An early morning yet again and while I felt like shot I got up anyway for the one place I wanted to come to. Venice. We had to get the bus into Venice because it's a group of islands. Our walking tour kicked off and the history lesson, would be very easy to get lost in Venice.

Our tour ended in the main square with heaps of shops, restaurants, the bell tower, the church, the bridge of sighs and naturally the ocean.  With our free time I got pictures and some lemon sorbet before window shopping and bloody hell they have the most amazing quill shop I have ever seen! I could have bought everything.

We then all caught up for the lace show, which was a bunch of laddies telling us about lace... very boring BUT after this was our river canal ride. Was really fun, how they get the boats in some of these turns I don't know! Our guy rocked the boat freaking us all out especially Jade who was already freaked out as it was but I highly recommend it guys!

This was followed by our free afternoon where we went looking for food and I got a really yummy fat steak! I then walked around with Kylie and Chris and we saw the town square flood a little from high tide! Was kind of cool. I did some shopping and then we wandered through the maze of Venice back to the bus station and the hotel.

The rest of the night was quiet, nearly everyone did their washing and tried to find somewhere to eat, I ended up with pizza... my pizza tastes better though.

It was an 8 hour bus drive today and shitty traffic! There was some nice scenery however and our guide put on Romeo & Juliet... Baz Lerman style. I could have gone insane but having a cold meant I slept through most of it! We did stop in Verona though where we were told about the different versions of the story and went to see Juliets balcony which you can also see in Letters to Juliet. 

Verona was rather nice, least the small bit we saw was. Due to the traffic on the way we didn't get to stop and check out the shops or grab a bite to eat and the square had some great places we wanted to check out. Granted we did get to see the Arena which the Colosseum in Rome was based after. They have a lot of famous concerts, plays and shows on there each year.

The bus then headed for Venice, due to road works we spent ages trying to get to the right road as every other road was blocked... some of us, including me, got car sick.

When we eventually got to our hotel we headed for dinner which I was not impressed with to say the least. Pasta was the entrée but it was so big you'd think it was the main course!

After around 6 hours of sleep we all got up and had some food before heading to the Vatican City where we did a rather long and somewhat boring tour. While indeed there were some amazing artworks and sculptures not to mention peaceful gardens I had expected more. Even the worlds most famous artwork by Michael Angelo was a let down, but it was still good. If you can stand the history church lessons and crowds you may enjoy it. I for one hated the crowds!

Our tour ended in Saint Peters square which is huge and very beautiful I will say that much, the pillars around the square were amazing as were the sculptures upon them.

once the tour ended we all kind of did different things, for me it was finding a pharmacy as I felt awful and wanted to pass out. However some of the group came with me, mainly the singles where we did a short walk and sat down for some pasta and pizza. It was good but nothing too special. I then headed for the hotel and had a few hours sleep and watched a movie.

I was not feeling well today so I skipped the walking tour and from what I hear that was a good thing. The church I hear however was amazing. I instead hit a pharmacy and a bakery which had a yummy glazed croissant, the food is rather cheap here and really good. I rested in a park before having some gelato and reading a book, it was a relaxing morning. 

The rest of the day was spent on the bus as we headed for Rome watching, yep, Gladiator! Now I will say the landscape was pretty. Rome was not what I expected at all. We headed straight for our 3 hour walking tour, which was more a jog to me no thanks to my cold. It was sunny though and we saw all the sites. We did get to have some dinner and the potato salad was really yummy. For you coffee lovers you'll love Rome. Again I thought the city was more beautiful at night.

we later checked into our hotel which looked flash but wasn't really not to mention the staff are rather rude, apparently that's italian men and the women do nothing... I did have a nice lady the next nigh though who was helpful.

An early morning again, as I wasn't feeling well I had a croissant before our trip to Florence. I have to admit the scenery was not that nice, very simple and well dull in my opinion. We did stop by Pisa, it was packed! I got some pictures though as I don't do crowds I didn't stay long. There are some old buildings in the area to check out. You can go into the church and Pisa though the line is very long. There are some great little shops but buy from the stalls not the people walking around it's illegal. I got some gelato and then we headed for the bus and into Florence. Now the landscape picked up... but so did the pick pockets so watch out, normally they are little girls. 

After checking into our hotel Kylie headed to town while I rested, the cold sucks! We then headed for dinner taking in some sights, walking along the river. Now the food in Florence is really good especially the pasta. There are some great shops too and like several cities I find they look more beautiful at night though I wouldn't recommend walking alone.

Today was a some what sleep in day. We got up around 8:30 and met with some others before trying to find this hill that had amazing views from. Alas we got lost but we eventually found it. While Kylie and Laura went up I got picture's of the beach and went for a walk chatting to a few people from our group I crossed. Then we went down to the beach and hired out a beach chair under the shade and got waiters brining us stuff. Despite the sunscreen I had on I still got sunburnt. While the pebbles look nice they really hurt the feet and make it hard to walk on, you tend to slide around and tumble into the water and crawl out with pebbles bombarding you all the time. The water is cold at first but it gets warmer and is rather lovely. But one can not stay in the sea all day so we headed out soaked up the sun and was dry within several minutes, we had some drinks and then tried another dip later though the tide suddenly came in so we quickly left. The bank was next, some shopping in new town and then lunch in Oldtown.  The Calzone was HUGE! We then went right for gelato at Finocchio... remember that name it has over 100 flavours all from real ingredients and is so yummy! 

We summed the afternoon up with showers and a bus drive to Monaco where we saw the royal palace but I didn't think it was that great, we saw the yachts, drive  the grand pre track, went to Monti Carlo and paid 10 euro to get in...remember that. I expected more from it but the ceiling was amazing, so detailed with gold, patterns, paintings and sculptures... no photography allowed though, so we headed back to the 'cheaper' casino, had a bite to eat and chilled out before we were off to our hotel again. 

Today was another early morning where we drove more Swiss country which was stunning but  entering Italy not so much. I can't say much for the drive but even Nice was a bit of a let down. During the day it looks filthy, no thanks to the colour of the building s. However the old town is a great market place with heaps of food and shops all fresh and well priced and near the beach. We shopped for a few hours and headed for dinner. I did love the city at night, cooler weather, statues that lit up, water fountains that went off in patterns and the clubs were not so bad indeed several of us went out and hit a bar... we got to dance on tables! 

As I am currently ill I am slow posting,  we leave Venice tomorrow but I will do my best to update, Pag Island tomorrow for 2 days so I plan to do very little. 

The drive from Paris to the Swiss Alps was stunning its so green hilly and forest like, you'd think you'd gone to another planet. The town we stayed in was very nice with a bathtub! Guess where I was after our long drive. That afternoon we looked around walked up some hills even the buildings were nice. Dinner was at the hotel which I didn't like. After diner we all went shopping because we were going to the snow the next day. The day ended with us teaching the local bartender how to make cocktails.

Day 6 was even more interesting. I woke up to fog and light rain, not what you want when you go to the snow. We had a fruit breakfast and some croissants before heading to our 10 minute walk along the stream. By the time we got to our destination the drizzle had stopped and we got on our gondolas to head to the top of  mount Titlis (yes that's right) as we got on our final gondola which slowly spun inside the green turned to cloud to snow. The very top was not too bad, we hurried off and walked up 5 flights of stairs before we headed outside and got some pictures. As the wind picked up though we put our layers on and rolled the base of our jeans up before trying not to fall over. We headed across the glacier walk which we saw little glacier and more cloud. We had a snowball fight on the frosted stairs and then headed to the ice caves before warming up inside and bought some Swiss chocolate.  Some people got watches before we headed out to see snow nearly ice... no thanks to the melted snow from the sun which had come out for a few minutes.  With people falling over and the clouds building up some of us headed back down where we stopped to check out the river, falls, mountains and the lake not to mention the wild flowers.  Was utterly beautiful! It's a must see. This was followed by us heading back to the bottom and hunting for food, TIP for you all. Wait until after 1pm, everything opens food wise then and the further up towards the church you go the better the food and prices. After lunch and having walked a round the small town and headed back to the hotel where I did some washing and soaked my feet in a hot bath before watching Forest Gump.

Now that I can get this working again lets do some updates. While we all met up at the hotel and got the bus we noticed most of us were Australians. We headed for a 2 odd hour bus drive to Dover where we went and got our passports stamped and got some pictures of the famous white cliffs. Our 90minute ferry was very relaxing and that led us to our nice driver and 4 hours of country side which was like Victoria fields and NZ green hills. The entry to the city was not so nice but the city was. After check in and dinner we went on a bus tour around Paris and got some history lessons. Paris has a dark past for sure!

The next day was an early rise, french breakfast and the bus to the Louvre where I got lots of pictures and saw the ugly glass triangle! It really is terrible.  We saw a small section in 3 hours of paintings and Roman and Greek sculptures. This was followed by a long walk past the church and the opera house which was stunning inside, its a must place to go. We had lunch which was nit so great went to fauchon and got yummy treats... expensive but yummy. We hurried to our bike tour and got lost... big city with countless alleyways.  But our 3 hour tour was amazing,  got to push in front of cars and take over the street! This was followed by the best creme brulee you could ever have followed by a light drizzle, a walk to the eiffel tower and picnic dinner... yes we saw a marriage proposal! Got rained on and the me and kylie hit the tower and went to the top we saw the sunset then the city light up... it was really high up! We saw the arc de triomphe and headed back to the hotel falling asleep at 1am and still didn't see everything!

Day 1 of London was a very busy day. I did so much I can hardly remember it all. From going to Kew Gardens (Royal Botanic Gardens) for 4 odds hours of walking around. Followed by Lunch and then into a section of the city to see Saint Pauls Catherdral. Down London Tower, Tower Bridge, London Bridge, Shakespeare's place, a river cruise, went by London Eye and Parliament House. To say the least my legs were so sore I ended up with blisters!!! 

Day 2 of London Kylie arrived, I woke up to my room phone ringing to inform my she was here. We chilled for a bit, headed to Olympic Park with Rob and Alison Quick (my relativities) and walked all around there for a few hours, got into the Olympic Pool area (didn't go swimming though). We did some small shopping including getting me some new shoes that wont cause blisters, we went into Disney store where I saw some cool toys and then we headed into Earls Court. There we got pictures at the Police Box (Doctor Who Box) and went into Kingscross to say goodbye to Rob and Alison. Upon our return too E.C we had some yummy chinese food and are now about to head to our rooms to get some much needed rest before our 6am start for our Europe Trip!