Bratislava, Slovakia

Crazy weather

The weather everywhere is certainly a laugh. In the first photo I am enjoying a sunny day walking around Bournemouth beach and the following week everything's frozen.

Checking out the scenes

In Bristol on a sunny day; walking around Paris and taking a coffee break in Bratislava.

Castles, cities and rivers

This blog features various places throughout Europe.

At the top is the stunning Bratislava Castle.
Vienna: Swarovski Crystal: This wall is very beautiful. It would be great to have a wall like this in the bath.
The Spanish Riding School Winter Riding Arena for Lipizzan Stallions.
Typical Viennese street scenes.
Prague over looking Vltava River.
A street of pubs near Temple Bar in Dublin, Dublin Castle and a beautiful red brick building across the street from St. Patrick’s Cathedral.

Okay I'm doing it! Istanbul

Yes this blog is titled Travelling in Europe but since Turkey is a bit here and in Asia I'll just add this blog.

Decided I will go ahead and take the one week holiday to Istanbul. Found a pretty good deal on a flight through KLM and will stay at a hotel in the Sultanahmet. This time I am going alone. I was a bit apprehensive about doing so but I have heard a few females claim to have know problems travelling in Turkey alone and that it's probably easier than being in London or the US.
I am glad the area I am going to is near all the touristy places that I wnat to visit like the Blue Mosque, the Grand Bazaar, Egyptian Bazaar, Hagia Sophia Museum and Topkapi Museum. Maybe even visit a Turkish bath.

I hoping to buy some really nice gold at the bazaar and hopefully do a good bargain.

Amsterdam, Netherlands

We stayed at the Best Western Blue Tower. It was about three or four miles from the city centre but at least we got it at a very good deal and it was in a quite area. The place was easier to find that what we had expected. Trams and buses right out front.

Amsterdam is one of my favourite places to visit. We went last year during the Queen’s Day celebrations. It was one big evening long celebration in the street. It’s quite a thing to see people actually openly smoking weed and hookers selling in the windows of the Red Light District. Not that I would participate but it is an amazing site.
Ade and I hung out in a pub and talked to the Canadian barmaid and other tourists. We had a good time being in the mix of things and trying to get back to the hotel very late at night.
General walking around was fun. Watch out for the bikes and there are loads of them.
We took a boat tour around the city. The architecture of this city is different but some of those old farm house style homes are really pretty.

The Keukenhof Gardens- about 80 acres of extreme beauty. This place is bliss. You could spend much of a day walking around this place. It’s very busy but you will love it. There are tulips and other types of flowers everywhere.
Rijksmuseum-we missed this one because of the confusion of where we were to collect out tickets for tours. But definitely next time.

I’d go return tomorrow if I could-Amsterdam is a lot of fun.

Dublin, Ireland

Dublin was fun but I think it would have been enjoyed better if I had gone with someone else. Being alone was an advantage at times but sometimes it wasn't. It's easy to spend loads of time in a museum if you want to if there's no one else with you. The National Gallery is lovely. It's not as large as the one in London but they have a magnificent collection of art. The National Museum of Ireland behind the National Gallery is quite interesting as well.
Other places I visited whilst in Dublin included Temple Bar area, Trinity College/Merrion Sq. and its beautiful grounds and the areas around it; O'Connell St., a few pubs, St. Patrick's Cathedral(I hope the one in NYC is more impressive) and a few other Catholic churches. I happened to find Whitefriar's Church where the remains of St. Valentine's to be far more impressive than St. Pat's which was a bit dull. Yeah yeah yeah it's a church-so what!
Dublin is a pretty city but at times not so well sign posted places made it very uneasy to sightsee.
Stayed at the Townhouse.

Vienna, Austria

Even though I wasn't at first sure of Vienna I was glad Adrian took me on this holiday. I really enjoyed it. At first I was concerned I wouldn't like it. What I loved about this trip is even though Vienna is different European city it wasn't too complex to get about. Unlike some places we had been you didn't have to hunt for everything. Sure you get a little lost looking for something but not all the time.
Vienna is a terrific place to visit at Christmas; the city was absolutely gorgeous with decorations and musical performances to see. The Christmas are good to see too.
Tried the Weiner Schnitzel and the Sacher Torte is very rich and tasty.

Places to see:
Imperial Palace-A beautiful palace near the city centre that holds loads of history on the Habsburg Family and the Austro-Hungarian Empire. The Spanish Riding School has an amazing breed of Lipizzan stallions. We watched the horses train and the show was great. They get a real workout.
Stephansdom Cathedral is a humongous place of worship and very peaceful and beautiful.
Next time we're in Vienna we will go to the Schonbrunn Palace--I hate we ran out of time and missed that one.
Ade and I also took a day trip over to Bratislava, Slovakia to visit the city and check out the Christmas markets there.

Bastille Day in Paris

I always love Paris--It was fabulous! Can't wait to go back. This whole trip was great. We stayed at the Starhotels Castille since we liked the one we were at in Florence. This one was on the Rue Cambon near Chanel and Herve Leger and across the street from the Ritz.
We went to the Louvre, saw the Mona Lisa and other great works of art. I need to go back to the Louvre because I am trying to find out the name of a certain painting that I am hoping to get a litho of.
Walking around this city is a lot of fun. People out walking, seeing the fashionable men and women of the city, going to cafes and shops. Must say the l'escargot is served here quite different from how I had it at home but it was still good.
On the second day we took a bus and river cruise tour, went to the Eiffel Tower but didn't go in since the queues were way too long to wait for. But we still had fun. Even that aggressive American lady telling someone she was English was funny.

Galeries Lafayette is great shop but always quite busy. I bought a few things and picked up a Tour de France shirt for my uncle who loves to ride and will one day be in it ; ))).

Our last day in the City of Lights was Bastille Day. We went to the parade and to some parks and just did more walking and looking around.

Looking forward returning soon.

My birthday in Florence

May 2007-I was very happy to take this birthday trip to Italy as it was a place I so longed to visit. That was until we arrived at the airport in Pisa, waited for a bus because trains were on strike and learned the definition of queuing Italian style. It took forever for us to be able to get on a bus that would finally get us to Florence. There is no order when it comes to queuing in Italy it seems. When the bus comes just jump on and screw the tourist who have been waiting over an hour to get on the bus before you. But we finally got there a few hours later.

Seems the prices are made up or rip off prices. Everything was either 8 euro or 20 euro. No matter how what. After awhile it became annoying and nightmarish.

Sightseeing wise we went to the Galleria dell Accademia which was great but thank goodness we did not to wait too long in the very long queue. It pays to get your tickets ordered ahead of time. Afterwards we had a nasty and expensive lunch at some rip off restaurant near the museums. Ade seems to get hungry as soon as we get near something that might be overpriced. I could have done without.
Continued on with a lot of walking and sightseeing to the Duomo, the markets, the squares and took lots of photos. Had some really good Italian ice cream---ahhh it's the best.
Adrian was really sweet and bought me a nice handbag for my birthday and took me to dinner at the restaurant at the hotel. By the way the Starhotels Florence is really nice. I would definitely go back.
Before we left we did go back to Pisa to see the Leaning Tower and some other sites but it was time to go. I loved this trip despite some of the disappointments.

Prague, Czech Republic

March 2007: The trip to Prague was very different. We did lots of walking around of to be expected. The first evening we got lost after wandering too far away from the hotel and spent a very long time trying to find our way back to the hotel before giving in to a very expensive taxi ride to the hotel which wasn't far from where we were but you know how those rip off taxi drivers in some of these places can be.
Anyways Prague has a lot of interesting sites. I have heard that it's changed a lot over the past several years.
Ade and I went to the typical tourist sites like the St. Charles Bridge, Wenceslas Square, St. Vitus Catherdal, Prague Castle and a river boat tour.
I found a very beautiful crystal and emerald necklace and earring set. They have such beautiful crystal in Prague.
Stayed at the Hotel Galileo about 3 km from the city centre. This is a really nice hotel and the best part is it being a four star at a really good price. In a quite area and near a great and inexpensive cafe LaRomantica.

We took a day trip to Dresden, Germany. It was okay but we went on a Sunday so we did not see as much. The Frauenkirche is a magnificent church. Very ornate with a huge dome. Germany was alright but like in Prague I got tired of being stared at by people whose tan wasn't much fairer than mine. I thought they were very familiar with seeing blacks especially considering the amount of black American servicemen who have been stationed there. Made me wonder how often Heidi Klum takes Seal home.