Florence...

Ok, I'm a bad blogger, let me start off in Florence, we arrived in the morning, took a group photo with the city in the backhground and then we all got dropped off for our free day of site seeing. It was pouring rain and my roommate Anna told me it was going to be hot, so guess what I was wearing, flip flops and capri slacks... yeah... So I nearly froze my bottom off, but once again I got some cool pictures. We stopped off and Leonardo's Italian leather and watched a leather demonstration, then I went to the jewelery store and bought and Italian puzzle ring. The story behind the ring is, that that Italian men use to give them to their wives while they were away cause if you take the ring off, it falls into 4 pieces and its REALLY complicated to put back together. Seriously, I had to take a few lessons to learn how to put it back together and I still can't really do it. Thenuska what am I going to do without you?! So after getting lost and we stopped for some gelato and ate at a really good restaurant.... After finding the museum where they house the statue of David, the line was 3 hours long! I told my roommate Anna I would go back to the bus and take it back to the hotel so we could have our luggage. If I would have stayed with her at the museum our stuff would have been on the bus and that would have been bad. So after I dropped her off I took off going the wrong direction! Yeah, thats me, I get lost going around the block. I walked about 30 minutes in the wrong direction, in the thundering rain, then I had to walk 30 minutes back, I saw Anna again, she was like WTF? Then I headed off for the bus. Dritto, dritto, dritto e sinistra! Yeah, good thing I read my Italian book on directions cause that translates to straight, straight, straight and then right. So, after being totally pooped, in the pouring rain, I stopped off for an espresso, then carried on. Finally got back to the bus, freezing and shivering. I told Paul I was never so happy to see him in my whole life... Once I got back to my cabin I met up with Thenushka and we grabbed a bite to eat and a bottle of wine (my 2nd drunk night) got a lesson in puzzle rings from some hot boy at the front desk and wrote a few post cards. We were really worried about Anna, it was already 8 pm and the statue closed at 6 and we had no idea where she was.... We asked if we should call the police, but the Italian police are totally useless... Finally Anna showed up around 10 pm and we rejoiced and then I passed out and went to sleep.

Drop the food Natalie!! Drop the food!!

Ciao from Italia! My first night in Venice was pretty interesting. We camped at Fusina (a port in Venice) in cabins that had an infestation of mosquitos. No one was exempt from being eaten alive, the showers were your own private flesh eating tombs. So, back in Austria, after my bad day, I promised my Aussie mates that Id come out and have a few drinks them... my first and only night of drinking and I got totally pissed! Pissed = drunk in Australian. Nathaniel and Eddie gave me something called Sambuca without having dinner and I was so drunk I couldnt find the bathroom or my way to the chow hall, so I basically missed half of d inner. I went back to my room around 9 and passed out and was woken up around 3 am by a new girl I was rooming with. She had somehow fallen in the water and came back dripping wet! Well, it wouldnt be a drunken Natalie night without a stupid comment, so the day before these 2 girls were trying to lure our fine-hot-young bus driver back to their rooms, one girl even offered him pretzels... so as I got off the bus (the night before my drunken incident) I said, " youre pretty popular with the ladies, pretzels eh?" and as i got off the bus he said "well i didnt see you offering me any pretzels", so the next day at our service stop, i grabbed a bag and offered him so "pretzels..." But the following night when i was drunk i said that i wanted to tear his clothes off like the girls the night before... pretty embarrsing.

So my first real day in Venice i bought a cool sweatshirt right when we got off the boat. Piazza san marco was flooded so the polizia were directing traffic as people walked along on planks.. rule number 1: dont piss of the italian police!! the police were screaming "andiamo!! andiamo!" so i screamed andiamo... big mistake... the officer turned around and blew a whistle in my face and said "signora!! silencia!!!"..... scary...

Rule number 2 in piazza san marco: dont bring any carbohydrates into the plaza. I was attacked by pigeons and my friends looked on and screamed "DROP THE FOOOD NATALIE!!! DROP THE FOOD!!" The pigeons swarmed me and there were tons on my head, on my arms, and every free space of body i had... this is no exaggeration, i have pictures.

most of the tour mates thought venice was a dump, but i highly enjoyed the city. its been my favorite stop on the tour so far. I decided to to see venice by just getting lost in the city. its not that hard to do considering its a city with a bunch of alley ways, shops, canals and dead ends. after walking around i decided to stop and write some post cards home when out of nowhere i ran into my two best aussie mates eddie and nathaniel. it was totally random! the boys seem to like taking pictures of them kissing me on the cheek, so we have a cute one somewhere in the middle of venice.

after that i traveled to the realto bridge and took some really great photos. later that evening i went on a 30 minute gondola ride... i really enjoyed it. i didnt think the water smelled that bad, but the gondola drivers arent very personable.

as for today, i was in rome all day long. they were having some sort of strike (what else is new in italy, a strike every day).. i guess the italian army was protesting the war in iraq, but the army guys were hot in their little blue uniforms.

italian drivers are crazy in rome! everyone practicially drives a motorbike and the entire city smells like exhaust, i seriously thought i was going to get carbon monoxide poisoning walking down the street. the street signs mean nothing, there are no lines dividing lanes and pedestrians bewary!! i must have walked a zillion miles today cause of this damn strike. i took a colosseum tour, walked to the vatican, saw the sisteen chapel, went to st. peters basilla, prayed, bought a cross, picked up some blessed holy water and actually ran into eddie and nathaniel again. after that i took the metro, accidently got on the express, went a few extra stops and had to get back on and go the other direction... (this is reminding me too much of germany).. oh and i also went to the trevi fountain and since my camera battery was dead i had this vendor take my photo and it actually turned out really great.... i will have scan it into a computer to share it.

tomorrow its off to florence... i mailed postcards to a few people on th 4th, apparently it takes a few weeks, so you all know who you are, youll probably get it when im already back. i hope i dont get the bubonic plague that everyone on the bus has, i feel it coming on, but ive been taking my vitamins and tryng to stay away from all forms of smoke even though everyone smokes in italy. ok, time to strip my bed sheets, were having a toga party tonight.

ciao ragazzi!

Off to Italia! Ciao!

Hey everyone, I was finally able to find some really crappy internet cafe in Vienna to upload some photos -> Flickr Photos I hope you enjoy them. Yes, I sampled the menu in Amsterdam, whats that famous saying, "When in Rome do as the Roman's do?", well the same applied to Amsterdam.

Anyhow, my last day in Vienna was OK. I did a ton of sight seeing. First I went to the Picasso museum and stood 3 inches from priceless works of art. Then I went to the Lapizzaner (spelling?) horse museum where they have the infamous Spanish Riding School. The horses are actually born black until about age 4 when they turn BRIGHT white. They are very beautiful. They have a signature move they use to use in I believe the spanish war called the Capriole where the horse can jump directly vertical about 5 feet, kick out its back legs and behead its opponent. I sort of had an anxiety attack at the museum sitting in a dark basement watching a movie and thinking about my lonely reality when I get back to the states. All was well after about 20 minutes. Then I went to the Natural History Museum and saw some more cool stuff. I had some Viennese coffee and a famous torte (in a picture on flickr). After that we took the U-Bahn and white kuckled it (the metro was so full we had to stand and hang on to these loops that were too hight above our heads so we nearly lost all the blood in our arms!) to Shonbrunn Palace and took a tour of the gardens. It was so amazing.

Last night we went into the Vienna forest and had dinner at some cabin. Everyone got piss drunk except me, my roommate Anna and my other roomate Thenushka. We seem to be the only non-drinkers on this tour. It was fun to watch everyone else get shitfaced though and get crazy. Some crazy Aussie ate his own vomit and drank a cup of his own urine. This was the same guy who was riding the laundry cart naked! "I don't own this laundry cart but I WILL own you!" as he tried barging into my room.... yeah.. Aussies.

Ok, off to Italia today. Maybe now I'll be able to eat. I haven't really been eating anything. You have no idea how hard it is to go to a restaurant and see a menu in German and have no idea what it says. I've just been sticking with bread and water...

Really excited to go to Italy and enjoy the real food. Keep the text messages coming

Greetings from Vienna!

So yesterday after leaving Germany we left for Vienna. We made a few stops along the way. The first stop was at Mondsee where the Sound of Music was filmed. The entire way there we were forced to listen to the soundtrack... After we left there we stopped at a former WWII concentration camp called Mauthausen. I took a lot of pictures there. Including where they slept, the gas chamber, the crematory and more. It was very sad to see how they treated these people. They would make people climb up these really steep stairs (seemed like 90 degrees) with heavy stones on their backs. If one person would fall backwards it would have some kind of domino effect and hundreds would be killed. They were also only allowed 5 bites of food every 3 days and if they ate more than that they would be killed.

Now on to happier things. Last night we went to a concert at the same concert hall Motzart use to play. It was really nice. They had some opera and dancing aswell. My roommates and I had dinner outside on the streets of Vienna. It was so beautiful. There was actually some clown (like a real clown) panhandling for money playing a song from the sound of music. After that we came back to our hostel Wombats and just hung out in our room for a while. Last night there was 4 of us to a room, but not so bad. We were told we should use the hostel linens instead of our sleeping bags because the bugs like to travel. This place is pretty clean and I haven't seen any bugs so far so hopefully one doesn't hitch a ride in my suitcase.

Tomorrow we're headed for Venice. I'm so excited for my gondola ride and to spend 5 days in Italy. This will probably be the highlight of my trip!

Anyhow, I'm still working on figuring out how to upload my photos. I hear here in Vienna that it's cheap to get them burned to CD so I may just upload them to Flickr and then you can view them from there.

OH! Also, if anyone is free on October 12 I'm still lacking a ride home from the airport... So if anyone is available send me a text message. Even if you're not available send me a text message. It get's kinda lonely even when you're around so many people, it would be good to hear from you guys back home!

Talk to you soon!

Guten Tag from Germany!!

There is so much to fill you in on! On Friday in Amsterdam we went to the Anne Frank House and visited the Van Gough Museum. We ended up walking around Amsterdam and seeing the buildings and taking an extermely over crowded tram back to central station. We had an intersting lunch and then jumped on the bus and headed for Germany. More on that later...

Oktoberfest...Highly over rated. My roommate and I actually took a rickshaw to the festival, it was really great because we were able to see some of the sights of Germany. Once at the festival, it was really depressing because everyone was so wasted! People were passed out on the floor, paramedics were trying to revive people and some crazy guy came up to me, put his finger on my chest and said "Did you say something?" and when I looked down at his finger he ran his finger up my nose like someone would do in middle school, Who does that?? Most of the people looked like drunk zombies, some guy came up to my roommate and grabbed her, in turn she threw our directions to get home on the Ubahn Metro and ran which leads me to our next adventure.... LOST in munchen!!

We got directions back to our hotel from a bunch of people who don't speak english and most of them were wrong.. We took the metro one extra stop and then asked some bus driver, he in turn told us to get on his bus which took us more out of the way. Finally we hailed a cab and said forgetttaa 'bout it because we were so tired of walking around aimlessly.

Yesterday we went to St. Goar and visited a stein shop, very cool!! St. Goar has the most beautiful countryside I've ever seen. The stein shop was really cool and had a ton of different steins. Some even had a piece of the Berlin wall on it, those were a bit more pricey. They even had World Cup steins still left which will one day be collectors items.

It's about 522 am in Munich and weve been kept up all night by the Aussies! Ive found that Australians are the rudest, drunkest, most inconsiderate, non-mannered, born in a barn people Ive ever met. This morning I was woken many times, at one point there was a drunk, Aussie surfing a laundry cart naked.... Once again, who does that??? They dont sleep!!

Were off to Austria today, where we'll have 2 nights and then off to Italia! I heard the internet cafe's are better in Austria including places to upload photos! Talk to you all soon!

Bikes, Cars and Trams!

There is a reason that they say watch out for "bikes, cars and trams" in that order. The cyclists are crazy here! They will ride at you at mach speed, ring a little bell and if you don't jump out of the way like someone lit a fire under your butt, you might just become road pizza! Amsterdam style.

Tonight my roommate Ana and I decided to skip the drunken canal tour and sex show and tour the Red Light District on our own. We actually covered a lot of ground. It's just as you'd expect, half naked women in the windows with illuminated red lights pawing at you to get you to come in and shell out a few Euro. We actually went into what they call a "coffee shop" but they serve a whole lot more than coffee. They pulled out a marijuana menu and you just order like it's a pizza. We got to talk to a few locals and get some good tips on where to exchange currency since it seems like you get ripped off everywhere you go. Actually, last night at the Royal National I got into a heated argument with the currency exchange guy. He told me all the rates were the same at all Travellex which is NOT true. He ripped me off by $48 bucks and I went down there and let him have it Italian style. Needless to say it got me nowhere, but he was pretty furious when some other people came up to the window and asked to exchange currency and I said, "Don't exchange with this guy, he's a crook!"...lol... yeah.. I'm making friends all over.

Last night there was also some mix up about my sleeping bag. According to when I booked my trip I was to be given a brand new, take home sleeping bag for when we stop at cabins, but somehow Contiki forgot that voucher and it was such a hassel. I basically had to call America because apparently Contiki America is different than Contiki UK.... whatever.. It seems the left hand doesnt know what the right hand is doing, but it was sorted out finally.

Tomorrow I'm going with Ana again around Amsterdam before we leave for Rhine Valley, Germany. I will write more soon. Miss you all!

Amsterdam Here I come!

So we just arrived in Amsterdam and had a interesting dinner. We had some kind of fried chicken that was pretty... uh, interesting. One of the Aussies told me "Don't eat anything crumbed unless you've crumbed it yourself!". It was a really long drive... It actually took us most of the day to get here. We took a ferry across the English Channel which took about an hour and a half. Then we got back on your bus, drove through france and even saw a little of Belgium. We did stop in Belgium where I was almost killed in a McDonalds drive through, aka "McDrive". I couldn't understand the language and thought I was just walking up a ramp to go into the restaurant, turns out I was walking up the drive thru ramp the wrong way and almost got run over by some formula one race car driver. I soon discovered I was "GOING THE WRONG WAY" but "how does he know where we're going?"

Tonight we're going to be taking a tour of the Red Light District, and tomorrow the Van Gough museam, Anne Frank house and a few other things. I passed on the live sex show tonight... yeah, don't ask.

Last night I got possibly the worst night sleep of my life. Around 2 am I guess someone pulled the fire alarm at the Royal National and I heard some girl screaming something about "evacuate, this is London, it could be a terrorist attack!" Seriously, the sounds these sirens made it sounded like a terrorist attack. It sounded like the sirens were ringing throughout the whole city of London. Talk about a rude awkakening. I was so freaked out!! Everyone rushed down into the court yard half asleep and freaked out. The only thing I could thing of is "grab your passport and your money!". I called Nicole and my sister asking them to check the news... Turns out it was just some drunk pub-crawler making trouble pulling fire alarms.

Ok, off to the red light district. I will post photos soon now that my hotel in Amseterdam has free internet! Ciao!

I'm in London!!

So, I have TONS of photos to share, but I have nowhere to upload them yet. I had a really great flight and I was sandwhiched in between two old guys. One was on his way back to Scotland and the other was on this way to Austria. We took some really funny photos on the plane, but like I said I'll have to share later. They served something that was supposed to be meatloaf and mashed taters but it was more like a lump of mystery meat. The chocolate cake was super good... For breakfast we had heart attack on a crossaint and fruit... I ate the fruit.

So I got to London and waited in the immigration line from hell. It was probably about an hour or more long and I got in trouble for taking a picture of the mass quantities of people and was told to delete it (but of course I didn't). I took the Picadilly line towards Cockfosters and got off at Russell Square, carried my 2 tons of luggage to my hotel, checked it with the front desk and set out for a day of sight seeing.

I met up with these 3 Aussie boys and we bought this ticket which allows you to ride the busses all around town and see all the sights (I have a ton of pictures of that too). LOOK KIDS BIG BEN!! I practically ran through London today. We even took a waterloo ride and saw all the bridges...etc. I just got back, met my roommate who was sleeping, took a shower and came down to blog.

Surprisingly enough I'm not totally jet lagged and I barely slept a wink on the plane. Tonight we have some meeting before we set out for Amsterdam tomorrow. I've had a bunch of people tell me they like my accent... uh, I'm not the one with the accent!!

FYI, the bus drivers are crazy and the pedestrians and cyclists have a death wish. I've never seen such crazy driving in my life. The roads are so narrow and the streets have zig-zag lines which I have no clue what they mean. Another odd thing I saw was a ton of joggers, I mean, like, more joggers than I've seen in my life in one day. Ok, I'm rambling, I must be starving....

Ok... I will write more when I get a chance. Miss you all!!

XOXO

I was so exicited last night I couldn't sleep!

Here is small proof of that. Here is my version of the Irish Jigg. This is what I do when I get nervous/excited. I eventually fell asleep but woke up really early and here I am, stressing rushing 5 minutes later. Ok too much to do, too little time. See you all in London!!

Twas the night before Europe and all through the house....

I'm running around like a chicken with my head cut off!! Actually, things seem pretty sane tonight. I have a list, and I'm trying to stick to the list. It's pretty hard with all these baggage and weight restrictions. Last night I went to church and rekindled a friendship with an old friend from high school. He came to my pseudo "going away party" which consisted of cutlets (my favorite) and an ice cream cake...lol. (Hope you enjoy the leftovers Frankie). I got this really awesome BRAND NEW digital camera from my sister (thanks Vicky!!) and my best good friend Nicole made me a worry stone/good luck charm to hold on the plane.

Frankie wrote me the sweetest letter (I know I wasn't supposed to open it until I got on the plane BUT I can't do surprises sorry!) The letter was the sweetest thing I ever read with the best words of wisdom and I will definitely get a biscotti and cappucino with your gift. We then had an awesome prayer and he went on his way....

Mean while back at the ranch..... we decided to take some photos and test out the new camera! Thank you Frankie for being a great photographer and showing us some great angles to make us look thinner.

In case you didn't notice...I went for my last tan today and I must say I'm looking mighty oompa-loompa, but hopefully I will have a more golden glow in the next couple days.

Tomorrow, Tomorrow, I'll be gone tomorrow, it's only a day away.....

A hot new hairdo and 5 days to go...

So, I went to the city this morning and got my hair cut. I'm very impressed with the job she did. She even flat ironed my hair so it looks totally awesome! One more purchase before I leave.... A flat iron for my hair! Tonight, I'm just gonna chillax and try to get a good night sleep since I haven't really slept well in about 3 weeks... Getting my haircut is just one more thing I get to cross off my list... Thank god, that list keep growing and growing!

So much to do, so little time.....

My trip is officially 6 days away! I'm so excited. I went to Target today and bought a ton of travel crap! They even had laundry detergent in a travel sized bottle which is so awesome! I was told to bring a roll of my own toilet paper cause I guess in other countries maybe they don't use toilet paper?! I don't know, BUT Target also has this little tiny purse sized roll of TP in a dispenser with 55 sheets! How cool is that?!

I went for my 2nd fake and bake today (a.k.a. High pressure tanning) and I notice that I'm already getting tan! I have 2 more sessions to go to get the full-on Euro-tan I'm looking for.

Tomorrow is a haircut in the Castro! I'm going to Notorious for Hair at 561 Castro Street in SF. Really excited about giving my hair some shape and style!

I'm slowly adding to my Euro-wardrobe, I bought a couple pairs of shoes the other day and some clothes, maybe I'll venture out into SF tomorrow to see if I can get some more stuff.

Monday I'm REALLY excited for cause I'm getting acrylic nails for the first time in probably 5 or 6 years! I'm also treating myself to a spa pedicure at Natalie's Salon in Menlo Park! YAY!!

Tonight I'm gonna pack up all my bath stuff and transfer shampoo's and conditioner's in their respective bottles, watch Deal or No Deal and take a hot bath....

To be continued...