Pictures from Florence

Venice!

I love Venice! It's exactly the way you would picture it. Everything is old, the streets are a winding maze, and the gondola drivers are in your face. We stayed in a nice hotel on the mainland because it is leaps and bounds less expensive than staying on the sinking island. Luckily, it was only a ten minute bus ride to Venice proper. We took a water boat and walked. I much preferred walking--you just get absorbed into the city that way. Our first night we ate at the Florida Restaurant. Venice is really very very touristy, so there are plenty of shops to look in. Another great thing about Venice is it is the birthplace of my favorite drink--the Bellini.
The next day we wandered around the city before our train left and picked up some Murano glass, a well known product in the area. We also saw the most amazing fresh seafood market. They were cutting swordfish steaks right off the fish carcass! I have never seen anything like it. They had it all, and then the fed the remains to the seagulls--we'll take points off for that. For lunch we went to a restaurant on the river. The waiters all stand outside the restaurant and try to steer people to a table. One group of old people really made them mad because they were only ordering drinks. You don't do that in Italy. If you only want drinks, you go to the bar and stand, you do not take a table. It's considered very rude. It was funny to watch though! Around 3pm we grabbed our stuff and headed to the train station for our trip to Florence. It was a really crappy train. Very old, think Harry Potter with the cabins and then think very old and dingy. Ah well, Florence more than made up for it!

Pictures from Venice

Trying to Leave London

What a debacle! Ronny and I took Easyjet to London. It is the only way to get from Geneva to Gatwick airport without spending a ton of money. Easyjet is a piece-meal company. So you pay for your ticket, and then your bags, and if you want something to drink you pay for that on the plane. We got to Gatwick three hours before our flight. Outside of the terminal, there was a huge queue (British for line) for Easyjet passengers. We waited in this line for about an hour and were finally able to check in. When we got to the waiting area for flights we noticed that our flight was scheduled to leave at 6:30 p.m., but the gate wouldn't be opened until 6:50 and then 7:15 and then 7:30ish. Okay, it's delayed. No worries. Around 8:00 we finally got on the plane. We were all on board. The captain came on and said "Well folks, we're ready to take off, but Easyjet just canceled your flight. We need to ask you to vacate the plane." WTF??!! Allegedly, there was a problem with the ticketing system for the company. Why it impacted people with tickets on a plane I'll never know. We all hustle off the plane and bee-line to the information desk. It's chaos. There is no one really directing people, and Ronny and I just haphazardly started following a group of people that were on our flight. All I was thinking was I need to get to the check in desk. Thankfully, Ronny had his wits about him and after we left customs (again) he had the fortitude to grab our baggage that came off the plane. A lot of people didn't know to do that, myself included. If he hadn't grabbed that bag, we would have been royally screwed. When we got back to the ticketing counter there was not one Easyjet representative in sight. They had packed up and said "Oh Shit!" At this point I'm panicking. I had to pick up my Uncle Doug and Aunt Wendy the next day. We walked across the parking lot and got a room at the airport hotel. I cried. I'm cool with traveling until something goes wrong. I was also really upset that I had family coming to visit me and I wasn't going to be there to pick them up. Thankfully, our roommate picked them up for us with a sign and everything. To top it off, Ronny was supposed to be on shift for work the next day. Joe took his shift too. That night we purchased two more tickets with British Airways (who were on strike) out of Heathrow. There were no flights with Easyjet until Wednesday (it was Monday). If we were on the continent of Europe we could have rented a car or taken a train; in London we were stranded without a plane. We had to take a bus to Heathrow, but we managed to make it back. Our friend Chris picked us up from the airport and we met Doug and Wendy at our house.
Lessons learned: DO NOT fly Easyjet; ALWAYS have a day buffer when you travel; be THANKFUL for great friends.

London

My long overdue narrative of London. We had such a great time while we were in the city. There will be another post about leaving the city. Margaret and Gordon, my London relatives (my Grandma's cousin's daughter...I think), picked us at up the airport. They remember me as an eight year old and I remember them as forty years olds. Needless to say, I didn't quite know who I was looking for. They are simply wonderful people! We were welcomed warmly and treated like it had only been a few years, instead of nineteen, since we had seen one another.
From the airport we were off to Hampton Court Palace, home of Henry VIII. What an amazing place! Real Tudor architecture right on the Thames River.
The next morning we went to London. We started at Big Ben, House of Parliament, and moved quickly to Westminster Abbey. Margaret and Gordon accompanied us on this adventure which was very fortunate because there were major changes to the metro lines. Without their help we would have been lost. Gordon is from Scotland, and basically everything he says is awesome because of that fact alone. Anyways, from Westminster Abbey, home of a lot of dead kings, we moved to Buckingham Palace. The Queen, anticipating our arrival, was in residence. Next we hit the National Gallery. By this point every part of me hurt from walking, so we zoomed through the Gallery. For some stupid reason I wanted to go to the Tate Modern Museum, a modern art museum. It was dumb, but I got to see St. Paul's Cathedral (site for Charles and Diana's wedding).
Sunday, Claire, Margaret and Gordon's daughter, met up with us for a tour of the Tower of London. We got to see the crown jewels, coats of armor, and the Beefeaters. For dinner we went traditional English and headed to a carve-ery. Basically, it's a buffet with three different meat options and unlimited sides. By the way, the staple vegetable of England is peas...gross. The meat was great and I got to have a Yorkshire pudding...amazing.
We packed the days full and had a great time. Hope you enjoy the pictures!

Pictures from London

Narrative coming soon!