Around Europe with my wifey
This reminds me of the singing lion.
My wife has never been outside of Romania before this year, so I thought I would use this summer to fix that by traveling around as much as possible.
Right after our wedding, we went for a short, one week, roadtrip honeymoon around three capitals: Budapest, Vienna and Bratislava. Bam, three countries right there.
We stayed only one night in Budapest and we left Romania late, because I had to update my Romanian bank account (which I hadn't used in the last three years) and because my wife had to apply for a new ID card.
There were two memorials, showing very opposite things, fairly close to each other. I was surprised to see one of them vilifying nazism, but the other one glorifying communism.
Next stop: Vienna. Here we spent a bit more time so we could actually enjoy the city. We went up the Danube tower, only to have super strong winds greet us there.
We went to an old musical instruments concert in the oldest church in Vienna. I had never even heard of the harpsichord before. Apparently it's the precursor to the piano. The guy was speaking in German. It was nice to be able to put my German knowledge to use and actually understand what was being said around me.
And we went to the Schönbrunn palace and learned about the fairly sad life of the monarchs from there. The highly idolized Princess Sisi was actually fairly unhappy in her marriage and did her best to avoid her husband. The Monarch woke up at 5AM to do his imperial duties. I admire his dedication, but they said he wasn't good at it, so it didn't help too much. We also tried the famous Apfelstrudel mit Vanillesauce, but to be honest, I've had better at any random bakery. The gardens were beautiful though.
On our last day there, the only one that was sunny, we went to the Prater, an amusement park. There we, you know, amused ourselves by doing fun rides such as Dizzy Mouse (they weren't kidding about the dizzy part), Water Ride and only me, Volare, where you lay flat on your belly and go flying like crazy. The last one was hang-on-to-your-pants-and-hope-you-have-nothing-in-them.
Our last stop on our honeymoon was in Bratislava. We stayed in a really fancy hotel, so we spent quite a lot of time inside, for example at the spa :D
But we also went to visit the Bratislava zoo, with it's fake dinosaurs. And we had langos, because that's what I craved at 10 PM in Bratislava. Langos. :D
The old city was surprisingly active and full of life even late at night and it showed no signs of slowing down.
After two or three weeks, the Zurich Street Parade was going on, which is a massive techno parade with about 1 million drunk people invading, so we decided to do a weekend break to London, where Roda's brother lives.
First stop, Indian food. Second stop, bubble tea. My wife likes the first one, but unfortunately not the second one :(
On the second day, we went karting. Given how much she loved racing on the highway before, I thought she might enjoy being able to put pedal to metal in a controlled environment. She mostly did :D
We also visited the Shard, London's highest building. Besides the view, which is pretty much the same as from every other highriser in every other major city of the world, there are several VR experiments you can try out, such as flying or walking across a plank.
On Sunday, we ended up having a lazy day in Greenwich park. We went to the Prime Meridian, learned about how to calculate latitude and longitude and just spent time chillin' on the grass.
We flew from London City airport, which is a very interesting airport, because it announces gates only half an hour before departure, so there's really no point in getting there early. I wish more airports did that.
The last pitstop for the summer was Norway, which I found to be among the most beautiful places I've ever been to. Until it started raining cats and dogs. Then it lost some of its appeal.
Bergen has rain 260 days a year, so when we arrived there, the receptionist told us that we are lucky because that weekend would be really nice and sunny. And it was!
On Sunday we went on the cruise on the Hardangersfjord (with such a fierce name, you almost expect viking raid ships to show up at any moment) to Rosendhal, where we had an amazing salmon lunch. Seriously, they had two kinds of salmon, cooked and smoked, and both of them were mind-blowingly good. I'm so glad my wife doesn't eat much and I can always steal finish some of the good stuff from her plate!
The landscape from the fjord cruise was amazing. It was a sunny day, not a cloud in sight. Really amazing.
The next day... a storm is coming. We just walked around a bit in Bergen and we went to the aquarium there, but it still was enough to get us soaking wet.
On the last day, it was still cloudy, but the rain kept delaying. So we walked up the Floyen. That's one of the steepest furniculars in the world. And we were wondering how on earth do people live on those super steep streets.
The view from the Floyen is nice, but it's sooo crowded. But we managed to find a small pond, a bit off the hiking trails, where nobody else was. And there was only silence. Complete silence. We sat there for 10 minutes, just enjoying the beautiful nature that God created.
And that, folks, was our summer Eurotour! I can't wait for part 2. Too bad my wife has to study a lot :|
