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Europe '99
Paris '01
Italy '01
Countries
on this trip:
Switzerland
'02
Germany '02
Austria '02
Useful Links for Central Europe:
Coming soon!
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The Motive
Spain and Portugal were next on the list, but a train ride
from Venice to Verona lent me a glimpse of the Italian Alps. I was still
planning on Iberia, but one day in January I stumbled upon this website on
Gimmelwald, Switzerland and that changed everything. Spain and Portugal
will have to wait until 2003!
The Plan
You're supposed to get more relaxed and spontaneous after each
trip. I'm not sure what's wrong with me, but this time I was completely ridiculous...
From February until August, I read any book or webpage I could find to help me plan
this trip! It turned out to be a great thing, because I only brought parts of my guidebooks to Europe, and we had a few surprises to deal with that I was prepared for. I used Lonely Planet Central Europe, Let's Go Switzerland and Austria, and
Rick Steves Germany, Austria, and Switzerland.
The Experience
Bad things come in threes, or so they say. A car accident left us with a
totalled car and Jamie with a broken arm just a few days before our planned
departure. He wanted to postpone the trip, but I was determined to go!
While we were sleeping the night after the accident, one of our cats,
Romeo, figured out how to open the kitchen cupboard to help himself to an
entire bag of catnip, plus the plastic bags it was contained it. A kitty
emergency room visit and $200 later, we figured out the reason Romeo wasn't
eating or going to the bathroom wasn't because he ingested the plastic bag,
but rather the phobia he had with Jamie's 'Get Well Soon' balloon... And
lastly, I came down with a bad cold! I rationalized that I'd rather be
sick in Europe than at home, and that I'd get better faster in Europe! So
we were off, with very mixed feelings!
Bad things come in any combination, the more the merrier, as I now say! We
arrived to a cold and rainy Switzerland. A few days later, Central Europe
began drowning in one of the worst floods in history. Our badly needed
vacation was an "Adventure" from the very start! It was interesting to say
the least, but I'm sure glad this wasn't our honeymoon! For the first
time, we witnessed history as it was happening in Europe, instead of
hundreds of years later! We never made it to Cesky Krumlov because the
flooding was so damaging, so we continued on to Prague. We found a place
to sleep in Prague for a few hours, but the Old Town was a mess and we
couldn't get near it by car, foot, or Metro, so we flew home the next
morning, four days early.
We hope to return to the Czech Republic soon and make up what we missed! The Czech can surely use the business that tourism brings right now.
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