Adventures

Vietnam - Hue to Hoi An/ Hoi An

2008-12-06T20:45:00.001-08:00

Vietnam - Hue

2008-12-04T20:44:00.000-08:00

Vietnam - Hanoi to Hue

2008-12-03T23:30:00.000-08:00

Vietnam - Sapa

2008-11-27T22:00:00.000-08:00

Sapa as described by Lonely Planet is "on top of Vietnam" . It is a small mountain town up north. I got to Sapa after 12 hrs train ride from Hanoi. I was travelling with Martin and Chris, we decided to buy "soft seats" rather than "soft sleepers" we paid 160.000 dong = cad$12.00 for a seat. As I get closer to the end of my trip I am getting also "cheaper" I am watching my money, one year is a long time to travel without an income. Vietnam is cheaper than Laos but still money are spend very fast:(

back to Sapa.....I liked Sapa, Except for the people that follow you around trying to sell you stuff. When I am saying follow, yes they do follow for a long time and keep talking and talking and talking until you have to almost shout a NO or give in and buy something.

I was in Sapa for 4 days. I stayed in Queen Hotel for 7 dollars. This is one of the best rooms I had so far, but it is very cold at night and in the morning. As soon as the sun is out, it is very nice and warm, as soon as the sun is down it gets really cold. I haven't felt cold for such a long time, it feels strange....I left my fleece in Nepal, I don't really have warm clothes and I don't want to buy anything as I will be heading down south and I want to keep my back pack a light a possible.

First day I took a day trekking tour to visit the nearby villages. Apparently there are 8 different tribal communities in this area, with their own tradition and way of living. I was with Martin and we met a very nice Danish couple, Bettina and Flemming. They are also travelling for a year.

Martin and Chris decide to leave the next day, it felt a bit uneasy to stay here by myself ( I was travelling with the group of people for a while and it is so comfortable!) but yet at the end I decided to stay for a few more days. I liked the place and it took a long time to get there.

Same evening Bettina and Flemming and I met Peter a dutch guy who is biking from Kuala Lumpur through Vietnam, China, Laos and Thailand. Hmmm I would have loved to be able to do this trip. Four of us went for more trekking around it is so much better to go on our own.

On Sunday we decided to visit the "famous Ba Ha" market.
Four of us got squished on the front seats -Felmming and Peter are very tall, it is hard for them to sit on this minibus. It took 3 hours to make it to Ba Ha which is only 110 km away. The ride is very scenic but the road is in a bad shape, we were sore by the time we arrive in Ba Ha.

Ba Ha Market is very disappointing. It is just a market, same as in Sapa, except that there are much more people. We are supposed to see many tribal communities, but there were only 2 visible ones. We were trying to figure out if there are more and we can't not identify them :)

Back to the minibus and back home, we had enough of the scenery, just wanted to get back. The only highlight of the ride back was to stop at the Vietnamese Chinese border separated only by the Red River. It was interesting to stand there on the Vietnamese side and watch people crossing the bridge back and forth. Also "life' on the other side.

I left Sapa on the night train back to Hanoi. I wasn't happy to take the train again,. but no choice......

Vietnam - Halong Bay

2008-11-26T15:30:00.000-08:00

Vietnam - Hanoi to Halong Bay

2008-11-25T23:00:00.000-08:00

Vietnam - Hanoi

2008-11-24T23:00:00.000-08:00

Laos - Vientiane to Hanoi

2008-11-23T23:00:00.000-08:00

Laos - Vientiane

2008-11-22T23:00:00.000-08:00

Laos - bus from Luang Prabang to Vientiane

2008-11-20T23:50:00.000-08:00

Laos - Luang Prabang

2008-11-19T22:48:00.000-08:00

Laos - slow boat from Xuay Kai to Luang Prabang

2008-11-17T23:16:00.000-08:00

I took the slow boat from Xuay Kai to Luang Prabang. I paid Cad$32 for the 2 days trip, quite expensive considering that nothing else is included, the boat is old and has wood benches. Despite bad stories from other travelers and warning from the Lonely Planet, I found the trip pleasant. The boat was comfortably full, most people on the boat were very nice, we had a good time talking and sharing travel stories. I was surprised again to find out how many people are actually travel for a year. The scenery was on Mekong river was beautiful.

The boat stopped in Pak Benk for the night. For that night Katrina and I shared a room in the worst guesthouse so far on this trip, we had a hard time falling asleep but we survived the night.

I made it to Luang Prabang around 6 pm on the second day. It took us a while to find a reasonable priced gastehouse, everything seemed expensive. We were used to Thailand prices and find Laos on a "pricey" side. Saying that we were laughing because we end up by paying US$12 dollars for a room which is still very cheap. As we walked into the city we were shocked in a good way. This city is really nice, lots of lights, nice looking restaurants and hotels....no wonder is expensive. Looking forward to explore our first city in Laos.

Laos

2008-11-15T02:09:00.000-08:00

It has been a long day. I spend the night in Chiang Seam 9 km from Sok Raup (the official Golden Triangle town). I got up in the morning to catch the bus to Chiang Kwong, the border town from Thailand to Laos. The cites are only 50 km apart, between the 2 cities there are only small buses running and they don't have a schedule; they go when they get full. I got at the bust stop at 8 am and left at 10 am. I was the only foreigner, no one around spoke English, I was very frustrated to wait for 2 hours without having any idea when the bus will leave. Finally by 10 the bus was packed full and we left; about 20 km and an hour later the bus stopped for me to connect with an other bus! I had to wait for the bus for an other hour.

I made to the border around 2pm. Border crossing was only 10 min boat ride. Border formalities were fast, I paid my us$43 dollars and here I was in Laos.

As I walked up the street thinking what I am going to next, Katrin showed up. I met atrin back in Chiang Mai when we travelled a bit together and now we want to continue to travel through Laos. I was so happy! She already got a room and tickets for tomorrow slow boat.

Welcome to Laos to me :)

Thailand Oct 31 to Nov 15

2008-10-31T23:25:00.000-07:00

India

2008-10-03T23:30:00.000-07:00

As I missed my first flight to Delhi India on Sept 27, next flight was Oct 3. On Oct 3 at 17 hrs I landed in Delhi. Yes, excately as everyone was telling me - Delhi is a big shock.

Nepal - Oct 7 to 31

2008-10-03T23:24:00.000-07:00

Jordan - Amman

2008-09-29T04:13:00.000-07:00

Monday morning at 9 am I was at the Indian Embassy; I handed in my passport and at 3pm my visa was ready. It is a full page visa for 3 month, multiple entries; I paid $30.00 for it.

After I browsed in an artsy part of Amman; books stores, coffees shops, museums.

This evening was the last day of Ramadan. At sun set there were lots of people on the street celebrating. People in my hostel were celebrating too.

It was very interesting to observe Ramadan. At sun set all the places were shut down and everyone was eating. Ramadan didn't inconvenience us at all, there were still plenty of stores, markets, juice bars open for us to get something to eat. People here are very considerate to tourists and they don't get offence if we eat. We tried our best to be discreet and respect people religion and practices.

Israel back to Jordan Amman

2008-09-28T03:45:00.000-07:00

I have a very nice and relaxing morning at my friends in Tel Aviv. I had good coffee and breakfast. I would have liked to stay at least one more day, but tomorrow Monday is a holiday in Jordan and Jewish New Year and apparently the border crossing will be a nightmare. As I have to be at Indian Embassy tomorrow at 10:00 am I did not want to take a chance.

I left Tel Aviv at noon and I arrived in Amman at 4:30 pm. Customs formalities at Israeli and Jordanian border were very fast; there were very few people. I had to pay us$50 .00 to exit Israel!

Myself and a Jordanian - American woman got a free ride from the border to Amman by a Jordanian - American guy; very nice of him :

Back to my hostel I read more about Amman and decide what I am going visit tomorrow.

Isreal -Jerusalem and Tel Aviv

2008-09-27T23:24:00.000-07:00

I was a tourist in Israel for a day, so I would call my trip - Isreal in one day.

I the morning I visited Jerusalem. I was with Susan, her husband and son. They took me everywhere.

In the afternoon my cousin Romana and her husband came and pick me up from Susan's place. We went and visit Tel Aviv.

Late in the evening we went to Jaffa.

What a day! At midnight I was really ready to go to bed.

Jordan to Israel

2008-09-26T23:23:00.000-07:00

Amman is an Ok city but not to much to see and to do; as I am stuck here until I get my Indian visa I decided to go to Israel. I have been told that I have have a Syraian visa on my passport Iwill not be allowed to enter Israel but I was thinking that is worth to try.

I left Amman on a service taxi with 2 Palestinian students that I met in my hostel. At Jordanian border we had to get off the taxi and had to go through customs. There was a huge line up of people. A policeman came up to me and told me that I am in the wrong line up. I am a foreigner and I was supposed to be in a foreigner line up. I went to the other line of the buildings; this line up was long as well; many tourists to visit Israel. After about half an hour I got my Jordanian exit visa.

After we got on a blue bus; only blue buses operates between the border, there are no taxis allowed.

First Israeli check point -an officer got on the bus and checked passports.
Second check point - we all had to get off the bus and have our passports checked.

we arrived at Israeli boder, wwe had to hand in our bags and passports. It was very chaotic, people were coming from everywhere with tones of bags; there iwas lots of shouting and pushing around.

Finally I got my bag and my passport checked again; now I was in line for customs and immigration. I was in line for 3 hours; when my turn I was barely asked any questions; I got my Israelei visa in a few minutes.

On the other side of the border I took the shared taxi to Jerusalem. Susan's husband Uzi came and picked me up.

I spend the evening with Susan's family; it was really good to see her and meet haer family. We had a wonderful traditional Israeli dinner.

Jordan - Amman - bad day

2008-09-25T22:00:00.000-07:00

Sept 25 was a very bad day :(

I was supposed to fly to India this morning at 4:00 am. I went to the airport at midnight, and try to check in at 2:00 am. When checking in the guy at the counter asked for my Indian visa. I didn't apply for an Indian visa because for whatever reason I assumed that I could get visa upon arrival in Delhi. Apparently India doesn't issue any visas at any border. So I was declined to board the plane.

At 4:00 am I took a taxi back to Amman. All hotels were closed, it took me a while to find a hotel that will open the door.

At 9:00 am I went to the Indian Embassy; it takes 5 working day for a visa. I filledSept out the application and paid 30 Euros.

After I went to change my flight; I paid 78 Euros, and next available flight out of Amman is Thursday Oct 2.

I paid already for India tour that starts on Sept 27, at this moment it looks that I am not going to make it for the tour.

On the more happier note everyone here has been absolutely wonderful and trying to help; the lady at the Indian Embassy, the hotel manager, the airline reservation agent.

Today I am not happy :( I can't believe that I have created all this mess.

Jordan - Amman

2008-09-24T19:00:00.000-07:00

Back in Amman for a day; getting ready for my flight to India.

Too many people on the street; spend most on the day on the Internet.

Jordan - Agaba to Amman

2008-09-23T23:00:00.000-07:00

I spend the day on the South beach in Agaba.

Took the bus back to Amman.

Jordan - Petra to Aqaba

2008-09-22T23:00:00.000-07:00

Three hours bus ride from Petra to Aqaba was spectacular.

Aqaba is a port city by Red sea. It is quite touristy but definitely worth visiting.

Jordan - Petra

2008-09-21T23:00:00.000-07:00

I visited Petra the whole day. This time I was hiking on the upper trails and enjoyed the scenery from up top.

Jordan - Petra

2008-09-20T23:00:00.000-07:00

Petra is about 4 hours from Amman.

I checked into Valentine Inn hostel with the beautiful view if Wadi Musa and Petra.

Petra is one of the most spectacular places I have seen so far.

Syria to Jordan- Amman

2008-09-19T23:00:00.000-07:00

It was a Ramadan Friday morning when I crossed the border from Syria to Jordan; barely any cars on the road which was very nice.

I went to Amman by service taxi; service taxi operates between the 2 countries. The way it works, as soon as taxi has 4 people taxi is full and is leaving. I was with Hiroki, Japanese guy that I met at the hostel; in the taxi there were already 2 guys: a Turkish and a Jordanian guy. Jordanian guy was a doctor and spoke English, He helped us through all the customs formalities. I paid 500 Syrian pounds for my exit visa from Syria and 10 Jordanian Dirham for Jordanian visa. Officers at both customs were very nice. Jordanian customs checked the car and everything inside the car.

It takes 3 hours by car from Damascus to Amman and it costs us$16.00 dollars.

Syria - Damascus

2008-09-18T23:00:00.000-07:00

This morning my group has left for Jordan. I stayed behind for one more day in Damascus. Still lots to see!

First thing in thee morning I moved from the hotel I stayed with the group to a nearby hostel.

Hostel was very nice and it was easy to meet people.

I spend the day visiting around and getting ready for my trip to Jordan.

Syria - Damascus

2008-09-17T23:00:00.000-07:00

Sept 17 was my last day with the group; from now on I will be on my own for about 9 days, before my flight to India.

I visited old Damascus.

So far I was happy, miserable, tired, hungry, stuffed, stressed, relaxed, belivered, frustrated, content, anxious, ecstatic.
More than 7 month into my trip I am content and grateful for my life.

I took lots of pictures, but a picture is just a pretty image....it doesn't mean nothing compared to actually being there when I took the picture. The most wonderful pictures are in my heart.

Syria - Damascus

2008-09-16T23:00:00.000-07:00

We made it to Damascus after a 4 hours ride from Palmyra on the crowded bus on a hot day.

Damascus is the oldest inhabited city in the world. It was busy, crowded, tons of cars, taxis, noise. We stayed in the hotel a few minutes away from the old city.

Syria - Palmyra

2008-09-15T23:00:00.000-07:00

Palmyra is a small town in the middle of the dessert. It is famous because the wonderful ruins; the ruins are part of the Unesco World heritage.

We browsed around marvelling of the beauty of the place.

We watched the sunset and the next day sunrise.

In the day time was hot, but at night and in the morning was very chilly.

Syria - Hama to Palmyra

2008-09-14T23:00:00.000-07:00

Scenery was beautiful, rugged mountains, grey and dusty green.

In our way to Palmyra we stopped to visit Crac de Chevalier, one of the most beautiful castle in the world.

After castle visit we continue our bus ride to Palmyra. Again we are travelling through the dessert; I found the desert fascinating most people on the bus were sleeping, but I just couldn't close my eyes. Looking out on the immensity of this place I felt at peace with myself.

Syria - Aleppo to Hama

2008-09-13T23:00:00.000-07:00

My blogs will get shorter; I don't have a laptop with me and I am on the road a lot, barely have time to rest. The blogs will show itinerary and places that I visited. I will try to download as many pictures as I can.

Four hours bus ride from Aleppo to Hama. We were traveling through the dessert, sand dunes, small bushes, some olive trees; scenery is not pretty, but yet had a surreal charm; I liked it.

We stopped to visit Basilica of St Simeon, one of the most famous archaeological sites.

So far I have seen wonders.

Syria - Aleppo

2008-09-12T23:00:00.000-07:00

Aleppo is the 3rd largest cities in Syria; is also one of the oldest inhabitated city in the world.

I got up in the morning; it was a Ramadan Friday morning in a muslim country, there was not a soul around, it seemed that city is deserted. I wanted a coffee so badly....hmmm, nothing I could do, just I was sitting on the roof terrance looking at the city; what a city, everything is grey, only a few dusty green patches.

Around 9 am I decided to go out and browse around; close to the citadel there were a few restaurants and wow! one was open :)

I asked the young waiter if they have Cappuccino, and he said yes; I was so sure he didn't understand me I asked again, and he said yes again. I was soooooo Happy, I have been drinking nesscafe for such a long time....Cappuccino was just perfect, I had such a great morning.

Citadel in Aleppo is something; I took lots of pictures.

Afternoon we visited more of the old city and also the Christian part of the city. Muslim part and the Christian part of the city are very different.

Turkey to Syria

2008-09-11T23:00:00.000-07:00

We got up at 6:30 am to catch the bus that will take us to Syrian border.
The tour leader told us that we will cross the border on foot.
So here we were 7 of us with heavy backpacks walking in the blasting sun on a concrete bare road fenced by chicken wire.
Not sure why we had to cross the border on foot, something to do with bus complication and visas that may arise between Turkish and Syrian border.
First there was to turkish check point - everything ok, we all got our exit stamps.

For a while we were walking in no man land, we are in between the two countries, it was really strange to walk on the road which has signs at both sides - "Mine field, keep off" ; hmmm I didn't quite enjoy walking on that road.

First Syrian check point; the officer looked carefully at each passport, gave them back to us, said nothing, just nodded his head to move forward.
Second check point; we filled out forms and handed passports. I was so happy I had my Syrian visa; I read on the Internet that tourists have to wait a long time and the border, but at the end we just waited half an hour, that is pretty good considering that we are a group of 7 people.

Right in front of Syrain border there was a bus waiting for us, nice! in short time we were in our way to Aleppo.

The road is not particulay scenic, everything around looks dusty and dry. Small villages looked poor and colorless. As we were approaching the city there are many unfinished constructions in different stages, the scenery is quite depressing.

Our hotel Al- is centrally located between the new and the old town. I like this location! I remember about Morocco, it is nice to visit the medina, but never chose a hotel in the medina. I like to visit the old, but I prefer the modest comfort of a newer hotel.

In Aleppo there are 8 more people joining our group: two couples and two girlfriends from New Zealand, a French woman that lives in London, a Canadian girl from Alberta that lives in Vancouver.

In Turkey Ramadan didn't have any impact on our trip; many restaurants, coffee shops and juice bars were open everywhere. Not in Syria, pretty much everything was shut down until dusk.

In the evening we went out for a group dinner (by then we were really hungry); food was awesome, traditional Syrain food, mezze, kebabs, some strange coffee at the end.

Turkey – Gaziantep

2008-09-10T21:30:00.000-07:00

Sept 10 was our last day in Turkey. It took only 4 hours bus ride to get here for the last town, we were all happy, at this time we all had enough of long bus rides.

I wouldn’t call Gaziantep a tourist town; it is a real Turkish town with very few foreigners. We walked around town for a bit, like everywhere in Turkey people are very nice and friendly.

We had our last Turkish yummy kebab and beer.
It was time for us to unwind, rest and get ready for our new journey in Syria.

Turkey - Mt. Nemrut

2008-09-09T23:22:00.000-07:00

During this trip we traveled long distances from one place to next; a second overnight bus from Cappadocia to Kahta a small town in Eastern Turkey. We stopped in Kahta just to be close and be able to take a tour to visit Mountain Nemrut.

Mount Nemrut is at about 50 km from town. The highway to get to the mountain is very narrow, sometimes rough and it is winding up and down the mountains. I was quite scared and worried riding in the minivan. There are many very sharp curves and no shoulders. We made it OK all the way up.

From the parking lot we had to hike about 25 minute to the top where there is a memorial sanctuary. The area is fantastic somehow similar to Utah, I would have loved to trek in this area; it would have been really nice to be there for a few weeks.
Well, I was happy just to visit, do the mini hike and watch a wonderful sunset.

Turkey – Cappadocia

2008-09-07T22:42:00.000-07:00

We traveled from Olympos to Cappadocia by an overnighter bus. Cappadocia is a region in the middle of the country, one of the most beautiful places in Turkey because of the unusual natural landscape. As we were appproching Goreme village the sun was raising, the sky is perfecly blue, the scenery was breathing. We arrived in Goreme village around 7 in the morning, it was absolutely surreal!

We checked in our hotel and have a rest on the hotel terrace overlooking the village.

We spend the day walking around, wondering and taking tons of pictures.

In the evening we watched the sunset for the highest hill in the village. The views were absolutely stunning.

We end up the day with Turkish pizza and beer a yummy 10 dollars dinner!

Turkey - Olympos

2008-09-05T22:22:00.000-07:00

Dalyan to Olympos bus ride along Mediterranean Sea was absolutely beautiful! 6 hours of wonder. Amazing scenery, a mix of Cote D’Azur, Sea to Sky highway, Canadian Rockies.

The bus stopped shortly in Finike; I would call Finike Monte Carlo of Turkey. Beautiful and impressive buildings, restaurants and coffees shops, wide and clean streets, palm trees, Bleu Sea.

We got to Olympos around 4 pm. Olympos is a small, laid back mountain resort. It is a in a valley surrounded by very impressive mountains, and one side has a rugged path that leads to Mediterranean Sea. It is beautiful! As soon as we got there I went for a walk to see the sea. I walked on the path looked at the trees and some ruins, and all of the sudden in front of me the path opens up and in front of me there if the perfectly blue Mediterranean sea- wow!

As accommodations there are only bungalows and tree houses. Bungalows are arranges around an interior garden with low tables and tons of cushions. Everyone gathered there, the night was so beautiful; it was hard to go to bed….

Turkey - Dalyan

2008-09-04T09:38:00.000-07:00

We traveled from Pamukkale to Dalyan. In Turkey Bus travel is very efficient, fast and comfortable. There are big buses and small buses, connecting all destinations. Most buses they have one person that takes cares of the sitting and offers drinks and sometimes small snacks. A man can not sit by a woman; during the trip people get moved around to have always man sit by a man and a woman by a woman. This rule doesn't apply to foreigners.

Dalyan is very touristy, lots of nice expensive hotels and resorts; apparently it is the most favorite destinations for the British.
We took a river boat cruise to the Mediterranean Sea; from the boat we admire the scenery and wonder at the tombs carved into the rock face.
We had to pay 2 euros to access the beach. It would have been an other 5 euros just to sit on the chair and have an umbrella. We opted to sit on the sand by the sea; also the water was so tempting warm, clean, big waves, how wanted to sit on the chair anyway? It was a great end of the day.

Turkey - Pamukkale

2008-09-03T22:00:00.000-07:00

Next day an other bus ride this time only 3 hours from Selçuk to Pakmukkale.

Pakmukkale is also small town quite touristy. The hotel has a swimming pool and as soon as we arrived we jumped in the pool. It is hot but so far I haven’t really suffered of heat as all buses and hotels have air conditioning.

In the evening we went up to this ca mountain. It looks like there is snow on the mountain but in fact is grayish-white limestone. There are beautiful calcified formations, terraces, falls and stalactites. Everyone has to take the shoes off for the first part to conserve the area.

Up at the top there are magnificent ruins of the ancient town Hierapolis. The view from up top is amazing. We walked around and stayed up there for hours.
Sunset was beautiful!

Turkey - Selcuk

2008-09-02T22:00:00.000-07:00

Bus ride was comfortable, but yet I slept very little. I got to Selçuk at 7 am and I was tired; I slept most of the morning.

Selçuk is a small charming town with some famous ruins; I don’t know too much about the ruins, I just went up for a walk and took some pictures.

It is Ramadan in Turkey; restaurants are open but nearly empty during the day; only tourists are eating. Turkish people are very nice they just walk by and smile. I haven’t felt that they will be upset because others re eating. I wasn’t hungry and I did not eat during the day.

I had a very yummy Turkish dinner with the group around 8pm.

Turkey - Istanbul to Selcuk

2008-09-01T03:50:00.000-07:00

At 9 am on Monday morning I was at Syrian embassy with the letter of recommendation from the Canadian consulate, 45 Euros and 2 pictures; my visa was ready by 3pm, I was now ready to leave Istanbul and join my group.

At the end of the day I was sitting in Istanbul on a bench in front of the Blue Mosque and I kept thinking: This is what so amazing about traveling: pictures, stories, movies, nothing compares to actually being here…

I took an overnight 11 hours bus ride from Istanbul to Selçuk to join my group.

Turkey - Istanbul

2008-08-31T23:00:00.000-07:00

Every morning as soon as I get up I need coffee. At the hostel breakfast is included, so the good news - I could have coffee right away. But the bad news – coffee is very bad, it is always instant coffee, Yuk :) I t is bad but I still drink a cup, I just think that is my medicine for the day, coffee is my addiction….

After breakfast (always white bread, cheese, tomatoes, cucumbers, eggs, jam and bad coffee) I head down the street to Starbucks, yes there is a Starbucks, actually quite a few in Istanbul, I am happy! Coffee tastes almost as good as in Vancouver. Coffee is expensive around 4 dollars for a regular tall coffee. Talking about prices Istanbul is a fairly expensive place, but again I had good kebabs for 5 dollars, beer is also 5 dollars. Dark Turkish beer is very good, food is everywhere and it is good.

Saturday and Sunday I visited Istanbul as much as I could:
Grand Bazaar, amazing place, many wonderful things, it was very hard not to buy anything, I found it much nicer that Moroccan medians , even though I have to admit that it is different

Galata Bridge

Istiklal Caddesi – Commercial Street

Taskim square

Sunday night I met my tour leader and fellow travelers. Tour leader is Chloe a young Australian girl; my fellow travelers, a Canadian couple from Nelson BC, an Australian couple and a single Australian man. They all seem very nice.

The group will leave tomorrow morning; I will stay in Istanbul for an extra day to get the visa and join the group on Tuesday.

Turkey - Istanbul

2008-08-29T23:00:00.000-07:00

My tour is 19 days Turkey and Syria. According to Lonely planet and some Internet reading Canadians can not get Syrian visa at the border.
There is a Syrian Consulate in Istanbul and Syrian visa can be obtained there. I get up in the morning and head to the Syrian consulate. Syrian consulate in the other part of town, so I have to take the tram, a funicular (it is very cool and fast) and the metro. Sure enough I get lost trying to get there, I had to ask about 10 people, my Turkish pronunciation of the street it doesn’t make it any easier, and finally I get there.
I am told by the visa clerk that in order to get the visa I have to get a letter from Canadian consulate that I am a Canadian citizen (what is the passport for???) and to pay 45 euros. It was already 10 am Syrian consulate works until from 9:30 am to 11 am, it is Friday, my tour leaves on Sunday no way I can make it to Canadian consulate and back and get the visa today! Anyway I took a taxi and went to Canadian consulate. Canadian consulate is on a pedestrian street, the take drops me off in front of the street; still takes me a while to find the consulate, there is a Canadian flag but it is up there very hard to see.

The lady at the Canadian Consulate is super nice, gives me the letter very fast (I had to pay 50 dollars for the letter) and whishes me good luck. Even with good luck I am not going to make it back on time, it was 11 am! Well I guess I am not leaving with the tour, I will have to spend an extra day in Istanbul to get the Syrian visa.

In the after noon I went on a couple of hours Bosphoros cruise. I really enjoyed the cruise; it was very interesting to watch on one side big, luxurious houses, villas, private beaches, boats, parks, restaurants.

The opposite side, old city, beautiful mosques, old buildings, parks and restaurants as well.

If I just looked at this bridge I could think for a moment that I am back home in Vancouver ( hmmm, yes I do miss home)

Istanbul is so different from any other cities I have seen so far, not wonder it is described in the travel book as the place where East meets West; it is fascinating, huge, beautiful, unexpected, clean, and mysterious. Bazars, markets, mosques, gorgeous architecture, parks, flowers, food, Turkish delights, and this city is truly captivating… This city has everything one can dream on.......

Turkey - Istanbul

2008-08-28T23:31:00.000-07:00

I arrived in Istanbul after 24 hours train ride from Bucharest. I changed my travel plans so many times, not sure where to go next…. I was never interested to visit Turkey but being in Romania I figured that I am so close to Turkey maybe it would be a good idea to actually visit Turkey. Last minute decision I booked an adventure tour for 19 days Turkey and Syria.

I got the Turkey visa at 4 am in the morning when the train stopped at the border. I paid 45 Euros!!!; the most expensive Turkey visa is for Canadians, don't know why...for Americans is only 20 Euros and for Europeans is even cheaper only 12 Euros! So what is up with 45 Euros visa for us???

Istanbul was never on my "must see city", but by the time I took the tram and walked to the hostel I was so amazed by this city, I realized that it should have been on the list, Istanbul is definitely a must see city!

I checked in the Bahouse hostel by 2pm. Hostel is located in Hostel in Sultanahmet, in the European part of town. It is a very cool place if I ever come back to Istanbul I will stay in same area.
Hostel has a roof terrace overlooking Mediterranean Sea. I went up and had my first Turkish beer and kebab – yummy.

In the afternoon went browsing in the neighborhood; there are tons of coffee shops, restaurants, stores. I am very close to the Blue Mosque and Aya Sofya; between the two there is nice park with colorful flowers and water fountain.

It is wonderful to meander on the streets, see, smell and feel the vibe of the city.

My decision to come to Istanbul was good; welcome to the “city of world’s desire”.

Africa back to Europe

2008-07-21T23:25:00.000-07:00

We checked out of the hotel at noon and Mark booked a bed in the nearby hostel.
We had lunch and ice cream and soon was time to head to the airport.

There is a train from city centre Casablanca (both rail stations, Casa port and Casa Voyageurs) to the airport. Mark accompanied me to the airport.
At the airport there was time to say good bye. In general I am really "weak" when it comes to good bye, and this time was Very Very hard. I have been traveling with Mark since March 1 this year sharing the good and the bad, wonderful moments, difficult moments, impressions, emotions. We parted crying.....from that day on our trip had different itineraries.
My flight to Milan was at 8 pm.

I am looking forward to meet Mark again; the latest at the end of the year 2008! we will definitely have the best New Year party.

Rabat to Casablanca

2008-07-19T23:37:00.000-07:00

From Rabat we took the train back to Casablanca Post station. We had to got to Casablanca, because my flight to Milan was from Casablanca airport. The train was 5 euros for an hour ride. We got fist class ticket and the train was brand new. It was the most pleasant ride that we had in Morocco, regretfully the shortest one.

We booked hotel Central on Internet; likely the hotel was very close to the rail station; we walked to the hotel and we were happy that we didn't have to deal with the taxi drivers :)

Hotel was nice and we spend the afternoon relaxing and taking care of last minute things. View from the hotel room.

As this was the last dinner of our trip, we decided to go to our favourite place in Casablanca: Rick's cafe.

Food was good, wine was good, we were talking and laughing remembering good and bad parts of our trip, funny, embarrassing, hard, difficult moments, and above all being happy that we have decide to pursue this journey; most important - No regrets.

Visiting Rabat

2008-07-17T21:25:00.000-07:00

We were in Rabat for three days. We really liked Rabat, I guess this is our favourite city in Morocco. Our Morocco trip was quite comfortable, but still rough compared to Europe. These three days in Rabat were ending our Moroccan trip and also our five months trip together; good reasons to spoil ourselves, decompress and have a really good time.

We leisurely browsed Rabat. Downtown Rabat had a European flair, buildings are white and well maintained, streets wide and clean.

Rabat has numerous coffee shops, patisseries and book stores. It is the first Moroccan city where we were pleasantly surprised to see many bookstores and many people in the bookstores.

Most Moroccan people on the street were westerly trendy dressed; also we have noticed many expats.

We come across this interesting church.

We visited the Kashba, according to Routard guide the "must see place” in Rabat. It is an interesting place, narrow strets, painted white and blue houses, awesome view of the ocean and the city.

One day we had lunch at Alliance Francaise. Lunch was cooked by French standards and prices same. We paid about 35 euros for 2 entrées, shared dessert and half bottle of wine.

In the evening we walked long ways along the Murrailles. First we passed by numerous impressive houses, all homes of foreign embassies and diplomats.

We ended the evening at Weimar Cafe which is part of the Goethe institute. Restaurant is run by a very nice French couple. Place is very popular with French people and many expats. We were lucky to find a table right away, we had pizza and beer, it was good!

Leaving Marrakech and arrival in Rabat

2008-07-15T23:37:00.000-07:00

It is far too hot in Marrakech and 8 days seems good enough to be in this city.
We left our friend’s nice apartment Tuesday at noon.

We had a good time here, made lots of yummy meals, and had nice cold milk, yogurt, and watermelon. The advantage of an apartment over a hotel especially in a hot climate is having a Fridge. Mark had every morning cereal with cold milk. Mark is very particular about his cereal with cold milk. He made such a fuss about having milk really cold. I hope he will eat cereal and cold milk every morning at his home, otherwise he will be in trouble.

Our next and last destination in Morocco is Rabat. We got second class train tickets to save a bit of money; the tickets were 12 Euros each for a 5 hour ride.

The train left half an hour late; the first hour or so of the train ride was very pleasant; in one compartment for 8 people we were just four; Mark and I and 2 ladies, one Moroccan and the other Dutch-Moroccan visiting family. We had a nice conversation in French and English about Morocco, Europe, and travelling in general.

After the train started to get crowded and hotter. There is an air conditioner in the train, but is weak and sporadic. More people came into our compartment and many people stood outside in the corridor. Most people have many, huge luggages and leave them in the corridor, therefore every time the train stops and people have to get on and off there is a big struggle and “bouchon”.

Closer to the end of our train ride I started talking to a guy sitting by me; he was from Agadir and was going to Rabat to get his car registered. He bough his car in Italy and he had all necessary papers from Italy. He showed us the car papers with tons of stamps, but he said that according to Moroccan bureaucracy the papers were not good enough and he has to go to another office and get more stamps. All I could think was that I am really glad that I am not in his shoes! He told us that lots of Moroccan are not happy living here, because of bureaucracy, injustice, bribery, lack of hope for a better life. That is very sad.

He helped us to get off the train in Rabat and after he said “bon voyage”. One of the few people that helped without expecting anything from us.

By the time we got to Rabat we were hot and tired. We had chosen a hotel from the Routard guide and luckily the hotel was walking distance from the rail station and in a nicer part of town. Before we got to the hotel I kept my fingers crossed that we find a room available, I was dreading the idea that we will have to walk around to look for a hotel.

As soon as we stepped in Hotel Splendid the front desk clerk smiled and said, Mais Oui, on a une chambre pour vous!

Hotel is very basic but clean and good shower, this is all we need.

Welcome to us to Rabat.

Marrakech – Osiria water park

2008-07-14T21:36:00.000-07:00

As we could barely handle the heat in the city, we had decided on our last day in Marrakech to go to a water park. Yes, somewhere in a suburb of Marrakech in the middle of the dessert there is a water park!

The water park entrance fee is 18 Euros! including the bus from Marrakech to the water park.

There was no exact indication where the shuttle bus will stop to pick us up, just the name: Plaza El Harti. Plaza El Harti is a big place with a roundabout; there are about 5 large streets intersecting into this place and about 5 corners where the shuttle could stop. We had to stand right in the middle of the plaza in the burning morning sun so we can see the water park shuttle. Once we saw the shuttle arriving we started running and guessing where the shuttle will stop. That is easier said than done, traffic in Marrakech is absolutely insane, it took us a while to be able to cross the street and make it to the shuttle, but finally we were on our way.

We knew from the Routard guide that there are restaurants and snack bars in the park; initially, we were thinking to bring some water and snacks, but later on in the morning we changed our mind. When we got to the park we were glad that we did not bring any food or drinks, because the clerk at the gate actually checked our bag! The water park really wants our money, beside the entrance being so expensive they want us to spend extra money on food and drink. It is impossible to be there for the day without buying something, this park is making good money!

But we had fun! It was a hot day, so it was nice to be in the park. The park is big, with a kids area, wave pool, swimming pool, water slides, restaurant and concession areas, even a pool bar with Coca Cola and juice, but to our disappointment no fancy cocktails or beer.

Mark went for the water slides gradually moving on from the gentle ones to the steep ones. Every time he was plunging in the water and coming out he had a very puzzled expression on his face! He was funny, I guess for the moment he didn’t know where he was. I was sitting on the grass listing to some techno funky music and looking at Mark and all the other crazy people sliding down and had a good laugh!

I was scared to go on the slides, but finally seeing how much fun everyone was having I decided to give it a try! After the first time I kept going and going and going, yes it is was lots of fun, even though I have to admit that I slid only on the green slides, the easier ones.

At 6: 30 pm it was time for us to go.
We got out of the gate to wait for the shuttle bus. There are only 2 shuttle buses one for Plaza Jemaa-El-Fna and one for Place El Harti. As it is almost closing time for the water park, many people were waiting for the shuttle. As soon as the shuttle showed up people start running, pushing their way around to get on the shuttle. We looked at this and decided that is no way we can fight like this to get on the bus. But we were tired, hot, hungry and want to make it home. Another shuttle arrives and Mark is getting a seat, but I am still outside and the shuttle is now full. This was absolutely crazy!

We don’t understand why the water park doesn’t have a civilized system to get people on the bus; something like handing people a number so when shuttle arrives people can get on the bus according to the number; or even easier to have 2 signs, and 2 lines (something similar to the airports line ups) one for place Jemaa-El-Fna and one for Place El Harti.

Regretfully after this good day we had a bitter feeling like many other places/business in Morocco the water park cares only about the tourists that brings money in; once they got your money they don’t care about you, customer service, reputation, good will and so on; that is sad for Morocco.

Marrakesh - Jemaa-El-Fna at night

2008-07-13T23:35:00.000-07:00

Marrakesh - Jemaa-El-Fna at night
We got to Jemaa-El-Fna around 9 pm – wow what at place, my first reaction – shock and terror! I read about this place before hand on Routard guide, but yet any descriptions of it can not possibly describe reality, the tumult, pulse, vibe, craziness of this place.

There are thousands of people Moroccan and tourists alike and all possible vendors; everything is for sale from “normal” things to all kind of weird looking stuff (we had no idea what they were). Some people just have a small blanket with a few strange things on it and sit there in the middle of crowd trying to make a few pennies. There are women that offer tattoos and henna paintings on hand and feet.

Also there is music, dance performances, monkey wranglers, snake charmers. I couldn’t take pictures at night, this is a picture of the snake charmers in the day time. In the middle there are two cobras.

Right in the middle of the plaza there are many “only at night” small outdoors vendors restaurants and Moroccan patisseries; (these vendors are not there is the day time, only at night); all restaurants and patisseries are pretty much same and they all have numbers.
For restaurants there are long plain tables where everyone can sit as long as there is room. Every restaurant has one or two guys in charge of getting customers to their restaurant. As we walked by many of them come to us showing up the menu right in our face.
That night we had already dinner so we decided to come back and eat here in couple of days mostly because of the atmosphere and “the experience”. The smell of the “grillades, tajines, spices, cakes was very enticing.

We went back a few days later; as all restaurants are the same, after shaking off some of the restaurants touts, we choose to sit somewhere not too crowded. I had poulet tajine, and Mark poulet grillades, about 6 Euros, plus French fries and grilled aubergines (eggplant). Before our order arrived the waiter brought a small plate of olives and some spiced sauce. The food was just OK, when we had to pay our bill we realized that the waiter has included also the food that we have not ordered and we have assumed that was free. In Canada if you are given a little something that you have not order before your meal that appetizer is from the restaurant and it is free.

The extra amount was very little, but yet we learned that in Morocco if we ever get food that we have not ordered we will ask first how much is going to cost.

That was our night experience in Jemma-El-Fna. As I recognize that maybe most tourist find this place very exiting, for me was again once in a life time experience. I am not planning to ever go back to this place.

Marrakech, nouvelle ville and Jardin Majorelle

2008-07-10T21:34:00.000-07:00

Today we have visited Marrakech “nouvelle ville”. It is the newer part of town, there are many beautiful buildings, trendy restaurants and coffee shops, it seems that is the Yale Town of Marrakesh. Also there is a brand new stretch with a shopping area, there are some store names that I am not familiar but also stores like Zara, Clio, Etam.
There are water fountains and benches, at night the place is packed with people – walking, eating, or just sitting around “people watching”.

Jardin Majorelle is a beautiful little garden right in the middle of city. It costs 3 Euros to get in.

As usually we walked to the garden, after a long walk in the sun, it was sure very nice to be in the garden and in the shade.

This garden used to be home of the painting studio of Jacques Majorelle in 1924, the studio is now a museum.

After Jacques Majorelle died, Yves Saint Laurent and Pierre Berge have brought the garden, renovated and maintained. There is a memorial for Yves Saint Laurent in the garden.

The garden is small but very nice with exotic plants, cactus, bamboo trees, palm trees, a small pond with lily pads.

Marrakech is very Hot

2008-07-08T23:30:00.000-07:00

Marrakech is Very Hot, I don’t really know the temperature and I rather not know. We can go out early morning and late at night. It is almost impossible to go out between noon and about 8 pm at night.

Marrakech is a big city with large boulevards. Architecture is very interesting, many beautiful buildings. The traffic is very busy and it is a challenge every day we have to cross the street, even at the intersection with lights. There are lots of coffee shops, restaurants and parks. City is relatively clean compared to other cities, the municipally here puts a lot of effort to keep streets and parks clean.

There are lots of constructions going on, it seems that the whole city is under renovation and constructions, it would be interesting to see this city in a couple of years.

We woke up early and headed to the Jemma-El-Fna which is the main plaza in Marrakech. We walked all the way from our place to he medina, about an hour walk. We are ok walking, we just find it difficult to cross any street because here traffic doesn’t have any rules; Especially the motorcycles never stop even at the red light.

Jemma-El-Fna is a big place surrounded by coffee shops, restaurants, hotels.

Right in the middle of the plaza there are many orange juicer stands and dry fruit stands and as soon as someone walks by all vendors start to wave and ask to go to their stand for the juice or fruit.

A glass of orange juice is only 3 Dirham, a glass of grapefruit juice is 10 dirham.
The juice is very good, fresh, we will have lots of orange juices.

After coffee and people watching (there are lots of foreigners) we decided to go to the medina. Wow!!! tons of stuff, everything one can imagine, clothing, jewelry, shoes, bags, carpets……..

I like to look around but as soon as I stop to look I am approached and Invited in the store. I am not used and I don’t like the pressure, this makes me uncomfortable and usually I pull away right away. Also by now we have been in Morocco long enough to know that if someone invited you in the store for tea and to look, is because they want us to buy something.

Finally I found a store that had clothes with price tags and I decided to buy some Moroccan traditional clothes, mostly because I was very hot.

I bought pants (they called pantalon climatise I guess just because the pants are very large and they allow air circulation) and a blouse. I paid 10 Euros for both, not a bad price considering that I have done very little negotiation. BTW – Mark and I hate bargaining, we always like to buy stuff that have a price tag.

This is my Moroccan outfit.

Leaving Essaoiura and arrival in Marrakech

2008-07-07T23:40:00.000-07:00

We were in Essaoiura for about 14 days, it was time to move on. We enjoyed our stay in this little town, Essaouira is like Vancouver of Morocco! on the Atlantic ocean coast. Temperature was very pleasant not too hot and always a nice breeze.

Going to the bus stop having our luggage in the push cart.

Bus ride between Essaouira and Marrakesh takes about 3 hours and costs 6.50 Euros. We left Essaoiura at 3:00 pm on a tourist bus with air conditioning, much much better bus trip than the one before.

The bus was almost full, mostly tourists and few Moroccans. When Mark and I got to our seats we could not even get to sit because the people, father and daughter in front of us leaned their chairs back to the maximum. I asked politely to be so kind to put the chair in the up right position so we can get in and sit comfortably. In a very defensive voice the father said that he wants to be comfortable and he is entitled to lean the chair back. Whereas I agreed with him I tired to explain that it would be nice for us to feel comfortable as well and is that particular situation it was not possible. He was really mad and rude, I decided not to carry the conversation anymore. Also in the same time a girl who was sitting across of me went to the back of the bus and waved at me to come over.

I end up sitting by her on the only 2 empty back seats on the bus. She was Moroccan and she spoke English very well as she studied Business in Philadelphia for 3 years. She went to visit friends in Essaouira and now she was going back home to Marrakesh. We talked about Morocco and travel, people, climates, Marrakech, food. She offered me very yummy Moroccan home made cookies.

At the end the bus ride was very pleasant. Mark sat in our seats and he told me that the father told the daughter that we are rude because we are “Americans”!

Sometimes we wonder why people travel and what in fact they learn from travel. Most people learn to happily agree to make a bit of adjustment on their comfort to accommodate fellow travelers – win , win situation, everyone is happy. Also most travelers learn and treat others with planet earth human respect that doesn’t have anything to do with one “place of birth”.

We were sad for this man and father and especially for his wife and kids. We don’t know where the man was from and where he was travelling but to us so far he is been wasting his family money.

We got to Marrakech around 6:30 pm. It was Hot!

I called Maria in Marrakech (Maria is the neighbor and friend of our friend from Montpellier) and the key for the apartment has arrived just that morning. We were so happy, we have an apartment to stay in Marrakech.

We took a taxi (again we were cheated and charged more) and moved in the apartment. The apartment is beautiful!

It did not take too long to settle in!

This is the view from the apartment.
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Essaouira and the hamman experience

2008-07-03T23:45:00.000-07:00

Mark got me a little gift for Canada Day, but I know that in fact he was a bit worried about me getting so home sick and he was thinking that I needed a pick me up; so he bought me a “Moroccan beauty” at the “hammam” = that means a facial and body exfoliation and massage with Moroccan special “savon noir” and oil d’argan.

Savon noir is not really a soap but a black paste; can be bought only in a hammam and kept for a month or so, after which it cannot be used anymore. It is an exfoliator and it is supposed to be the best.

Oil D’argan is an oil that we ever heard of before--in Essaouira it is famous and everywhere; apparently this oil can be bought only here and it is considered a “miracle oil”. It can be bought as a cooking oil and as cosmetical oil; also used as main ingredient for many cosmetic products.

I am really curious about this oil’s properties so got myself a small oil bottle and a soap.
1824
Back to the hammam = bath, the one I went to is was called Lalla Mira.

Hammam is a made of stone, small, low ceiling, dark, steamy hot room. The room is completely empty besides a water troughs and a few very thin white mats on the floor.

I lied on the mattress on the floor; this woman came up and poured a bucket of warm water on me. After she started rubbing me with a glove dipped in savon noir; she is not very gentle, she flips me around rather abruptly. She is not talking just concentrating on her “work”; despite the abruptness the rubbing feels good. At the end another bucket of water is thrown on me.

Now there is the wrapping in something muddy. Once I am all wrapped up she leaves me lying there on the mat for about half hour. It feels really good all wrapped up lying motionless in a quite hot room.

Another bucket of water; then there is washing – hair, body, oooo that feels really good.
At the end there is massage with the d’argan oil. That is the best part, I could have been there for a longgggg time.

An hour and something later I am perfectly clean and stress free; my skin is oily and soft.
Oooooo I really enjoyed the hammam. I will have to do it one more time before I leave Morocco.

In the dressing room I struck up a conversation with a woman; she was my “bath mate”. Her name is Elisabeth and she is from United States, just visiting Morocco for a week. We made plans to meet for dinner.

At 8pm we met Elisabeth and her friend Joe; we went to Sirocco restaurant. Everything on the menu looked really yummy, hmmmm hard to decide what to eat.

I had Moroccan salad, Tajine Sardines and Chocolate cake, lots of food, but I managed to eat everything because it was too good to leave on the plate.
Tanjine Sardines

During our dinner a magician came to show us tricks; he was very good, he did all the tricks asking us to help, we looked at him in wonder as he was so close to us, but yet we did not see how he was able to manage the tricks.

July 3 was a good day! the trip goes on :)

Essaouira, on July 1

2008-07-01T09:50:00.000-07:00

Today is Canada day, also 4 month anniversary of our trip! We left Vancouver on March 1. I can’t believe that it has been already 4 months, we have done soooo much in this time.

Today I am sad, I miss home, it is one of these days that I just wanted to be home. I want to go to the airport and buy a ticket to Vancouver.

If I was in Vancouver, I would have had a long weekend and most likely I would have been hiking or biking in the mountains I love. I miss everything about Vancouver, the air, the rain, the sun, mountain, ocean, English Bay, Stanley Park, my street, my place, my friends.

Essaouira, moving to new place

2008-06-30T09:49:00.000-07:00

Today we moved for an apartment to another. The new one is a bit cheaper, nicer and better fridge and kitchen.
Stairs to go up to the apartment are very narrow and steep – scary!

Living room

View from the terrace

We will be here for one more week; we didn’t really want to, but we were kind of being sweet talked by this guy and agreed to stay; now, we will see….

About “sweet talk” – what we find frustrating is that we can never tell if someone in being just friendly or want something from us, or taking advantage of us. Also Mark and I are very poor “negotiators”; we don’t know how to bargain and we feel uncomfortable. The very few times we wanted to buy something, we end up by giving up just because we didn’t want to be bother.

We are wondering why people here don’t realize that putting pressure on foreigners is not a good sales tactic.

Essaouira, end of the festival

2008-06-29T21:47:00.000-07:00

Today was the last day of the Gnaoua festival.

In the morning I went for my walk along the ocean. I like to get up in the morning and go for a walk; I enjoyed the first hours, when the stores are not yet open, streets almost deserted and few people around. It is not too hot, there is a cool brezze from the ocean. In other words a good time to be out on the beach.

But for the last 3 days because of the festival in the morning there are tons of people around; lots of young guys sleep on the becah and they are just waking up; also there is a area where the city has set up huge tents for people to sleep. People are coming out of the tent, stretching, going out for a walk as well.

I guess for people for here is an event to come out to this festival; also maybe some of them have never seen the ocean, sometimes I can tell by the excitement on the faces when they rush for a dip in the ocean.

This Sunday morning is really busy, I didn’t enjoy my walk too much, lots of young guys sitting around and saying stuff when I walked by. I know they don’t mean harm, they are just young guys trying to play cool when a foreign woman walks by, but still tends to get annoying….

At noon I went back to Alliance Francaise Marocaine to watch “Return to Goore”. It was an interesting movie as well, a musical documentary in regards to slavery and how some famous black people living in United States tried to trace their ancestry through music.

In the evening we went to watch the closing concerts. First band was a Moroccan band, we got there almost at the end of their show.

Second band was the National Orchestra des Barbes; we didn’t know what to expect, but we decided to stay and watch just to see what is all about, and to our surprise we really liked this band and the music. We were there for couple of hours dancing or tapping away; it was hard to stay still with all people around dancing and having fun.

Altogether I enjoyed the festival. We watched concerts every night for a couple of hours. However I had a hard time to manage and be in the crowd. Apparently 200,000 people were in Essaouira for the festival. This city is very small, indeed we were absolutely overwhelmed by the number of people!

We were happy that the festival was over and looking forward for city to go back to “normal life” for our last week.

Essaouira

2008-06-27T23:51:00.000-07:00

Essouira is a fairly small city, by now we know the place pretty well, this is the main plaza.

Lots of coffee shops

The medina

The nicest part about the medina, beside that is cleaner than any other medians, is that merchant here are less aggressive than anywhere else, we can actually look at the stores. Stores are wonderful, leather goods, bags, shoes, scarf, dresses, silver jewelries, cosmetics, spices….It is very hard not to buy anything. At the beginning I said that I am not going to buy anything on this trip, but now I kind of change my mind, so I will see……
By the tourist information centre

Alliance Françoise Moroccan

As part of the Festival Gnaoua there are films at the Alliance Francoise Moroccan ; we have seen 2 movies so far :
“ Ali Farka Toure, le miel n’est jamais bon dans une seule bouche » life story of the african singer nick named Bluesman du desert.

Made in Jamaica – documentary movie about reggae music and its importance in Jamaican life from hunderds years ago to today.

In the evening we watched outdoors concerts ; there were mostly Maroccan bands playing morcoon folklore music. Around 11 pm Wayne Shorter Quartet started palying but by then we were tired of standing up for a long time, also I couln’dt stand the crowd moving continuasly around us. The music was beautiful we would have enjoyed a lot in a different setting, maybe a jazz longe sitting on low confortable chairs and sipping on Martinis 

Essaouira

2008-06-26T23:50:00.000-07:00

We have been in Essaouira for a few days. There was a black out in the city for almost 3 days. We were OK with the black out because the days are very long, we don’t really need light. However the reason we have rented an apartment was to be able to cook at home and if there is no power, therefore no electricity and no fridge :( we were not happy about that.

Mark walked all over the city looking for generators and signs that electricity people are working on the problem. He checked almost every single electricity box at the buildings, to the point that I was afraid that we may get arrested for suspicious activity!

He didn’t have any faith in the Moroccan electricity office that the problem will be solved in a few days. He dragged me all over the city to ask tourist information, electricity office and others the time frame when the power will be restored. I felt like a fool, but I went along just not to make trouble. The only answer we got is that “we are working on it”. On the other hand Mark keeps reminding me all the time that here we are dealing with “African time” – go figure!

I was a bit more optimistic that eventually power will be back before the festival starts, at the end we end up by having a bet as when the power will be on. I won the bet! the power was back before the festival. The bet was a scarf, now I have a brand new beautiful scarf.

Power is back on and the fridge is working, everyone is happy!

There is a festival in Essaouira for 4 days, June 26 to 29; it is called “Festival Gnaoua” (www.festival-gnaoua.net); we are looking forward to see the concerts.

Essaouira

2008-06-19T23:23:00.000-07:00

Hotel Maison des Coleurs is wonderful!

We got up in the morning refresh and ready to explore new city; but first here I am in the hotel lobby enjoying the colors and pictures.

We found an apartment, it this on the last floor in a building in the medina, it has a downstairs and upstairs, a big terrace with the roofs view and the ocean.

The apartment is 30 Euros per day. It is old and a bit moldy, I guess the German owner doesn’t come here too often. But here all the buildings are very old, sometimes it is unsettling when I look up the stairs case.
This is our street

This is our building

The apartment was very dusty, we had to clean and wash dishes but didn’t take too long; same morning we were already installed in our new place!

Essaouira is a former port town, now a fishing town resort, very different than other places in Morocco that we have seen so far.

Town is small and relatively clean, medina is clean, pollution free.

We will be here for 2 weeks, plenty of time to explore the city and around.

Leaving Casablanca and arrival in Essaouira

2008-06-18T23:00:00.000-07:00

To travel from Casablanca to Essaouira there are trains and buses: tourist buses and regular buses. The schedule for the train and the tourist bus wasn’t good for us, so we decided to take the “regular bus”. This was an interesting adventure that is good Only Once in the life time.

We took a taxi from the hotel to the bus station; I guess the traffic in Casablanca runs only by one rule: try not to get killed by anything around you. I am really happy that I am in a good health, otherwise I would have got a heart attack by the time we got to the bus station. But at the bus station there is more to take; lots of men running towards us speaking extremely loud trying to sell us bus tickets. Mark is much braver than me, he is quite calm and managed to buy 2 bus tickets for 7 Euros each.

It is 10:30 am, the bus is leaving at 12:00 (noon). There are already people on the bus! Oh, we start to understand, in order to have a seat you have to come early and sit on the bus, it is not even enough to leave something on your seat to reserve.

Mark was sitting on the bus, I was standing outside by the bus because I couldn’t handle the heat and smell. I felt like crying, this trip is 6 hour long! I was panicking thinking “Am I going to last 6 hours on this bus?” In the mean time lots of people are walking around on the bus and by the bus trying to sell all kind of stuff, water, candies, bread, gum, watches, radios, belts, sunglasses, you name it. It bothered me only because they came so close to us, they almost stick the merchandise in front of our noses.

Well, at noon we were off. It was hot and smelly. I am trying really hard not to think about he bus and the trip and enjoy the scenery. The scenery is interesting, but quite depressing, there are little villages with tiny run down houses in the middle of nowhere. It is another world!

The bus stopped at few villages to let people off. In fact the bus didn’t really stopped, just slowed down and people have to get off while bus still moving. There is a guy on the bus in charge of a announcing the name of the villages and the stations and getting people off. Every time the bus slows down he is jumping up, running by the bus and jumping back in; he is wearing flip flops!

The last part of the trip is a bit more enjoyable, the bus is half empty and it seemed that we were getting a bit more air; also the scenery is nicer, there are rugged reddish mountains and wide valleys with green vegetations, small trees, bushes, cactus.

We made it to Essaouira by 6:30 pm.

As soon as we got off the bus we were surroundered by people that offer accommodation. I was scared again, it seems that I get not get used to crowds and people speaking so loud.

The town and the medina are close to the bus station, and no cars are allowed into the medina which is great! The medina is clean and pollution free.

There are “push carts guys”, men that have a little cart and serve the role of the taxi for tourists. We put our languages on the cart and few minutes later we stopped in front of a hotel.

It was a difficult trip, this hotel is beautiful, is called “La maison des coleurs”. Every floor and room is painted in a different color . We made the decision on the spot, we were staying there for the night.

We were very tired, we had a very good night’s sleep.

Leaving Fez and arrival in Casablanca

2008-06-17T23:00:00.001-07:00

We left Fez at noon; first class train ride between Fez and Casablanca is 4 hours and costs about 16 Euros.

Train ride was uneventful, at times the air conditioning didn’t work and it was very hot, otherwise the ride was quiet and fast.

Well…… Casablanca … We all have cities, places that we want to visit. Also we have sometimes imaginary pictures in our mind about places that we want to visit. Casablanca was on my list of “must see cities”. Also I had a picture in mind of the city: white buildings with blue windows frames, colorful flowers, blue ocean waves washing sandy beaches…….

We arrived in Casablanca at 5pm. In front of me there is real Casablanca: busy, crowded, dirty, smelly, polluted.

As soon as we came of the rail station we were surrounded by all the taxi drivers offering a ride to the hotel. We finally picked a driver that seems a bit less eager to rip us off (even though he still charged us 2 Euros more than the actual cost) and went to a hotel recommended by the Routard guide.

Every time we moved from one city to an other we learned more and more about travelling, arriving in new places and booking a hotel. For now our strategy is to choose a hotel from the guide, go there for the first night and next day, if hotel is good to stay there if not to find a better hotel. It is very difficult (especially in Morocco) to decide what hotel we would like just from information from the guide book or even Internet. Real life is different than descriptions. We stayed one night in Galia hotel, wasn’t too bad except that hotel was on the very busy street, therefore extremely noisy, on top of that there was a repair shop right in front of our window and the repair shops emanates really bad smells and pollution.

We changed this hotel to hotel “Mon reve”; Mark and I agreed that the correct name to this hotel should be “Mon couchemar”. Hotel was bad and we lasted there 2 nights. We barely slept and I was almost eaten by the mosquitoes.

In two days in Casablanca we tried to visit the city as much as possible. Some of the buildings, boulevards are nice but worned down, old, decayed, streets are dirty. It is strange that there are lots of people washing the streets, but still there is garbage and dirt everywhere.

We visited “Sacre Coeur” church (nothing like Sacre Coeur in Paris”, Arabe League Park, City hall, mosque, all city centre, the port.

It was intersting, but I failed in my efforts to like and understand the “charm” of the city.

Tourism information centre in Casablanca belongs to a “comedie noir” movie. The lady at the tourism office knew nothing about the city or city events. All she wanted to do is to sell us this “amazing city tour” for 45 Euros in a Mercedes. By the way in Morocco are lots of old Mercedes, it seems that Mercedes = status.

The highlights of our visit in Casablanca; one evening we went to famous Rick’s café. It is a beautiful old white buildings by the port. It has 3 open floors, the last one is a terrace overlooking the ocean. The inside of the café is beautifully decorated, the atmosphere is wonderful, waiters are wearing formal Moroccan outfits.

We went up to the terrace. Mark ordered beer (5 Euros!) and half bottle of wine for 7 Euros. I order a chocolate mousse for 5 Euros. The restaurant offered us little treats, some olive, little pastries, nuts. Everything was delicious! soft music in the background, beautiful scenery, it was a great evening! I will definitely go back to Rick’s café.

Last evening in Casablanca we have discovered the “best” part of town, quariter Gauthier. It was hard to believe that this quartier is a part of Casablanca: beautiful buildings, clean streets, women and men very nice westerly dressed.

These are the twin towers in Casablanca, part of the new town.

We had pasta dinner is a small café.

During dinner out of the blue Mark came up with the idea to go to Essaouira. I quickly glanced and read in the guide book about Essaouira. It took me only a few minutes to say Yes, let’s go to Essaouira!!!

We deserved a treat for all this time spend in Casablanca. We ended the evening by going to the trendiest ice cream place in town; the place had an impressive variety of ice cream and many ice cream combinations as well as very good looking cakes.

We were happy to leave Casablanca as well.

Visiting Fez, day two

2008-06-16T23:00:00.000-07:00

Mark got sick yesterday night; he wasn’t felling well and barely slept at night; he figured that he caught a bacteria of some kind. (he is kind of wimpy, I told him to take vitamin C every day)

In the morning I went for breakfast around 8 am; Mark doesn’t want to come and eat, but he did not eat anything since lunch, so I told him to make an effort and come for breakfast. Mark showed up; he looked really pale. He sat down and tried to sip on tea. Few minutes later he passed out. I got off my chair really fast and went to support him, and talked to him. Few seconds later he opened his eyes, he is really white and sweaty.

Together with the waiters we got Mark back to the room and in bed. Mark stayed in bed the whole day, no food just water. I went out to get more water, lemonade, check the internet. I was out just very short time, because I was afraid to let Mark alone. By 5pm he is better, even manage to eat a bit.

As he wasn’t in the situation to go out, and I was home most day I decided to take an official guide n the evening and go and see the medina.

The guide showed up on motorcycle; he said just hop in the back; I am scared, I have seen how people drive the motorcycle and the traffic here; on top of that no helmet! but now what I am going to do, the medina is quite far and I have asked for the guide.

So I get on the motorcycle behind this guy; I am so scared as he drived between the cars, up and down a winding road.

We get to the medina, I am fine – Halleluhlia!!! Medina in Fez is the biggest medina in Morocco, it has 14 gates. Half of Fez population lives in the medina.

There are streets and streets with everything one can imagine; streets only with stores that sale dresses (some are absolutely beautiful), streets with carpets, jewelry, fabrics, copper pots, mirrors, spices and so on.

Some streets smell nice, some are really disgusting; I was getting really nauseated.

There are beautiful mosques where I am allowed to take pictures but not to enter.

At the end I feel overwhelmed, claustrophobic and dizzy. I am glad when we left; back on the motorcycle I feel a bit better than the beginning, I am telling my self “it is just a short ride and I am going to make it”.

I was happy to get to the hotel. Mark is feeling better too, that made me happy too.
We are leaving Fez tomorrow, three days is Fez was good enough.

Visiting Fez

2008-06-15T22:00:00.000-07:00

Every time I woke up in a new city I feel eager to go out and explore. First I went to have coffee and breakfast in the hotel’s restaurant. I was sitting there having coffee and reading about Fez with the cool, soft breeze coming for the open windows, mmmm, morning feels so good.

Mark showed up, chatted and eat breakfast, we were ready to explore Fez. We walked on boulevard Hassan II, it is nice, wide, clean, lots of trees and flowers.

There is a huge park on one side, if wasn’t that hot I would have like to go to the park. The park seemed deserted, it is Sunday morning and hot, but I guess that the park would be full in the evening. I am impressed, after Tangier I imagined Fez differently. We stopped at take pictures at the Royal Palace.

By the palace there is one gate to the medina; it is quite early in the morning, shops were just opening up, not too many people yet, great time to visit.

There are 14 gates to the medina, apparently median is huge and it is very easy to get lost. Mark is very good with maps, but even he has a hard time to follow the map. Our goal today is to visit the city and browse around, we will visit medina tomorrow, and we are considering hiring a guide.

We wandered in the hot city, most of times on paved streets, a few times taking short cuts on a dusty paths. One paths went through a cemetery, I don’t like cemetery, I am a bit frisked out, I am just looking in front of me.
We went up on this hill, the view of the city is impressing.

We took a few pictures and this man is approaching us. He seems pleasant, speaks English really well, and no doubt Arabic and French. He tells us a bit about the city and after he tells us that his family barley makes a living selling leather bags. He has a big bag and starts to pull out some leather bags that he has for sell. They are beautiful, I had to be really strong not to buy one; also I felt really sorry for this man, I was looking at him and wonder how can a man so articulate that speaks 3 languages is just making ends meet by selling leather goods? life is harsh to some people, again in a split if the second I am so grateful for my life; I am grateful to Mark to encourage me to come on this trip where we got to learn and experience so much!

Fez is busy city, there are many people around, modern and old cars, motorcycle, motor bikes, traffic is chaotic, pedestrian are crossing everywhere they feel like it; there are men on donkeys and horses.

We walked for hours it is almost noon now, we could not figure out a better, shorter way to get back home, we took a taxi, nice!

Travelling and arrival in Fes (Fez)

2008-06-14T23:30:00.000-07:00

We were taking to train to Fez, first class hoping that we will have a pleasant six hour train ride.

We get into out compartment and there are only guys speaking extremely loud – great! this looks like the nightmare kind of a company for a 6 hours ride.

Train starts moving, the men start moving to a different compartment and three pretty women showed up; Mark is happy! the woman sitting right by him is in her twenties and very pretty. Besides Mark there is only one man and he drives me crazy from the beginning; he talks very loud and he is trying to be funny. I decided to stand out on the corridor, looking at the scenery, but in the mean time I was thinking “dam it I am not going to let this guy to spoil my trip”.
I looked around and I find an another compartment; only 2 girls are in the compartment and they are half asleep. I asked permission to sit there, they don’t have a problem with me. I sat there quiet looking out to the Moroccan arid landscape ; there is beauty but it seems to me there is certain sadness in the plains, crops, low mountains, country roads; one in a while solitary figures showed up in the middle of nowhere, going to nowhere…….there is nothing around.

Half way the trip I go back to my compartment; I started talking to one of the girls. She is from Taza, but works in Tangier, she was going home for the weekend. She was westerly dressed, she seems very well educated and modern. I asked her about Morocco, about women status and life in general. She is happy to answer all my questions; as I was noticing on the street there are many women still very traditional and wearing traditional dresses, but the new generation is modern and has a choice between traditional and modern. There is still lots of pressure form society for a woman to have a certain status and behavior but this is more and more changing.

By the end of the trip we are all talking and laughing. Luckily my French and Mark’s French allows us to have a conversation. At one point the Moroccan guy offered us his business card to call him if we want to rent a place in Fez; I took his card just to be polite, but at the end of the trip he asked for his card back saying that he doesn’t want to deal with us “poor people”. I gave his card back saying “merci, ce pas grave” but in fact I wanted to say “I wouldn’t have called you big fat, cocky, stinky bastard (he was smelling really bad).

We got to Fez around 4 pm; I got off the train and I felt like I hit a wall; how I am going to survive in this heat?

We don’t have hotel reservations, so we have to look for a hotel. In Tangier we went to an Internet café and I wanted to book something on the Internet, but a room can not be booked the day before, plus as usually Mark is very impatient when I am trying to look up stuff on the Internet, so I gave up; now in this unbelievable heat I regret that I gave up and I am really mad with Mark, but I keep my mouth shout.

There are taxis in front of the rail station, but the taxi driver really wanted to rip us off by charging almost 10 times more than the correct price! so we got pissed off and decided to walk in the heat; to put it Very Mildly that was NOT fun at all. We found hotel Splendid, hotel that is recommended in Routard book. I was so happy, hotel is located in the new ville, it is nice, clean, has air conditioning and a small pool! Wow!

We settled is, showered (the shower was soooo good, I haven’t had a shower in a couple of days in the other place we barley had any hot water) and went for a walk. At this point my impressions about Morocco are about to change. Fez new ville is very nice, streets are wide, there are lots of lights, people walking around and having a good time. In the evening is still hot, but pleasant. We had dinner, went for a walk and in bed by 10 pm.

Ugh, I am tired but glad to be here! welcome to Fez to us.

Leaving Tangier

2008-06-14T18:00:00.000-07:00

We had a bad sleep; noises, the “music guy” = muezzin is on time at 3 am in the morning screams to pray; it is very loud!!! 15 minutes later it seems that we have a bonus >:-< the muezzin comes on again, hmmm is this a bonus???? because is Saturday morning and we should be grateful for the weekend????

We set the alarm clock for 7:15 am, but we forgot that the clock was still on the “French time”, therefore it was 6:15 am in Tangier. We went out to visit “Kasba” an old fortress on top of a hill that guarded the straight of Gibraltar. We walked out on the street and streets are deserted, I am happy it is for the first time we are here and we can actually walk together on the street without fighting a crowd.

We were up at Kasba overlooking the sea? or the ocean? it is a good time to meditate….

According to our book, Tangier is the place where you can swim in the Mediterranean sea in the morning and Atlantic Ocean at night.

It was a good morning; back to our hotel we finished packing , getting a taxi and going to the rail station.

Wops! when we arrived at the station we realized that is in fact 9am, not 10am as we assumed, and we had two hours to wait for the train our train departs at 11 am. Oh well, the rail station is nice and has good coffee 

Bye, bye Tangier

Tangier, day two

2008-06-13T23:00:00.000-07:00

Last night I was tired but I had a hard time falling asleep; I guess the room and the uncomfortable bed did not help. There were noises on the street, people yelling at each other (actually they are not yelling, this is the way they speak), someone running water somewhere, cats noises; at 3 am in the morning the religious guy comes on very loud, I almost felt out of my bed! should we pray now?

I was glad when the sun was out, we went for coffee. Coffee is very good here (I always order café crème), as well as patisseries and food in general; everything is almost as good as in France for a third of the price.

We went along the sea to the rail station to buy tickets to Fez; I like this part of town, there is the sea, new white building, the side walk is nice and wide.

Rail station building is surprisingly modern, it has to be brand new. We got first class tickets to Fez – 14 Euros each. It is 5 hours train ride from Tangier to Fez.

Still I am not sure how I feel about being here and Tangier; sometimes I like it sometimes not. Tangier is a mixture of old and new – this is how I see Tangier.

But mix of old and new isn’t this pretty much everywhere? do we like the old? do we like the new? how can we manage to harmoniously mix them? how do we feel about it? maybe France has the answer….

Back to Tangier…I like the old part, the medina because is old, different, interesting, it has character and originality; I don’t like it because is dirty, smelly, sometimes scary. I like the new part because is clean, functional, practical; I don’t like it because is boring.

Now we are in a hotel in the medina (the worst hotel I ever stayed in) , for Fez I guess we are going to choose a hotel in the new city and just visit the medina.

In our way to the hotel we stopped at a random restaurant to have lunch. We were lucky to find this restaurant; it had a little veranda in the back, was nice and quite, away from the chaotic city; the waiter was like from the ancient times, old and extremely polite with a soft voice. We had traditional Moroccan food which is was very good; we paid 10 Euros including the tip.

In the afternoon we went to an Internet café, check email and update blogs. We walked around some more trying to find a restaurant for dinner. The restaurant recommended by our book was closed. We walked down to the port and just picked a restaurant that serves fish. We got big portions, I had fish and Mark shrimp, but the food wasn’t really that good; well, that is ok, as per Mark “you can not hit a home run at every at bat”.

We would have liked to have a nice glass of white wine with the fish and seafood, but most restaurants don’t serve alcohol.
In France and Spain we had something to drink almost every day; since in Morocco we had one beer; I guess Morocco is a good country if you want to slow down on booze.

Well, this was the second day in Tangier; how do I feel? I am still overwhelmed and a bit freighted. There are many people on the street and I am not used to that. In the medina everything is small, there are tons of shops and people hanging out in front of the stores. We don’t want to stop anywhere because as soon as we stopped someone is trying to became “our guide”. I would like to look at some of the stores, there are lots of beautiful Moroccan dresses and outfits, but I am afraid to stop and look because then there is lots of pressure to buy something. If I was going back home maybe I will consider buying something, but I still have a long travel to do.

Coffee shops and restaurants are full of men; I feel intimidated and scared by these men. I think that they are good people, but I am not used to see a full restaurant of men just sitting, drinking tea, watching sports.

It is 11 pm an we are heading home. It seems that Tangier really comes to life at night, the streets, restaurants, parks are packed with chatty and laughing men, women and kids, everyone is having a good time.

I am glad that I choose to travel to Tangier, it is an interesting place, however I will be happy when I leave……..

Tangier, day one

2008-06-12T22:00:00.000-07:00

On Thursday morning I woke up in the room in the Continental hotel in Tangier at 7:30 am, 6:30 am Moroccan time! I was too anxious after last night’s arrival and experience.

I knew to expect all was different in Africa, but still I couldn’t notice that the room for 52 Euros in a beautiful building is not very clean, the furniture, carpet, bathroom, everything is run down. There is no soap in the bathroom and we don’t have soap.

The hotel has Wi-Fi so I was eager to check the Internet and find other accommodation and find out more about Tangier, but the Internet connection in our room wasn’t working so I had to go downstairs. I was furious because I was tired, I did not really want to get out of bed, but no choice.

I went downstairs in the lobby – the lobby is beautiful, crafted furniture, painted and tiled walls, Persian rugs.

Actually the hotel looks amazing (was build in 1870) but is run down; according to the guide book some rooms have been renovated and redecorated trying to reflorish the old charm.

I went out on the balcony, the view of the port in the morning was beautiful! wow – everything is so different that what I have seen before! ok, now I calmed down.

I checked the Internet for a bit, Mark showed up and we went for breakfast (the room price included breakfast). The breakfast room has a beautiful décor; breakfast wasn’t the best, mostly bread and I don’t really like bread , but at least had 2 good coffees.

We walked around a bit and we found a room in a hotel for 20 dollars; it is livable, but I think it is the worst room that I ever stayed in.
This is ther view from our window

Mark and I had some disagreement in Europe, however we agreed on most things. In Africa we have the accommodation disagreement. Mark wants to stay in very cheap places, I want to stay in reasonable places, that means a decent room with the bathroom. We think that Africa is cheap and I guess it is (I don’t know, I am about to find out) but here in Tangier, Morocco is not really cheap cheap if you want a decent room. Same goes with food.

We settled in the new hotel, I cleaned up the place a bit to make it more “habitable” for me. Mark is happy doesn’t matter what, except that he has to “fight” to open and close the door, the lock is very old and strange and requires lots of fiddling to open and close.

We walked in the medina, the downtown and a bit along the beach; everything in this city looks very strange to me, I feel a bit freighted, it will take a while to get used. Most women and men are wearing traditional outfits; there are some younger women wearing jeans, knee length dress and head scarf, it is a mix a tradition and modern, I am wondering if they are struggling with this issue in their daily life. I don’t know anything about Morocco but I assume that here as many countries young people want to be trendy, be themselves but also to fit in.

There is Arabic music on the street, men sitting in the cafes, 5 times a day a very loud religious music comes on and covers the city noise.

We had lunch in a restaurant downtown, I had grilled sole that was delicious.

In the afternoon we walked again in the medina and downtown. Mark got a Routard book, the French equivalent of the Lonely Planet. For whatever reason Lonely Planet was twice more expensive than the French version, but both books have pretty much same information. We went to have tea and read about Tangier, Fez and Marrakesh our next destinations. We also read about best restaurants in Tangier.

We went for a walk along Mediterranean sea; it is like walking the sea wall on English Bay, except the that are palm trees and cactus, the sea has a very blue color, women dress in robes and wearing a head scarf, people fully dress on the beach; otherwise is like back home, young couple sitting on the benches, kids playing, parents having a chat.

For dinner we went to Agadir, one of the restaurants recommended by Routard. I had chicken, couscous and a beer. Very few restaurants serve beer, so it was nice to have try a Moroccan beer that went really well with my dish.

The weather was a bit hot at noon, but bearable, pleasant in the morning and evening.
This was my first day in Africa; I don’t know yet if I like Tangier or not and what I am going to do next………

Changing continents Europe to Africa

2008-06-11T23:00:00.000-07:00

Wednesday morning we woke up in a hotel in Seville and day at night we are sleeping in a hotel in Tangier!

What a day – we woke up in the morning rush around to get a few things that Mark still needed – a lock, sunglasses, wrist watch. I brought too much stuff, but Mark should have been more proactive and get those things either from back home or from Montpellier where we were for 2 months and we had tons of time to go shopping; we both screwed up somehow in trying to prepare for the trip. It is hard to shop in a city that you don’t really know, stores that you don’t know and in a language that you don’t speak. Our little Spanish wasn’t good enough to figure out how to say lock in Spanish; finally we got everything except the wrist watch.

At 1 pm we took a taxi from the hotle to the bus stop; most of the time we would be ok for us to walk but with our language and the heat, no way! the taxi was 7 Euros and it was definitely worth it!

Bus ride from Seville to Tarifa via Cadiz was very pleseant; Spanish music in background, we were just sitting there admiring the beautiful scenery; villages and small cities all with white houses, many colorful flowers.

We arrived in Tarifa at 5:30 pm went and got tickets – 31 Euros each one way. Our ferry was supposed to depart at 7 pm it turned out that the ferry is one hour late.

We waited for the ferry at the terminal, it was interesting to watch people, only a few foreigners.

Finally the ferry arrived, we went to Spanish passport control, we got the exit stamp. My exit stamp is barely visible, the ink did not transfer on my passport!

Ferry departed at 8:10 pm, it takes 35 minutes to cross the Straight of Gibraltar. I was very excited to see the Rock of the Gibraltar and to be on the boat between the Atlantic Ocean and Mediterranean Sea.

Ferry is very nice and modern and Gibrltar crossing was very fast. As soon as we got on the ferry I noticed that a few people were lining up; I assumed that were lining up for the restaurant even though there was a cafeteria in front of us with lots of food and very few customers. When the ferry docked in Tangier, then we realized that people were lining up for passport control, and they were smart. We lined up when the ferry stopped. There was a huge line up and only one Moroccan customs officer. It took 2 hours for us to go through customs and get off the boat. In the mean time there are many arguments between people because some people were trying to get in front of the line. The arguments were in different languages, Spanish, French and Arabic, so it was quite interesting for us to watch.

We finally made it off the boat at 10:30 pm Spain time, and 8:30 pm Moroccan time. I am glad that I got a good customs stamp on my passport (la passport ete tamponee)

It was already dark and we have to walk to the city and find a hotel. I was walking behind Mark just looking in front of me. I was overwhelmed!!! no book could have prepare me for the shock of walking on the streets on Tangier. I was scared….

We had to find a hotel, but as it was dark and I wasn’t sure of the hotels, so I choose a hotel that I read about it on the internet. This hotel is very expensive for Morocco, it is about 50 Euros. Mark is not happy about it, yes I know that I did not make the best decision, but at the time I did not know any better, I was tired and scared, I just wanted to be in a better place. Tomorrow we will look for an other hotel.

This was my first day in Africa, absolute overwhelming! I was glad we had some water, none of us wants to go out in the medina!

Visiting Seville

2008-06-10T23:45:00.000-07:00

I was in Seville nine years ago when I was on a Spain and Portugal tour. I still remember a few places in town, I am happy to be back here.
Seville is one of the most beautiful places that I have visited: cathedrals, churches, monuments, architecture, colorful terracottas, tiles, verandas, streets, orange trees, olive trees, terasasas, tapas, sangria, fashion, people……

We were in Seville for three days, we walked pretty much every where in the city; I never cease to wonder every time I walked by the Holy Cathedral Church of Seville, Girolda Tower and the main Plaza.

At night Seville is beautifully illuminated, I could keep walking for ever just to look at the building and lights.

We eat out every evening, always tapas and Sangria. I could eat lots of tapas and drink lots of Sangria, we had to use our common sense to stop eating and drinking. We promised that when we go home in the summer we will have many Sangrias :)

In France as well as in Spain I was impressed by the variety of yogurts and dairy desserts that are available in grocery stores. We have yogurts, but the variety here is much greater; and we don’t have these kind of dairy desserts made by Danone, Nestle, like puddings, chocolate toffees, custards, truffles, tiramisu. Today we had a very yummy desert lemon ice cream in an actual lemon.

Tomorrow we are off to Morocco. It is going to be interesting…….hmmm, not sure how I feel, a bit scared, worried but also curios and ready for a new experience.

We bought the tickets from Seville to Tarifa 16 Euros one way.

Last day in Paris and arrival in Seville

2008-06-07T23:30:00.000-07:00

We had to be at the Orly airport at 1:15pm. We took advantage of the time that we had in the morning and we went to visit Montmartre and Sacre Coeur church. At 10 am in the morning the street and the church are filled with tourists. We visited the church but it hard to enjoy the visit with so many people around. I forgot my camera at home, I don’t have any pictures, oh well…..

At noon we were heading to the airport; we took the subway, a suburb train and the train to the airport. I am just following Mark, I am so glad that he understands and knows how to read the subway and train map, I don’t think that I will have made it to the airport on my own; what I am going to do when I will start travelling on my own?

Airport is packed, long line up to check in; we are flying Easy Jet one of those European budget airline. Flying from Paris to Madrid is cheaper than talking the train; there is weight restriction for the luggage, 20 kilo per luggage. Our luggage are heavy, we have no idea how heavy is 20 kilos, Mark is worried about the weight. It is very expensive to pay for the extra weight. Finally we checked in and we were relived that our luggage were under 20 kilos, Mark’s was 11 and mine was 14 kilos.

There are no seats assigned on the plane, there was an alphabetical system, boarding A,B and SA, SB. Because there is no seating assigned and it is hard to understand what they are saying on the loud speaker in all the languages, everyone is crowed and trying to get first on the plane . I understood that letter B is boarding, we were letter B but this French man is snapping at me to wait my turn! hmmm, so much for the French politesse….on top of that despite the luggage restriction that we took vey seriously, one very small carry on, most passengers have huge carry ons.

The flight from Paris to Madrid is only one hour and 40 minutes, I am thinking if I ever have a chance to leave in Paris I could come to Madrid for the weekend!

We arrived in Madrid at 5pm; as both of us have been to Madrid before, and we don’t want to be bother to find a hotel and carry the luggage around, we decided to go straight to Seville. I have visited Seville many years ago, Mark never been to Seville.

The bus to Seville is at 10 pm arriving Seville at 4am. We figured that we can sleep on the bus and find accommodation when we arrive in Seville. The bus is almost full (what is what Spanish people travelling at night – maybe because is cooler???) anyway we barely sleep in the bus. We arrived in Seville at 4am the town is asleep, but there are quite a few young people on the street trying to get home from the bars. Some of these guys are actually quite noisy, the police cars are making rounds.
We have to wait until something is going to open. First we are tying to rest on the bench but smells quite bad around, we found a this stage and I was trying to sleep. Security guy comes around and very nicely he said that unfortunately we can not sleep on the stage – go figure :)

We decided that it would be better to walk around and get an idea of what hotel we can get. We put the luggage in the locker and here we are 5am waking in the “Centro” of Seville. It is beautiful and it is pleasantly warm, but I am so tired by 8am I feel that I will pass out. Luckily we found a coffee shop it is the only shop open at 8 am. It seems that in Seville on a Sunday even coffee shops open really late or not open at all.

We had coffee and croissants and we feel better. We walked around and we found a hotel! woohho! life is beautiful!

Hotel is simple, nice an clean, air conditioner! We had a nap, uh we are soooo tired.

Got up at 6pm went for a walk and well deserved Spanish dinner Paella and Sangria.

Welcome to Seville to us!

Presque the dernier jour in Paris

2008-06-06T23:30:00.000-07:00

I simply can’t believe how fast the time went by!!! We were in Paris for a week, tomorrow we have to leave for Madrid and further to Seville and Morocco. We have to pack again, ugh….I have too much stuff, I really wanted to pack light but it seems that in fact I packed all possible outfits for a trip around the world – silly me! I read the Nomad Traveler, find it very useful but I have not learned anything! Well I guess now I am learning the hard way, I have to lug all my stupid outfits to Africa.

Morning was all about packing and organizing. Mark went to the post office by himself and ask how much it will cost to send a parcel to US. He came home very happy that he had a very interesting conversation in French with a ‘postal’ lady there and his parcel will cost only 13 Euros. We packed some stuff and went back to the post office to send the parcels. It turned out that Mark’s parcel cost 38 Euros not 13; the lady understood that Mark wants to send only a book not a parcel, this is why the difference. I would advise Mark not to negotiate the stock market in French, as French is not his forte. 

With all this packing we were hungry; we had a bit of food left over, so we cooked a nice, simple meal with couscous, lentils and tomatoes(we are by now experts in couscous). We also decided to have some dessert for lunch, so Mark graciously offered to go to the patisserie; Mark come home with the cakes, however he emphasized that he was extremely brave to have to ask in front of the French people for Mille Feuille and Religious ! I laugh my head off, for the life out of him Mark can not pronounce Mille Feuille and every time he is tying to say it I can’t stop laughing………..after all what can we expect from an American Geek speaking Frenc:)

In the evening we were meeting Philippe and Malika for dinner.

I decided to walk from our place to Philippe, it is about an hour and a half walk, crossing Champs Elysses and by the Arc de Triumph. In my way to Philippe I got a bit lost, but that was good, I discover a few more beautiful streets and places. I walked on Rue Montaigne, and I came across Canadian Embassy; along this street are many exclusive expensive brands stores like Cartier, Gucci, Chanel, Valentino and so on, beautiful hotels and apartments. I looked at the people coming out of these apartments and stores and I wished I was one of them. All of the sudden I wanted to be rich, why wasn’t I born in a rich family???

Back to real life I was grateful just for being in Paris and being able to do what I do. I met Mark, Philippe, and Malika and headed out for dinner. Malika took us to one of the trendiest places in Paris, the 20 arrondissement. It is kind of a Yale Town, but the buildings are old, crowd is mostly young professionals where everything goes, it is a very busy place. There are tons of restaurants and coffee shops and they are all full; there were many people on the street smoking and drinking in front of the restaurants, hey if the French can not smoke inside anymore they are now taking the drinks on the street.

Malika had a restaurant in mind but it was booked for a private function; she suggested as an alternative a Moroccan restaurant and we ended up having dinner there; the food was awesome! I had lamb with artichokes, peas, other vegetables, everything cooked in a earth ware, it was very delicious.
This is us, we are about to eat and we are happy!

We finished dinner and we went for a drink; we talked and laugh and talked in sometimes very bad English and French, we had a great time. We are so happy to have Philippe and Malika as friends, they are both very special people. It was 2 am in the morning when we had to say good bye. I will miss them both and of course I miss Paris :(

Visting Paris

2008-06-05T22:00:00.000-07:00

We have been in Paris for four days now; we walked everywhere to try to see as much as possible, La Place Concorde, Vendome, Montparnasse, Quartier Latine, along de La Seine, Jardin de Tuilerries, Luxembourg…..and many otheres. I would like to be able to live here for a year to have a chance to really visit these places, to slow down and enjoy the beauty, the pulse, the feeling of this amazing city……

We visited Le Louvre and Versailles. I think of both places like a day trip; it is good to get there early and spend the whole day; they are huge, there is so much to see, it is overwhelming. Le Louvre ticket is 9 Euros and Versailles is 21.65 Euros including the return trip by train from Paris.

Apparently in Paris it is not the full tourist season yet, but to me there are already too many tourists; I don’t even want to think of Paris and the museums, gardens, streets in full tourist season.

In Le Louvre and Versailles there are tons of tourists, and they are taking far too many pictures, it gets really annoying, cameras are snapping pictures everywhere; we noticed some people don’t even look at the paintings or sculptures, they just take a picture and move on. In the museum store one can buy beautiful picture albums; I think would be much better and helpful to the museum, the artists and everyone’s enjoyment if tourists wouldn’t take any pictures and buy the album at the end of the visit.

I was telling Mark that if I was the “director” of the museums I will add 20 Euros to the ticket price for the right to take pictures in the museums; there are already some museums that charge for the picture taken and we money talks it seems that all of the sudden people become more “considerate”.

We snapped only two pictures as souvenirs.
This is La Louvre

This is Versailles

Mark and I are thinking what can we do to have lots of money so we can live here for a while; did I mention that Paris is one of the most beautiful but also most expensive place to be……….

Arriving in Paris

2008-06-01T23:00:00.000-07:00

We arrived in Paris at Gare de Lyon at 5pm.

Two metros, going up and down the stairs (no escalators, no elevators, the French have lots of caching up to do when it comes to making easier to take the metro with luggage or people with disabilities, we are at our apartment in Place de Clichy. We rented the apartment on the Internet. The owner is waiting for us, we go up, this is our little apartment for a week in Paris; not bad at all….

This is the view from the window.

We left our luggage (why do I still have sooo much stuff?) and went over to Philippe place. Wow Paris!!!! this city is being described, photographed, it is the most city visited in the world! how can I describe the feeling that I have being here? for now I am just overwhelmed.

Philippe took us to an interesting restaurant close to his place; the restaurant has 3 open floors, we are on the second floor, we can look up and down at the other floor. The ceiling is open, there is a glass roof that closes only when it rains or very cold. There are many flowers and many paintings on the walls. There are lots of people, no wonder food is very French and very good! It was after 9 pm and I was eating; at home I never eat after 9pm, hmmm…my French vacation is changing everything.

This was our first day in Paris; we got home almost at midnight, we are tired.

Leaving Montpellier

2008-05-31T23:00:00.000-07:00

Today May 31 was our last day in Montpellier. We got up early morning again and did last minute stuff; a bit of cleaning, packing, getting everything ready.
As we lived in a student residence at the end of your stay there is an inspection for the rooms; at 10 am the receptionist came up for room inspection.

Everything was in order and clean, we got our deposit back, woohoo!

Our friend Claudine came to pick us up from the residence. We haven’t seen Claudine in a long time, her father is very sick and she is being very busy taking care of him and family. It is an extremely difficult situation for her. She would have like to meet us more often during our stay but that was impossible; likewise we would have loved to see her and her daughter Aurore more often. We met Claudine and her daughter at French American centre very soon after we arrived in Montpellier.

Claudine invited us for lunch in her place; first we stopped at the bakery to pick up some quiche, octopus pie, zucchini pastry, and sweets: mille feuille, chocolate éclair, strawberry tart, baba du rum.

We had a wonderful lunch, the food was yummy, we chatted and chatted, time goes by toooo fast, it is so good to see Claudine and have a chance to say good bye.

Last moment chat in Claudine’s garden. I love the flowers and the olive tree.

She drove us to la gare; this is out TGV, the fast train to Paris!!! Our luggage are very heavy…ugh….we still have to carry those from gare de Lyon to our apartment in Paris.

Leaving Montpellier in the train, I have mix feelings; I am sad that I have to leave here, I had a great time, met wonderful people and I made friends; but I am also ready to leave, looking forward to spend time in Paris and new places…..

I am definitely a wimp when it comes to say good bye, Mark and I just sitting in the train looking a the French country side while the tgv speeds up.

Presque the dernière jour in Montpellier

2008-05-30T14:31:00.000-07:00

Last night I could not sleep very well (usually I sleep like a log). I am anxious! Got up in the morning, start to clean and pack. I have some stuff to give away, some food. Everyone who really knows me, understands that I hate to waste food or anything for that matter, so I am trying to find people to give food and a few things that we have to leave here.

Also in my last day, I really want to go biking, go and see places that I love. I got on my bike, I biked to the sea, Montpellier to Carnon, Carnon to Palavas and back to Montpellier. On my way back I biked really fast because I was running late and I was supposed to meet Mark at Claudine’s place and return the bike. At one intersection I stopped suddenly (don’t know why) and I flew over the handle bars.
I was lying in the middle of the street; there was a car behind me, I could see the lady was more scared than I was (well, I guess is not fun to have a cyclist that falls in front of the car). She and another lady got out of the car and ask if I need help. In my broken French I explained that I just needed some time to recover and get over the pain, but I am OK. To be honest when I fell in a split of she second I had this vision of me laying with my leg up in the French hospital. I got back on my bike, and biked as fast as possible to meet Mark. Uh, I was in pain.

This is my hurt knee...ouch

This is me laying in bed at the end of the day….I am tired, tomorrow is the last day, we are leaving to Paris.

Wandering in Montpellier and starting to say au revoir

2008-05-30T00:14:00.000-07:00

Living in Montpellier for almost 3 month we feel pretty much “at home”. We know our neighborhood and downtown really well. When I walk on street and browse in the store people always address me in French, which make me think that I look really French, especially now that I have very short hair :)

It come to my mind that we don’t like to move and change places because it is so dam hard – emotionally! like it or not you get attached to new friends, place, city, street, coffee shops, bookstores, churches.

My last days here I am wandering kind of aimlessly in the city; we done lots, but I feel that I should have done more and spend more time in places. I love Book In Bar, I should have spend more time there!

Yesterday Mark and I went to have coffee by our favorite church; it is his favorite church and also mine.

We went to this church for a Mozart concert in the evening, and it was beautiful, the music has such a good acoustic in the church. I stopped at this church several times in my walks. It is something about this church that I like: I am not religious at all, but somehow in this church I can sit still and meditate a bit….I told Mark the other day that as I was sitting in the church one day a light came to my mind…Mark was teasing me…”was the light Jesus?” no, just kind of a peaceful feeling that I am OK, and the fact that I am here so far from home and I am not sure where I am going next is OK too….

Yesterday night we also had dinner in the centre de la ville, in a nice restaurant. Since we moved here, we eat mostly at home, so we decided that before we leave here we deserve a nice dinner. I would compare Montpellier prices with Vancouver prices, it is just the exchange rate that makes everything here expensive; a euro is 1.6 dollar or sometimes even more.

The restaurant, the food, the waiter – everything was very good; I had caviar de aubergines, blanquettes du veau and creme brulee. It was a great evening….I can say that just by looking at my big grin. (this pictures was taken by putting the camera on the water bottle, so Mark head is sticking out from the other side of the table and the umbrella).

After dinner we went to see a free concert in pleine air at the Esplanade d'Europe. There were tons of people there, the event and the crowds reminded me of the Fire Works envenings from back home.

We walked slowly at home enjoying the evening....
Hmmm....one more picture in the Place the La Comdie at night and the Opera in the backround.

Last week in Montpellier

2008-05-26T22:12:00.000-07:00

We have been in Montpellier for a little bit more than two months. Why and how did we get to live in Montpellier? Well first we want to live in France for a bit, Mark wanted to learn French and I just want to live life in South France. I have been travelling in France twice before, but always very fast I didn’t really have the time to experience the real “la vie francaise”. But why Montpellier? We wanted a city big enough to see places, visit and to do stuff, a city close to the mountains and the sea, but yet small enough to feel comfortable, to be able to walk pretty much everywhere, to slow down and meet people. How did we find Montpellier? it is the most pathetic story, Mark and I kept looking on the Internet to find a place in France, and we were not sure where to go and one morning Mark went downstairs to do laundry and run into this guy and started chatting, Mark told him that he is heading to France in next couple of day and the guy said – you should go to Montpellier; Mark came upstairs and told me – We are going to Montpellier!

This is the Place De La Comedie, first place that we seen as we arrived at Montpellier, it is the place to see and be seen!

The Opera house is on the other side of Place de La Comedie.

Regrets? not at all….we really like Montpellier, it is everything we wanted and more. It is beautiful, old and new, comfortable to walk around, lots of coffee shops, restaurants, lots to do, concerts, art events, sports; it is close to the mountains and the Mediterranean sea. Close to the small villages and the sea resorts.

Would I consider living here? When I left Vancouver I told all my friends that I will never consider living anywhere else than Vancouver; but now I have to admit that if I could get a job I will live in Montpellier for a year, still so much to see and to do! but it is almost time to say goodbye 

Philippe's visit and Caroline's dinner

2008-05-25T23:30:00.000-07:00

Friday night my friend Philippe from Paris came to visit. I know Philippe for about 18 years; all this years we seen each other a few times, twice in Paris when I was travelling in France and stopped in Paris, and one time when Philippe came to visit Vancouver. It is one of this friendships that we both know that it will last forever, it doesn’t matter how often we have the opportunity to spend time with each other.

Where I met Philippe and how we became friends? hmmm….this is just my dear story and it is not to share.

I was very happy to see Philippe, last time was 8 years ago!
Saturday we visit Montpellier, went to see the most beautiful church in the city, cathedral Saint Pierre.

We had lunch at the Creperie de La Montagne, I had peasant galette and as dessert profiterole; too bad I didn’t take pictures, they were yummy!!!

Saturday evening we had dinner at Caroline’s place-; Chris, Cressida, Mark, Philippe and I. Caroline lives in Grand Motte in a nice house inherited from her grand mother.

We made sushi again (now that Mark and I are pros!!!) We got all the sushi ingredients, including Japanese beer to go with the sushi from an Asian supermarket just opened in St Jean de Vedas.

Cressida made chicken, Caroline a great salad, Mark and I sushi, dinner was a success; to top it up as dessert Caroline made a fruit salad to go with the six different kinds of ice-cream and sorbets! sure we had to try all the ice creams, they were all yummy, we eat lots.

On Sunday morning despite the rain Philippe and I took the train to Nimes; yes, sometime it does rain in South of France :(

We browsed dans le centre ville and visited churches.

We also visited the famous Nimes arena; arena is and it is till one of the few places in France where there are still allowed corridas. Fete de la Nimes are very popular in France.

Philippe left on Sunday night for Paris; we are going to Paris next week, so we will meet again soon.

I was tired, but what a great weekend!

Lac Salagou - my last hike with OnVaSortir group

2008-05-23T23:45:00.000-07:00

Lac Salagou - 27 km, peu denivele.

My last hike with the group is around Lac Salagou; the lake is close to Lodeve (50 km from Montepllier), the lake is one of the most beautiful places to spend a day. The best way is to go around the lake on a VTT bike (mountain bike) but also it is very nice to walk, it is just a looooooong walk, 27 km!
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The soil is red, the trees are different degrees of green, and tons of colorful flowers around, the scenery is amazing; perfume of the flowers is everywhere is the air, walking and breathing flowers perfume, what a wonderful day.

We are a group of 6 people, I got a ride from Montpellier with Laura, young and sweet French girl; 2 of the guys in the group speak English, by now I can carry one a conversation in French, but it is nice to be able to also communicate in English.

This is a mountain where are lots of love expressions – hearts, names, love declarations written by people using white rocks on the bare red soil of the mountain. It looks really pretty - red, white and in between yellow flowers, wow it is nice to see so much love….hmmm….love.

Well, we started walking at 10am it is 6 o’clock we are still walking and it seems that we are a bit lost.

Finally we arrived in a village and stopped in front of a house to ask for directions.

A man comes out of the house and my friends ask him what would be the shortest way to get around the lake and get to the our cars. It turns out that we have at least another 8 km to walk to the parking lot. I guess we looked quite tired, so the man is offering us a ride to our car. We are happy and grateful to this man, so nice of him, we were indeed tired, is has been a long day.

We get to the car and Bernard is turning on the music, he is got good music and it is loud. We danced a bit just for fun in the parking lot, they were yelling we are tourists! just to tease me.

It is was a very nice day and I had a great time! Provence is beautiful!

Les Salines - easy hike with OnVaSortir

2008-05-18T23:49:00.000-07:00

Randonnée : Les Salins
Villeneuve-lès-Maguelone (Hérault)
Durée : 5 h30
Distance : 18 km
Balisage : trait jaune

Une excursion au pays des oiseaux et du vent, entre lagunes, roselières et prés salés vous attend.

Sunday we went on a easy hike with Elisa and Chris. This hike is like a walk in Stevenson (BC) on the dikes. Beautiful scenery, farms, wineries, estuary, many colors flowers, old buildings.

We had to cross the railway tracks, trains here are fast!!! so we stopped and let the train go first 

It was very pleasant to spend the day with Elisa and Chris; Both are very nice people, we are very lucky to meet them. We walked for about 15 km, had a nice lunch that finish with Elisa’s coffee; after the hike we went to Villeneuve de Malgulone for a relaxing chat in front of cold beer.

Book In Bar

2008-05-16T13:44:00.000-07:00

Today is Friday so it is Book In Bar evening; we love Book In Bar! it is so nice to meet people and chit chat in English and French. We share stories and try to learn as much slang and funny expressions as we can.
Book In Bar is a small book store on one of the narrow streets in Montpellier centre de ville.

This evening were lots of people, "the regulars" like us Cressida, Alain, Laurent, Said, Kamir and new faces from Montpellier, Germany and Sweden.

I will Miss evenings at Book in Bar and my friends.

Sushi night in Montpellier

2008-05-15T23:40:00.000-07:00

Stef posted a sushi chez moi for 15 people on OnVaSortir ; Stef was going to Japan in next few days and he wanted to have a fun Japanese night at home. Mark and I registered right away as we were very curios to see what French people know about sushi and how sushi is in France. In Montpellier there are only a few sushi places and not very popular; it will take a while for the French to learn to like Asian food and sushi.

Stef has mentioned that if you want to help in sushi preparation to show before 8 pm; Mark and I got there around 7 pm willing to help. When we got there was only one other guy there making nigiri, and a open sushi book on the counter, it turned out that Stef never made sushi before. I offered my help which was well received. I start making sushi but it was difficult because the rice wasn’t sushi rice, vinegar was not sushi vinegar, and on top of that the rice was warm.

Well I tried my best and this is the sushi that I manage to make.
As per Mark these were the worst sushi that we ever had.

Stef was very generous in buying all the fish and everythig needed for the sushi dinner. His place is very nice, a little charming French house and interior garden that looks like nothing from outside.

People there were very nice and friendly. We brought wasabi mames and Japanese crackers, others brought wine, sake, more crackers, pina colada, and moroccon tea. We chatted in French and English and listen to some French jokes that we did not get, we had a great fun evening!

Biking from Villeneuve de Magulone to Sete

2008-05-14T10:44:00.000-07:00

Today I biked about 70 km from Villeneuve de Magulone to Sete. I met Christian in the morning, we are supposed to bike from Montpellier to Sete, but he decided that would be a really long day. On the highway there is only 25 km from Montpellier to Sete but if you bike you have to go on the biking pass and the distance is much longer.

Today was a beautiful day; we biked along the river and partially along the sea. There are many beautiful flowers everywhere and the air is charmingly perfumed.

In Sete we biked through the city, took a few pictures and head back.

Long weekends - holidays in France

2008-05-12T22:12:00.000-07:00

Since we been in Montpellier, almost for two months now, there were quite a few holidays. Only in May there were 3 holidays: May 1 = Labor Day, May 8 = V-E day Victorie 1945 (end of the World War II) and religious Ascension Day by coincidence; today May 11 = Whit Monday (Lundi de Pentecôte).
On holidays pretty much the city is shut down, almost everything is closed, all stores, restaurants, coffee shops; there are only a few coffee shops and restaurants open in the tourist area and a few odd groceries stores that will open for a few hours.

Transit trams and buses are running every hours or so, last Thursday the whole transportation system was shut down.

On holidays French people just have fun, go out and visit places, hiking, biking, out to the park, walking and pique nique (they really love picnic), are go out to concerts, museums, movies, or just hang out on the street. We were surprised to see how many events from cultural (many concerts, museums, art galleries) to sports are in Montpellier during the week and on the weekend; there is always something going on.

I like this lifestyle and the fact the stores are closed on holidays; I think that somehow this is an enhancement on life, forces people to slow down , find and enjoy different activities rather than going “shopping”. In North America the greatest past time on the weekend is shopping. If stores will be closed than people will find something else to do, read, watch movies, visit an art gallery, visit friends or new places, cook at home, or simply slow down and think…….

The holidays and the store breaks in France is a major disagreement between Mark and I; Mark opinion is that everything should be open at all times, especially groceries stores that according to Mark should be open 24 hours; Mark also think that would solve part of the unemployment problem is France is facing right now (from what we can tell there is major unemployment in France, very hard to find a job in Montpellier). I kind of agree with the unemployment part, but it has to be a better solution to solve the unemployment. On the note of holidays and time off, French people have 11 National holidays and 5 weeks paid vacation to start……….

Cote D’Azur – Visit Saint Paul De Vence

2008-05-11T23:38:00.000-07:00

An other day, an other visit, today is Saint Paul De Vence.

We have a outdoors swimming pool at the hotel and since we got here I haven’t had a chance to go for a swim; so I got up early morning and went to the “piscine”. Wow, it is nice to get up and swim. After I had my “café au lait” on the balcony looking in the little green lush garden. I love this morning and I am ready to visit a new place.

Today we visit Saint Paul De Vence, an other famous French charming artsy village. Beautiful buildings, narrow streets, statues.

In the village there are tons of art stores; paintings, sculptures, jewelries, tapestries, fabrics.

I feel so fortunate to be here and be around so much beauty!

Cote D’Azur – Visit Monaco

2008-05-10T23:45:00.000-07:00

We got up in the morning ready for our visit to Monaco.

First we have breakfast in centre de la ville cafes. Breakfast is baguette with jam, coffee, orange juice for 6 Euros, that is about 12 Canadian dollars. In Vancouver we get a really nice breakfast for the money, but hey this in Vance an old charming French village not Zen cafe in Vancouver

It took us about an hour to get to Monaco from Vance. We drove on the winding highway and after down on the narrow road. We had to go to another toll booth to enter Monaco; there are customs officer at the gates, but it seems that were just there to look around.

There was police everywhere, we were wondering if police is like this on the street every day, but soon we realized that it was the day prior to Grand Prix Historique, an event as the Grand Prix but with vintage cars racing. From up top we could see the piste and the cars.

We were really tourist for the day; visit the castle, church, watching changing of the guards (as much as we could because they were tons of tourists), browse numerous gardens with flowers and statues, browse the narrow street packed with coffee shops, restaurants and souvenirs shops.

Did I like Monaco? yes I did! Monaco is one of the places that I feel I had to see it in my life time. It is a beautiful city, building, gardens, streets, it is impressive, clean, rich and very touristy. Do I want to come back? not really….I am happy that I have seen it for one day.

Cote D'Azur visit - what a weekend!

2008-05-09T22:12:00.000-07:00

We left Montpellier in Friday morning with the vague idea where we are going and what we were going to see. All I knew was that we will visit Cote D’Azur, staying in Vence and visit Monaco the next day, well that was enough for me, I always wanted to see Cote D’Azur. I was in France many years ago driving up Italian and French Riviera and stopping in Monaco for a few hours, but for whatever reason I remember very little from that trip.

At 9 am Christine, Guylaine and Cathy came to pick us up, so we are 5 in Guylaine’s minivan. It is a nice day sunny with a few clouds, perfect day for driving and visiting around.

We were heading direction Cannes, Nice and Monaco- we were are in Provence, the scenery all around us is beautiful, so there is a lot of: hey look at this, fantastique, magnifique, sympa, super, I look around and smile, yes it is a scenery that makes me happy.

We stopped a few times at rest stops and could’ help to notice how expensive snacks, light meals, hot dogs, doughnuts and coffee were.

The highway is in perfect condition but there is a heafthy price to it; there are toll booths everywhere, to get from Montpellier to Vence we must have been through at least 10 of them. Every “paient” is different from 30 cents to 8 Euros, sure enough by the end of the trip the cost of gas and all the toll both doesn’t make travelling in France cheap at all.

After about 5 hours we arrived at our hotel in Vance; hotel Floreal it is a family run hotel, but somehow part of the Best Western chain. To me looks like a old charming small French hotel, I like the name of Floreal and ignore the Best Western part.

After we check in we drive to Tourettes sur Loup a small charming French village. First we had lunch in a Creperie, yummy I really like the crepes. I had “gallette avec de legumes”, that is a buckwheat crêpe with vegetables, eggplants, zucchini, red peppers.

Pictures are better than words, I took lots of pictures, Tourettes sur Loup is beautiful, no wonder there were and they are so many artists that want to paint in Provence; everything pleases the eye and makes the heart happy: buildings, walls, rocks, art shops, flowers, views, smells…….

Our next visit is up the mountain on the very winding and narrow road : a waterfall, Cascade du Saut du Loup.
There is a rainbow on the waterfall:;The vegetation around is different than in Canada.

Back on the winding road this time we are driving up to the top of the mountain where according to the signs there is the most beautiful village in Provence: Gourdon.
As we arrived there yes, we have to admit this village is beautiful. It is indeed build on top of the mountain, views are amazing and the village itself is like out of the story book. Many art stores, many stores that sell all kind of local delicately, church, cathedral and museums, it is so pleasant to browse around.

We stopped for coffee (stopping for a French coffee when you visit is a must) to have time to inhale the beauty of the village and the natural surroundings.

Mount Aigoual - hike with OnVaSortir group

2008-05-04T23:28:00.000-07:00

I was waiting for this HIKE - Mount Aigoual!!! it is 1567m high, a few kilometers from the Mediterranean Sea, in Cevennes Park, one of the most beautiful parks in the region, it is a dream destination…

For this hike I got up at 6:30 am, met Chris at 7:30 am and met the group at 10 in Valleraugue. This village is about one hour and half drive from Montpellier, I got a ride with Chris. It is a beautiful morning, sky is perfectly blue, very few cars on the road, the scenery is breathtaking, it is definite worth it to get up early.

We were a group of 8 people, it is a 9 hours hike, it seems that not too many people are keen to do it. But everyone in our group was determined and looking forward to the hike.

The trail starts in the village by a sign “4000 Marches=stairs”; and the trail goes up and up with very little flats.

I feel like I am doing the “Grouse Grind” in France. We take very few breaks and we keep going. It takes us about 3 hours to get up to the top. The trail is beautiful, the views from the top are amazing, after all it doesn’t feel that hard because we are surrounded by so much beauty.

At the top we find a good spot with almost 360 degrees view and we have our picnic; fresh bread from Cevennes, sausages, home made pizza, cheese, dessert and of course wine.

We are laying there is the grass on top of this amazing mountain – hey, why go anywhere :)

But it is getting late in the afternoon and we have to get up and go; we have 4 hours of descent.

Going down we are taking a different trail, the hike is a “boucle=loop”. The trail is mostly switchbacks, it is not too difficult to hike down; but it is a long way down.

We are almost back to the village, we passed through some farms with charming old houses, surrounded by beautiful gardens exploding of spring flowers, yellow, red, violet, blue, and fruit trees; and above all and everywhere is the dominant fresh vibrant green; this place is so idyllic, it almost feels surreal, I am walking and looking around as in a dream.

We are back to village centre---we hiked Mount Aigoual, it feels like a victory. We are tired, dirty, sweaty and happy, what a great feeling!

We end up the day by having drinks at the local restaurant. My French friends are giggling and laughing I understand that they have a good time, so did I even though I understood half of the conversation. It is difficult to understand jokes in a foreign language especially after 9 hours hike.
Got home at 10pm, Mark was waiting for me with dinner! Did I mention how important is to have a good friend……..

La Mount Baudille - hike with OnVaSortir

2008-04-29T23:24:00.000-07:00

LE MONT SAINT BAUDILLE
Point culminant du Larzac méridional (848 metres)
Un des plus beaux panoramas du Languedoc Mediterranéen
11km - 545m de dénivelé - 4 heures de marche + pauses

Vous l'avez surement repéré de nombreuses fois lors de randos ou de balades dominicales car le Mont Saint Baudille est dominé par un imposant emetteur régional de télévision (les chaines dites "de montpellier" vous parviennent par cet emetteur). C'est dire le dégagement qu'il propose: pour les ondes mais aussi pour la vue (table d'orientation au sommet).

Tuesday we went hiking again. So far I think that we have hiked more around Montpellier than any other Monteplliarian 

It is a Tuesday (people are working) so we are only 5: Jacques the leader, Christine, Maggie, Mark and I.
This is our leader Jacques, finally took a picture of him:

This hike starts a bit farther than Guilleme Le Dessert. To get there Jacques is driving on this mountain very narrow winding road. There is lot of twisting and turning, lots of blind spots. I am worried that if a car is coming the other way there will be a head on coalition; Jacques is very confident and he is driving rather fast on this road. Fortunately there is very little traffic, only 2 cars are coming from the opposite directions and miraculously it seems that 2 cars somehow managed to fit and pass by each other on this narrow road.

We start hiking up and the views are getting better and better. It is a clear day, soon we see below the entire valley, and as far as Sete, Mediterranean Sea and the Pyrenees.

It is nice to have a small group, there is no one around but us. We can enjoy the views, the mountain and the quietness of the surroundings. Actually we enjoyed the quietness for a very little time because in our group there is Christine. Christine is very talkative and funny. She keeps chatting with Maggie and Jacques. She speaks very fast, we understand very little but I like her talking, her voice, the tone and French accent is like a music to me.

We made it up to the top in no time; on top it is windy again, it is a hot day but the wind is very cold.

We find a sheltered place to have lunch. We eat our lunches and I take out the dessert to share. To my surprise my French friends are ready to go, usually we take a long time for lunch, have coffee, dessert and so on. After a while I understand it is too cold to eat up here, we will have dessert down below where is warm.

We stopped for dessert on the padded green grass with beautiful little colorful wild flowers; then the cookies, cake, coffee are savored. We have a good time telling jokes and laughing of translations and misunderstandings.

Our car was parked by a Fromagerie = cheese farm; if the fromageie is right there how can we leave the place without checking it out. There is none around, we had to ring and a lady owner showed up. She let us sample the cheese and showed us where the cheese is kept and how. We liked the cheese, we all bought little rounds fresh cheese right from the source.

In our way home we decided that one can not have cheese without wine; next stop at the Wine Co-op degustation centre. The host is very welcoming, he seems quit proud of the wines that he is selling; he is trying his best to explain in English about the wineries, the uniqueness of the soil (the limestone from the north but the dryness from the south), and the wines.

We got to test a few wines, I was getting almost tipsy.

Mark and I got 3 bottle of wines, one white and two reds.

We have learned savoir vivre; we need only the French baguette, hmmm actually the baguette as we are in France………..

ps: how we call French onion soup in France? Onion soup 

Soubes - hike with OnVaSortir

2008-04-27T23:29:00.000-07:00

Soubes
A partir de Soubès, passer par le sentier botanique puis l'ancienne route du sel pour atteindre les contreforts du plateau d Larzac. Cette rando offre un point de vue unique sur le Cirque du Bout du Monde.
A découvrir : village médiéval de Soubès, dolmens, forêt domaniale de Notre-Dame de Parlatges, chemin de Camargue, point de vue sur Gourgas.
Durée : 5 h Distance : 14 km Dénivelé : 519 m Niveau : Moyen

Sunday we went hiking again. We got a ride from Montpellier to Soubes with Chantal; we were five in the car: Chantal (she lived in many places in France and her son lives in Montreal) , Stephanie (very cute, from Paris, she moved to Montpellier 8 years ago) Freddy (from Montpellier, he did not talk too much), Mark and I and Chantal’s dog; we are all in the mini van , the ride is nice and comfortable.

This is a the farthest from Montpellier we been so far. Soubes is north of Lodeve about 50 km. It is a small medieval town with narrow street mostly covers in arches street; church in the middle of the town, a castle to visit.

The hike leader is Pascal. We meet the group in the parking lot, we know only Caroline and Virgine; it is all good as soon as we start walking up we start chatting with everyone.

As the previous hikes as soon as we start going up the views are magnificent. Down below in the valley, there is a small village with brick houses, beautiful green trees, yellow, purple and red flowers everywhere. There is thyme and rosemary as well; Caroline and Chantal are picking thyme, they told me to boil the thyme in water and drink with the honey, they assure me that is delicious and good for health.

We stopped for picnic up top and Freddy is offering everyone a glass of wine; well, wine, home made cake, coffee, cookies how can one resist not to randone with the French 

Picnic was delicious, everyone always is bringing something to share.

This hike is a loop too, on the others side of the mountain is a bit different.

We came across ruins, olive tree and cherry plantations.

After the hike we went to the only restaurant is town for drinks.

St Guilhem Le Desert - La Rando des Fenestrettes - hike with OnVaSortir

2008-04-26T23:20:00.000-07:00

St Guilhem Le Desert – La rando des Fenestrettes
(10 km - 715m de dénivelé - difficulté moyenne - 3h30 de rando + pauses + visite du village médiéval de St Guilhem-Le-Desert et son abbaye)
Une balade surprenante dans le cirque de l'Infernet puis par les Fenestrettes: un étonnant chemin construit par les moines de St Guilhem, surplombant de magnifiques panoramas.

So far this is my favorite hike; the hike starts from the village St Guilhem Le Desert; this is the famous abbey.

The beginning of the trail is flat surrendered by beautiful green grass and tress; the trail climbs up gently and the higher we get the better the view.

The fenestrettes are like natural “windows” in the mountain; actually the fenestrettes are pillars to the road above that was build in 12th century when Shepherd’s were bringing sheep up and down the mountain.

We had picnic at the top, trying to find shade and nice view of the mountain.

The hike is only 10 km but very beautiful, I will come back here any time.

There were 14 people in the group, everyone very nice and friendly. As in previous groups quite a few people spoke English and we had interesting conversation about food, hiking is different places, Paris, working in Afghanistan…..

La Roc de la Vigne - Hike with On Va Sortir

2008-04-24T23:11:00.000-07:00

La Roc De La Vigne
20km - 650m de dénivelé qui méritent d'être faits
Au programme: une grotte chargée d'histoire et une vue unique sur toute la région (des Cevennes à la Montagne noire, des Alpes au monts de l'ESpinouse et au Pic Saint Loup) sans oublier la traversée d'une magnifique forêt de pins Salzman et le passage par le superbe Mas d'Estagnol

We are lucky that Jacques (the leader) is now on chomage (temporally unemployed) so he has time to organize hikes during the week. Jacques is a very nice guy, knowledgeable of the area, good organizer, and patient; he reminds me of Scott, my friend back home in Vancouver.

We carpooled from Montpellier to the trail head, about 30 km from the city. People here are really into carpooling which is good for us, mostly for 2 reasons: gas is expensive, and parking is limited, so the fewer cars the better.

The trail starts from the beginning by gradual switch back. We gain elevation quite fast and the views are amazing. The vegetation is different here, it is dry and desert, there are olive trees and others that don’t know the name of. Jacques stopped and pointed to us this very interesting tree, that has different leaves and the top and different leaves at the bottom; at the top the leaves are softer, and the bottom there are stronger and…so the leaves can not be eaten by animals. Also the leaves are harder and “glisant” on the top (the part facing up, so protects for getting to dry) and softer and moistures underneath – very interesting.

After about on hour hike we stopped to visit a “grotte” = cave. It is a fairly big cave and it is free. We needed lamps to get in, not all of us had lamps, but we all share and helped so everyone got in the cave and visit. It is a deep cave with red walls, stalactites and stalagmites. For a few minutes we decided to sit quiet, I could hear only our breathing and the water dripping on the walls. It is hard to keep quite and listen to silence….eventually someone start giggling and then it was all over with our “meditation” experience. Our group in the cave:

Back in the sun we kept climbing up; it did not take too long to make it to the top.

On top the view is magnifique and the wind is strong- hey we are on top of the world; we took tons of pictures 

We sat down below the peak a bit away from the wind to have our picnic; we all had our food, and then we start sharing our goodies. We had coffee, tea, different kind of cookies, and Swiss chocolate from Switzerland that Ramon the Swiss guy brought with him; ummm, Swiss chocolate from Switzerland taste much better that Swiss chocolate that we buy in Canada- why is that??? no idea…hope one day I will make it to Switzerland.

This hike is a loop; after picnic we continue on flat and start descending. We stopped at Estagnol – a deserted site for a short break , water and more goodies, pictures and more chit chat.

In the group there are a few people that speak English and most of people understand English a bit so conversation is always very mixed French and English.

In no time we are back to the cars – was this hike really 20 km? I guess because the hike was so scenic and company so good we had fun too much fun and the hike didn’t seem long at all.

After hike we went for refreshments to a restaurant in a small village called St Jean de Fos.

First bike ride in France

2008-04-22T23:33:00.000-07:00

I am so happy, I have a VTT = velo tout terrain, moutian bike which is very light and comfortalbe. How did I get a VTT? ? Claudine, the lady that I met at French American centre has landed me her VTT, she is very, very nice……

So today I was able to join On Va Sortir group for “moutian biking” or how they called it here VTT. This is my French bike.

We went to Villeneuve and biking around Les Salins de Villeneuve.
BALLADE VTT - A LA DECOUVERTE DES SALINS
15 kms à peine (dénivelé cumulé inexistant: 69m)
Apres les rives magnifiques des étangs de l'Arnel et de Vic, parcourrez les anciens salins appartenant au Conservatoire du littoral et découvrez un milieu d'une grande richesse ecologique.

After the bike ride we went to visit Abbey de la Magulone; at the end we had coffe in a very small village where café au lait means a very small strong coffee and a liltle bit of milk; where the we had to wait for the addtion because the patron is having a good chat with his friends 

Visiting Sete – outing with Evasion

2008-04-20T23:30:00.000-07:00

As every Sunday morning we met Evasion group at the coffee shop on Esplanade d’Europe. This Sunday we are only 7, I guess because it is a rainy and windy day. People here are used to sunshine and warm weather, today is considered cold for them. For us it is nothing unusual except the wind. I have to admit that the wind in Montpellier bother me because it comes in gusts. For example we are walking on the street, it is a bit windy and all of the sudden there is a gust of wind that almost “flips” me over – that is scary!

Anyway back to our outing; despite the weather (and hoping for the best) plan remains in place and we are heading to Sete.

Sete is a port city at 40 km from Montpellier; it is a fishery and a commercial port; it is the second port on the Mediteraeen Sea (Marseille is first) and the ninth port in France.

Our first visit was the old fishing village which is the same as many, many years ago.

It is interesting to see the old houses and the new cars parked in front of the houses, a mixture of very old and new, maintain the old but adapting and taking advantages and to the new. (I feel that everywhere is France, there is desire to keep the old , but yet to embrace the new).

After we visited the old village it is almost noon, the French really have to eat at noon. We had lunch at one of the local, non touristy restaurants. We are in a port city, then for sure we are going to eat fish and seafood. I had a fish soup which was very good and Mark ordered menu de jour with oyster, calamari and dessert “tart a pomme avec de chantilly ”. He let me taste some of his food, everything was delicious! We shared a bottle of the local French wine that I really like it as well.

After lunch we vistied George Brassens museum. George Brassens as presented by our French friends is the Bob Dylan of France. I listen to same of the songs and I liked them a lot. You have to listen to the music and understands the words to really his music. He is still very well known and loved by the French.

Second museum was Paul Valery. The exhibition was interesting, local and contemporary art, the only names I knew was Raoul Dufy.

In the meantime the weather improved quite a bit, no rain and some blue skies. We drove up the highest point in the city to visit a small church and see the city from up top; but city view wasn’t the best as still the sky wasn’t very clear.

I definitely want to come back to Sete, be a tourist for the day, visit the port, narrow streets, have a coffee et de patisserie du jour dans le centre de la ville, browse the stores…
I also want to walk up (there is a stair case )to the view point and admire the port on a sunny day. I would like to come here by bike, hope to find someone to come with, Mark is not into biking 40 km to Sete :(

First hike with “On Va Sortir” group

2008-04-16T10:30:00.000-07:00

Medium difficulty “Rando moyenne”LES FERMES CAUSSENARDES DU CAUSSE DE BLANDAS
Rando de 4h15 + pauses- Dénivelé 300m

On Friday I went hiking with the On Va sortir group (similar to meet.up hiking group); we were 10 people, Jacques was the leader. The hike is very scenic, not too much elevations, we were at the top quite fast and the view were magnificent.

This hike is a loop, we strated at one village and finish in other. (I can’ remember the name of villages)
“Le Causse du Blandas revêt un caractere particulier: d'austérité, de calme, de tranquilité mais, tout de même, de vie. De nombreuses fermes, le plus souvent abandonnées, hantent ces lieux désertés des hommes. Seuls les bovins et les ovins apprécient les pâturages chauds et secs aux alentours de vieux mas où il fait bon flâner et se reposer. Le Coulet est une des rares fermes toujours en activité dans ce coin de paradis, elle est le lieu de départ de notre randonnée.”
After the hike we went for coffee (not beer) in a village called Cirque de Navacelles; to get there we drove on this winding highway. Accroding to the tourist guide this view and village are unique in Europe. I have to come back to this place, there are numerous hikes around this area. This is the view from the coffee shop up top to the valley. The highwasy goes around the mountain, it is very impressive and beautiful.

Saint Guilhem Le Desert - Visit and short hike – Evasion outing

2008-04-13T23:30:00.000-07:00

Our third outing with Evasion on a Sunday; we met as usual at 10 am at Esplanade de Europe. We chatted a bit having coffee at one of the trendiest “resto” (restaurants) by the Lez river.

We car pool with Jonathan, a French chemist that just moved to Montpellier from Bordeaux not too long ago. Same as us Jonathan doesn’t know Montpellier that well, so is happy to explore the city and beyond. Luckily he speaks some English, also understands quite a bit, we are relieved to be with someone that we can communicate easily.

Guilhem Le Desert is about 40 km from Montpellier. It is an amazing place (it is my favorite so far); this village was founded in 804, it is one of the most picturesque places in France (according to the guide book) and it is part of the French National Classified Site.

In the middle of the village there is an abbey; the abbey was rebuild in 11th century, it is considered a masterpiece of the Romanesque art and it is included in he World Heritage of Mankind by UNESCO.
The village and the abbey is also a starting point on the pilgrimage road to Santiago de Compostella in Spain.

The village is small and very charming, narrow streets, stairs and passages, many restaurants, coffee shops, artsy boutiques, flowers…….

There are several hikes of variable difficulty starting from the village. Due to the time constraints we choose a short but very scenic hike. These are the picture of the village from the top.

Amazing mountain view from same hike.

As any other outings with Evasion we had lunch in the village; this is a picture of the resto logo. I had lamb and sheep grill, frites, and salad.; all sounds good but I wasn’t very impressed with the food……..

Pot luck party with new friends

2008-04-12T23:38:00.000-07:00

We were lucky enough to meet nice people through language exchange meetings.

Last Friday we went again (second time) to Book In Bar and we chat English-French with some people that we have already met and also some new people. At the end of the evening we got invited to a pot luck dinner at Alain (he is French from Montpellier) by Alain and Cressida from Australia living now in Montpellier; actually the pot luck was Cressida’s idea and Alain was happy to host.

Alain’s place is a one bedroom apartment with the nice view in a residential part of Montpellier. His place was 20 minutes pleasant walk from our place.
There were 10 quests, 6 from Montpellier, one British, Australian and us.

We all brought one dish, the dish was supposed to be from our country, but Mark and I agree on a American – Canadian version of a Indian - Moroccan dish: eggplant curry with couscous. All dishes were very good; I liked all of them, the aubergines caviar, meat balls with tomato sauce, curry chicken, dark bread with nuts; as dessert we had crème Brule and “oreillettes” French pastries, something like a dry doughnut.

We drank red wine and for dessert we had apple cider---everything was yummy! nous avons trop manger :)

Four of us walked home together at midnight, the night is warm and beautiful; hmmm…. I start to like Montpellier and my new friends, if I could get a job and make some Euros life would be really good here.