Nice - Monaco - Cannes!

Well it was lovely having one Day without rain. We went to Monaco, Monte Carlo for breakfast today (crossant and coffee). Was great to catch up with the prince of Monaco- had a good chat with him and his new wife!!!
After ten minutes of arriving it rained and it's rained all day. Our thirty minute train trip to Cannes- turned out to be 90minutes after bad weather delays. We have finally found some boots- goodbye cold wet feet and chillblains.

Only one week till NYC- here's hoping things improve for those poor people. Looking forward to seeing Michelle and Sav!! Countdown is on!!!

Char & Lu.

Nice in Nice!!!

After a water logged few days we boarded the train and left Italy behind! Spent 9 hours on trains... By the time we arrived in Nice, France we were exhausted! All this traveling around (and the heavy packs) is slowly catching up with us.

We are staying at a guest house, a lady just opens her house up for visitors so it's pretty cool. Cooked our own dinner (couldn't have meat... Too expensive!! So vegetarian lasagna it was).

Spent the day today wandering around. We were going to hire scooters but they needed €800 on our credit card (and who on earth has €800!!!!!!)

Is such a nice clean safe feeling place. So pretty, is on the waterfront with a stony beach. We climbed to the top of a lookout and did some sightseeing for the afternoon.

Been whipping out our French when we can... So far we are limited to "bonjour" and "baguette"... But we are learning...

Tomorrow off to Monaco for breakfast and then to Cannes for the night.

Bonsoir xxx

Pisa

Leaving Lucca in the poring rain! We are WET!! Crossing our fingers and toes it will be sunny in Pisa....no such luck. The Dutch blood didn't allow us to pay for our packs to be in lockers at the train station... so we walked 35 minutes in pouring rain to the Leaning Tower of Pisa. We can confirm it was leaning- if it wasn't before the rain, it was now. It was wet and cold. Everyone was trying to sell us umbrellas, after we were drenched we finally purchased some (so our camera would stay dry to take a picture- didnt work) Our bags were soaked our hands numb and lips blue. It was still absolutely awesome to see!!

We arrived in Florence - more rain, but managed to hit the markets. Tomorrow we train to Milan then Nice (France). It's turned colder than cold!! Let's hope we miss the snow that's hit Southern France today. (Maybe the sun is in NYC or Canada- waiting for us)....

Char & Lu x

Bologna to Lucca

After Venice we trained to Bologna. Arriving to a big city in the dark is always a bit of fun. We spent the day shopping and catching up on some sleep. Today the rain came.....

We then went to Lucca. It's a cute town near Pisa. The town is within a circle wall. You walk in through big arches to the old town and all new industrial areas are outside the circle.
So walking again with packs in pouring rain.....hello wet cold feet. We have every warm layer on! It's 6 degrees!!!

We love Venezia

Back onto the train & bus we get to Italy- Venice. After a long walk to our accommodation ( now we are glad we haven't shopped much)- a 15kg pack feels double after a 45minute walk.
For some weird reason the little Italian man couldn't find our accommodation booking.....trying to make our English roll off our tongue like Italian, didn't help!! Then comes a "no show" piece of paper in front of our nose. Two very confused kiwis!! Next thing he points to the date........"oh we booked for yesterday?" "nooooooo"!!!!! So we paid to stay in Venice, while we slept soundly in Croatia!! Little guy wouldn't even give us discount- turns out he didn't understand our English at that point!!

We explored Venice! FULL of tourists after quiet little Croatia. We loved our day exploring Murano (glass blowing island) and Burano (colorful houses & lace making) islands.

Lesson #1 it's important to keep track of the date/day when traveling.

Char & Lu x