long time, no update

Hey everyone. so sorry for the delay in the updates...turns out internet isnt as much everywhere in europe as i'd hoped it would be. meh.
Today is day 11, we are in a small Italian town 2 hours from Venice. Our hostel is very nice and clean and the town is beautfiul and full of happy, beautiful Italians! At the moment I am situated in the common room of our hostel, and at the other end of the room a group of people are singing, I'm assuming it's a church service of some sort...It's quite beautiful, and I'm enjoying listening to the voices fill the room. It really is a lovely language.
We are here fore the tonight and tomorrow night, and then will be in venice for three nights. Im assuming we will have no trouble updating while we're in the city. After venice we have schedualed 4 or 5 nights for the Cinco Terre area. Im looking forward to the lull in pace as we are all feeling the exhaution of traveling every other day...
Yesterday we were on the train for 13 hours, from Reutte, Austria, all the way down here. It was a very long day on a very crowded and hot train. Lets just say we're all glad its over, as we had some reservation mix ups once we arrived and actually had to find somewhere else to sleep last night. Not fun.
Sorry this entry isnt as exciting as my recent stories have been. Perhaps i'm running out of steam (yes, already).
Everyone is well, happy, and healthy for the most part however and we are still enjoying ourselves immensly.
Hope you are all doing well, let me know how school is Kelc and Karen, and Ashley...I'm thinking about you, and praying for you.
Love love love
-Kait

"Dude, Your in my bed!" (day 7)

So here’s an amusing story for you (pay attention, you may also learn a lesson about hostelling that we had to discover the hard way):
We’re staying in Salzburg, Austria at the moment, at a fairly large and loud HI Hostel, in a mixed dorm room of 8 beds. When I say fairly loud, I mean the kind of loud that makes you wonder what all the people screaming out on the lawn are blowing up at 2am(hopefully just firecrackers), and why the same large group of rowdies find it necessary to sing at the top of their lungs 24/7 for no apparent reason. Anyway, last night we all went to bed rather earlyish, knowing we had a full day of sightseeing and galavanting around town ahead of us. Obviously no one fell asleep too quickly, due mostly to the fact that it was stifling hot and opening the window would subject us to the racket outside.
All I have to say about what I remember happening next is thank goodness Jordan had the bed closest to the door.
At approximately 3am I awoke to what sounded like Jordan sleep talking (he’s been known to do that from time to time), and I didn’t really wake up or pay attention until I realized that a guy I had never seen before was pacing up and down our room dressed in basically nothing and muttering to himself in German. He then proceeded to head back towards Jord’s bed where he promptly laid down! I sat up trying to figure out what was going on and I heard Jordan getting louder and louder… “Dude…you are in my bed!! MY BED! WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!” To which drunken German buddy did not respond. “WRONG ROOM…You’re in the wrong room! HELLO?!! YOUR IN MY BED!”…Finally our friend from Ireland (who thankfully speaks German) woke up and started yelling at him, and that conversation was translated for us in the morning.
Irish buddy: “Your in the wrong room dude! What’s your room #?”
Drunken German: No response
IB: “Where’s your key, do you have a room key!?”
DG: “its in my room”
IB: “what’s your room #?? This is room 205, Get out of here!”
DG: “No, this is my bed”
IB: “Get Out!!”
DG: (slurred) “You shut up.”
….IB then leaped out of his top bunk to where Jordan and DG were siting on the bed and helped jord force him into the hallway. They quickly locked the door. Good thing, because he tried to get back in twice.
We found out the next morning that there had been a run in in the room across the hall as well… Maybe he had gotten up to use the WC and gotten confused? Why else would a drunken guy be wandering the halls in his underwear?... I don’t really want to know.
The whole episode was quite entertaining from where I was sitting, but apparently Jordan’s pumping adrenaline wouldn’t let him sleep for quite some time afterwards.
Today we just can’t stop laughing about it.
So kids, lesson of the day: Make sure the last person in your room locks the door, or you too could wake up to a drunken man in his underwear cuddling up to you at 3am.
That’s all I have to say for now… Us girls took a “Sound of Music” Tour this afternoon and it was lovely but not quite blog-worthy. I’ll update again soon.
Love ya!
-Kait.

So I haven’t that much to say, but the drunken visitor story’s just too ripe to miss out on. Allow me to give you my perspective (no worries I’ll keep it short, non repetitive and sweet). Firstly Kait didn’t really give you a good idea of the floor plan; my bunks straight across from Jord’s, both are on the bottom. Had drunken guy turned left it would have been my bed he tried to sleep in instead of Jords. Not cool. Never in my life have I been so happy that it happened to someone else then I was last night (I also kind of wanted to laugh but I saved that for morning. It was all so surreal while this guy was in the room). I’m also glad that there was someone in the room who knew what the guy was saying. Anyway I hear the door open and, thinking someone had returned from a trip to the washroom, I roll over to sleep. That’s when I hear Jord’s voice saying “Dude, your in my bed!” Ok now I’m awake. Looking over I see two bodies in the bed across from mine...and from there on I think Kaits given a detailed account of what followed. Lets just say I might start sleeping on the top bunk from now on.

As for the “Sound of Music” tour I also haven’t much to say except that I now know that I’m just not the type of person who enjoys tours…maybe when I’m too old to walk and haven’t got a choice I’ll try again but for now I’m going to stick to doing things myself. I think it’s the crazy tour lady who tried to make us sing and told the stories in an odd fashion (I might add that her pants were slightly to short and it was killing me the whole time) that turned me off of them till I’m real old, say pappys’ age. Well that’s it for me, I’ll keep on missing you (not enough to stop me from enjoying my time here mind you) and loving you.
Chel

Sore Bum’s and Fish on a Stick (day 5)

This morning, after quite a decent sleep and a run-in with a shower that got more water all over the floor than on me, I headed down stairs with the others for a breakfast of yummy fruit and cereal, and good ole Nutella on bread (a favorite over here in German speaking Europe).
After sitting around for a good while and deliberating on how to spend the day, we took the advise of our host and rented some bicycles in an attempt to ‘see the sights’. We ended up taking a 43km trek out past Gruau im Almtal to a little lake nestled in the foothills of the Alps. Needless to say for the first few kilometers I felt quite Austrian, and much like one of the VonTrapp children from that scene in The Sound of Music…I hummed Maria’s “Doe, ray, me” song quite smugly to myself as the 5 of us rode along the winding road.
Our first stop was for lunch, and since it’s Sunday and most of the little shops in town were closed, we continued on until we came upon “Grill Fiche”, a small stand on the side of the small street, where many happy families with chubby Austrian children were enjoying what we discovered to be entire Mackerel fish skewered on sticks and cooked over a bed of hot coals. What a discovery! They were delicious, as you can see from our smiling faces and clean plates in the pictures (www.flickr.com/photos/jordan_shaw click on “Europe”..they'll be up by Sept.26). Who knows, maybe when we get home Jonny will start up a Fish on a Stick stand in Ukee, he was quite enthralled with the idea☺ (See Dad, we are learning!).
It took us 16 more kilometers to reach our destination, which turned out to be crawling with Tourists and very, very hot. We ditched in the shade, ate some chocolate-coated popsicles and wondered why they didn’t make them like that at home, and planned out the next few days of our journeys.
The trip back seemed less exciting than on the way there, and since it had gotten very hot I felt more like a sweaty, wimpy teenage girl than a beautiful Austrian singer. By the time we got within 10km of our hostel our speed had declined to almost a pitiful rate, and now we’ve all got such sore bums and are so exhausted we’ve decided to let tomorrow be a “day-off” (which, according to Chelsea can include anything except any form of exercise beyond what’s absolutely required).
I feel good about our accomplishments of the day. The scenery was beautiful, even though it did remind me of the Fraser River Valley in BC.
Now it’s dinnertime, and tomorrow we’re off to Salzburg where we will be going to see where Mozart spent his childhood as well as where most of The Sound of Music was actually filmed (woot!).
Till next time…
-Kait.

Sardines

end of day 4.
Picture this scenario: It’s past 10pm. We have just concluded a long day of train hopping, missed connections, delayed trains, and extra-greasy French-fries with who-knows-what-kind-of-meat-sandwiches for dinner.
We are tired, semi-dehydrated and quite disoriented as we step off the train into a whipping cold wind and gaze around for the man from the hostel who had promised to meet us with a vehicle. Since none of the 5 of us can make even a half-decent attempt at pronouncing the name of this town (Gruau im Almtal), we’re anxious to find some friendly, English speaking Austrians.
As we find our guide and ride, we notice that the car looks quite small and cozy for the 5 of us with all our packs, and at the same moment we realize there are 3 other travelers standing behind us, also looking dazed and confused.
Before I realize what’s happening, I’m wedged in the back seat of a European mini-mini-van between Jeanette and a loud Norwegian girl with a pretty scarf, with Chelsea and the Norwegians friend both sharing my lap. On the other side of scarf-girl a skinny 20-something guy from Pennsylvania is crammed next to the door, and in the front seat my two brothers share a space suitable for one small Austrian housewife.
And just like that, we’re off. Zooming in and out of narrow roads in what seemed like a deserted, almost alpine Austrian village, listening to “Mexican Girl” on the radio. A few chuckles and smiling glances from the Norwegians let me know they are friendly enough, and that I shouldn’t be too concerned about sharing this much personal space with them. I grin to myself about how odd the situation is, and settled into the 10-minute seems like 1-hour car ride.
-Kait

On the Train (yes, we know its long!)

We are now (this by the by will be out of date by the time anyone reads it, or at least this part will be) on the ICE (intercity express) on our way to a little town in Austria that neither Kait nor I can pronounce and I can’t even remember, or spell. I just hope we get there even with this hurdle of not knowing how to say it; I assure you it’s written down somewhere. That said I’ll recap our last few days:
I think today is day 4 of our trip and so far we have been to Rothenberg, and Nurnberg. Rothenberg was amazing; I can’t express in words how awesome it was to spend two days there. However that wasn’t our first impression when we first arrived by train Kait turned to me and said “ Is this the right stop?” So I says, “ No, it can’t be…maybe…looks like” the sign on the platform clearly read ‘Rothenberg otb’. So we got off, got help, and started walking to the hostel, we weren’t even sure they had room (my bad). To make a long miserable walk short we found the hostel, a privet room was available and it was clean. Could you ask for more? Also breakfast was included in the price so one meal down and two others to worry about. Speaking of food we wandered down the road found this little café-style-outdoor restaurant. A really nice waiter told us what everything was and we all ended up with one of the specials. I got some type of noodle and meat dish. The pic is below on the last blog. Still I think that nice waiter kind of ripped us off. Anyway the old town part of Rothenberg, which we never left, was surrounded by this old wall (the type built to protect from just about anything) and filled with cute, tall, packed and old houses. It was a like Banff in a lot of ways. And stupid us we didn’t buy a schneeball (not spelt right) cause we thought everywhere in Germany would have them. Nope, it’s a town special…and that’s why every second shop sells them.

Nurnberg was next and not as great as Rothenberg. We didn’t get out to the Nazi stuff, which was the reason we went there. Instead we went to the German National Museum that never ended. We must have walked for hours through all these little nooks and still everywhere we turned there was a door that lead into a large room that led into a hallway and so on. It was fun for the first half hour, but of course we had to get or 6-euro worth so we stayed a lot longer. Finally we got fed up with the fact that it kept going on and on so we decided to leave, that’s when we noticed the part that we actually wanted to see. Despite it’s neverendingness there was very little on Nazi history (I saw all of one Hitler head). Between that museum and the ones we went to in Rothenberg (the crime museum there was filled with masks of shame and not much else…I think I got the idea; do something, anything and wear a uncomfortable and goofy looking mask) I’m pretty much museumed out.

Ok I know this is long but I haven’t really updated lately so you’ll have to deal with it. The hostel we stayed in next was Nothing like the last. The lights only worked when you didn’t turn them on all the way, the toilette had a crocodile painted on the lid with it’s tail going on to a red and white stripped seat, and I don’t think they clean it between campers (lets just say that I was happy I had my own sleeping bag). We found a half empty Coke in the fridge. Oh and the room was painted, poorly I might add, in stripes of bright yellow, pink and orange. At least we got a private room again.
Chel

PICTURES

hey all!!!!
Today we are in Nuremberg and this afternoon we're heading to a little remote hostel in the Austrian Alps..So we're not so sure if we'll have internet access or not.
On Monday we're making our way to Salzburg, and we will be there for 2 nights. we will update and hopefully make some phone calls at that point..
Here's the good news for now..We've got pictures online:):) To make things easier we've put them all onto one page.
please go to www.flickr.com/photos/jordan_shaw and click on "Europe", or go directly to http://www.flickr.com/photos/jordan_shaw/sets/72157594295309708/ these are photos all the way from the airport before we left up to yesterday
Hope your all doing well...We're tired (and some are STILL sick and a little run down...cough cough.) but nontheless we're having a great time.
Miss you all so much
-Kaitlyn

WE ARE HERE

...and everything is in GERMAN! ACK!
so amazing though..after stubbling off the plane in Frankfurt and finding our way through several train connections we arrived here in Rothenburg, Germany, around 5 pm local time...What a town! Surrounded by castle towers and cobble stone streets..beautiful beautiful buildings (including the hostel in which we are staying...built in 14 hundered and something?! wow)..anyway we are all extrememly jetlagged and sleepy and adoring where we are. thats my update for the update...and Ashley ill email you as soon as i can...Chelseas turn!! love yous
-kait

Hey lovelys!
So Rothenburg is soooo awesome!! I'm in love with it. Mum you'd love it too; its got an whole Christmas theme area where you get get all those things you like to display in Sept. Anyway we had an amazing meal...so good... a little bit much but it was our first so it's all worth it. We'll post pics when we have some wireless.
P.S I'm having more fun then you.
Chel

Fare Thee Well

So I leave this morning in an hour to get to Vancouver....One hour. I'm running on no sleep cause I'm about as excited as some little kid at Christmas. But in stead of some jolly old fat man dumping stuff down the chimney I'm waiting for a plane and an adventure. Well who needs sleep? All I can think about right now is the plane, if I think about Germany my mind explodes and my tummy starts to pick fights with all the body parts surrounding it. How's that for an account of how I feel. Its all good. Where was I?...Oh yeah, we leave today, spend some last min shopping in Nanimo and then hope on the ferry to Vancouver. Tomorrow at five am we get to the airport and fly out at 9:30. mmm 5 am. I'm just hoping that the in flight movie's good. With my luck it'll be one of those movies you see the commercial for and say "I would live a happy life if I never see that.". I actually like flying. Its odd yes but most my nerves are all about getting on the plane but once I'm in my seat I'm good...Just give me a paperback and a coke and I'm good. Well now I only have half an hour till I leave so I should brush my teeth...And pack my toothbrush (not sure anyone would want to travel with me if I forgot that)...And get ready. I'll write again when I can but it might not be for a while. Cheers! (like that I'm already talking the talk...lol)
Chel

Bye Bye Canada

This will most likely be my last post before I arrive in Germany.
It's about 10:45 on monday morning, my last day in Sydney, NS. Tomorrow I will be hopping on a shuttle to Halifax airport at 6:45am, where I will be waiting until my flight check-in time at 7:40 pm. As you can imagine im not exactly looking forward to waiting for 8 hours in that stinky airport again..I already know it too well. And no steven to wait for this time!! But I do have my friends and family in Germany who I will be quite anxious to see.
This morning i got up early to go and see the school nurse before it got too busy. I had my last twinrx vaccination with me and she gave that to me as well as some advise on how too avoid too much pain in the airplane since i have such a horrible cold in my sinuses.
Anyway I guess it was the stress of knowing im leaving, and the fact that I hadnt eaten anything yet, or somthing...but when she gave me the shot i was fine for about 6 minutes and then I felt like i was going to pass out. I might have momentarily actually. I havent been that close to throwing up since i was sick with Norwalk flu this summer. very bizzare, as i normally do not react at all to vaccinations. I barely made it back to my room where i collasped and slept for another hour. Im feeling much better now, but it wasnt exactly a nice start to my last day here.
we're going out to dinner tonight, and then i think the plan is to have a glass of wine and head to bed extra early..Gotta save energy for all that waiting around tomorrow:)
Stevens traffic control evaluation is this friday, and I believe he has a written test on thursday. Keep him in your thoughts and prayers, as he's been somewhat distracted with me here and im afraid his study habits have suffered slightly..:s
Thanks for all the advise Amanda..I was also thinking very strongly that we would need to slow down a lot..I just want to enjoy my time, not have to rush about worrying that we're off schedual because we couldnt see everything in Rome within the 48 hours we had alloted. :)
honestly, if i only get as far as Italy or spain i'll be just as content as seeing it all. Im sure i'll be back.
Talk to you all soon (I'll update as soon as I can)
-Kait.

How fast the time goes....

I can't believe I've already been here for a week! I guess it's true that time flies when your having fun, but i wish it were possible to slow it down..
I'm getting more aquainted with the college here..especially with the funny cleaning lady who comes in every morning to take the garbage and wash the sink. I've never had a cleaning lady before, and I'm not sure that I enjoy it. Maybe it's just because Im a girl but I somehow take pride in being the care taker and cleaner of my own space. It's beautifully sunny today and we're looking forward to the weekend. We have nothing exciting planned, just spending as much time as possible together before monday arrives. (we've decided that we're not going to think about being sad until monday-then we're allowed:)
Anyway I hope you'll all write and let me know how your September is going...How's school? Hows work? I miss you all..
love kait

Change for the better?

Ok so I've done some much needed replaning! Some of it will be the same but there's a few minor changes so I'll just write it all up. Give me some feedback on this guys its (for a couple of you) your plans too. Are you ready for this? Are you standing at the edge of you seat? Well you should be after all this is what our future may look like. Bright stuff anyway nough said on with it!

Sept 18: Leave for Vancouver cause I live in an awesome little town has far away from the airport as possible. 19: Fly away from here. 20: Arrive in Frankfurt 6am local time, Kait comes at 10, head to Rothenburg. 22-23: Munich.
Austria: 24: Salsburg. 25-26: Vienna, night train on the 26th.
Italy: 27-29: Venice. 30: Bologna. Oct 1: Bologna/ Genova. 2: Riviera. 3: Pisa. 4-5: Florence. 6-8: Rome. 9: Rome/Naples. 10-11: Naples. 12: Salerno (Amalfi coast). 13: Taormina. 14: Palermo. 15-17: Extra days.
Spain/Portugel: 18: Fly from Palermo to Barcelona. 19-20: Barcelona. 21-22: Valencia. 23-24: Madrid. 25: Toledo. 26: Avila/Segovia. 27-29: Sevilla. 30: Gilbralter? Sevilla?. 31-Nov1: Lisbon. 2: Santiago. 3: San Seb.
France: 4-5: Toulouse. 6-7: Aries? Nice?. 8-9: Chamonix.
Switz: 10-12: Bern and Berner Oberland
France again: 13-14: Paris. 15: Versailles. 16: Chartres. 17-19: Extra days. 20: Pass expires and we take the Chunnel to London.
UK: 21-23: London. 24-25: Bath. 26-27: York. 28-29: Edinburgh. 30-Dec1: Inverness (and a quick stop at good old Lock Ness). 2-3: Glasgow. 4: Extra day. 5: Ferry to Belfast. 6-departure date: Northern Ireland. And that's it. Forgive my spelling (I can't really read my own writing at times and when the originals in Sharpe it gets worse). For those of you coming with me please let me know if this is better or not.

If it takes all day

Ok lets see if I can get the picture up. It really has nothing to do with the trip but I'm not going to let that stop me. Anyway I thought I should let everyone know that we might be going to the Netherlands and Belgium. *crosses fingers* well this is going to be short because my keyboard isn't working, I just set up the computer and I think is hates this keyboard not that I can blame it... The point is it doesn't register every other letter. Great its getting worse... The pic's of my niece (we were trying to get her teeth)
Chel

chillax

Hey ya! Well its another blustery day here in Sydney. The expected hurricane finally blew in last night and ruined our plans to tour a cruiseship in sydney harbour today. I guess it couldnt make it in due to the weather...dissapointing, but i guess this just means im going to have to go on a cruise if i want to see a ship..which doesnt sound like too bad a plan to me or steven. :)
We're having a grand time here (as you can see we've also been having fun playing with my new camera built into my computer:)..Yesterday I went with steven to his simulator class and watched him do his thing on the computers and radio etc. It was pretty fun, it actually looks more dificult and stressful than i thought it was. He's doing really well though.. I can't believe how fast this week is going! In no time at all it will be next tuesday morning, and i'll be tearfully saying goodbye while trying to remember that I'm heading out on a wonderful adventure, and that leaving steven here for another 3 months will not be the end of the world. Im so excited to see my brothers and friends next week in Germany...It still almost seems surreal.

Ohh Hey Chel: Yeah I know it will be difficult because there are so many of us traveling. but i thought if maybe just a cupple of us wanted to try it out while we're all staying in the same area, it might be fun. We'll see. Any progress on the Ireland or not Ireland debate??? Have you been in contact at all with Shandell or anna? They havent emailed me in quite awhile.

Not too much else to update on..I dont think we'll be getting away this weekend due to the fact that we cannot rent a car and the bus will take us about 1000 hours and 100 dollars to get anywhere we want to go. But i'll let you know if any more adventures arise.
Take care !
-Kait

Another year

“Happy birthday!
Now you're one year older!
Happy birthday!
Your life still isn't over!
Happy birthday!
You did not accomplish much
But you didn't die this year
I guess that's good enough

So let's drink to your fading health
And hope you don't remind yourself
The chance of finding fame and wealth
Decrease with every year”
-Arrogant worms-

So it’s my birthday I’ve made one more trip around the sun and this years looking good. For one thing no more school! I woke up to my alarm the other day leaped out of bed thinking ‘crap I’m going to be late for school again’. That was a bad start but that didn’t happen today so that’s a plus. I didn’t get up till late (sweet, sweet golden days). I get to have my favorite meal today, yeah steak and Caesar salad. The Shaws and Tina are coming over to share it with me. Sorry you had to miss it Kait but don’t you worry I’ll eat enough for the both of us. We’ll I’ve got a lot to do. Arrivederci
Chel

HAPPY BIRTHDAY CHELSEA!!!!!!!!!!!

Hope you are having an incredible day chels!! Actually your probably still sleeping as it's only 9am back there. Big plans for the day? I guess going out to buy beer isnt too exciting for you as you were already legal in calgary. meh. I can't believe we're all almost grownups. its too weird, hey?

Im having a super time here in Sydney..The college is a lot nicer than i was expecting.. The rooms are like little hotel rooms but much friendlier. There are tons and tons of trees and water with a pretty little bridge.

This weeknd steven and I stayed with his friends in Lunenburg, which is about an hour from Halifax..about 5 hours from here. It was a really cute, old little town. All the houses and downtown buildings look like they were built before 1900 and are all beautifully painted in bright and cheery colors and situated close and comfortably on the harbours edge. I think i could quite easily enjoy living in Nova Scotia, it's beautiful.
Today I slept in until almost lunch time (still working off the jetlag...ha..or just being lazy because I can.) and am now relaxing and reading and exploring unil stevens done school at 4.
I'm happy, content, warm and comfortable inside..I didn't think I realized how wonderful it would be to be here until I saw steven in the airport on friday night. I love him soo much!!!
Hope all of you are doing wonderfully..I'm sure I'll update more before the week is through.

Happy happy birthday again chelsea!! I'm thinking about you today, we'll have to have a mini party for you once we get to germany....:D:D

Hills?

So today was the last day of work. I think I’ve forgotten what a ‘day off’ is. I have a vague recollection of something awesome that allows you to get things done and/or have fun but it’s oh so very dim. What a summer it’s been! Somehow it went by really quick and I even got in a few good times (which is all anyone with two jobs and a ton of planning can hope for). And now I have that awful trip ahead of me, uhgg anywhere but Europe…ah sarcasm. The truth is I’m so excited I think my brains melted from the heat caused but the constant shaking in my everywhere. Tomorrow I head off to Nanimo to get some much needed supplies…I should look into a first aid kit, Lord knows I’m the most likely to hurt myself. Then I’ll have time Sunday to get more planning done. No worries guys I’ll keep you posted (I have to Kait’s got that motherly I’m-disappointed-in-you look down packed). As for the planning so far here’s the most up to date schedule (starts Sept 20):

20th: Arrive in Frankfurt head to Rothenberg
21st: Nierenberg, 22nd: Munich, 24th: Salzburg (Austria), 25th: Vienna, 27th Venice (Italy), 30th: Bologna, Oct 1st: Genova, 2nd: Italian Riviera, 3rd: Pisa, 4th: Florence, 5th: Rome, 8th: Naples (and surrounding area), 11th: Salerno (Amalfi coast), 12th: Taormina (Kait there’s a cool volcano that I was told is a must see here), 13th: Palermo, Couple extra days incase of changes, 16th: Barcelona (going to fly to Spain from Palermo), 19th: Valencia, 21st: Madrid, 22nd: Toledo, 23rd: Avila/ Segovia, 24th Sevilla (and surrounding area, Arcos de la Frontera), 27th Gilbralter?Savilla?, 28th Lisbon, 29th: Santiago, 31st: San Sebastien, Nov1st: Toulouse.
The rest hasn’t been completely worked out yet but we do know that we will be spending time in France, Switzerland, Ireland and the UK. Sounds fun eh!

Kait: I have looked at the couch surfers web site before and the main page displays a dude with his shirt either open or off and he’s pretty goofy looking and his friend had a weird name. Long story short JO and I couldn’t stop laughing long enough to get past that. I’ll look into the other ones later.

Well that’s all I have to say. I NEED to get some sleep tonight since I didn’t get to bed till late last night and had to work in the morning and I have to leave early tomorrow. I was watching the Great Escape, the Irish guy was my hero but like all true heroes he dies (the good ones just come back to life three days later), anyway I never saw the end cause it turns out it was playing for another hour or so and it was already time to get some shuteye. I hope Hills didn’t die, only three make it I guess (can you believe I’ve never seen that movie. Me! Not see a movie, I watch TV twenty-four seven...) and I was beginning to like him.
Chel

Scotia Cafe?....hmmm...

HEY!!!!!
Ok ok here it is... the First "Official" post from me, KAIT, from the beginnings of my wonderful journey through canada, Europe, and possibly beyond.
Sound glamorous? think again.
I got to the Vancouver Airport last night with my mum and lil sis at about 8pm. My flight wasnt until 1am, so my dear friend ashley and her awesome fiance Nathan (who are both living in vancouver) came to hang out and help ease the stress i was feeling. It was so nice!! But of course the time eventually came and I said goodbye to all and headed through the very anti-climactic and very sleepy security and waited for my plane.
I think i slept for about 3 hours all together, but when we landed in Halifax it was apparently 12pm and my body apparently did not want to come to terms with that fact. i slept in the noisey, pooey airport for another 2.5 hours.
now it's been 6 hours, and i'm still hanging out here, trying to find interesting people to watch but honestly there's only so much hugging and tears before it becomes quite dull.
Stevens on his way here to pick me up from Sydney, NS with a cupple of his friends as we speak (or as i type i guess) but it's a 4.5 hour drive and they had to first finish the day of school so they will not arrive here until about 9:30pm nova scotia time.
....SoOoOooo.....to make a long story short im bored out of my mind and i DEFINITLEY packed too much stuff. ( i think i would be outside wandering around at this moment if it were not for the insane weight of my pack) honestly, it's hard to lift. i dont really know what happened, because 2 days a go when i weighed it i was acutally quite proud of my prudent packing. i guess i got a little frantic at about 2am one morning wondering what i was leaving behind that i might possibly need. good thing i'll be in the country for 10 days before heading to germany....i have a feeling there'll be some packages heading home before too long.
oOoOooh hey CHELSEA: Nathan (ash's beau who traveled europe) gave me these links we should look at:
www.globalfreeloaders.com
www.couchsurfing.com
www.hospitalityclub.com
www.place2stay.com
and www.stay4free.com
APPARENTLY these are what he used to stay most of his nights in europe..he only hostel'd it once in a while and apparently the poeple who sign up on these websites are familys and other locals who open their homes up to people (FOR FREE) to come and stay for a night or so...Im sure youve heard of it before, apparently its all getting quite popular. anyway there are tons of us traveling together so we might not be able to do it too much, but it might be worth ($$) checking out...Nathan said he never had a bad experience with the poeple and apparently his best memories of his trip are of a few different families who took him in.
pretty fun
ANYWAY.....oooooh K! It's been almost half and hour, this is good stuff. Im soo excited to see steven..but all this waiting has made today a little anti-climactic.
I'll leave you for now...Hopefully next time i'll have a real adventure to report (that doesnt include any embarressing sagas of me trying to carry my own backpack and receiving more than one bizzare stare from people as i stumble down the hallway...)
Love you all!!!! Hope your all as happy (and much less tired) as i am:)
Ciao
-kait

testing 1,2,3..

Just a little post to see if this actually works...
more soon
-k&c