Fjord photos...

So, as I am sure most of you know, it has been very wet and rainy here in Norway. In fact, it has rained almost daily here. Amost. Yesterday we had a beautiful, cloud-free blue sky day. It happened to be the only day we could hike to the top of the Lysefjord, so we were going to go regardless of the weather. As you can see from the photos though, we had beautiful weather. All of the days of rain were worth it for a day like yesterday!

Photos...

So, we have tried to post photos, but have not met with much success. We are going to try a new method the next chance we get. Sorry for the delay!

Getting cold, wet, moldy

What rhymes with "hold" and starts with "m"? Mold!!! This sporific substance comes to a tent near you with relentless rain, cold, and drizzle. Not since Bellingham have I experience conditions quite like this! We are having a great time, even though the weather is less than ideal. After leaving Belgium, we headed through the Netherlands, into Sweden, and on to Norway. We spent a terrific several days with friends Finn and Barbro in Sweden (where it did NOT rain!!!). We even went out on Finn's boat and saw a great sunset. Here are some photos.

Photos coming soon...

Hello all!

We have been busy since the last post! After checking out some pretty amazing waterfalls in Switzerland, we headed northeast into Austria and Poland. It was pretty interesting traveling through Poland, where we didn't know any of the language or even recognize any words! We had fun navigating the train system and truly enjoyed beautiful Krakow and Zacopane.

From Poland, we headed into Germany and spent some time in Bavaria! And yes, it looks just like home. The smells are even the same (brotwurst and kraut). We enjoyed a daytrip to Rothenburg, a town on the Romantic Road, before heading north to Frankfurt and into Belgium.

In Belgium we met with our friends Bryn and Jindra and had an absolutely fabulous time! We saw the little statue of the peeing boy (very famous for some reason), had waffles, and spent several evenings talking and laughing. It was a great time. Thanks again to Bryn and Jindra!

Now, we are in Copenhagen and ready to head into Sweden and Norway. I have been studying my Norwegian on all of the trains. I can't wait to taste the lefse and see if it is like what we make at home. I don't know what I will do if I don't like real Norwegian lefse... that would be quite a shift in perspective!

Hiking the Eigertrail

We left Zermatt and headed to Grindlewald, another hiking mecca. It was no great surprise to us that it was raining upon arrival. We heard, once again, that the weather would improve in a few days. Thus far, these predictions had not been accurate! However, we have great rain gear and a new waterproof bag for the camera, so it doesn´t really bother us much any more. We took a rainy hike up to the high pasture land our first day. The weather cleared just enough to keep us below the clouds most of the day. The next day, we took a spetacular hike to the glacier visible from town. It was our first hike without rain!!! As you can see from the photos, it was a beautiful day.

Following that, we hiked from the camp along the Eigertrail (at the foot of the Eiger) toward Gimmelwald. It was a long uphill climb, but we were rewarded with the best campsite ever. On one side was the north wall of the Eiger and on the other side, we could just see the Monch and Jungfrau mountains. Pretty spectacular.

Matterhorn matters

We arrived in Zermatt, Switzerland on a rare sunny day. We had our new camera in our pocket and were ready to see the Matterhorn. It was a good thing that it was sunny when we arrived, as we were not to see the Matterhorn again during our rainy visit.

The best part about Zermatt, other than the amazing view, was meeting new friends. Christian, Hans, and James were fellow campers and hikers who were also trying to get in some hiking in the wet weather.

Christian took us on a great hike up to the base of the Matterhorn... the hut where climbers depart for the summit. It is really cool to hike in the rain and have a hot meal in a hut way up in the mountains. Later on, we all went out for a Swiss fondue dinner.

Sorry the first photo is sideways, I haven´t learned how to rotate them on the blog yet!

Over the mountains...

One of the most amazing days of the trip so far was the day we took the cable car over the Alps from Italy (Courmayer) to France (Chamonix). We haven't had the best weather, but fortunately, the clouds cleared just enough for us to see some amazing things. The pictures pretty much speak for themselves.

In Chamonix, we took a great hike into the mountains. At least, it was great until our beloved Casio camera got wet. We tried hairdryers, campstoves, and good old-fashioned wishful thinking, but nothing worked. Fortunately, the pictures were on an SD card that weathered the storm okay. We are the pround new owners of a Fuji camera purchased in France. It is great, even if the instruction manual is only in French!

Coming soon... news of Zermatt and Switzerland....

Somewhere in Italy...

The real date of this post should be around the end of June... sory for the long delay! We visited the ruins at Pompei before heading to the heal of Italy's boot. We even managed to make it to our firend Giacomo's house on a train strike day. Train strikes are interesting experiences here, as you never know whether the train will show up or not. We ended up on a bus (without a ticket incidentally) travelling in the general direction we wanted to go, without knowing exactly where we were. It was pretty funny.

At Giacomo's house, we had a great time. We went to the beach, tried to stay cool (it was 43 degrees C), and made pasta. From there, it was on to Bologna. We stayed with Giacomo's parents and took day trips to Venice and Ravenna. Ravenna was particularly important to me, as that is where Dante is buried and it was quite interesting to see his tomb.

After Venice, we moved on to the Aosta Valley and prepared for passage back into France.

Photos from all over...

Sorry for the long delay between posts. We are now in Italy and enjoying the summer heat. Above you will find a few photos of the Cinque Terre, the leaning tower, and beautiful Florence. We loved our hike between the towns of the Cinque Terre. Each of the five towns had its own personality and it was great fun to visit each of them. I even managed to score a local recipe for lemon liquer from our landlady.

We miss French bread but are enjoying Italian cheese. Aaron still has a bottle of wine in his pack, though the nation of origin is continually changing.

We have also updated a few of the previous posts with photos...

Spain and Andorra

Our first stop in Spain was San Sebastin where the food was incredible. We are going to start up our own Tapas culture in Leavenworth when we get back!! From there we went south to Sevilla and Granada before heading up the eastern coast. Much of Spain seemed a bit dry for our tastes so we kept moving but in the northeast corner we came upon some mountains -- Andorra is its own country on the Pyrenne crest about the size of your average county and has incredible mountains and skiing. We couldn´t resist the mountains at our first stop and headed up. They have well-marked trails all over but most of the trip was above tree line anyways. We started in Pas de la Casa (on the French boarder) and managed to come down and down and down to another town (capital -- Andorra de la Vella) and will be moving back on the trains again tomorrow!! What a trip -- even had a good freeze overnight.

Photos from Normandy and Paris!

We arrived in Paris several days ago and stayed with the wonderful family we met in Lion sur Mer. They have shown us Paris and Versailles with much love and kindness. We took a small rowboat in the Grand Canal of Versailles. Aaron did most of the rowing. There has been lots of good cooking, food, and fun, but we are ready to move on again. Paris is a beautiful place, and we loved discovering the treasures in the Louvre. Aaron's favorite was the Code of Hammurabi, while I loved Michelangelo's slaves. The Mona Lisa was smaller than we expected, and the crowds were larger!

Stories from Normandy

Several days ago, we decided to see Pointe du Hoc, the location where the Rangers scaled a 100-foot cliff against all odds. Pointe du Hoc was 12 km from where we were staying. Unfortunately, it was Sunday, and the buses in the area did not run on Sunday. Aaron tried to convince me that hitchhiking was easy, safe, and fun. I remained skeptical. So, the compromise was that we would walk until I became comfortable with the idea. So we started walking... and walking... and walking. About half-way we started trying to catch a ride. Lots of cars went by. And then more cars went by. Pretty soon, we were almost there!!! About 1 km from the Pointe, a Canadian couple on vacation stopped to pick us up and deposited us at the Pointe. After checking out the sights we began our long walk back. Not far into it, a 80-year old woman stopped us to ask if we liked her roses. She only spoke French, so our understanding of the conversation is a little sketchy. But we told her that her roses were marvelous and they were. She proceeded to make many hand gestures, and then she cut roses and handed them to me to take on our walk. When we explained where we had started from, and where we were going, she motioned us inside her beautiful home and gave us each a cookie for the road. Pretty wonderful. We then walked almost all the way back, with no hitchhiking success. Again, about 1 km from the end, we were picked up by a French couple on vaction. We had seen them before while having lunch earlier that day. We thanked them for the ride and went on our way.
Fast forward three days and several hundred km. We ran into the same French couple on a sidewalk at Mont San Michel, one of the most touristed places in France. What a small world. We had lunch and shared as many stories as the language barrier would allow.

The Normandy Coastline

First of all, forgive the many typing errors that will surely be here:. The keyboard is French-style and is a little different. We hqve spent the last few days camping in Normandy. It is wonderful here. Aaron eats from the bakeries everyday. Sometimes three times a day! We tried to send photos but had trouble with the connection. We are having a good time and will write again from Paris.

Snapshots of London

We climbed the 311 steps to the top of the Monument (tallest free-standing column in the world, designed by Wren).

Here we are in front of Buckingham Palace. We missed the changing of the guards, but hope to see it on our return trip!

Above, we are in front of the Tower Bridge. It has been a rainy few days here, but we are enjoying it anyway!


We still have much to see in London, but we thought we would save some of the sights for our return trip through in October. Above is a photo of me with our friend Jonny, who graciously allowed us to crash at his flat during our London stay. We even experienced kiwi flat-warming. What a party!

London!

We are coming to you from the beautiful United Kingdom. It is beautiful here, though it has rained for the last several days. We have seen a bunch of wonderful sights... including the Tower Bridge, the National Gallery, the British Museum, and more. Tomorrow, we are off to France via ferry. We hope to spend time along the coast there before moving inland.

Our biggest hitch thus far has been our calling cards - we haven't been able to get them to work at all!

We will update the blog with pictures in a day or so...

Here We Go!!!

We are off tomorrow! We can't wait to get started. The first few stops for us will be London, the coast of Normandy, and several of the D-Day beaches. We plan to take a ferry across the channel. After that, we plan to head south. Our hope is to beat the heat by seeing the southern countries first, before heading into the mountains for July and August.

We have not weighed our packs yet... but we did take them on a short walk yesterday to see how it felt. Not bad. I am guessing that after traveling for a few days with our packs, we may re-evaluate the contents. :)

The next post will be from London!

Prelude to a trip...

We have finally finished with work. Not too much longer before "The Trip" begins. Five months is a long time to be gone. I try not to worry about too much, but that is a little difficult. I tend to worry.

Our shopping list is getting shorter. I still need one pair of good hiking pants. As if finding a pair of pants isn't hard enough to begin with... finding a pair of hiking pants takes the struggle to a whole new level. Now, not only does this mythical pair of pants need to fit, but they need to be packable, lightweight, durable, and darkly colored. Oh, and cheap. Yeah, right. The search continues.

We have plans to stay with an old friend of Aaron's in London. It will be nice to have a place to go right away. I can only imagine that we will be a bit tired after such a long plane trip. Staying with Johnny will be both fun and relaxing. Where we go from London has yet to be determined. The general plan is to head south after that and try to beat the heat.

As overwhelming as all of the little details are, I am starting to look forward to "The Trip" a bit more. Aaron can't wait to get going. I imagine that leaving a stable environment is going to be more challenging for me. But, once we hit the road, it should be a real adventure. We are starting to get travel recommendations from friends... so if anyone has a suggestion...