Two weeks of WOW in Spain and France

The last couple of weeks traveling in Europe have been incredible. Since Rome, Iain and I have spent a lot of time hanging out on beaches, in cafes, watching the EUFA games (soccer), and getting to know a very good group of people from Australia who have been traveling with us for the past week.

In the last few days, we have visited Florence, which I highly recommend as a good shopping and artistic appeal destination. They have a very famous art museum called the Uffizi Gallery, which has the world´s largest collection of Renaissance Art and several masterpieces by artist such as Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, Titian, Raphael and so many more. If you come to Florence and visit this museum expect a three hour wait to get in. We were lucky enough to only have to wait an hour and a half to get in.

After Florence we went to Nice which was nice. It is a quaint little town in the South of France with a great beach and good shopping. We spent both our days here lying in the sun. However we also did get a chance to see Monaco with its ridiculously opulent lifestyle and incredible beauty. To live here you have to apply with the Monaco governing state and your application will cost a million euros. After paying the application fee, you are still not guaranteed entry. Michael Jackson was rejected (I´m not surprised). We were able to see Bono´s house and private island which was really nice.

From Nice we travelled to Barcelona which became my new favorite city in Europe (along with Berlin, Stockholm, Vienna and Dubrovnik). It had everything I love about a city including a great beach, exceptional architecture, cathedrals, history, sunshine, great food, equally great shopping, lovely people and was even the site for one of the summer Olympics. We found that renting bikes was a good way to see the city. I think the art around the city was my favorite part with Gaudi being the centre of artistic expression. Overall I give Barcelona a 9.5/10 for most appealing city to visit or live in.

Madrid came next and we not only made some amazing friends here (ones that will always be close to my heart and will visit when we go to Australia) but we got to do two REALLY cool things here. First and most important was visiting the home pitch of The Real Madrid soccer team. You can go visit the stadium, see the museum of all their greatest players including Backham, Zidane, and Ronaldo but you can also tour the team locker rooms, sit in the player´s seats and even touch the pitch (well, you´re not supposed to but we did). This was such a meaningful experience for Iain because it was his childhood dream to visit a professional soccer stadium. What better way to do it than visit the most successful soccer team in history´s home field.

The other thing that I was a particularly big fan of in Madrid was the Madrid Flamenco Dancing Theatre. There were about six of us (all girls staying at the hostel) who wanted to go out and see the traditional Spanish dancing. Not only did the dancing blow us all away but the costumes and music were fabulous too. This was a great girls night for me and each of us became very good friends over the course of the week we spent together.

Now Iain and I are in San Sebastian which is my new favorite smaller city. It´s so unbelievably beautiful here you would have to see it for yourself to believe it. There is a giant statue of Jesus on a hill overlooking the city and you can see it from almost anywhere in the town, the shopping is awesome (I bought a pair of shoes from Zara here which is where the store originated) and the beaches are pristine. They comb them every night and people sunbathe and surf on them every day. The tans we have from being here make us look like professional beach bums.

With only two weeks left in Europe before we come home for our friends weddings, we are going to Bordeaux for two nights, Paris for one, Bern in Switzerland for three, Lauterbrunnen for two, Munich for one, Paris for one, and then Canterbury for three to visit Iain´s brother Paul again.

Even though we have been to a lot of places in such a short amount of time we actually feel rested because of the people we have been with and the downtime we have had on the beaches in Spain and France.

Although we are looking forward to coming home, we can´t believe our time is almost up and will have to re-adjust again to get used to the lives we used to lead back home. This trip has been incredible and its not over yet. With two weeks left we plan on living it up until the very end. Until then, best wishes to all and we will see you very soon.