Galavanted Globally

The day has finally arrived; we are officially back in the motherland.  Though this might sound counterintuitive, after a year abroad, returning has been a complete culture shock thus far.  Understanding everything everyone is saying is simultaneously awesome and heinous.  You get to eavesdrop on everyones' phone conversations, though I can't say that I  particularly care to hear about the results of your uncle's colonoscopy.  Now that I'm back though, I figured I should leave you with a bit of a summarization.  After all, we've been on this journey together for a year and I feel like we need some closure.  Now, some of my friends hate it when travel writers quantify their statistics as if going to fifty countries in year makes you a better traveler than someone who lived in Russia for six months.  In general, I don't think it makes anyone an expert either way, but I happen to like numbers and stats so I guess you'll have to suffer through this one (plus it makes me look super cool):

- Number of countries visited on this trip; 24  
- Number countries I've visited in my lifetime; 33 (a lot of people want to know if I count Canada; yes, of course)
- Number of weekly-ish blogs I've posted; 53 (that's an average of 1.01923076923077 per week; you lucky dogs I've spoiled you).
- Number of books read; 41 (while not that impressive, if you consider the amount of time not reading do to debauchery and hangovers, it's a god damn miracle)
- Travel buddies that are still my friend despite spending every waking hour together for the 12 months; 1 (success!) 


Unfortunately not all statistics are quite so awesome:

- Number of time's I've packed up my backpack; 109 (yes, I actually kept track)
- Number of times we've been robbed (not including general swindlement which is to be expected on this kind of trip); 4
- Times I've pooped the bed; 1 (though this may have turned out to be a success story in the long run)
- Pounds gained; 20 (ouch)
- Debt accrued; too, too much (but it was worth it)


Since I don't have any entertaining stories from this week, unless you count the awesome 22 hour layover in Helsinki, I'd now like to impart on you some enlightening nuggets of wisdom that I've discovered on my year journey.  Oh wait, that concept is a total sham.  I still haven't even figured out the answers to the questions that I thought I'd have all the time in the world to analyze this year while I was supposed to be finding myself or whatever.  Such as, "what kind of job do I want?", "should I go back to school?" and "should I first get Pizza or Mexican food when I get back into the country?".  The solitary life skill I've picked up is how to defuse the self-important rants from other travelers when they are talking trash about the United States.  This actually happens quite frequently, especially in hostels where young, know-it-all 20 year-olds from every corner of the earth come to congregate over booze (plus, we have some shit to answer for).  To mitigate this situation, as the American all you need to do is simply challenge the person who is talking smack to a teeth competition.  Not a "smile" competition, but a contest focusing on the actual teeth.  In my experience, The United States has the best orthodontia in the world by far, because as a full blooded American, my record in this area is unblemished.  Nobody can even dispute this fact because a foreigner so rarely even comes close to having perfect teeth.  Not that this is something to hang our hats on, but it certainly does the trick to put everyone back in their places.  So the trip was not without at least some lessons.  

A lot of you (about five or so) want to know if I'm going to continue my blog now that I'm now home.  Oh hell no.  I need to get an actual paying job.  And you guys frankly need to get a life or a hobby or someone new to stalk.  I promise my normal life is seriously less entertaining, "so this really cool thing happened in my cubicle today".  Yeah, let me know if you ever want to hear about deductibles or umbrella liability and I'll send you a personal email for you to gouge your eyes out to, but I won't be subjecting the masses to that kind of punishment.  Perhaps after I secure employment I might even get a phone again.  The transition from the hobo life is a gradual process, but when that happens call me, maybe.  

What fresh faced travelers looked like a year ago

Spain in My Ass

Since leaving France, Kelly and I have spent our remaining days of freedom (aka unemployment) in Spain between San Sebastian, Bilbao and Valencia.  This dwindling time has been spent on sandy beaches, drinking sangria and mostly doing nothing in general.  I was surprised, however, at the varying ideas of what 'Sangria' is, even in Spain.  In one bar you'd simply get fruit filled wine, while at the very next bar the bartender would mix a bottle of Smirnoff Ice, some orange Fanta and top it off with a splash of red wine.  Sick.  I'm not even ashamed to say I drank it.  Certainly it will not be the worst thing I've put in my mouth this year (insert dirty joke here...pervs).  Plus, at the end of a long unemployed year you won't find me throwing away a drink, especially when paying with the Euro.  

All of this inactivity has all been in preparation for the crescendo of this trip: La Tomatina.  Tomatina has been on my bucket list since before I even knew what a bucket list was.  To give you an abreviated description of the festival (you won't be getting any historical facts here), a bunch of drunk assholes (see above picture) put on their best all white outfit (not the flattering number I imagined it would be) and head to Bunol, Spain.  The festivities comence at 9:00 AM where anyone who is brave enough attempts to scratch and claw their way up a very tall and greased pole (apparently there is no official height requirement for this, any old log will do) in hopes of seizing the coveted grand prize topping this slippery log: a ham.  The obvious choice for a tomato festival.  This moment of glory with ham in hand, heralds the start of the biggest food fight in the world.  120 TONS of tomatoes are trucked into the city for this annual, hour long, free-for-all.  The only rule being you are required to crush the tomatoes for safety reasons before hurling them at a fellow festival participants.  Sometimes I forgot.

The following is how Tomatina played out for me.  First off, staying anywhere close to the village is near impossible this time of year.  This means that Kelly and I had to wake up at 6:30 AM to get ready and start drinking.  I don't necessarily recommend boxed wine for breakfast, but that's what happened whether we liked it or not.  We then were whisked away on a bus full of other early risers/boozers/assholes to find the mystical greased pole.  In a town teeming with drunk tourists, asking for directions to the greased pig pole was a bit of a challenge.  Though I was prepared with my trusty translator Kelly, "greased pig pole" even escaped her Spanish vocabulary after living in Mexico for a year.  I guess the Mexicans aren't as versed as the Spaniards when it comes to lubing up swine festooned timber.  When the pig is finally liberated, truck load upon truck load of tomatoes are dumped into the streets of Bunol where the culinary combat kicked off.  It was just as exciting as an adult food fight sounds...times a million.  

I couldn't stop smiling if I wanted to, which was a disadvantage when the tomatoes were being chucked directly into my grill.  At a time like this  it was best not to think about the contents of the produce that had just been scraped off dirty city streets, especially since I too had just relieved myself around the corner.  (Don't judge me, the boxed wine made me do it.)  Tomatoes ended up in every fucking crevasse.  Literally.  I'd be upset about the copious amounts of tomato paste produced in my ass crack that day if I hadn't spent about half the fight strategically shoving tomatoes down other peoples' pants.  Hey, sometimes my throwing arm got tired and things got creative.  

Another fun fact about tomatoes: the acidity will take off any waterproof sunscreen you lathered on your body and face that morning.  Not that Coppertone should have specified that "tomato juice" does not count as water, I just wished I would have taken that into consideration before crisping in the sun for several hours.  Damn.  All that time spent getting rid of  tan lines on that nude beach in San Sebastian was all for naught.  Someone please tell me sports bra tans have come into fashion stateside since we've been gone.  

I even sacrificed my fancy camera for this momentous life event.  Yes, extra money was paid for the shock-proof, water-proof  and all around Krista-proof camera, but I never underestimate my ability to fuck shit up.  So I gambled with my camera's life in order to document this glorious event for you (yes, you Ramey P. Marshall).  My rationale being that should my camera go to Kodak Heaven, then at least it had made it through an epic year-long around the world trip and had seen more things than most cameras do, documenting inconsequential birthday parties and such.  In all my excitement, I did however think to buy a new memory card and leave the precious memories of this year safely in the hotel room (not to toot my own horn, but Beep-Beep!).  I'll risk the camera, but that memory card is pure gold.  Pray to god I like you enough to show you the uncensored slide show when I get home.  Highly unlikely, I don't even want to remind myself about some of my recent shenanigans.

Well a day that starts early, ends early and the nice thing (terrible, awful thing) about starting a drinking bender before 7:00 AM is that the hangover is at full force just before dinnertime.  The trouble is that while I would normally be asleep during the eye of the hangover storm,  I was actually fully awake for the hangover of a lifetime; a pounding headache, being sunburned beyond recognition and after three showers, I was still crusted in tiny bits of tomato shrapnel.  Luckily, the extra recovery hours made sleeping it off a snap and I felt fleet footed and fancy free the next day for the bus ride out of town.  Here's to ending things with a bang...or a SMASH!

The camera lives!!!

Gay Paris

Perhaps not as gay as our recent journey to Amsterdam Gay Pride, but gay nonetheless.  Or perhaps it's just that all the men in this country yeild that impression due to their liberal use of capris pants, v-neck sweaters and their toy poodle companions.  Surely it's the reason I didn't find a French husband.  Other stereotypes shockingly held true in Paris as well.  Most obviously was that every man, woman and child does indeed carry a baguette with them everywhere and at all times.  Another factual convention being that all the women here are actually supermodel thin.  How these two seemingly contradictory customs can simultaneously exist might only be explained in the other underlying messages in Dan Brown's "The Da Vinci Code".  

Since we're on the topic of France and bread products I should mention that I am allergic to gluten (and dairy to make everything extra stupid) and being in Paris is like being repeatedly slapped in the face since you have to pass a patisserie every 10 feet.  The onslaught of fresh baked aromas was more than my poor olfactory system could handle.   Kelly also happens to be a fellow glutard, so at least we could bitch about it together.  However, after 10 brutal days of this French torture it was time to put an end to Paris's confection oppression.  We researched the best god damn bakery in Paris and marched ourselves down there early one morning to catch the chocolate croissants straight out of the oven.  After saying a prayer to the gastrointestinal gods I proceeded to have a brief and intense love affair with said baked good.  For the other victim's  protection, I won't disclose the details of Kelly's own personal experience.  Was it worth it?  Ask me when my bowel movements have returned to a state of semi-soundness.    

Enough about me, let's talk about Kelly's family.  Oh I wish I had some good gossip to indulge you, but unfortunately they are lovely.  We stayed with Kelly's dad who is spending a few months in France.  He was nicer to me than any sane person should be to a complete hobo.  He let us monopolize the washing machine, eat his groceries and invade his personal space in general.  He continued to spoil us by taking us to every museum I'd ever dreamed of going to in Paris.  It was the first time I've lived the high life since we started this trip (as if I normally live a extravagant lifestyle when I'm back home).  It was also just nice to get to know Jeff.  Kelly and I have been friends for 11 years, but the most time I've spent with him prior to Paris is when he dropped us off at the airport last September.  And dare I say he got to know me too.  Perhaps more that he wanted, but I'd to think we are close now.  Especially after the day he came home and I was doubled over in pain from a failed high kick attempt.  Jeff walked in the door to us blasting pop music at an inappropriate volume for an old French apartment building at the end of an epic high kicking competition (which I obviously lost) thus my usual colorful language spilling forth as you readers might have come to expect.  Hopefully he liked getting to know me too.  Maybe?

I'd like to think France was where my true tourist spirit shined (this primarily made possible by Jeff Brittan).  Eiffel Tower; check.  The Louvre; check.  Arch de Triomphe; check.  Drinking before noon; double check.  We even got to see the Notre Dame Cathedral, which I've been lusting to see for ages now for it's Gothic architecture, flying buttresses and grand scale stained glass.  Plus, who doesn't want to get a picture of their best friend posing as the Hunchback of Notre Dame in front of THE Notre Dame?  A group of Italian tourists were highly impressed as I helped Kelly position her bag under her shirt for the perfect hump effect.  I can go home now feeling like I've properly done France.  

Just hanging with my new buddy Jeff

Fly Like an Eagle

This week marked a momentous event in this trip; Kelly and I traveled separately for the first time in 11 months.  Hold the phone, nobody call People Magazine just yet.  We're absolutely fine, you can get an official statement from our publicists this afternoon.  Kelly's dad is currently on holiday in France and she took off to Paris, where I'd meet her later, for some quality family time.  Plus, Ramey still had another week of vacation so we had some extra time to galavant about a bit.  I'll admit it felt a bit strange ("a bit" = there may some serious codependency issues to deal with at a later date) being separated from my constant companion.  In the End, I think we managed swimmingly.   

There were six days to kill and 380,820 square miles of Western Europe to consider.  Neither Ramey or I had been to Switzerland, so in a very complex desicion making process that took us precious seconds to decide, we concluded it was Switzerland ahoy!  To save save time (and oddly money as it worked out) we rented a car for the travel flexibility necessitated when you are traveling several thousand kilometers in a short amount of time.  In order to start our adventure we had to hop on the German Autobahn...THE Autobahn.  The autobahn's fast and furious reputation nearly slipped my mind.  Frankly, the autobahn itself seemed like a mythical creature, something I dreamed about speeding down as a child (I was a weird kid).  The difference being I always dreamed I was ripping down the freeway in a Lamborghini Diablo instead of a Opel Astra that ended up pooping out at 160 kmh (calm down parentals, that's only kilometers).  The Ford Escort that I drove in high school (and admittedly most of my adult life) went faster than that.  Still it felt kind of invigorating and free.  These sensations usually only felt when I wasn't getting passed by a BMW going thrice my speed. 

In a few short days we rallied through Zurich; Lake Geneva; Mont Blanc in the French Alps and Chablis, France.  I won't bore you with flowery words describing how gorgeous the country side is in this part of the world.  You know it was fucking beautiful.  After spending an interesting night couchsurfing in Zurich with a bunch of college boys who were obsessed, in a serious way, with David Hasslehoff (and I thought the Germans only had the weird fascination with the Hoff), we gradually made our way to the French Alps.  We spent the day hiking to Bossons Glacier, a severely vertical climb that threatened cat-size capacity of my lungs in their current state (god knows if I'll ever fully recover from Gay Pride in Amsterdam), however, our labors turned out to be fruitful.  The view was one in a billion and the sweet, ice-cold, delicious glacier water was a nice reward in the end.  At one point, as we were standing at the glacier overlooking the world, we had to laugh thinking about all the people (yes, you) who were slaving away at work that day.  Laugh it up we did.  Imagine us on top of the picturesque French Alps manically laughing, imagining all of you at work, our voices echoing out over the pristine, snow capped mountains.  Said it just to be a dick.  Though this statement was made with the horrifying realization that I will be home in a short month frantically searching for one of those so-called "jobs".  

After our alpine adventure we searched for accommodation in a little town nestled in the foothills of Mont Blanc.  Someone forgot to tell them that the hobos were coming to town.  A bustling ski resort town in the winter, Chamonix looks like every other posh resort town you've ever seen in the movies (or in real life for you non-hobo types).  The lady at information was caught off guard when we inquired about a youth hostel.  She told us there was indeed a hostel but it was way out of town and, "you know you have to sleep in a dorm...with other people".  Well, the "out of town" hostel ended up being a seven minute walk from the city center and was nicer than a lot of places I've rested my head this year.  The other problem with these resort towns is that they seem to offer an endless number of extreme sports.  Somehow these towns also make these elite-priced activities seem like a wise investment in highly valued vacation memories.  I guess the market valuation for paragliding must be very attractive right now because I soon found myself running off the side of a mountain.

Oddly, throwing myself off the mountainside in the French Alps wasn't even slightly scary.  I had expected the same mounting anxiety and subsequent freakout I had experienced when I went skydiving.  Paragliding was a much more peaceful encounter and it mostly felt like I was a soaring eagle (that is if eagles wore huge, ridiculous looking smiles on their faces while they were flying).  The half hour of floating over France, including the very same glacier we had hiked the day before, was over much too soon.  I could have stayed up there all day.  The only way to recover from the devastating adrenaline withdrawal was, obviously, to drown our sorrows in several bottles of Chablis...in Chablis, France.  Sorry, just have to squeeze in the dick comments while I can.  

Look Ma, I'm flying!

Shimmer, Sparkle and Shine

I have a secret.  Kelly and I are not actually the great hobos we make ourselves out to be.  All this time I have strategically kept from you that we have spent the last several months preparing for one of our favorite holidays; Gay Pride.  I may be a dress wearing, lumberjack chasing, straight female (pay no attention to my previous references to my rugby career), but I LOVE me a shiny, slutty gay pride parade.  Kelly and I have sacrificed too many precious cubic inches and kilograms of backpack capacity (a cardinal vagabond sin) in order to collect the finest spandex, false eyelashes, fish nets, glitter and more glitter.  We have amassed an impressively eclectic collection of flare from around the world for a mere three day celebration.  Yes, it is by all means necessary, and probably a rule, to have a different outfit everyday.  Reservations were made way back when we were in Vietnam (whoa, remember Vietnam way back in February?) and finally the week was upon us.  We had one last stop this week before the festivities began; lovely Hamburg, Germany (or so we were told).

Poor, poor Hamburg.  I am sorely sorry I neglected it, but it was a busy week of working out, completing the finishing touches on our costumes and watching The Olympics!  I know people disagree about the importance placed on The Games.  Some people could care less and others think they're a waste of time (this includes most Swedes I've met).  Well, they're wrong.  The Olympics might be my favorite thing in the world (behind a warm chocolate chip cookie, obviously) and our hostel was playing the adrenaline spiking competitions non-stop.  This made out to be the perfect background (and often foreground) for costume crafting.  Further in our defense, the weather totally sucked that week.  So really Hamburg needs to take some of the blame here too.

Enough blabbering about Hamburg, the city I virtually know nothing about, and fast forward to Amsterdam Pride 2012; reportedly one of the best parties in the world.  This was about to be the best party of the year and sure to be our sparkle Mecca.  And then things got even better.  Gasp!  Better than gays and glitter?  Gays, glitter and my best friend Ramey!  Ramey, being one of my more organizationally challenged (also see disaster) friends had been suggesting that she was going to try to meet me in Amsterdam.  My expectations were low considering she is in grad school, working, taking care of her sick grandmother and, well, see my previous comment.  My low expectations, however, were advantageous because my friend the disaster made it happen!  (This may be the most exclamation points I have ever used in a paragraph).  I haven't seen my best friend in 11 months and it was an airport reunion to rival all airport reunions (and I didn't even have flowers)...and then things got even better!  Gays, glitter, Ramey and San Juanita.  San Juanita (AKA San J - she totally loves this nickname) is significantly more delinquent than Ramey when it comes to getting it together (really) and one of my other favorite people in the world.  How Ramey convinced AND then got San J to buy a plane ticket across the world a mere two weeks before departing is beyond my comprehension.  It is something that can only be described as a Gay Pride miracle.

Amid all the excitement I failed to mention that we had also convinced Weird Kate and some of her other recently released Peace Corps cronies to join us.  So, the eight of us squeezed into a rental apartment reserved for four people.  Cozy and sparkly.  It wasn't the occupancy the renters should have worried about.  Not many people think to enforce a No Glitter rule.  At least that apartment will never be dull again.  Unfortunately for them we were prepared for the second coming of the Dark Ages with the armory of glitter we were packing.  This is in addition to our shimmering clothing, metallic hair extensions, glimmering eyeshadows and shinning personalities.  Of course we cleaned, but it is a fact that glitter is the herpes of the costume world.  You can never get rid of it.  I do like to think that we left a permanent mark on Amsterdam though.

Yay Gays!

History Week

In the past I've had superbly few motivations to visit Poland, the one very important exception, however, has been the chance to see Auschwitz.  So when we decided to spend some time in Krakow as means to visit the old concentration camp, I was pleasantly surprised at just how charming this country is.  Krakow is reminiscent of Prague with it's old, stately architecture but lacks the sheer multitude of tourists (and drug dealers) this time of year.  There were local artisan markets, outdoor cafes and mouth watering sausage vendors everywhere you looked.  What else could a girl ask for?  Besides an ex-Nazi concentration camp that is.

Auschwitz is about what you would expect.  We all know the horrible story; hundreds of thousands of Jews enslaved, tortured and killed.  It's where the Nazis first experimented with Cyclone B in those infamous showers.  It's depressing and sad, just like it should be.  It's also an important part of history to learn from and a humbling place to visit.  No one was expecting a trip to Disneyland.  Unless you count several of the other tourists in our tour group.

At Auschwitz it is compulsory to have an official tourist guide take you through the complex.  In addition to the valuable information, it is also for another very good reason; your average tourist is a douche bag.  The kind of insensitive moron that will still take pictures even when the free guide explicitly instructs them not to.  I felt weird enough joining the masses of tourists to be herded around what is now a memorial site, but how else do you get a chance to see this monumental part of history?  Then you get there and your fears are confirmed in the form of those camera toting sons-of-bitches who take prohibited pictures of the human remains.  It's such a intense mix of emotions, it's hard to know where to draw the line.  At least the museum had enough tact to not call the souvenir shop a "souvenir shop".  Rather the building just listed all the things you could normally find in a gift shop, "Information, Videos and More!"  Ok, I exaggerated with the exclamation point, but that doesn't make it any less true.  I personally had my eye on the "I Survived Auschwitz" t-shirt, but it only came in an XL.  Ok, ok, there's the line, I see it way back there now.

Donning our new t-shirts (I kid, I kid) we headed for a pick me up in Berlin, Germany.  Berlin is just a (Pacific Northwesters you should cover your ears here) bigger, cooler version of Portland, Oregon.  This is with the brief exception of the blatant racism that exists here (Portland at least hides it better).  Apparently Berlin recovered from their jewish prejudices and turned around and redirected them to the black and middle eastern population.  We saw and heard too many stories of minorities being denied entry into local bars and clubs on the basis of their race.  This was a disheartening discovery after I had already decided I loved this city so full of art, thriving coffee shops and hipsters (side note:  Kelly and I were devastated to find out that we had missed the Berlin Hipster Olympics by a mere two days...you know we would have killed it in the Beer Crate Racing event).

We did get to see the remaining sections of the Berlin Wall though and I even got my official piece of scrap concrete that was once part of the wall (look what good tourists we've become!).  This chunk of cement was an actual souvenir I could get on board with some how.  Well, besides that t-shirt (that's the last one I swear!).  The art on the remaining part of the Berlin Wall combined with the massive amounts of really interesting, quality street art is so fascinating that we found ourselves walking for many, many hours each day.  I left my legs somewhere in East Berlin last week and have yet to recover them.  So, in conclusion, I think I love Berlin...I'm pretty sure...I like it at least more than a friend.

International Rendezvous

I've officially named this phase of the trip European Rendezvous.  It all started with meeting Weird Kate in Moldova in May, followed by Maggie in Hungary and then, good god, the remaining mass of our friends since then.  After a few brief days of solitude in Salzburg, we traveled to Munich only to immediately delve back into the life of an international socialite.  

If you can remember way back to New Zealand, where this crazy trip all started, you will recall that we spent quite a bit of time on an amazing farm on the north island.  That's where we fell in love with our friend Anna who showed us how making dinner could be a five hour event in which four of those is actually spent gossiping over several bottles of wine.  You might also remember that it was her son of a bitch roommate (I say that with much love) who duped us into kissing those famous goat balls.  As fate would have it, Anna was in Germany visiting her German boyfriend, Joschi (who also worked on the farm while we were there) and we got to hang out with them in Munich for a couple days.  Having a personal translator is not overrated.  

The last (and only) time I was in Germany I spent three days in Munich and I never actually saw Munich.  This requires and you deserve a thorough explanation - Oktoberfest 2005.  On my last day in the city I woke up with a traditional German beer stein, a technicolor Oktoberfest commemorative t-shirt and a hangover on which to compare all future hangovers.  So, yeah, I've been to Germany before, but I'm sure glad I had a chance to redeem myself.  

Upon meeting up with Anna and Joschi they wasted no time sweeping us off to the nearest German beer garden where they sell those famous kiddy pool sized beers (this stereotype turns out to be true...along with the unbridled wearing of lederhosen).  And all these years I thought that kind of consumption was reserved only for Oktoberfest.  Turns out the germans prefer Paul Bunyan scaled beverages year round.  After a few goliath steins, it was comforting to see that our friends haven't changed that much.  The conversation turned for the worse (better?) when Anna and Joschi started having an argument over whether "Robin" or "Thor" is a gayer name for your first born son.  This all brought on my Joschi who insists that his first child will bear the unfortunate and beating inspiring name, Robin.  I guess you could say that I'm on Team Thor.  

Anna's other hot international relationship is with her credit card.  If you turn your back on them for one second you will find yourself with five fresh drinks and a heaping basket of fried food.  I love/hate it when she does that.  When Anna found out the pub we were at had a credit card minimum, poor Kelly fell victim by proximity (within shouting distance of Anna) and ended up taking the two tequila shots Anna had to order to fulfill the required minimum.  So it will come as no surprise when I tell you that we found ourselves at three o'clock in the morning sprinting through Munich's massive fountain in the main square.  Making for a long, soaking wet, freezing cold walk home.  No amount of liquid long johns (even tequila) could have negated this cold.  Which is actually not so bad  when compared to the next day when I remembered that I am a hobo living out of a backpack and those are my ONLY pair of shoes.  I begrudgingly put them on anyway so I could go get a lifesaving German sausage and cup of coffee the next morning.  Squish, squish, squish.

Thank god (or not) our next stop this week was to the city of the green fairy; the city of Absinth; Prauge.  While Prague might be famous for it's hallucinogenic liquors, we were in no shape to partake after our fountain fun in Munich...mostly.  Well, what kind of friend would I be if I didn't a least help Kelly take her first ever shot of Absinthe?  In reality we spent most of our time sightseeing, working out and enjoying sobriety.  I know, I know, you want a better story than the We-Went-Home-Early-and-Knitted-by-the-Fire kind of a story, but my liver respectfully says, "suck it".  Therefore you'll have to imagine us traipsing through the city viewing the ornate architecture, listening to classical music and sipping espresso by the picturesque river that runs through the city.  Oh yeah, after all this time, that still IS an awesome story.  

"The Fountain"