popular here.

If drinking beer is popular, then smoking cigarettes is even more so. We have discovered this in many countries we have visited in Europe, but the Czech Republic is among the worst. Even more concerning is the age of many smokers, with some clearly in their very early teens. Nowhere have we seen a single billboard or advertisement warning of the dangers of smoking, not that we’d been able to read it even if there had. Tonight we had our evening meal in our hotel’s restaurant and almost had to use search lights to find our meals there was so much smoke in the room.

A lovely old building near the city square

It is obvious that Ceske Budejovice is not really a tourist mecca, as there is virtually no English written anywhere. Menus, supermarkets, food stalls, they all have to be deciphered to try to figure out what is selling. Fortunately, those working in the hotels seem to have at least some English, but it is very broken at best.The other really amusing thing over here is the currency, the Koruna. It takes about twenty Koruna to make one Aussie dollar, so the denominations are pretty large. We spent 500 Koruna on a meal last night, which sounds extraordinary, but since this is really only around $25 AUD for one pork schnitzel, one beef stroganoff and one litre of beer (OMG, Alison can drink), your money does go a long way here.

The beautiful Town Hall, which plays traditional music on the hour

Hello Comrades - welcome to Ceske something starting with B

We have today arrived at Ceske Budejovice, the capitol of the Bohemia region of the Czech Republic (despite weeks of practice, we still have no idea how to pronounce this place. Even our Google translate says, ‘You’ve got to be kidding, mate). We are at Ceske for two nights, a shortish stopover on our way to Prague, although it was only a three and a half hour trip. Our hotel, the Grand Zvon, is as its name suggests, grand in every respect. The rooms are decorated as if from the nineteenth century, but not old and decrepit like our Salzburg accommodation, which was probably the worst of our trip so far. The Hotel Grand Zvon reminds me of the sort of hotel the Communist Party officials would have used a mere twenty-five years ago in Cold War Czechoslovakia. You know what they say, all comrades are equal, but some are more equal than others (I’m not sure I can get away with saying this even in modern Czech Republic, so I’m going to type quietly).

Even though it's gloomy, Salzburg is still a lovely city

We left Salzburg after four of the dreariest days you could imagine. Although we arrived in sunshine, we awoke the next morning to thick cloud and drizzle which did not lift for our entire stay. To be perfectly honest, it really clouded (pardon the pun) our perception of this city to the extent that we left pretty unimpressed. I’m certain in sunshine it is lovely, but you get sick of walking in the rain and fog, which pretty much blanketed the city obscuring almost all views. The other thing which stands out about Salzburg is the saturation bombing of tourists of all things Mozart. I was honestly sick to death of Mozart t-shirts, Mozart pens, Mozart stuffed toys, even Mozart strudel. I don’t care if the guys was a genius, I think even he would have thought it over the top. 

Our lovely hotel in Ceske, the Grand Zvon

If you ever consider visiting Salzburg, be aware that it is the most expensive city we’ve ever visited anywhere. Alison and I needed to take out a second mortgage on our home back in Wangaratta just to buy a cup of hot chocolate (we had to take our first mortgage out to buy a bun to go with it). Yesterday, we paid close to $10 AUD to go up and back in an elevator of literally ten seconds duration, just so we could go for a walk through the elevated parkland. And too bad if you need to go to the toilet while you’re out walking; for two people (there’s something about one person going that makes the other person also want to go) that’s going to set you back almost $2 AUD. Out of pure principal, we’ve refused to pay, which probably explains why we’re both suffering from massive bladder infections (just joking).We’ve been on the road now almost four weeks, and the jadedness is starting to manifest itself. Our weather since leaving Greece has been pretty terrible. We counted three half-days of sun in two weeks, and I swear yesterday in Salzburg the temperature never crept above 6 or 7 degrees all day. The pattern has been that we have cloud and rain until the day we are due to leave a place, and then the sun comes out. It has become somewhat an exercise in looking for things to do to keep busy, rather than really enjoying places. 

Premysla Otakara II Square - this is the view from our window (lucky, aren't we)

The same square at night - simply stunning

Fortunately, it has been fine all day today. The rail trip from Austria through Bohemia was absolutely lovely. One thing you have to give Europe is its lovely scenery. The mountainous terrain of the eastern Alps today gave way to the rolling farm land of Eastern Europe. I could really see myself driving a tractor on a few acres of dirt here, and I reckon it’d be pretty affordable. In fact, the contrast in the cost of living between Austria and the Czech Republic couldn’t be starker. We just went shopping here for a few freshly baked rolls, a pizza sub, two apples, some milk and a drink and it came to around 80 koruna. My god, 80 koruna for that! Oh yeah, forgot to mention 80 koruna is around $4 AUD. In Salzburg, we’d have had to sell the car to buy this. Ceske is a really love place, and hopefully we'll get a chance to explore it better tomorrow (if the bloody rain can hold off for one day).

I've heard it's a small world, but this is damn ridiculous

We left Innsbruck at lunchtime today for our ninety minute trip to Salzburg. Before leaving Innsbruck, we managed one last trip up into the mountains to look down on the city bathed in sunshine. Although the city itself was in full sun, the mountains behind us were covered in thick fog, vindicating our decision not to take the cable car to the top. By the time we were on the train, however, the fog had cleared completely and we were able to see these most imposing peaks for the first time since arriving. Looking up at these monsters, almost able to touch them they appeared so close, is a little bit surreal. It’s as if they are keeping watch over the city below, some ancient gods (well, I’ve no doubt that European skiers worship them).

The mountains rise above Innsbruck like sentinels guarding over the city

The train from Innsbruck to Salzburg takes you through some of the most spectacular rural scenery, it really is like something out of a picture book. That’s the problem travelling through Europe; every bend in the road or the track reveals something even more breathtaking than the one before. It is very easy to start turning off, until of course you remember you’re only here once and all you’ll have in a few weeks are the memories, so you shake yourself out of your half-sleep and fix your eyes once again out the window.

The trains in Austria in particular are amazing. In typically Austrian fashion they are incredibly clean, fast and punctual. You can also take whatever you like on board: beers, wines, a full Austrian feast if that takes your fancy, and everybody is remarkable comfortable with it. Speaking of drinking, we are incredulous at just how cheap and plentiful alcohol is in this part of Europe. In Australia, you might go down to the local milk bar to get bread, milk and maybe the paper. What you could never buy would be alcohol. Over here, every little shop and supermarket have beer and wine next to the bottles of coke and bottled water. In fact, the bottled water is frequently more expensive than the beer. We have purchased 500 ml cans of beer for around 45 Euro cents, which is around 65 cents Australian. But if you think this ubiquitous exposure to alcohol would translate directly into alcohol abuse, you’d be wrong. We’ve not seen a single incidence of drunkenness since we arrived. It would appear that it’s not the exposure and access to alcohol which is the problem, rather the culture surrounding its consumption. Take note Australia.

Beautiful Salzburg, with a castle atop the hill (just about every European city has a bloody castle atop a hill)

A very pretty walking path along the Salzach River

Now, this next part is going to blow your socks off, so make sure you’re wearing some. We arrived at our Salzburg hotel after about a ten minute walk from the station. On the whole, our accommodation hitherto has been first rate, so when we arrived at our Salzburg accommodation we were a little bit disappointed, based on its appearance. The lady at reception was very welcoming and when we went to take out our passports, something you must do in every European hotel, she insisted she didn’t need to see them. ‘Are you sure’, we asked, ‘we’re from Australia’.

‘I know’, she said, ‘it’s written here on the reservation’.

‘Do you have many Australians staying’, we asked, trying to be friendly.

‘Not too many, maybe one’.

At this point I thought, great, we’ve doubled her Australian contingent in one booking. She then went on to say, ‘maybe, how do you say, one group per year’. Okay, so that made sense, she has a tour group from Australia book each year.

‘So you have a group from Australia?’, we said.

‘Yes, ah, Trev… um, I mean wick…, sorry I can’t quite think straight’.

At this stage, and I don’t know why, but my mind wanted to fill in some gaps that should never, in a thousand lifetimes, have been there. I found myself saying if you put those two utterances together you get ‘trev wick’, which sounds remarkably like someone from Wangaratta who runs tours for cashed-up pensioners (well, I’m sorry, but that’s pretty much the reality). The next thing which happened I could never have believed had I not experienced myself, and even now I’m not sure I wasn’t dreaming it.

‘Wanga, Wangaratta, he comes from a place in Australia called Wangaratta. He brings a group of people from Wangaratta.’ At this point, we almost went into cardiac arrest. We then explained that we also came from Wangaratta (not the sort of thing I normally confess to people when I travel), that we knew Trevor Wickham and that Alison’s mother travelled with Trevor and, therefore, most likely had stayed in this very same hotel.

I cannot help but attempt to do the maths of how unlikely this coincidence can possible be. There are probably three or four hundred hotels in Salzburg. Most of these, at some stage, would have tour groups staying from all around the world. What would be the chance that a hotel we picked totally at random from Trip Advisor would be the very same hotel that a tour guide from our home city of Wangaratta would also pick for his tours?  And what would the chance be that this piece of information would even come up in conversation with the lady at reception?

We’ve experienced some amazing coincidences in our travels, but this definitely takes the cake. I’m still pinching myself to see whether I’m dreaming.

Looking towards the older section of Salzburg