Fiona and Claire's Travel Blog

In advance, we are sorry (but not really that sorry) that we are running a bit behind on updating our posts!! We have been exploring and enjoying ourselves away from the Internet and haven't really had much time to keep on top of this. Also when we do have time we are dog tired and would rather nap ;) and rightly so, no apologies there. Anyway (mostly to all parents) we are still doing ok and are now in Switzerland and finally back-blogging for the last few days.  We have treated our stay in Nice as a relaxing time to catch our breaths a little. We've been pretty non stop with only two or three days (maximum) in each city. Lausanne in Switzerland marks our 13th city that we've visited and explored. As nice as it has been to dive in and explore these cities , walking tours, museums, art galleries, studying maps, catching metros and busses and trams, Nice has been a by nice city to just switch off in. Our hostel was quite central within walking distance between the train stat...

We had another slow day here in Nice. Starting the day with a breakfast on the hostel terrace where we were joined by Denise, the resident turtle that likes to snap at poor unsuspecting feet. We then headed into to town with one of the girls that we'd been talking to last night; Jess from Queenstown, New Zealand. We had all decided they we'd go on the walking tour of Nice this morning and the three of us got some water and headed to the meeting point.  This walking tour was significantly better than the tour we had done in Florence. This young local man as informative, quick to get to the point, and also covered some informative info about modern day Nice as well as the history of this city. For example, the pink house on the hill that we were about to go to thinking that it must have been the Matisee museum, that was also a big pink building on a hill, was in fact the mansion of the first Mr Bond himself, Sean Connery! We had a laugh about this thinking about how funny it wou...

After packing our bags in the morning we walked to a local coffee bar/bakery guided by David and upon Heather's request for the "delicious jam filled brioche" they really were delicious! We savoured this last tast of Italian coffee as last night we decided to head to the French Riviera to Nice!  We threw together a wee packed lunch from the left ova of last nights salad and headed off for example train to Milan where we'd get our connection to Nice. From the we settled in for our 6 hour train journey.  there was a very posh designer lady sitting opposite us for the majority of the way, until Monaco Montr Carlo, and although she was very distant for the Friday hour or so she quickly loosened up after I offered enr a chocolate treat and subtly complimented her in small talk. we found out that she was originally Estonian but had lived in Londona and Nice and a for other places but was now base in Monte Carlo. Claire and I wer speculating after she got off that we though ...

We slept late, had a slow breakfast and then meandered out way to the beach. We sat there for most of the day, claire swam, I sunned myself had a we nap, took some photos....then we wondered up and found somewhere to have lunch and had a delicious seafood salad each. WE MISS ITALIAN COFFEE! They still have lovely pastries here but their coffee is sharp and a bit bitter comparison to the delightful coffee we've been indulging in for the past week of our travels.      We went back to the beach for a wee while in the afternoon and just enjoyed the salty sea breeze in the still quite warm 4pm sun.   We adventured out does the to a local chain restaurant called Hippopotamus for dinner, and just to spite the rude and ignorant American voile beside us we iced to speak as much French as we could muster to the poor waitress. Dinner was ok but reasonably priced so we didn't mind.  After a couple of weeks with very little social contact (and by this I mean going out or dr...

We woke up to a wonderful view outside our room window, we could see Tuscan hills, the church next door and the courtyard below us.    The sun was shining so we were excited to go out and explore. The lady at the reception desk recommend a great place to have a typical Italian breakfast which had the best coffee I have ever  tasted. Such fast service too! We took a bus to the centre of town and found the most helpful tourist information lady. She highlighted all the sights on our maps along with all the best places to eat (very important). So we made our way to an attraction just around the corner. We noticed a huge crowd of people straight away, and had a moment of 'what are they all looking at?' And as we walked a few more steps we saw exactly why. In front of us was the most huge elaborately designed cathedral we had ever seen, we couldn't even fit the whole thing into a picture! (so far this city was off to a good start and it wasn't even 12 yet). The famous dome ha...

The rain is here to stay, making today another good day to visit a gallery. We left our big heavy bags at the hostel after checking out and made our way to the Belvedere gallery which is one of Vienna's many great places to absorb some culture. We bought tickets to see the Gustav Klimt exhibition which was just amazing. The paintings are huge in real life. 'The kiss' was the centre piece, taking up an entire wall top to bottom. A lot of the works on display were unfinished as he died before he could complete them, but there was something nice about seeing his work from a more deconstructed perspective.    Along with that we got to see some of Egon Sheile's stuff too, which is an artist our life drawing teacher always used to rave about. He's a big deal when it comes to drawing naked bodies and even some not so naked bodies. A lot of the work we saw was (relatively clothed) family portraits and embracing couples which were similar in subject matter yet very different...

Well. Had a VERY relaxed and amazing sleep in David's gorgeous colourful apartment last night! We didn't even set an alarm today we simply woke up when we were ready. Unfortunately the SEVRAL churches in Davies neighbourhood had other ideas. I was woken at 6 first then again at 8 so I just got up. It was a lovely view from the front balcony and you and from the back veranda you could see the hills of Switzerland.         Once everyone else had risen we had a coffee on the balcony and headed off in David's convertible car towards two lakes in the area,  Lake Lago d'orta and Lake Maggiore. We first hea ded to  Lago d'orta, perched at the bottom of a deep valley we waked down a very steep hill from the car park th the village and the lake. The village was quite typical of a lake village in Italy; steep pebbled streets, colourful houses that are slightly falling apart, altogether a very beautiful and idyllic setting to have lunch.  (Photos to follow) ...

WE'VE REACHED ITALY!!! Yippeeeeee!! I think Claire and I have been looking forward to this leg of the journey since we started off!! Th e land of pizza and pasta and cannoli and biscotti and COFFEE!! We have checked off at least three of that in our first day here as we've been exploring the beautiful Venezia!  We were originally hoping to have a few days here in Venice, or at least two, but unfortunately our wee pockets couldn't fulfil that...we arrived to the tail end of the Venetian Film Festival and so the price of accommodation, which is usually in the top end of our budget, was skyrocketed! Therefore with the the flexibility that the interail pass gives you, a wee change of plan, we spent the day in Venice and in the evening we headed to Florence for a couple of nights.  But first I'll tell you about Venice.  Arriving early off the overnight train (which claire may have mentioned was a LOT more comfortable that the first one we did) we got started in Venice shortl...

We were a little sad to check out of our nice accomodation in Florence today, however we were quite excited to leave the masses of crowds of tourists behind and head to Varese in the evening to see my friend David. However we had a whole day left of exploring the compact city of Florence before we got to escape to a much smaller town in the Italian countryside. After leaving out heavy backpacks at the left luggage again, we headed in search of a coffee and a brioche, and then headed off to find the meeting point for our free walking tour of Florence. Although we had been wandering around the tightly compact city yesterday we felt we needed some more backside info on a lot of what we'd seen. It has also been a wee while since we've followed a guide ant not just done our own thing, so the prospect of following and listening without much thinking or struggling with maps was quite welcoming.    This tour however, despite being the only free walking tour in the city was by far the ...

Not going to lie, this was not the most productive day we've had so far. We had the majority of the day to spend in Zagreb before we needed to board our first night train of the trip. However, we couldn't do anything with our big heavy rucksacks so we had to lug them about wherever we went. To be fair we did do a lot of walking the previous day, so we felt quite content with exploring the areas closer to the train station.  So, first of all we walked up to the grand hotel that used to serve as a rest stop for travellers of the great Orient Express. We considered having a wee coffee just to experience a small slice of what it might have been like to live such an affluent life (the hotel has been visited by the likes of Queen Elizabeth...). I would love to say that we did... But we gazed at the fancy waiters in their fancy suits and then took a look at ourselves and settled upon having our pack lunch in the gardens with a view of the hotel instead. We we haven't had a great e...

After arriving off the overnight train (...a very much not so comfortable over night train) we decide to go straight to the hostel, and see if we could leave our bags there until we could check in later in the day. That's exactly what we did and with a weight lifted (literally) off our shoulders we headed into downtown Vienna to explore, and to locate a much needed Viennese coffee and Strudel! ( thank you Aida Cafe!) Rather than doing a walking tour in this city we tried something different. The map provided by the hostel we were staying at was actually FANTASTIC! The best free map we've found so far in our travels! Where in the previous cities Claire and I would be comparing and jumping between two or three maps - one with the city, one with the metro lines, one with recommended sights and food places - this one had it all! It also had suggested self guided walking routes, and a wee bit of history/description about some of the main sights areound town so this was a real treat!...

We had a really slow start today, well claire had a lie in, and I had a slow morning researching accomication and things to do in the next couple of weeks. Anyway once we cpruanlly got going we got the tram to opposite some of town (and as we were still not sure how th tram tickets worked, we managed to use e same ticket we bought last night since we hadn't validated it :/ oops)  We got the ram to Illica street and walked back towards the Illica square, whilst looking out for a pub/beer cellar that my dad had recommended! ...one hitch, he couldn't really remember the name or where exactly it as but he could walk me through how to find it. And so he did (by whatsapp and google street view of course!) haha the place was in Matica Hrvatskih Obrtnika and was originally part of the old technical college of the Zagreb University. Good beer and good food, and we tried a local delicacy prunes wrapped in bacon and cooked! Yummmm!!!        Then we shuffled to the gallery...

Where we stayed The Hostel Advantage on Sokolská street. A lovely little colourful hostel in the heart of Prague, a ten minute walk from the main train stations and a 20 min (if you have long legs like me) to the old town of Prague. The room was very comfortable and the staff was nice. Also, good reliable free wifi!!! :D not to be scoffed at, especially when you're only booking your accommodation a few days in advance!! We really enjoyed our two days here! (Past tense as this is a back blog...too many days hit us at once! 🙃) What we explored As this has become routine now, another city, another free walking tour! We LOVE these!  If I have tale wary explained this concept, these tour guides work on a tips only basis, they do this job because the this love their city and have a passion for sharing the stories of its present and history with visitors. It's not there to rip you off, only to inform and it's made so that everybody, regardless of their budget, can enjoy and learn...

Well today has been the earliest start since we left Scotland! I think it's safe to say that 4:30am isn't our most favourite time of day to rise and shine. Despite that we made it to our train no problem, as we waited on our platform we could see nobody else but fellow tired interrailers. Who else is crazy enough to get on a train at this time? We got on board and bagged a whole cabin to ourselves for the majority of the journey. The sun was just starting to rise as our train set off, making for some splendid views of the Hungarian countryside covered in morning mist. It was enough to make us think that the early start was worth it. We fought our eyelids for as long as we could trying not to miss any of it, but we soon gave in and dosed off for a fair bit of the 7 hour journey. Somewhere along the way we woke up shivering (not often we've been cold on this trip) turned out that the air con was just too  good. Extra layers ensued and a warm jacked that I was beginning to reg...

Seeing as we had two days in this amazing city we decided to strategically plan day two so that it was relaxed and full of interesting things. So we woke up slow and headed to the train station to try and reserve seats for our horribly early train tomorrow, turned out that was a waste of time but hey ho, boring stuff so I'll move on.  Turkish baths: We had heard from various people that we must try the baths in Budapest as it lies upon several natural hot springs. Our tour guide from yesterday recommended a couple of budget places we could go, so we ended up at this nice little Turkish style bath and it felt like we were the only tourists there. There was a labarynth of pools indoors and outside, each of varying temperatures. After wimping out at the freezing outdoor pool, we unknowingly went for the hottest indoor pool at 40 degrees. It was like stepping into a smelly hot bath. A nice smelly hot bath that tingled a little bit. There was definitely some funky science stuff going on...