Lisbon

Hey, we made it to Portugal. The weather here is awesome! It's 80 degrees and sunny all week. We'll be sure to take advantage. There looks like there's some fun stuff to do. The only issue at this point... our Portuguese knowledge is at 0%. We know 0 words, 0 foods, 0 nothing. Wish us luck!

Spain

We have spent a couple days in Barcelona with Lois and that was good fun. We saw a lot of work by the artist Gaudi, and that was some really unique and interesting stuff. We ate a lot of paella (sort of like Spanish jambalaya) and drank some Sangria (cold wine mixed with fruit) which was nice.

We have had a lot of trouble getting food for the most part. Either we have fallen into tourist traps ($17 for two Cokes) or just haven't a clue what to eat. Our Spanish isn't too good, and neither is our Catalan (a Spanish derivative spoken in most of Barcelona).

We have flown to Madrid and are struggling a bit to get motivated. I have come down with a crummy cold and Jen might be heading there. We have two days here and we're going to try to catch a bull fight.

On Monday we head to Lisbon and spend our last two full days abroad there.

I have decided to work on all my pictures when I get back. I want to learn with my new photos how to do a nice professional work-flow and work with these photos in Adobe Lightroom. So look for a mega-picture post around mid October.

More Europe!

Oiy! So little time.

We've been pretty busy bouncing about. We enjoyed Venice thoroughly and visited my friend Jen/Brian in Venezia as well as my old Italian teacher Mara (ciao!) in Padova. Good stuff.

We checked out Milan and saw giant churches and more.

Now we are in Barcelona. We found out Barcelona's largest festival is this week so there is TONS of stuff going on. Plus, Lois is here! Fun! Fun!

More updates later. Maybe some pictures. School is ending in a few days so time is short as I have lots of grading to do.

Buon Giorno!

We arrive near Venice and are at a lovely bed and breakfast outside of town near the airport. The room here is huge and there is Internet in the room. We're going to head into town today and begin the eating! My commitment this week is to eat as much as possible and have ice cream (gelato) every night. Magnifico!

Stuttgart

Hanging out in Stuttgart with Brian and Anna. Being lazy for the most part. Eating. Mostly eating.

Heading to Venice tonight. Bellissimo!

Ich bin ein Berliner!

Ok, I'm not a Jelly Donut, but I digress.

We spent the last few days in Berlin, Germany (not Ohio). It is a very nice city! We walked all over town and saw lots of things. Some highlights:

-Brandenburg Gate
-Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe
-Seeing the big TV tower
-Parliament Building
-HUGE dome church
-Learning TONS of history at the German history museum.
-Celebrating our 2nd wedding anniversary!! Yeah!!
-German pretzels for breakfast, Turkish soup for lunch, breaded pork for dinner

Already it's apparent this place is WAAAY easier than SE Asia. We can eat fruits and veggies right off the street, we can communicate fairly well, and the hotels aren't nearly as scary. Although we are paying for the luxury as 1 Euro costs us about $1.40 USD.

We arrived in Stuttgart today to visit Brian Fuller and Anna. We'll be here for the weekend, then off to Venice.

No pictures for now. But maybe I'll get some up at some point.