Europe trip 2023

After a great flight into Lisbon, I had a transfer waiting for us – which is not something I do often but this one I had scored for free!
It’s wonderful to walk along a bunch of people holding names, see your own name and know you just have to follow from then onwards. He put us in the back of a black van and we drove through the dark streets of Lisbon…
Sounds dodgy I know but it was a great experience, brand new van with a lovely friendly driver – I was very tired so it’s just what this Mum needed! 

Our first day nobody had any energy for anything!
We did walk round our area mid afternoon, and that, was all that got achieved.

The next day it was time to go into the city centre. I’d booked us another walking tour!  We found a direct bus that stopped outside our door! We were staying in the suburbs so it was a bit of a trip in. Once we navigated ourselves to the starting point we plonked ourselves on some concrete steps in the shade, it was already getting warm and was only 10am. I am not missing my hoody, jacket or beanie!
A lovely Canadian couple asked us if we were there for a tour and we worked out we were on the same one. They were lovely to talk to, a teacher and an accountant from London, Ontario. 3 daughters in their 20’s. She’d taught in Auckland back in the 80’s. We stuck together as we found our guide and started walking. Our guide was funny, entertaining and thee most wonderful story teller! We followed him round Lisbon for 3 hours as we went from monument to monument, street to street, neighbourhood to neighbourhood.
I could write an entire blog post on this walking tour. I’ve done loads and loads of them and never have we ever had such an engaging guide as him. Loved it. Two special stops stood out. On the Main Street he disappeared into a bakery and came back out with a Portuguese tart (just out of the oven) for everyone. Yum!
 (They’re hard to find at home but if you want to try one the Malaysian place upstairs at the crossing does them, not cheap but very nice!)

Then the second to last stop we paused at a grandmother’s house – STOP READING RIGHT NOW MUM 🙈🙉🙊– she made homemade Ginjinha. A cherry liqueur. So our whole tour group lined up at her front door, paid our €1 for a shot in an edible chocolate cup. (It’s not technically legal but the authorities don’t seem to mind.) It was the sweetest and yummest liqueur… so we went back for seconds and bought a mini bottle…not entirely sure how I’m going to get that non labelled, could be anything, bottle back into NZ! 🤔 Actually might not even last that long! Ha!
The tour ended soon after by finishing the story of Lisbon and then he announced “class dismissed!”
If you’re ever in Lisbon please contact me, I’ve got his full name and number. I’d love for you to go on the same tour we did. 

After that I browsed a few souvenir stores to find a magnet for my collection, then it was on the bus towards Belém Tower. Belém is always on those Facebook ‘where have you visited in the world?’ things so I was determined to see it!
(Delwyn – if you’re reading this I’m secretly, or not so secretly, in competition with you on those things! Ha!)
BK needed to hop off the bus early which left me on the bus with both kids. He text to say he’d catch up with us so we carried on our way. We made it to the tower – go me and my trusty stead, Google maps!
A lovely violinist was busking while we sat in the shade and ate a bag of chips, we moved closer to enjoy the music. If you’d like to sit with us a couple of minutes to listen too, I took video for you which is scheduled to post to Facebook in the coming days. Which Disney movie is the song from? 🧞‍♂️
BK did not manage to catch up with us, he ran short on time and had to join a work call from somewhere. It was up to me to navigate getting us 3 back on a bus packed so tight like sardines, fortunately it’s the bus that stops right outside our apartment so once we offloaded the tourists at stops closer to town the bus emptied enough to get seats and off we went, very thankful for air conditioning! If we don’t get sick from being that close to so many people it will be an utter miracle!!We tumbled in the door gasping for liquid, I’d taken some but it hadn’t been enough for the exercise we’d done and or the heat we experienced. We’d bought some extra too but still not enough! Brendan came in a wee while later and it was bed time for everyone! 

I woke up just after midnight to an absolute racket out on the street below us, which is interesting because we’re on the third floor, doubled glazed and it STILL woke me up. A 20+ person drumming and trumpet procession were at full noise walking down our road! Having the time of their lives! Escorted by what appeared to be a police car, not at full noise thankfully! We’d been warned on our walking tour It was freedom day coming the following day and obviously they’d started celebrating at midnight! I grabbed my phone to take video from our balcony, unfortunately in my sleepiness I’ve taken it in portrait rather than landscape but I’ll post it to Facebook for you too see….or hear!!!!

The following day was a work day for BK and an absolutely nothing day for me and the kids. I did manage to find a laundry mat and get a big load of clothes washed. I also managed to schedule a weeks worth of posts to Facebook. Love that scheduling tool, so helpful! Oh we did have an evening walk to see the water and the massive bridge to the other side of Lisbon. If you’ve been to Denmark or seen my photos or other photos of their never ending bridges, it looks like that.

There was really only 2 touristy things I wanted to do in Europe while we are over here and one is 45 minutes by train from Lisbon. It’s a town in the middle of nowhere called Sintra. Many palaces and castles all stuck on a hill. So out we missioned, fortunate to get a direct train from our suburbs train station (€1.65 each) I expected an over full train but due to avoiding the main Lisbon city train station I think we managed to side step the bulk of the tourists, we also went really early! We arrived and the options were : a bus for €11.50 each or very steep walk uphill for 45 minutes or an Uber for €6 – guess which one we choose!
Once I’d secured tickets and a time slot to enter Pena palace, we wandered the gardens. They were well kept and beautiful. We saw horses and a cute cottage. Mini lakes and water features. Soon it was our turn for the palace, it’s a circuit which is really helpful for tourist flow! At the end we sat on the balcony and I fed the fam chips and popcorn that I’d packed in, cause I’m cheap like that! Ha!
An Uber for €4 back down the hill, it was back to the train station….after a couple of no show trains we jumped on one going to Lisbon city. BK bailed out early – spotting a theme here? 😂 – to catch a work call and I managed to navigate me and the kids back into the city, onto the metro, several changes to get onto the line that went to our suburb and back to our apartment! Let’s just say, my brain isn’t going to mush on this trip, it’s not idle in any way! It’s exercising the problem solving gland extensively!
Sintra and the palace we saw were stunning, the architecture so unique! It was most definitely worth the day trip.

Our last day BK packed his stuff and ubered with it to a co working space. This left me to pack up the apartment then get us three and a pile of gear down the road – via a mini mart for Fanta, CK and I have a new addiction! – and onto the metro to the airport. Let’s just say I was dripping with sweat by the time that was over!!! I love my pack, this is its third trip to Europe. It’s wonderful to have everything on my back and my hands free to manage extra luggage or children…or food!If you haven’t seen me recently I lost 17kgs last year, my pack is 19-20 ish kgs, so today the realisation came that I used to carry almost all that weight round, all the time. It was quite a realisation actually.

After a few hours BK joined us, we processed through the airport, getting stamped out of Europe, and onto a plane to our next destination- which is where I write this blog, and like my last one I watched the sunset again. I took video of our take off so keep an eye out on Facebook if you’d like to see Lisbon by sunset! I’ll probably mute the noise as we are on quite the party plane! At least 2 brides on here and the excitement to go with it!

We managed to be almost last off the plane, then after a pause for the toilets almost last through customs, then almost last to the baggage carousel to find our bags just going round and round!
One last hurdle before entering the new country, getting our bags scanned….but before that even happened I was escorted by police to a small office…

Till next time,

Claire

A wonderful bus ride along the coast to Barcelona, I thought the driver was just fantastic! Young Spanish dude but he knew the route, the vehicle and he did not mess about. We ran perfectly to time!
Dumped unceremoniously at a bus station, we grabbed our gear and took an Uber to a hostel. 2 sets of bunk beds in a private room with en-suite is costing us upwards of $200 NZD per night! Ouch! Big city problems!
Once we’d explored our building we set about finding a supermarket and were so relieved to see food prices were cheaper than France. Thank. Goodness.
In the evening we went exploring to find the infamous Sagrada familia – it apparently was 10 minutes walk away from where we were staying.
We found it.
What. An. Odd. Building!
I’d seen photos. I’d heard all about it from others that had seen it, but nothing prepared me for seeing it up close! So quirky. So creative. So imaginative.
We walked round the whole block, looking at it from different angles to try and make sense of it.
We went into tourist merch shops, came back out and looked at it again.
We ate some churros lathered in chocolate sauce and looked at it again.
We waited for it to go dark and watched all the lights come on.
Nope. Still bizarre.
So we walked home in the dark – I thought I’d feel a bit unsafe having the family out after dark but it was all good. Lots of ladies were walking by themselves which eased my fears.

The next day BK decided it was buffet breakfast for the family. Cereal to cheese / ham / raw veges to cooked egg / sausages / baked beans to pastries. The boys tanked themselves up!
We ordered an Uber, and we waited and waited….we were meant to be going in a walking tour and the start time was getting closer!
Stuff it!
We hastily made our way to the metro station, and caught the train, arrived at the correct stop and popped up to the meeting place just in time. BK took a photo of me checking us in with our guide “to add to your story” he informed me. So I’ll add that photo to my Barcelona set on Facebook.
Our guide was called Claire she was from Ireland, she’d been guiding for 6 years!! Must love it??!!
The walking tour was mostly in the gothic quarter and it was fabulous. Absolutely loved it. What a pretty city. What a fascinating history.
After a supermarket run to top up on food for the next 24 hours, and to buy a box of ice creams – yep when you travel with me I’m not going to buy you expensive €3 each ice cream, if you want ice cream I will go buy a box of 4 for €2 from the supermarket and you can have one of those! We went to the roof top of our building and ate them there enjoying the view of the city and the water.
After that it was back to our beds for rest while BK punched out some urgent work.
Touristing is exhausting!

The following day we’d booked a car rental to drive out to a mini country in the Pyrenees mountains, Andorra.
We piled on the metro again, smoothly picked up a random car, an upgrade from what we’d ordered! (The same had happened to us in Amsterdam with our car rental there – how blessed we are.)
It was a bit stressful navigating out of the city but once on the motorway we were all good. The views were beautiful. After 2.5 hours we reached Andorra. It was my 45th country to visit! It’s a city/country squashed between two mountains. Not at all what I expected. We parked, made a beeline for the information centre, got a map and directed on the things to see and then went about it! After a few hours we were done. We had to have the car back by 8pm and just didn’t know what Friday night traffic going into Barcelona would be like. We took a different route back, it was more beautiful than the way up – and it had no road tolls, unlike the way up!!! I know you all loved that cruise along the Croatian coast last time with Salmonella Dub so I took some clips for ya. No SD this time though!
Traffic was non existent so we had the car returned 1.5 hours early. I am glad we did the mission out there, it was a big day but so worth it! 

Our final day we packed up our stuff and took it all out to the beach. Our flight wasn’t till the evening so we had time to fill.
I was going to throw DJI up for ya all to look at the coastline but when I went for a wee walk to see where I could take off from I came across true European beach bather ladies, sooooo decided that wasn’t very appropriate and took a panoramic photo from the back of the beach, avoiding particular ladies, for you all instead!!!! You’re WELCOME!
After a few hours of people watching…the ones with their clothes ON, it was time to head to the airport. I found a limited edition baileys ‘Colada’, ahhh YUM! And smelled all the smells in the perfume section 💕
The flight out of Barcelona had been a bit of a sticky point since I booked it. I had CK as an adult fare but it would not take his birthdate, maybe he should have been a teen fare? I thought maybe I’d booked it incorrectly? I had looked for any contact details or social media I could contact with no luck. When I got to Nimes last week I found a number to call and got thee most lovely guy, who spoke English, to explain my situation to. He informed me it was all good, a system error, just check in at the counter he told me.  “Ok” I replied with great relief “you’ve just made my day!” And then hung up and thought nothing more about it….till I checked in! He had upgraded us to row 2 with ‘space plus’ (premium economy basically) given us priority boarding and extra carry on luggage allowance. He’d made my day, again!
How blessed we are.
A bit of a delay on take off even though we were loaded and ready to go on time! (Something about a busy runway) I watched the sunset and wrote this blog as we flew to our next destination.

Thanks for reading team, means so much to me. Yes I’m moving fast and yes my days can be reasonably full but that doesn’t mean I’m not thinking of home. I’d so love to hear from you and what’s going on in your world. Please keep your comms up, even if just to check in quickly.

Till next time,

Claire.

Nîmes – pronounced Neam.

A bit of background on why we are here.  Our cat is called Nimes. We acquired our cat in 2018 from a family member who had been to Nîmes on a work trip in 2017. Once he got home, the family got a kitten and Nîmes had left such an impression it was decided the kitten would be called Nimes. 

After a late arrival into the city – good ol’ intercity bus links – our wonderful Airbnb hosts rescued us from the bus station and drove us to our home for the week, all the while incessantly chatting to us in charming, broken English. 

An apartment walking distance to everything. Room to spread out, a well stocked kitchen.

Day 1, BK disappeared to a co-working space, the kids and I achieved a supermarket visit to top up on food for the week. 

A comment about French food prices, it’s not cheap aye. You think New Zealand food prices are horrendous, they’re not! It’s been so surprising over here considering how much they grow and how not very far it has to get shipped. Hoping the next few countries are a wee bit easier on the budget! 

Day 2, the kids and I had a ride around the city on a tourist ‘train’ (yes like that one at the mount.) It was good to get some bearings of the city, see what we could explore in the coming days. We then lunched with BK and went to the Nimes “Arena” (a mini Roman-built colosseum). I took some video from my phone for you in which I chat about all things production as it’s used for concerts. (In my previous life I did sound/lighting for events)

Day 3, we decided to day trip out to see a massive aqueduct, Pont du Gard. These day trips seem to be my favourite days, and this day was no exception. A very cheap €1.50 bus for 45 minutes! (You can barely buy a packet of lollies or a nice pastry for that price!)
Such a magnificent structure.
It was used to run water from Uzes to Nimes….downhill because there was no pumps in those days. It took 5 years to build the bridge and along the 50km the water had to run, it only had 17 metres of downhill slope to play with. That’s 34cm per 1 kilometre. Crazy huh! Who knows how they measured that kind of thing back in the day!!??
It was really windy, big gusts coming through the valley but BK decided he was going to risk flying DJI, so you’ll see some aerial footage on Facebook soon! 

The next few days we just milled around, did laundry, walked through some gardens, went to a big mall and shopping complex to get Nimes the cat something from Nîmes, and of course the ever pesky supermarket run. BK made the most of the co-working space and knocked out a few more work days. It was good to slow down, pace ourselves, when you’re on the road for a long time you just can’t tourist all day every day for financial reasons but equally for energy level reasons! 

So that was Nîmes – slow but needed. Busy week ahead, onward we go! 

Till next time,

Claire

Nice + Monaco

Flying to the French Riviera was wonderful.
Oh the sun. Oh the warmth. Oh the beauty.

We’ve seen a lot of France but never the south. We bailed on it last time and went to Disney instead! It was just too far to drive in our little Peugeot 208 with a 6 and 8 year old in the back seat. So we made it a priority this time and here we are. 

After a quick Uber ride from the airport we checked into our Airbnb, it’s a tiny apartment but suits us well for the few days we’re here. We arrived on Easter Saturday so as soon as we could we made haste for the supermarket and topped up on food. We just couldn’t get a straight answer out of Google if the shops were going to shut on us for Easter Sunday, or Monday!
RK and I wondered along the promenade, so pretty! So many roller skaters, runners, people walking their dogs.

The following day we went into Nice central for a walking tour. Our guide was knowledgeable and we learnt a few things, like if you look at the side of buildings closely they aren’t what they seem! I’ll post a photo to Facebook in my Nice set, see if you can work it out! We also learnt Nice is the second most visited city in France, and the second most expensive!
The kids weren’t overly happy, one didn’t feel so well, one was grumpy, so we chopped our visit of the old town a bit short and went back to our Airbnb to rest.

Waking up the next day everyone was in a good mood, we packed the day pack and ventured to a new country, Monaco.
Wow! I already loved mini country’s and have  now added this one to the list. It’s so beautiful.
But wow the wealth! Expensive luxury cars just parked anywhere and everywhere – so surprising!
It was a wonderful day walking the Grand Prix track, the harbour, the old town, the new town and everything in between. I took a couple of videos for you all which I’ll also post up to Facebook.

The most random thing about our whole Nice experience was noticing a particular, familiar, type of tree on our walk to and from our tram stop. There standing on a random bit of land, on a random street in suburban Nice is, a pohutukawa tree – with a little plaque stating ‘originated in Oceania’.  A little taste of home, made us all smile.

Our last full day I took the kids to Phoenix park, bit mini zoo bit pretty planted out gardens. BK found a co-working space and knocked out a days worth of work. He’s been getting up each morning for a 6am meeting (4pm NZT) to sync with his team. So proud of his commitment, but looking forward to him switching off when we Camino next month.

So that was Nice, yes a few of you text me ‘Is Nice nice?’ Ha ha! Yes Nice is nice.
We loved the tram line, so simple, so cheap, so frequent. We loved the colour of the sea. We loved those patisseries. We love the ease of French life – so easy to slot into.

We’re now west bound to our next and final French city. I’ll give you a hint, our cat is named after this city. We’re slowing it down and will be in one place for an entire week. Expectations for touristing are low; Expectations for work and school work are high!
We’ll see how that goes.

Hope you’re enjoying the blogs and corresponding photos! I’m SO glad I’m not a content creator! It’s a lot of work! Hours and hours ….and that’s not including actually being out and about doing stuff! I’m thankful for Facebooks scheduling app. Makes life so much simpler to get all my posts queued to roll out at 6.30am NZT each day.

Till next time,

Claire

We spent 8 days here and it was COLD but we had a lovely social time with familiar faces. It was fantastic to have wheels to get out about.

We based ourselves in the area of Putten for the first 4 days.

The day after we arrived BK made a beeline for an aquarium shop! I know! Who on earth does that?

That afternoon we were invited by some friends to a pancake house. It was Hansel and Gretel themed. It was too cold to play outside but the children had a lovely time playing inside. The building was very interactive. Almost to a Halloween type style actually.

The following day was church – songs in English, message in Dutch but we had earphones with a translator doing really well to keep up! Then lunch and a lazy afternoon with the same friends.

The following day I expected to go into Amsterdam but I couldn’t secure tickets to the Anne Frank museum/house. BK and I went in 2007 and we felt the kids were old enough to go this trip but it wasn’t to be. So we skipped Amsterdam, we had explored it well 5 years ago so went to see the old town of Amersfoort instead. I had forgotten how beautiful old towns can be. We enjoyed warming up in a cafe with hot chocolate and apple cake. Our waitress was very interested that we were from New Zealand as her boyfriend is half kiwi and his Dad lives in Auckland – such a small world.

Then it was back to our Airbnb to pack and move south to the province of Zeeland. A friend came in from London with her 4 year old to stay with us. The Airbnb was a bit of a disappointment, not quite as advertised and not all beds were made up. This made for a pretty grumpy me!

We had a couple of big days. One day we missioned into Belgium to the old town of Bruges. Bruges is known for 2 things. Beer and chocolate! 

We arrived early and just wondered the streets. It. Was. Beautiful. Then the bus loads of tourists arrived. They always busy things up! 

The smell of Belgium waffles and chocolate filled the air. Yum! Once we’d seen the sights, we left BK with CK to do a brewery tour. Bruges has 3.2km pipe underground full of beer!! The brewery wanted to keep brewing on the old town site but as the business was growing they wanted to bottle on the outskirts of town….so came up with a creative way to get the beer out there! It would be interesting to taste the beer before it goes in the pipe and after. Apparently they’re very careful about this but surely it tastes different!! 

The following day we rested while it rained all day – RK and I stayed in our jarmies all day! Glorious!

Then it was off to see the tulips. This whole 15 week trip has planned around seeing the tulips! They’re only active for about 6 – 8 weeks, we’re already 2 weeks into the season. It was an early and cold start! The Keukenhof gardens are vast and beautiful. Not all tulips were out, in another 2 weeks it would be quite the sight I think? But a lovely morning was had wondering the gardens. Lots of information to be learnt. I wanted to get DJI up to take some shots of the fields for you all but I just didn’t come across any to capture! I thought they’d be everywhere and easy to find. They weren’t. So disappointing.

We finished off the day in The Hauge. We met a colleague of BK’s. She was lovely and walked us round a few sights.

The budget took quite the wholloping as we set up phone SIM card’s and did a few expensive things. I hope to streamline a bit from now on! 

We’ve adjusted to the time zone, jet lag only lasted a few days which I’m thankful for. 

As I write this I’m sitting on a plane heading to our next country. I’m looking forward to the warmth. I struggled with the cold! I’m glad I brought my hat. I’ve worn it every time I’ve been outside. 

Till next time,

Claire