Mike D Goes to Europe!

Hey there, sports fans. Sorry I haven’t written in a few days. I have either been ludicrously busy seeing stuff or completely exhausted from being ludicrously busy seeing stuff. Since I last wrote, I have been to the Louvre, Montmartre, the Orsay gallery (note the photo below of me and my pal Vinny), Saint-Chapelle (really old church which, if I read the French brochure correctly, is a monument to comedian Dave Chapelle), the Conciergerie (prison where Marie-Antoinette was held before she was executed), some house in the burbs where a bunch of guys named Louis all used to live (see photo of me strolling through the small garden they have out back), the Arc de Triomphe (just like being in Vegas, only not as hot), and countless cafes and restaurants where the locals were surprisingly friendly. Most of the time.

Oh, and I also saw some big cool pointy building. Didn’t catch the name, but I’m including a picture.

Overall, Paris was pretty damned impressive. Despite my list above, I didn’t get a chance to see everything I wanted to see. But that’s okay. I intend to come back.

Update: here are some photos from this part of my trip:
Paris - General
The Louvre
Versailles

I arrived in Paris yesterday afternoon and I’ve barely stopped moving since I got here. After a quick (and delicious) lunch at a cafe near my hotel, I went out and saw Notre Dame, then walked around Ile St. Louis and the Latin Quarter.

My good friend Dave Schulz was kind enough to connect me with his Parisian friend Anne-Cécile. I met her and a few of her friends for an English-style tea at her apartment, which is not far from my hotel. After tea, her friends left, and she and I went for a long walk all over the city center, bringing along feisty Austin, the Jack Russell she is taking care of for a friend. We walked for a good three hours and saw so many places that I can’t possibly remember them all.

A lot of tourist destinations can be a bit anticlimactic. You go, you take a picture, you check it off your list, and you wonder what the big deal is. There is nothing anticlimactic about Paris. The place is like one giant museum. Everywhere you go, there is something beautiful and historic. I think you could live here your whole life and never see it all.

Update: here are some photos from this part of my trip:
Paris - General
Notre Dame

I’m a little behind with the entries because I have been trying to cram 4 days of sightseeing into a day and a half. Here are the highlights of my time in Provence…

Stayed in Arles. This time of year, it’s pretty empty, as Summer is the real tourist season. The lighting at night is flourescent and, on my hotel’s street, pink. That and the lack of people makes it a bit creepy at night. There is an excellent coliseum here (see photo), built by the Romans around fortysomething AD. They still use it for “bull games” (humane bull fighting). There’s also an awesome medieval church (St. Trophime) and a lot of stuff related to Van Gogh, who lived here for many years, but none of his actual paintings.

Today I day-tripped to the Pont du Gard which is a big section of a Roman aquaduct, built from 38 - 52 AD (see photo). I had an interesting adventure on the way back…

The Pont du Gard is not a real easy place to get to. I had to take two trains and two buses to get there. Upon trying to return, the bus stop was at a roundabout some 300 yards from the site’s entrance. In waiting for the bus, I was joined by an 18-ish year-old girl from Montreal, whom I had seen on the bus on the way there and around the park. We chatted briefly in a combination of broken French and broken English. Eventually (15 minutes late), the bus stopped on the opposite side of the roundabout. We waved at him and hurried to cross to the other side but he just shrugged his shoulders and drove off. Dick.

Since the next bus on the schedule was not for another 3 hours, we resolved to go back to the Pont du Gard parking lot and try to bum a ride. After a few minutes, a group of 3, clearly American, girls in their early 30’s, came walking out and I successfully negotiated passage to Avignon for my young quebecoise cohort and myself. Avignon’s not Nimes, but they have a train station, so good enough. The ladies in question, Candice, Liz, and the other one (can’t remember her name), were from Chicago, and were very kind to help us out. Thank you, ladies!

After that, got a train back to Nimes, where I was determined to see more sites. My new friend was headed that way as well, so she joined me for my quick and dirty tour of the town. I won’t go into the siteseeing details here but it was my overall impression that Nimes was a more pleasant town to see and hang out in than Arles. If I were to come back, I would want to stay there.

Around 6:00-ish, my new friend (Catherine) and I parted ways as I headed back to Arles. It was interesting and enjoyable partnership, brought on by shared hardship and a desire for two lone travellers to have a companion, if only for a few hours.

Perhaps it could be said that one has not truly travelled until they have been lost in a foreign country. It takes some resolve and resourcefulness to find your way out of such a pickle. In this case, I took advantage of a nearby hub of tourist activity, which is probably a sound general strategy. But I feel it was something of a defining moment. Hopefully future defining moments will be less stressful. But the stress is probably what makes them defining. C’est la vie.

Update: here are my photos from this part of the trip:
Arles
Pont du Gard
Nimes

So, yesterday was the longest travel day on my agenda. I left Vernazza at 10:30 and arrived in Nice at around 16:30 (or 4:30 PM for you Americans). Unfortunately, that killed most of a day for me. After settling in, I got back on the train to go to nearby Antibes for the evening, as mentioned in my previous post. That train ride was an interesting experience. Rather than the inter-city trains I had taken so far, this was more of a commuter train and it was an entirely different crowd (i.e. I was the only foreigner). On the way back, the train station was closed which, needless to say, was something of a concern. Luckily, I noticed a small sign indicating how to get directly to the platform at night. It was a bit nerveracking sitting out there in the dark with a few questionable characters, but the train did eventually come and I did make it back to Nice.

Today, I started out by visiting the Chagall museum, which was interesting, if a bit small.

In the afternoon, I walked along the Promenade des Anglais at the sea shore (see photo below), and explored the old city.

Since I arrived in France, I have surprised myself with my knowledge of the French language. I have managed to speak it almost exclusively, except when the conversation goes a little deeper and my limited vocabulary is exhausted. I even got stopped by some sort of petition-toting activist who clearly did not know that I wasn’t French (as soon as I told him, he apologized and went away). So I guess I’m doing a decent job of blending in.

Ended up having dinner at a restaurant full of English-speakers again. I’m afraid Rick Steves has a few too many avid readers, as several copies of his guidebooks could be seen on the tables there. Everywhere I go, I run into these people. I guess I’m one of them. It’s like a club. We should have a secret handshake or something.

I sat between a couple from Ireland and another from Scotland, all good folks. The adjoining tables were chock full o’ yanks. Out of all these people, I was the only one speaking French to the waiters (which clearly makes me a better person).

Tomorrow, on to Provence.

Update: here are the photos from this part of the trip: http://www.flickr.com/photos/therealmiked/sets/72157608736735176/

Hello, dear readers. I write this post from a restaurant in the Juan-Les-Pins area of Antibes, in the French riviera. At the moment, I am “benefitting” from having consumed most of a bottle of local wine by myself, so if I slur as I write this, you have only yourselves to blame for not coming with me on this trip and sharing the burden.

But enough about France. Let’s backtrack. Yesterday, I went on a hike through the five towns of the Cinque Terre. Or at least, I started to (hang on - there’s a common theme here). I started at the Eastern-most village of Riomaggiore, and met a couple from the Twin Cities - David and Gloria - on the trail with whom (even drunk, my grammar is exemplary) I had chatted briefly at the train station earlier. We ended up joining up on our walk and, as we approached the third town, Corniglia, it was noted that this town was known for its local wine (here comes the theme). It was about lunch time, so we decided we should stop and chow down and sample some of the local product. Around this time, we randomly ran into the previously mentioned Gary from Albany, who joined us as well.

Long story short - there’s a damn good reason that they’re known for their wine there. The food was excellent as well. Unfortunately, we were unable to hike to the last two towns, for wine-related reasons. But it was a really fun day nonetheless.

After a nap and an ensuing late-afternoon hangover, I met the previously mentioned Finnish girls, Kerttu and Elina, for dinner. We also ran into a couple of guys from Salt Lake City with whom we had all been talking the night before. As with the night before, we had a very fun night of eating, drinking, and stimulating international conversation. Between Gary, David and Gloria, and Kerttu and Elina, I am really fortunate to have found such good travel buddies while on the road. Here’s hoping there are more where that came from.

Oh yeah, the title of this post! I came to Europe trying to experience local life and meet local people. So far, I have pretty much only met other tourists. But so what. I’m having a great time and meeting great people. It’s hard to complain about that.

I’m including a view of Vernazza from the harbor’s walkable breakwater. Next post will be tres francais.

Update: here are the photos from this part of the trip: http://www.flickr.com/photos/therealmiked/sets/72157608739311887/

This morning I took an early train from Milan to the Cinque Terre, a group of five villages on the Italian Riviera, which is known for its unspoiled beauty and its resistance to modern life. And beautiful it is. I have a small but quaint room that looks out on the Mediterranean. I had to climb 165 steps (I counted) up narrow and winding back alleys to get to it, which can be a little challenging after a few glasses of the locally made wine. I had a nice relaxing nap this afternoon listening to the surf out my window.

This is the Europe I came to see. Unfortunately, so did everyone else. The word is definitely out about this place. It’s absolutely infested with tourists. I would guestimate a tourist-to-local ratio of at least 7-1. That’s a minor bummer, but not so bad. I met some nice Canadians, a friendly guy named Gary from Albany, and a couple of fun Finnish girls, whom I’ll be meeting again for dinner tomorrow.

Time to catch up on my sleep. Attaching a couple photos from the balcony of my room.

So, here I am in Milan, bringing you my first impressions of Europe. My initial arrival on the continent was in Frankfurt, where EVERYTHING IS IN ENGLISH. Seriously, if someone blindfolded you and dropped you off there, it would be several hours before you realized you were in another country.

After a short connecting flight to Milan’s Malpensa airport and a longer bus ride to the city center, I made my way to the Hotel Valley which is, in a word, a shithole. Whoever made this place look appealing on the web site deserves some sort of award. I believe their motto is “Taking ‘dank’ to the next level.” The desk clerk’s energy level makes “Napoleon Dynamite”’s Pedro look like Richard Simmons. I fully expect to find him in the lobby tomorrow morning swinging by a noose of his own creation.

Overall, Milan is entirely underwhelming. It could be any big city in the US or anywhere else.

The hotel’s best feature is its short distance from the train station, enabling me to get the hell outta dodge as quickly as possible, and go see the real Europe.

Update: I just wanted to clarify, for those who weren’t aware, why I came to Milan at all. It wasn’t really somewhere I wanted to visit but it was a somewhat unavoidable quirk of my schedule. My first real destination is the Cinque Terre region on the Riviera. Milan is the nearest major airport. If I had taken the train to Cinque Terre right after arriving in Milan, I wouldn’t have made it there until after midnight. And they don’t go for that in these small towns. Hence, I was forced to spend a night in Milan. Looking forward to moving on this morning.

Well, many of you had some strong feelings about me only bringing one pair of pants on my trip, most enthusiastically my mom, who was not so keen on the concept.  Thank you for sharing.

Thanks largely to the advice of my friend, former boss, and expert traveler, Mike Manning, I decided to ditch the jeans altogether, and I picked up two pairs of pants from REI this morning.  One is lightweight nylon, looks pretty decent wrinkled, and has good zip-up and button-up pockets for thwarting pickpockets.  The other pair are slightly heavier cargo pants which zip off into shorts.  They have good secure pockets as well.  Both of them claim to be quick-drying, so when I get rained on, they should be ready for action again much more quickly than the jeans would have been.

Following the Rick Steves philosophy of packing light, I am going to Europe for three weeks with nothing more than a single carry-on bag and the clothes on my back.  Below is a picture of everything I am bringing, with the exception of what I am wearing on the plane and my camera (for obvious reasons), all of it packed into the backpack at the top of the picture.

Stuff I Packed

Top row: backpack; collapsible umbrella; the pertinent pages sliced out of several guidebooks; pen.

Middle row: packing cube full of miscellaneous electronics, such as chargers, adapters, extra memory card for camera, and travel alarm clock; vacuum sealed bag of socks (six pears white, one pair black); iPhone; earphones; a few streetmaps; journal; case for glasses; a couple of phrase books (one for French, one for everyone else); one book for recreational reading; a small spiral notepad; gym shorts; packing cube full of underwear (six pairs).

Bottom row: small day pack backpack (for carrying around town while the big bag stays in the hotel room); vacuum sealed bag containing three collared shirts, one sweater and a light rain jacket; vacuum sealed bag of t-shirts (4 with stuff printed on them, 2 plain black, 1 plain white); money belt, containing passport, rail pass, driver’s license, ATM card, credit card, and cash; toiletries kit; stain remover pen; assorted pain relievers, antacids, vitamins, etc.; ear plugs; homeopathic jet lag prevention (I’ll let you know if it works); a small container of Altoids.

It might not look like much, but it feels like a lot of weight when I put it all in the bag, and put the bag on my back.  But then again, I am getting older.

A note about the vacuum bags: no, they are not to keep my clothes fresh (that’s just a bonus!).  These reusable, resealable bags allow you to compress otherwise bulky clothes into a much smaller amount of space.  Without them, I don’t think I would be able to pull off taking a single carry-on bag.

You may have noticed that there are no pants in the picture.  I went back and forth over the idea of bringing an extra pair, but I finally decided to try going with just the one pair of jeans that I will be wearing on the plain.  It’s a little risky and I may regret it, but bringing another pair seemed like it would be a lot of extra bulk for not much extra use.  Stay tuned to see if this comes back to bite me or not.

In planning for this trip, I relied heavily on the books and PBS tv show by Rick Steves. He can come off as a bit of a namby-pamby, but I think his approach to travel abroad is dead-on.  A few key points to his travel philosophy:

Travel as a temporary European.  Go see the touristy sights if that’s what interests you, but also try to get off the beaten path.  Get to know the locals in each town you visit.  Try to live a day in their shoes and get a feel for what their lives are really like.  Don’t just see Europe, experience it.

Pack light.  This means no checked bags - just what you can carry.  This allows you to get from one place to another much more quickly and easily, and saves you a lot of hassle lugging your big heavy bag over cobblestone streets.  (More on the details of what I’m packing in the next exciting installment.)

One of the best ways to change foreigners’ opinions of Americans is to go to their countries, meet them, be friendly, interested, and respectful, and leave them with a positive impression.  Rather than pretending to be Canadian, travel as an ambassador for those of us who consider ourselves enlightened, and generally pretty cool, Americans.  Let’s show the rest of the world that not all of us voted for Bush or believe that we are “spreading democracy” in Iraq.