I realize that this blog has turned into our travels outside of Taiwan more than our life in Taiwan. Oh well. Our trips are more interesting than our day-to-day life.
Greece:
I fell in love with Greece! There are not many places that I plan to go back to (mostly b/c it's expensive and why not go somewhere new?), but Greece is definitely a place I'd love to visit again. The beautiful landscape, Greek food, and the culture. We stayed with a French couchsufer who has spent the last 10 years in Athens. She said that her father was a teacher, and for the entire summer, the family would vacation in Greece. I want to do that. Yesterday I was daydreaming about spending a whole month on a remote Greek isle, where I can just sit and stare at the Mediterranean every day and drive a scooter around the island. Someday, I will do that. I love knowing that I'm only 27, and I've accomplished so many of my "somedays". It makes it easier to believe that I will accomplish this one.
France:
Paris was the most stressful part of the trip. There was SO much to see in such a little time. We saw the Eiffel Tower, Castle at Versailles, Moulin Rouge, the opera house that inspired The Phantom of the Opera, Arc de Triomphe, Louvre, Muse de Orangerie, Muse de Orsay, Notre Dame, etc.... We met up with 2 teachers that work with me at my school, and one girl's sister and brother in law. We were the ringleaders of the group, taking them here and there. While seeing some of Van Gogh's paintings, I would quickly get a glimpse and then quickly swerve out of the crowd and move on to the next. If there is one thing I've perfected while living in Taiwan, that's how to navigate in a crowd. I'm a pro.
I have two favorite memories of Paris. 1. Racing up the 284 steps of the Arc de Triomphe to see the lights on the Eiffel Tower sparkle. It's was ridiculously exhausting, passing up people left and right. We got to the top just in time to see the 3-5 minute display. 2. Spending the evening of the last day there buying ice-cream and sandwich materials and plunking down on the couch and not moving for the rest of the evening. I was SO exhausted. It felt amazing not moving.
After Paris, we visited the quaint town of Vitre. We never needed to use any French in Paris, which was somewhat surprisingly. Actually, I think we heard more obnoxious American English than French. I understand more and more why people around the world think Americans are obnoxious, many of us are. Anyways, once we got to Vitre it was kinda refreshing having to use our little French to get buy, and when I say little French, I really mean it. I barely remembered anything from my French classes as a child, but we did know all the basic fruits (strawberry, lemon, raspberry, banana, orange, blueberry, etcc..) which is incredibly important when buying French pastries. However, we did not know how to say, "Where is a grocery store?," and ended up walking for about 3 hours until we found one.
Rennes, Mont St. Michel, and St. Molo... We spent the weekend with a cute French couple who cooked galette, quiche, and tarts for us. They even took us to see St. Malo and Mont Saint Michel! We would have only been able to see one of them if it wasn't for their generousity.
Belgium:
Zach and I were both relieved to leave France behind, for a couple of reasons. Number 1 reason was for the food. We found some yummy treats, but found little in the way of food that actually filled out tummies. France was ridiculous, but the grocery stores were nice. 2. People eat so late in France. Since we're up early most days trying to get in a full day of being a tourist, we're usually quite exhausted in the evening. We did not anticipate our hosts to eat supper at 9:30 at night. I really felt like I was going to fall asleep in my food. Brussels was the change we needed. Food was everywhere! Plus, the sun started to come out. You don't realize how comforting that is until you've spent multiple days soaked in the rain trying to stay warm and dry but still wanting to see things.
Our hosts in Brussels were amazing. It felt like I was back at Grandma's house. This couple was so hospitable, feeding us until our tummies were stuffed. When she found out that we liked a certain type of spread, she went to the grocery store to buy a couple items for us. Amazing! Besides our hosts hospitalities, we enjoyed Belgium chocolate, Belgian waffles, and loads of other goodies. Brussels was a fun town to explore. By that time I was getting pretty depressed with the rain, so when it finally stopped raining, I think I would have enjoyed any place that I was in. Rain can really be depressing for me.
Holland:
I distinctively remember not feeling my legs when we arrived in Amsterdam. I felt like I had stepped outside our house in SD during the winter wearing shorts. It was ridiculously cold, and we were confused where we were going. Taiwan has really gotten us used to warmer weather. During the next couple days, we put on all our warm shirts (about 4) and huddled around through the city. I kept thinking, "If it's this cold in Holland, what's it going to be like in Iceland. The country has Ice in it's name."
Despite the cold, we really enjoyed the Netherlands. We got to watch a futbol game in an abandoned wearhouse, watch a cheese trading demonstration, visited the M C Escher museum, visited the Anne Frank house, ate frites, biked around the city, saw windmills. Ah, yes, Amsterdam was lovely. We even were able to meet up with a classmate from Union.
Iceland:
Iceland lived up to it's expectation, but surprisingly, it wasn't too much colder than Holland. We did go on a whale watching trip, and that was by far the coldest I've felt in years. After a little while, my feet went numb, and I couldn't properly walk on them, but we did see whales, dolphins, and puffins! Yay! We arrived in Iceland on their independence day. It was incredbily weird walking around the street at 1:30 am trying to find our host, and it still being light out. We ended up talking to our host until 3:00 am, which I have no idea how I even stayed awake to talk. I have never been more perpetually tired than I was in Iceland. I never got more than 4 hours of sleep.
Iceland was amazing. We didn't have much time there, but I really enjoyed it. One day we rented a car and drove out of the town to see Thingvellir and Gullfoss (Geysirs and an amazing waterfall). It was absolutely stunning. After traveling by train, cruise, plane, taxi, bus, and bicycle, it was finally nice to have our own car to drive around in and go at our own pace.
During this trip, we constantly went through eating binges where we loved all the food that a country had to offer, and then we fasted when we either didn't like the food or thought it was too expensive. France and Iceland fell into the latter category, which was probably pretty good after eating to our hearts content in the other countries. By the end I was ready to come home for home cookin' and sleep.
Greece:
I fell in love with Greece! There are not many places that I plan to go back to (mostly b/c it's expensive and why not go somewhere new?), but Greece is definitely a place I'd love to visit again. The beautiful landscape, Greek food, and the culture. We stayed with a French couchsufer who has spent the last 10 years in Athens. She said that her father was a teacher, and for the entire summer, the family would vacation in Greece. I want to do that. Yesterday I was daydreaming about spending a whole month on a remote Greek isle, where I can just sit and stare at the Mediterranean every day and drive a scooter around the island. Someday, I will do that. I love knowing that I'm only 27, and I've accomplished so many of my "somedays". It makes it easier to believe that I will accomplish this one.
We also went on a Greek Cruise! I'm now a cruise person. The cruise was AMAZING! The best part was going to all the Greek Isles. We went to Mykonos, Patmos, Rhodes, Crete, Santorini, and even part of Turkey. It was amazing being in places that we've read about in the Bible. I remember sitting in a little cafe in Patmos thinking about what it would have been like for John to be exiled here. We walked through Ephesus, and yet again, we imagined what Paul experienced as we stood in the amphitheater. Simply amazing. Then, there was the beautiful white and blue houses of Mykonos and Santorini.
France:
Paris was the most stressful part of the trip. There was SO much to see in such a little time. We saw the Eiffel Tower, Castle at Versailles, Moulin Rouge, the opera house that inspired The Phantom of the Opera, Arc de Triomphe, Louvre, Muse de Orangerie, Muse de Orsay, Notre Dame, etc.... We met up with 2 teachers that work with me at my school, and one girl's sister and brother in law. We were the ringleaders of the group, taking them here and there. While seeing some of Van Gogh's paintings, I would quickly get a glimpse and then quickly swerve out of the crowd and move on to the next. If there is one thing I've perfected while living in Taiwan, that's how to navigate in a crowd. I'm a pro.
After Paris, we visited the quaint town of Vitre. We never needed to use any French in Paris, which was somewhat surprisingly. Actually, I think we heard more obnoxious American English than French. I understand more and more why people around the world think Americans are obnoxious, many of us are. Anyways, once we got to Vitre it was kinda refreshing having to use our little French to get buy, and when I say little French, I really mean it. I barely remembered anything from my French classes as a child, but we did know all the basic fruits (strawberry, lemon, raspberry, banana, orange, blueberry, etcc..) which is incredibly important when buying French pastries. However, we did not know how to say, "Where is a grocery store?," and ended up walking for about 3 hours until we found one.
Rennes, Mont St. Michel, and St. Molo... We spent the weekend with a cute French couple who cooked galette, quiche, and tarts for us. They even took us to see St. Malo and Mont Saint Michel! We would have only been able to see one of them if it wasn't for their generousity.Belgium:
Zach and I were both relieved to leave France behind, for a couple of reasons. Number 1 reason was for the food. We found some yummy treats, but found little in the way of food that actually filled out tummies. France was ridiculous, but the grocery stores were nice. 2. People eat so late in France. Since we're up early most days trying to get in a full day of being a tourist, we're usually quite exhausted in the evening. We did not anticipate our hosts to eat supper at 9:30 at night. I really felt like I was going to fall asleep in my food. Brussels was the change we needed. Food was everywhere! Plus, the sun started to come out. You don't realize how comforting that is until you've spent multiple days soaked in the rain trying to stay warm and dry but still wanting to see things.
Our hosts in Brussels were amazing. It felt like I was back at Grandma's house. This couple was so hospitable, feeding us until our tummies were stuffed. When she found out that we liked a certain type of spread, she went to the grocery store to buy a couple items for us. Amazing! Besides our hosts hospitalities, we enjoyed Belgium chocolate, Belgian waffles, and loads of other goodies. Brussels was a fun town to explore. By that time I was getting pretty depressed with the rain, so when it finally stopped raining, I think I would have enjoyed any place that I was in. Rain can really be depressing for me.Holland:
I distinctively remember not feeling my legs when we arrived in Amsterdam. I felt like I had stepped outside our house in SD during the winter wearing shorts. It was ridiculously cold, and we were confused where we were going. Taiwan has really gotten us used to warmer weather. During the next couple days, we put on all our warm shirts (about 4) and huddled around through the city. I kept thinking, "If it's this cold in Holland, what's it going to be like in Iceland. The country has Ice in it's name."
Despite the cold, we really enjoyed the Netherlands. We got to watch a futbol game in an abandoned wearhouse, watch a cheese trading demonstration, visited the M C Escher museum, visited the Anne Frank house, ate frites, biked around the city, saw windmills. Ah, yes, Amsterdam was lovely. We even were able to meet up with a classmate from Union. 
Iceland:
Iceland lived up to it's expectation, but surprisingly, it wasn't too much colder than Holland. We did go on a whale watching trip, and that was by far the coldest I've felt in years. After a little while, my feet went numb, and I couldn't properly walk on them, but we did see whales, dolphins, and puffins! Yay! We arrived in Iceland on their independence day. It was incredbily weird walking around the street at 1:30 am trying to find our host, and it still being light out. We ended up talking to our host until 3:00 am, which I have no idea how I even stayed awake to talk. I have never been more perpetually tired than I was in Iceland. I never got more than 4 hours of sleep.
Iceland was amazing. We didn't have much time there, but I really enjoyed it. One day we rented a car and drove out of the town to see Thingvellir and Gullfoss (Geysirs and an amazing waterfall). It was absolutely stunning. After traveling by train, cruise, plane, taxi, bus, and bicycle, it was finally nice to have our own car to drive around in and go at our own pace. 
During this trip, we constantly went through eating binges where we loved all the food that a country had to offer, and then we fasted when we either didn't like the food or thought it was too expensive. France and Iceland fell into the latter category, which was probably pretty good after eating to our hearts content in the other countries. By the end I was ready to come home for home cookin' and sleep. 