April 19th - April24th: I don't know if I can get down with your burrito

We are on vacation from backpacking in Corfu, Greece! We are having an amazing time lying on the gorgeous beach by our crazy huge mountain top party hostel, The Pink Palace. We walked into the hostel bar on our first night here for a beer and Jen spotted a guy who looked exactly like Ben (the Canadian 18 year old backpacker who we met on the random pub crawl in Rome - he and his friend Taite hung out with us and Ashley and Jack a little that night). Strange lookalike turned out to be even stranger, it actually was Ben! We exchanged super weirded out looks and then saw Taite and their third buddy, Simon. They were accompanied by Jordan, a sweet 20 year old studying in Athens who was pretty headstrong about fighting the cultural norm and distinguishing himself as different. The 4 of them had befriended one hell of an "athlete" lacrosse loving Logan, who turned out to love Dutch cougars even more...a scaring discovery by Kelly Puckett. One beer turned into several and we talked about the strange workings of the universe that would bring us to the same island in Greece to the famous hostel here at the same time when we had never discussed this plan with each other. These guys are great fun and we immediately formed a brother/sisterly bond with them and have been hanging out over egg breakfasts and at the bars here...they sleep all day, which we can't hate on them for since we are usually dozing in and out on the beach. We also met a big group of kids studying in Prague...as college graduates we are clearly a few years too old for this place, but the Dutch Logan-loving cougar had us beat by a few decades. Prague kids turned into buddies one day while poolside so our group of vacation buddies grew with the addition of Dan, Ian, Greg, James and there 4 other friends. Chaos hit the Pink Palace on Friday with the arrival of a 700 person spring break tour. Our palace was overrun with 20 year old messes that brought us back to our spring break memories, and lack thereof. If you can't beat them, join them, was the general attitude of the prior palace occupants, so relaxing vacation became more of a party pit stop. One of the best days was when we rented four wheelers from our hostel with Ben, Taite, Simon and Jordan and whizzed off down the windy Greek roads to Corfu Town to get a little feel for the island outside of our party confine. Free wheeling along cliff roads looking down at the beautiful beach and Adriatic Sea below the green mountainside thick with tall pointy pines made for amazing views. We caught parades as part of Corfu's famous Easter festival...which were pretty much one morbid marching band after the next, but an interesting change of pace nonetheless.
Swimming in the sea here was freezing but so clear it felt like you had been dropped into a glass of drinking water. Looking down at not only your toes but every individual grain of sand on the sea floor it seemed like you were looking down through a sheet of glass. 
A toga party was Saturday nights big attraction and hundreds of Pink Palce residents attempted to make decent and sturdy togas out of the shiny pink satin sheets that were mandatory to attend. We helped our temporary little brothers tie their togas the best we could and headed to the huge paladium nightclub here. In case you haven't pieced this one together, this hostel is ENORMOUS and reminicent of a summer camp for drunken 20 year olds. The toga party was part rave and part tradition as  a traditional Greek dance performance turned into the staff setting the dance floor on fire as a man lifted a flaming table with his mouth. Then hundreds of ceramic plates were carried out, stack after stack and smashed on the head of every guest followed by a shot of Ouzo from the bottle while the Greek music blared and ceramic shards flew everywhere....Greek traditions are weird. The madness was swept up as quickly as it had begun and the smoke filled toga rave continued all night. This was convenient for us and our Canadian and Prague friends as we were all taking an early morning ferry to Venice which meant we needed to be on a bus departing the palace at 5:45am. No sense in going to bed first we reasoned, as this was a 23 hour ferry ride and embarking well rested would make us some bored bunnies. After nearly missing our bus, perhaps due to Jenny's inability to get her life together, we were finally on our way. Help got us up and moving, the perks of befriending the hostel staff over a political discussion that day at lunch. Big shout out to our buddy to Armondo, who Kelly said she would see in 5... Not so much. You are a gem for the personal wakeup and help dear! 

We had all been seriously Pink Palaced and were ready for a  slice of reality and a return to Italia. A ferry floor had never seemed such a comfortable place to sleep as it did to our group of 11 that morning. Partied as we were, we were no strangers to the danger of travel so we all secured our belongings, hiding our purses and lining our bags up behind our heads. Everyone lay guarding their things and we all fell asleep on our bags, drifting in and out of sleep, but apparently were no match for the agile robbers aboard as we woke up to find 3 members of our squad (including yours truly, Kelly) had been robbed of their most valuable belongings. This was a crime that no one could wrap there heads around, including head of security when he saw the precision with which it had been executed by someone who would have had to make his was through our crowd of people silently. Hours 4-23 were now a giant game of clue and with knots in our stomachs we kept a hand on every bag at all times. We wish the agile robber had had it in his heart to leave Kelly her camera card containing every picture she has taken on our travels for the last 2 months. Losing your possessions out of carelessness is hard, but theft out of a hidden purse behind a 40lbs  backpack with 3 people sleeping practically on top of it...that's a loss that's hard to swallow. 

So now Kelly is phoneless (our only lifelines to the real world), and camera-less. Which, if you know Kelly, you know her camera and pictures are her most valuable and personal belonging since she was in middle school. When you are far from home and have one backpack, it seems to amplify this loss. Kelly of course will always feel sick about her pictures and the phone is just more or less a pain in the ass. It's strange to be electronic-less for these last couple of weeks, and probably not a bad lesson. Frustration, sadness, anger, confusion... The list of feelings goes on especially after so much good luck and 3 months of being so careful. But the reality is we have had nothing but great fortune (knock on wood) our whole trip, healthy bodies and once in a lifetime experiences. Being with a group was a crucial aid to staying positive all day on our ferry and then we are in Venice. It makes it hard to complain... As the expression goes, shit happens. Kelly feels positive and isn't going to waste time being anything but grateful to be back in Italia :) 

We all took turns eating, napping, and being general bums on our long adventure. As a group, we came to a general consensus that selling deck seats on a 25 hour janky ferry is cruel and unusual punishment. Thank goodness we had a squad to stay distracted. Ian had a laptop, so we piled around it an watched hours on end of the Amc show "breaking bad", as our butts went numb. Bored eating got the best of us and ice cream Sunday's made for perfect midnight snacks. Finally the group fell tired again, and decided to get a few more hours of shuteye. Well as best we could... Kelly & Greg undoubtedly had slept with one eye open. 

Venice scenery surrounded us all we pulled up to port the next morning. We couldn't wait to be off this boat and bid farewell to our lost belongings and sketchy neighbors. We were in Venice! Venice! Words can't describe our excitement, so we won't bother trying... 

Tuesday April 19: "I mean, this is the best pre-packaged toast I've tried"

We start waking up here in Sorrento about 6am to loud church bells that we remain unsure about... Church or rude alarm? After that its a series of loud gals and door slams. So when our alarms went off around 8 we were already awake. We must have our minds in the right place, because we got right up and set out for a jog. After a quick shower, we moved quickly through free breakfast and checkout. Greece? Venice? Decisions decisions. Were having trouble figuring out our ferry to Greece. We decided we need a few Samara kind of days before finishing up, so were hoping to make it to an island in Greece by tomorrow. There we have some serious goals: bake in the sun, sleep in the sun, explore grecian island life and re-center/refocus/regroup. And maybe wash some socks, panties and shirts. Not that we smell or anything....
So we skipped town towards Napoli... That's Naples for y'all American folk. On the way we jumped off the train in Pompeii, curious about the ruins. We wanted to see te froZen people but not enough to pay and wait in line. So we took it in from a distance, compared my Vesuvius to arenal, and re-boarded our train. We had about an hour and a half to kill in Naples, and the one thing that's a must do is eat pizza (where it was created)! Jenny had done some research and we mapped our way to what was reviewed as the oldest and best pizza. There were tons of people waiting outside to get in... The city has pizza rules, thats right, rules. Here's the guidelines for Napoli pizza:

We decided to ask for ours to go and when Jenny ordered one margarita (the only other option is maranara) the friends chefs thought she was one crazy Americana. We walked back to the train station in anticipation and they were right. One was a bad idea. This was the best pizza imaginable, and we can't explain why. It was unlike anything else. We enjoyed our halves and dreamed avout more as we waited for our train.
We had 2 trains to catch to Bari (the port town and homeland to THE Shea Donovan-there's billboards of him all over, your people send their love dear). Obviously, Jenny passed out while Kelly watched the gorgeous Italian scenery pass by as er iTunes played the perfect soundtrack. Today we are feeling great about our decision to go home and know it's the right time. We passed a ton of windmills and as U2 serenaded Kelly there seemed to be signs and symbolism coming at us the whole day. Now let's just hope we can find a boat to Greece...
Success! We made it to Bari with approximately 30 minutes to find the port, figure out a ferry, book and board. We did it! We would be in Ingomenutsa by 6am.
We boarded expecting a shnazzy ferry like our first to holland. Ehh not so much. No Internet or cool spots. We sat in a movie theatre meets airplane type of room with a bunch of strangers and our backpacks. Salad and fries for dinner and, as always, stole some bread for breaky!We watched Erin brokevich (yay for no dubbing) and then spread out across seats in hope of sleeping a bit...
Doze on and off... On and off... I think were somewhere in Greece by now...

Monday, April 18-- The uncurable travel bug

This day was for centering, reflection, and planning forwards. We have had so many ideas and plans and uncertainties rattleing around in our heads and we needed to get some calm. We are really conflicted as we approach the end of the route we had in mind. We both encounter homesickness in fleeting moments, whether it's as silly as missing our blowdryer and straightener or as deep as longing to see a person that we miss. We are really fortunate to be able to talk about these things with one another and be each others support system. The internal conflict comes into play when homesickness meets desire to nomad. We are obsessed with Italy and typically totally absorbed in the present, hence our usual lack of planning! We are soaking up every moment of where ee are but we have a seerious case of the travel bug, there are endless places we want to go. We are fearful that some of these are now or never. It seems unlikely we will retire our pencil skirts and disregard work emails in future years to be dirty hippies living out of a backpack with no plan and few commitments. We want to see Morocco, we have both dreamed for years of a trip to Africa to volunteer, Kelly longs to travel Oceania and Jenny is dying to go to Thailand. The thought of time in a disciplined Ashram strikes our fancy, and so does some time in China. We don't have the money for these right now, and we both have people and upcoming events at home that we are ready to get back to. We decided Almafi was the place to go to mellow our conflicted souls. The Almafi Coast is amazing and the most celebrated in Italy (although we still hold Cinque Terre as an untouchable number 1 in our hearts) and we intended to find and hike Sentiero degli Dei (Path of the Gods) a well famous 6 hour mountain hike. Yea we are just as surprised as you that a long hike appeals to us more than cafe chilling or window shopping...our inner dirty hippies must be really thriving. After an insanely long windy bus ride from Sorrento along the edge of the cliff (think the crazy mountain top toads on which James Bonds high speed chases occur in Austin Martin convertibles) we arrived in Almafi. Wrong place for our path we learned but awesome seaside village surrounded by cliffs with aqua water. We ate crepes in an Italian cafe where the smiley server pridefully told us about the greatness of Almafi and gave us his address so we could write to him when we wanted to return, gotta love those Italian men!
We have come to terms with the fact that this trip will not cure our travel bug, and that's okay.
As much as we feel we need to go everywhere right now, if we hold ourselves to everything we have learned on this trip then we know our travel adventures are far from over. The challenge will be coming home to a society that prizes work and "adulthood" over all else.
After a long chat about home and travels and life, We hopped on a bus back towards Sorrento. We decided this was a good place to map out the last leg of our trip. After some down time and a quick jog for Jenny, we grabbed a salad in the restaurant of our hostel and camped out at the computers. We looked at going to Africa, asia, etc etc. But the reality is, we need a planning break! Despite our lack of planning style, when you're backpacking with no set plan, the reality is you plan everyday. Plan plan plan. Our brains (and bank accounts) need a holiday. So together we decided when were done with Europe, as our rail pass expires, it's time to go home. And time to get excited for it! So... I guess you could say that's the plan :) bed time... Tomorrow were going to.....???

Sunday, April 17- Do you want a bite of my cheese and lettuce sandwich?

This morning we enjoyed the quiet solitary environment of our B&B, and not being
in a mad rush to check out for once. We took nice long showers and repacked our
bags (which are considerably heavier after some impulse gift and souvenir
shopping...guess we should have see this one coming) and did travel research. We
were Romed out so it was on to the next. We were having a hard time making
decisions so we just got on a train to Naples, not the safest place we have
heard, but the Almalfi Coast is supposedly one of the most beautiful in Europe and
we could see the frozen ruins of Pompeii as well as Mt Vesuvius.
Heading this way we could take a train to a nice hostel that Sam (our friend
from Florence) recommended to us in Sorrento.

Sketchball city is what we will call Napoli, although we only saw the view of
the city from our train, and the train station as we connected onto a heavily
graffitied train to go to Sorrento. We arrived at our hostel with some directional guidance from a Polish guy who was also staying there. We dropped off our belongings and headed out for dinner, a delicious and filling roast vegetable dish, before going home for a decently early night.

Saturday, April 16th--Pope's are Weird

We had left things with our hostel hosts open ended about whether or not we could stay Saturday night. By 11 (end of the checkout period) they were no where to be seen so we presumed they had arranged another night for us. We had another date with Jack & Ashley to go see the Vatican so we hustled to meet them at a nearby McDonalds. Most people would take a bus or train over to the Vatican city, but these 4 amici were going to soak up all the sunshine we could. About an hour later we were approaching Saint Peters Square, which is quite a site on Saturday afternoons (or ever). We knew we had a long wait and day ahead of us so we popped in a pizza place... Yes more pizza and no we aren't sick of it yet. Something in the air here strips away the need for all food that isn't Italian... Or maybe were just on a ravenous carb binge and our bodies now refuse to desire foods that aren't white. The busy pizzeria gave us way too much food as we stood in the packed room chowing down. We were barely into the city limits before tour guides bombarded us from every direction. We listened to one woman for a while but decided to just wait in the line and wander through on our own. Luckily another guide approached us and decided to cut us a deal since Kelly and Ashley had student IDs (traveler tip: NEVER get rid of your student ID...you can get discounts everywhere, plus cheaper movies at home. duh). As we spoke with him the first woman came back yelling at all of us and trying to bargain her deals over his... The guy was calm and starred at lady #1 like the looney toon she seemed to be so we left with him, listening to her angry but compelling sales skills behind us. While it was a bit stressful getting there and going, buying a tour was the smartest thing ever! We would have probably never even found the Sistine chapel on our own (seriously, that happens to people). Our extremely knowledgeable guide dragged us through the dangerously crowded Vatican museums. Our first stop was the courtyard where parties were held for popes back in the renaissance, and she explained all the insane details behind Michelangelo's famous ceiling. We also learned about fresco paintings and artists like Raphael who have left their marks. We listened to our guide via one eared headphones, so naturally we played secret agent while trying to follow her red umbrella around. Maturity.

After a lot of narrow corridors full of frescos, ornate ceilings, tapestries and ancient statues, we had finally made it to the Sistine chapel. The ceiling has been restored fairly recently and they left a patch of what it looked like before... The difference was insane! Michelangelo used really bright colors and they say he painted for himself based on details found during the restoration. His self portrait is said to be in the de-skinned saint within The Last Judgement. We sat in the quiet chapel as long as we were allowed. You have to really take it in to be in the sheer awe of what he did. It's overwhelming. Stiff necks and all, we wound our way out and into St. Peters basilica. Another overwhelming site; the basilica is beyond ornate and enormous. We snapped a few pictures in St. Peters Square, which was roped off with thousands of chairs for Palm Sunday tomorrow. Crazy to think that the Pope would stand right there the next day! We stumbled around like idiots before realizing we all had terrible "museum legs". So we walked back to their hotel (across town) because Jack decided we had wine to finish off! Gotta love his style. While crossing over the river into Rome, Jenny heard someone..."Jenny? JENNY!"... then out of NOWHERE, squeals were let out as Jenny ran into a friend from home who is studying abroad in Florence, Carly. It was SO random but awesome. Funny how those things happen. Our tired legs made it to the hotel, passing by the Pantheon, Spanish steps, and other amazing sights. Ashley tucked in for a nap while the three of us took our wine to the neighboring park to play cards. We played games, went through our wine stash, and had life chats with 20 year old Jack. He is an amazing person, as is Ashley. Sightseeing is so incredible, but sometimes nothing beats making new friends with such awesome people around this world and hearing their story and thoughts. New bestys in whales? Check!

When the bottles were empty and out bladders were too full, we ran back to the hotel to wake up sleepy Ashley. Our friend in Florence, Sam, suggested a restaurant to us in Rome with a student menu. It was in Trastevere, where we had been wanting to go, so the 4 of us hopped in a cab and on we went. La Fate was perfect! Italian, cute, and 3 courses for 10 euros!! What a killer deal for Rome. Red wine included of course (keep it coming with this quartet). We all knew we wanted an early night, so we shared an awesome dinner and headed back towards home. It was the perfect end to an amazing few days together. Jack & Ashley are our travel bffs. We were sad bunnies to say goodbye but we know we will see them again :)

As we walked up stairs to our apartment room, we joked about our stuff being gone because the room wasn't ours anymore. Then around the corner there was Johncarlo and Maki, our hosts. Up so late? Oh no! They informed us they had to give the room to new people with reservations so they moved ALL OF OUR STUFF to another hostel they own. We will admit that we had stuff everywhere, personal, important and a lot of it. Our combination of being grateful and mortified left us shell shocked. They laughed and said it wasn't our fault and it was no problem. Maki walked us about 10 minutes away to another nice apartment where our backpacks and a bag full of every lose item we own sat. All our valuables, panties, lost socks, trash... ALL of it. It's official these people are amazing! Totally shocked and humiliated, we paid maki and said goodnight. This was definitely a first (and a last). Bed time... Somewhere above a Chinese restaurant in Rome....

Friday, April 15--Pain No Shame

Today's themes are hangovers and wine...which we suppose are kind of
contradictory themes, but they went together pretty well. We hadn't made it
home until the early hours of the morning, so we had what Patti Foster would
call "a bed day." With our technology and B&B provided snacks we did absolutely
nothing until the late afternoon (not that we could have if we had wanted to). This was obviously the hangover part of our
day, not the wine part. We headed out into Rome to see some sights...which
turned into playing with make up in Sephora and talking about how much we were
going to indulge our vanity when we got home...especially after nights like last
night when we go out to clubs with not a scrap of makeup, scraggly hair, and
dirty tourist outfits. We walked down Quattro Fontane and saw the 4 famous fountains
tucked into the buildings on the four corners. We walked around some beautiful
Roman building looking at the stone fountains and imagining how scary This
statue-filled city would be if everything stone came alive at night. Then we
headed to the Spanish steps to meet the boys we had met on our pub crawl last
night. We really didn't expect them to be there as we barely knew them, made
these plans totally inebriated last night, and would be invading on their
couples trip to Rome. The Spanish steps are known for their people watching so
we scanned the crowd until our gaze fell upon...Jack! He was jumping up and down
and so were we as we ran to meet him and Ashley. This was a fast forming
friendship and the two of them are our new favorites, hilarious, a totally
adorable couple and insanely fun!
Jack immeditaley declared it was time to start hitting the bottle...the red wine
bottle that is. Our first instinct was "heck no!" as we were both still a little
on the queasy side and Jen's head was pounding more and more. Our second thought
was "heck yes we're in Italy, bring on the vino!" We were all in agreement that
this was a hair of the dog kind of evening. We strolled to the Trevi fountain,
where we stopped to toss a penny in and make a quick wish, before finding a
little wine bar with outdoor seating and some seriously strong heaters. Wine and
apperitivo time had our headaches fading and the four of us cracking up and all
enjoying the company of new friends in a new city. We decided to keep the good
times rolling so we had some pasta...and wine...at another spot up the road. Not
the best food we've ever had but definitely some of the best company. We were
probably disturbing the other diners with our level of laughter as we chatted
and planned the script for Ashleys new feature film, based on his highschool
years, Zach Efron will be staring in this award winning film and we will be
first on the list to the London premier thanks to our inspiration and
support....right Ashley?! After dinner we decided it was probably time for some
more wine so we went to a little shop and bought 2 bottles for good measure, but
the wine loving girl working decided to throw in one for good luck so we left
with 3. We walked back with Ashley and Jack to their hotel room where we all
sipped about one plastic cup of vino before tiredness came over us and we were
ready for bed. Hangover + wine must = sleep. We weren't done enjoying Rome with
our new friends so we decided to meet in the morning and go to Vatican City
together.

The 2 of us walked home to brush our purple teeth before falling asleep in our
awesome, quiet, peaceful B&B (Wow Roma is the name if you are looking for an
apartment to enjoy in Rome!) Goodnight peeps! See you tomorrow for adventures in
the Vatican.

Thursday, April 14th-- When in Rome

Most days we are up and going fairly early, either for free breakfast, checking out or sightseeing. When you share a dodgey room with 10 strangers, sleeping in isn't really all to appealing anyway. Our hostel in Rome is more of an apartment bedroom, where the breakfast and snacks sit out all day in the kitchen. Taking in the quiet, clean, dark private room we shared, we decided not to set an alarm on our first day in Rome. Well, it worked! We didn't wake up until about noon. Moments like these remind us that after 2+ months of traveling, your body starts to get a little worn down. So quit your judgin', we still had plenty of time to explore Roma!

First stop today was a little snack bar where jenny was in need of a coffee on the go. Since everyone here takes espresso shots, she ordered an American coffee... A few moments later they handed jenny a small plastic dixie cup of coffee. As she walked awkwardly holding the tiny treat, we decided America does take away best. We headed south through Piazza Republica, stopped in Santa Maggiore (a huge and beautiful basilica) and then winded around streets until we suddenly saw the Colosseum down another normalroad. Lucky for us, we waited less than 5 minutes before we walked in for free (love culture week!). The Colosseum is pretty amazing. The history, what's left, the sheer size of it. We imagined it in all it's glory; drunken brawls over favorite gladiators and men being eaten by starving lions. Roman history is craazy! We peaked around the neighboring ruins where archaeologist work all day but the cold grayness was not awesome for our ugg-less adventures. So we took our freezing feet to a cafe across the street for a snack.

Sometimes culture finds you in the least expected places... Now, everyone warns you about Italian men. And we have encountered a few charmers here and there but nothing to hilarious. As we waited for Jenny's panini, Kelly ordered a latte on which "I *heart* u" was written in chocolate. But this was only the beginning... soon we made a new friend. A 77 year old man, Gianni, came and sat down with us. He has lived in Rome (proudly of course) since he was 7 and we talked about places to see and where we are from. He told us about his 2 sons and his hobby of archaeology. Quite the charmer this guy was... He looked like a short round Robert DeNiero. Gianni asked us to join him at his apartment for homemade gnocci that he was making for his German friend in town. As always, we declined, And then we declined again... and again. But Gianni redeemed himself by sending us 2 huge glasses of the wine of Rome on his way out. Free wine? Yes please! As we sipped our sparkling reds, a young waiter from somewhere near Saudi Arabia came out from the kitchen with a finely constructed foil rose to present Jenny with. Habib, was sure he was in love, and sat down to win Jenny's heart. His Romanian boss decided it was rude to not make Kelly a flower, so he quickly took care of it, bursting Habib's bubble; but not as much as hearing about Shea the boyfriend. Nonetheless, in typical European fashion he persisted, with no luck of course. Before we knew it we had a free pizza and champagne! All we had heard about Romans being rude was bogus! This place rocks. Kelly sampled free gelato flavors with the awkward Romanian manager while Habib explained to Jenny not to "fear him" because he does not use drugs (insert heroin motion) or want her money. If that's not a solid first date we don't know what is, gotta love a man who lays it all on the table! While we applauded his efforts, it was all a bit too much. Our empty glasses were the que to get the heck out so we did just that. Assuring our new friends we'd be back tomorrow (yeah right). Turns out these Italian men are indeed quite forward. Just not the cute ones...

We walked down the street to catch a bus to an area called Trastevere. As we searched for our bus stop, a group on a pub crawl passed us merrily. Earlier in the day we were handed a flier for this event, but we never do things like this and usually venture out on our own. But this pub crawl leader was a smooth talker and convinced us to come into the first pub and think about it. For 15 euros we got free covers, open bar, pizza and tshirts. Since most drinks in Rome were upwards of 8euros it turned out to be a good deal. Since we don't clean up to well these days anyway, we went for it despite our very non clubby appearances. 2 hilarious sweetish girls quickly friended us as we made the most of the open bar. We made friends with a couple promoters for the team before they rushed us out to catch a bus to the next bar. On the way there Jenny befriended Jack & Ashley, an adorable couple on vacation from Whales. While Kelly friended Ben and Taite, backpackers from Canada.

By the time we were in bar #2 everyone was soaked to the bone from the rain. It was a bit to quiet so we all headed saugy to some big club. The rest of the night we danced and partied til the wee hours (details shall go unsaid seeing as they are a bit foggy anyway) when we shared a cab across town with Jack & Ashley. The four of us made plans to meet tomorrow night on the Spanish steps. New friends and a crazy night in Rome... We don't usually splurge or go out but it felt right, it was ladies night, and heck, when in Rome... :)

Wednesday April 13th - Almond biscotti is worth the walk

You can't say you've seen Italy if you haven't been to the vineyards of Tuscany...today seemed like a great day to get our wine buzz on. Everyone said we should go on an organized tour to Chianti but we have discovered we aren't really fans of overpriced tours where we are stuck with a group of potential dudders all day (anti-social of us, we know, but we didn't want any debbies raining on our Italian vino parade). We decided to ditch our backpacks at the hostel luggage room for the day and attempt to get a bus to the region and attempt to find wine...I mean how hard could it be? This was agreed upon as a pretty stupid idea by everyone we came across as reservations are usually needed for tastings and the Chianti region is pretty large and not very pedestrian friendly. We ignored everyone and stuck with our plan but decided we would need a hearty breakfast to fuel for this day. If you are ever in Florence go to the Cafe Deluxe. We had the most amazing eggs benadict with huge coffees - not a big deal to all you at home walking around with your venti lattes, but Italy is a fan of the tiny espresso and has refused to allow a single Starbucks in the country as it is apparently a commercialized rip off of Italian coffee bars. Some of The Beatles greatest tunes played loudly as we ordered from our cheerful Italiano server and enjoyed our amazing breakfasts, happy as clams (why do people say that? Flashback to all-nighter in the library with Tori and Chelsea when this question led to a very strange clam discussion). We were in in this great happy cafe in a city that is at the top of both of our lists for it's beauty, charisma, history, and vibe - this was just one of those moments of true elation where we dug our lives more than we can explain. Dear Jenny and Kelly, when you are old fogies reading this to remember this experience, remind yourselves how important these tiny moments of friendship and bonding and simplicity are! They can be found in every day as long as you seek them out!Anyway, got lost in the moment for a second, back to the main point, we got bus tickets to Chianti and took in the amazing scenery...well Kelly did while Jenny took a nap, she has become a serious master of passing out on any public transportation vehicle, not sure if this is motion sickness or exhaustion but she always misses the most epic landscapes in favor of a little shut eye. We got off the bus full of locals and walked to a cafe where the barista said he had a friend who worked at Castello di Verrazzano, located on a hilltop in the Chianti Classico area. The castle's high position over the Greve valley was once of strategic-military importance and was an etruscan then a roman settlement before becoming the property of the Verrazzano family in the VIIth century (Giovanni Verrazzano is credited with discovering NY) Winemaking here is said to date back to 1150. History lesson over....
Unable to contact his friend he was happy to point us in the right direction. A a nice very italian romance novel cover bus driver took us there for free and we ended at the bottom of the enormous hill that the castle sat on. Here was a a small building for wine tasting where a scary school teacher type Italian woman told us we could basically do whatever we wanted and the castle was up. She wasnt kidding when she said up...holy walk. We really shouldnt be phased after Cinque Terre but this was pretty far, probably 30 minutes straight up hill, but the views of Tuscany were worth the climb. We followed the noise of wine buzzed laughter into a room in the castle and were so sad to find that they were just closing. A nice lady working there looked a little shocked when we said we had walked from the bottom and arranges a special last minute tasting for us with their classic chianti wine, port and almond biscotti while she told us about wines and history - we cannot thank her enough! This was such a wonderful experience!We were apparently there at the perfect time to see the Italian owner of the vinyard and castle cut loose as he took paintings off the wall and posed in pictures with the last lingering guests before switching shirts with one guest wearing a grape covered hawaiian shirt. He tried pretty hard to convince kelly to swap shirts with him as well...but she was definitely not on their wine level and politely said no thank you.
We were offered rides down the hill but preferred to walk and admire the insane views again before getting on our bus back to Florence. We managed a speedy backpack pick up and train station paninis to go before getting on our 8:10 train at 8:08, perfect timing! We were heading to Rome not really knowing what to expect except a big city with big history, especially as it often gets mixed reviews from visitors. We arrive in Roma at night to find what seemed to be an outdoor homeless shelter, complete with drunken prostitutes, lining the train station wall. Cities always give a better first impression when you arrive in daylight. We were so happy to get to our quiet peaceful apartment at B&B Wow Roma. The family owned little place was so nice and relaxing! The owners are amazingly kind. It felt so nice to be away from what we now call "mega hostels" and have a little place of our very own as a home base in Rome. We slept like babies :)

Tuesday April 12th ~ Its Raining Drunks

After being lost for hours in Florence the other night wehad seen a tiny adorable boutique, which we were determined to find again. We decided the best way to find it was to try to get lost the same way we had been lost that night. This was a simultaneous failand success. We definitely got lost, but we did not fun our store. Instead,we were the great kind of lost where we come across a huge amazing market. Browsing through market stand after market stand occupied our entire morning as we planned all the things we would buy our friends and fam and ourselves if we had the money and the room. The leather here is amazing and the people are friendly and lively. We are seriously just soaking up the vibe and loving it. Lonely Planet says we have to eat gelato here, so we did. As we indulged in pistaccio flavor topped with a mouintain of sweet mousse, we sat in the sunshine in a big plaza here and watched children on the beautiful carousel and listened to a guitar player seranading the busteling area. Making the most of cultural week we walked to the Uffizi museum, very cultured of us, we know. We stood by a seriously oddball Irish family whose trip looked like the father and daughter ganging up on the mother...awkward. Although the line was long there was plenty of peopole watching and evesdropping to keep us occupied, especially when aSpanish woman erupted on the museum employees about how long she had been in line for...we thought that was how lines worked but what do we know. Museum summary, the building was beautiful, Renaissance art is def not our favorite...madonna after madonna painted in similar styles...but at least we feel cultured. Jen is starving (huge surprise) and so we stop for sandwiches and we munched as we made our way back to the hostel, wandering out of our way still on the hunt for the missing boutique, which had obviously vanished. It had to be nap time by now so we checked back into our hostel, decided we needed more time in Florence, and took a snoozer. Then it was out for a slice of unbelievable italian pizza on the steps of the Duomo. We have never seen so many people unconcerned with the presence of other people or drunk shenanigans in one place. Hammered students, mostly American, screamed and yelled and Spanish girls stumbled down the street trying to carry their collapsing friend before giving up and all deciding to lay rightin the middle of the road. Football fans shouted and danced through the plaza after a win, couples turned on the PDA, people were introduced to friends, goodbyes were had, crazies strolled by, men escorted their dates, all the while we watchedand munched on the most delicious pizza we can recall. As the rain started pouring down all these people scattered and Kelly gracefully bit it on the slippery Duomo steps before we headed home, drenched but super happy. We have some epic life talks and a kind of friendship that is more sisterly than anything. Just another thing on our list of things to be grateful for.

Monday April 11th ~ 80s Revival

Today was about sightseeing in Firenze, loving Italia and excited to see more. Obviously we want to go into the huge and beautiful Duomo here. Apparently we weren't the only ones with this plan as there was a lengthy line wrapping around the people-filled plaza. We stood in the awesome warm sunshine reminissing about freshman year of college and all the nutters and drama of Hess Hal. We, and the people in line with us, presumed we were entering the Duomo to walk around and stare up at the pretty ceiling. Upon entering we went through a turnstile directly leading to some very narrow steep concrete spiraling stairs...460 steps to be exact. If we had eaten only a few more tapas in Spain there would be no way we could fit in this spiral staircase. We guess the Italians were pretty literal as entering the Duomo meant actually being inside of the dome structure itself looking out at the entire city and the Tuscan hillside beyond. If you ever go to Florence, this is well worth the climb! We stayed up there for at least an hour admiring the sorbet collided buildings with their terra-cotta tiled roofs and the white tents of the markets below. Back on solid ground after a seriously scary climb down all of these stairs, we decided it was market time. Jenny temporarily forgot we have no room in our backpacks or money and bought enough for both of us today. Florence is known for it's quality leather so we were in purse heaven. Beer time led us to a random Irish pub for a pint as we jammed out to the awesome mix of 80's tunes blaring inside. Thanks to Spain siesta time now follow beer time so we made our way back to Plus Florence for a little snooze before going to the restaurant patio for some pasta and a bottle of wine (free thanks to Gustavo! Italians seem to be totally okay with giving things away and we don't mind it one bit!). We talked to Sam about her day wining in Chiani as part of a tour and we decided to add this to our Italy to do list. We are reallyyy digging Florence so we booked another night in our hostel before bed so that we could enjoy more of this Firenze living tomorrow. Boring blog post, but a most delightful and enchanting day. Florence is our shit yo! We are really needing our pictures to describe all of the great things we are seeeing and doing here but we dont have the time or means to upload them. Sorry guys!

Sunday April 10th - Vol Pizza

We wandered and wandered around the city of Florence. We both LOVE it here. The city has a feel that we can't describe but you really get caught up in it. Our first stop after all the plazas and roads we discovered was The Academia Gallery, most famous for Michealangalo's David. Luckily we were entertained by great people watching and the ridiculous street vendors carrying prints of identical paintings. One of them told Jen he would give her a Venice painting for free but after grabbing her hand and trying to drag her to a nearby cafe we decided that nothing is ever really free. The David statue was worth it. We stared in awe of it's size and detail. It really is an amazing sight. Plus, it's cultural week in Italy! Luckily we have time to kill instead of money because all museums are free, just long waits. But we dont mind; some of these places you just have to see. We strolled around all the winding streets and stopped for a falafel (there's a shocker) before getting right up by the Duomo. From here we walked down the famous shopping street, where We (as always) windowed shopped at all the awesome boutiques. In the late afternoon we found ourselves near the river and famous bridge ponte vecchio. This historic bridge is lined in jewelers and loads of people. We sat and listened to a man play covers of jeff Buckley and coldplay. This whole town smells like the best Italian food, sounds like a dull roar of conversation as people wander in delight, and looks like a picture you imagine painting in your mind. The best word we can come up with is enchanting. Friendly people, mellow vibes, busy streets, and history oozing from every untouched building and cobblestone. Trying to describe Florence seems to be impossible, so we'll just say the vibe is an A+. We walked to another bridge to see ponte vecchio at sunset like in so many famous pictures. Nothing like the amazing sunset in Cinque Terre but the couple a few feet from us seemed to find it romantic enough. Shoving your tongue down your loved ones throat in the most public of places must be Europeans way of saying "I love you"...makes us pretty queasy though. Apart from the barf-inducing PDA this was a really delightful time of night to take in Florence. The view was absolutely amazing as we stated down the river. We decided to climb the steep hill up to Piazza de Michealangelo for the best view of Venice at night. Groups of people, mostly young students we guessed, sat on the steps sharing 3€ bottles of vino and laughing and chatting. We have totally fallen for Venice, and the pizza and glass of wine we had for our late night dinner really dotted the i on a perfect day. We realized how much we liked the city when we got wrapped up in conversation and were lost for hours making accidental circles through the city streets on our way home. In many cities this would have bothered us but we didn't mind a bit here :)

Saturday April 9th_ Oh look, a talking squirrel!

We awake in Pisa. The Leaning Tower of Pizza...the tower does indeed lean, but no pizza in sight. However, we did find the world's most delicious and enormous grapes here. We highly recommend them. We, and our grapes, headed to the train station to go to Florence. We arrive to find hostel heaven: an indoor pool, steam room, sauna, gym, rooftop terrace and bar, huge restaurant, full English breakfast offered until noon, fluffy towels, blowdryers, nicely decorated dorms catered to girls, and a welcome pack of necessities. First things first, book another night here, giving us 3 nights total in Florence. We made a friend, 20 year old Sam from California who has been studying in Rome. She is a sweetheart and we drank plenty of red wine (thanks hostel employee for giving kel a free bottle) over pasta dishes from the hostel restaurant. It was Saturday so we figured we should explore some nightlife so we polished off our wine in our dorm as we put on makeup and Sam complained about feeling grungy and having nothing to wear despite the fact she was adorned and accessorized to the nines and has a huge apartment in Rome....if she only knew. We were ready to go but our discussion about good spots to head to in Florence turned onto a mini book group and we ended up sharing good and bad books and talking about our favorites for hours...nerd alert?! By this point it was a little late for nightlife but the right time for our red wined peepers to close for a great nights sleep. Can't wait until tomorrow when we will venture out into FLORENCE :)

Friday April 8th - Holy hiking

Today we would hike Cinque Terre through all 5 towns (Riagimmore, Manorola, Corniglia, Vernazza and Montorosso) a 5 hour hike in all if taking the coastal paths...most of these were closed due to recent landslides so we mapped our journey up on the longer mountainous and much more challenging trails instead. Our hostel owner told us that it would take 3 hours to hike from our town, Manarola, to the next one, Corniglia, and we would have 3 more to navigate to after that. He told us that although the coastal paths were officially closed, we could most likely use them from Corniglia to Montorrosso, although he said they were "a little eeeh," not sure what that means in Italian but it's probably okay... Our paved walk from our train station to our hostel last night had not been a good indication of our hikes today. We embarked on our journey and faced a shocking uphill incline straight from the start - our bums were going to be more sore than anticipated. We can't explain Cinque Terre. It is the new love of our lives, crisp salty fresh air and gorgeous blue sky meets crystal clear aqua water meets gorgeous rocky cliffs and sprawling meadows and forests upon steep mountains. It is the quintessential point where sky land and sea come together on the unbelievable world that we are all a part of. We never want to forget this day, what it meant to us, and what it represents in our world. Beauty aside, the hike we took was insane, and we mean iiiinsaaaane! Leaving Manorolo we began by climbing 400 steps (if you can call rocks jutting out of a green mountainside steps...) up to the mountaintop town of Veronza, on the way to Corniglia. Up in the tiny village of Vernoza we entered an empty church built in 1204.It was silent and peaceful (well except for Kelly putting her pipes to use as she envisioned an echoing choir singing here) and we both lit a candle and stood in reflection for a moment before it was back to the hike. Bums burning we were surprisingly dying to continue, we could not take in enough of this place. Every time you think you have seen the most beautiful view of your life, you hike around another mountainous alcove and find an even better one waiting. It is literally like walking around in a postcard. As a pair who are no strangers to exaggerating, we can tell you without an ounce of truth stretching that our hikes took us up enormous mountains above the clouds where the paths were unfenced and just wide enough for a typical person. Looking down at birds flying hundreds of feet below was a reminder of the fact that a trip or stumble would be less than funny up here. After hiking for just over an hour, finding incredible vantage points where we sat overwhelmed by our surroundings, we were edging around a particularly narrow part of mountain trail when 2 American boys came up behind us, knowing their country of origin from the totally epic USA bandana that one of them sported around his mop of hair. Zack and Jonny were quite the pair and we ended up in a lengthy convo with them as we all climbed further and further up this mountain wondering when we would be heading down. The guys were studying in Rome and were really using every spare second to explore Europe. They were as infatuated with Cinque Terre as we were...well except maybe for Jonny who was more focused on the possibility of plunging to his death at any moment and the potential need for the first aid kit he carried in his backpack. Since we felt the need to stop and take pictures as we hiked down to Corniglia, Jonny and Zach beat us down. We stumbled back across them at the bottom where they sat munching on pringles and chocolate. Since we were all headig the same way, the four of us decided to hike together. We were stuck with these stage 5 weirdos! Just kidding guys :) Vernazza was our next destination and 4th town heading north. The coastal path we hiked here was nothing like the paved sidewalk from the train station last night. This was no joke of a hike, but still breathtaking. We managed to run past a few groups of older folks and kids on the narrow trails, flipping coins and making guesses about which direction to go every so often. Part of what made this hike so cool was stumbling down right into the next busy little town off a rugged path and out of the woods. This was a cool town and we decided to take a snack break and enjoy the view. We sat with our new pals, on giant coastal rocks, munching on pesto covered foccacia. we had one more town to hike to, where we would finally be on a sandy Mediterranean beach! Monterosso was a ways away but we had managed to climb a few barriers and make use of the landslide paths so far. 2 crazy French woman with a tuny dog had been hiking at about our pace and disregarding the signs saying the paths were closed. We decided to follow their lead as they headed toward the closed path to Monterosso. After hiking it uphill for a while we came to a huge pile of bags that were full of boulders. The crazy French ladies managed to climb over this so we did the same....this probably should have been the time we decided to turn around. A Canadian and his American girlfriend were attempting to get on the closed hike as well. We hiked straight uphill for abut 20 minutes through the forest growing on the mountain until we got to a barb wired barrier blocking the rest of the trail. Zach decided he didnt like the way this tragedy sounded ....5 Americans, 2 French women and a Canadian die in landlside after ignoring the clear warnings of danger" and we all agreed and hiked back down to the train station to get to Montorosso. Train it was, and we made our way to the beach in the first of the 5 towns, Montorosso. We were determined to take a dip in the super clear ocean but after sticking a toe in we decided we would remember it more fondly if we didn't. Instead we simply lay in the sand, zack and Johhny bitching about not having a towel (wimps) soaking up the sunshine and breathing the gorgeous clean air of Cinque Terre with the amazing cliff and mountain views around us...heaven on earth. We had consulted our lonely planet book before we ventured out and it raved about a family owned place in Montorosso that made 15 kinds of amazing foccacia daily. Johnny consulted his phone to try to find it and we of course just put our wandering skills to work. We found this place and were not so impressed with the focaccia selection (bogus rec lonely planet) but the pesto lasagna looked delicious! We all got some to go and sat on a park bench scarfing down before the 2 of them were off to Rome and we were off to find somewhere to live (homeless again as our hostel was full for tonight). We left and said see ya, loving the simplicity of random travel friends, a great day together and then no fuss with the goodbye. We took a train to Riommigore and hiked the last part of Cinque Terre, the coastal path to Manarolo before getting back to our hostel and remembering we were homeless for the night. We managed to catch the last train to Pisa so we could wake up and see the tower and head to Venice. We were honestly both heartbroken to leave Cinque Terre. We know this is somewhere we will both see again and we cant wait for that day!

Thursday April 7th The one where we learned not to bunk above a witch

Ooh sweet travel day, how we have grown accustomed to thee. 3 trains later (one of which we was the wrong train that we accidentally got on) and zero euros (thanks eurail pass) we find ourselves in....drumroll please....ITALIA!! Holy wonderfulness, we are like 2 kids on Christmas morning who just got a puppy and a lifetime supply of chocolate. We feel totally rejuvenated and are so excited for this leg of our trip. Our first stop is Cinque Terre, 5 Italian villages on the Mediterranean coast that have remained essentially untouched since they were first inhabited by farmers who managed to grow olives and grapes on the steep rocky mountains and cliffs here. We stepped off of our train into a dark stone tunnel and we quickly walked the tiny footpath with one side of our backpack grazing the wall and the other side almost touching the train that was about to depart...scary, and definitely not like any modern train station or platform we have ever encountered.

The train did not go directly to the town with the Lonely Planet recommended hostel so we embarked on our first hike, which was really more of a walk...a coastal path "Via del Amore" between Riagimmore and Montoroso with fingers crossed the hostel would have room.


We stared down from our very high cliff paved path in awe of our surroundings. The clear dark blue water here puts any other beautiful ocean we have seen to shame. From the top of a cliff you can stare down at every rock on the bottom of the sea floor. The rocky cliffs and mountains above with a crisp blue sky made for the most beautiful scenery we have ever seen. We literally gasped as we turned each curve at the view that awaited us. We will get more into the scenery tomorrow but it is literally indescribable, we understand why Jenny's friend Christie said she still has dreams about this place. We made it to our village and got off the coastal path for a steep steeeep climb up the one road of Manorola to the old church square. Behind this church we found the Eco friendly hostel Lonely Planet had told us about. Hostel success! They had space only for tonight but that was better than nothing...we would figure it out tomorrow.

Our room here has some real quirky Canadian characters. A lady from Montreal lay in her bed and told us about all of her greatest rebellions from never paying for trains to working illegally in Australia to cutting lines in the Vatican...she was not our fave and Jenny decided she was obviously a witch, she did have a gnarled walking stick. Her redeeming factor was when she told us she ate at a world famous gelato shop and 15 minutes later went back for another cone.
"It's the worlds best gelato, it would be dumb not to have it twice," she said...and this witch had a point afterall.

We walked through our quaint seaside town and along a cliff path to the seaside. Up on a cliff we discovered an empty wooden playground and hopped on a seesaw. As we flew up in the air we laughed and laughed thinking about the whim that has brought us here and how it is the most amazing thing that we are in Italy atop a cliff in an empty old wooden playground in Italy. We knew that we were in the right place at this time in our lives.

Sunset, reflection, there is so much more to life and the universe than just us. We want to capture this moment and keep it forever. We sat seperately on the stone boat dock surrounded by beautiful mountains with tiny towns on them gazing out into the vast deep dark blue ocean with an aqua rim at the horizon as the giant orange sun slowly fell and disappeared. As the sun vanished a huge distant mountain range appeared on the horizon...we know this sounds strange (and it was as we had been staring at this spot in broad daylight and taken dozen of pictures and not been able to see this huge area of land) but it was the most amazing and epic sunset ever. We were captivated by this appearing land, we just couldn't wrap our heads around it and neither could our cameras as we can't see it in our photos. We smiled a we remembered the last amazing sunset we saw on our last night in Samara - how circular things sometimes feel.

As we walked back up the cliff to the village, we decided we are proud of ourselves. We feel accomplished and happy. We mutually agreed that backpacking and it's struggles and triumphs has been our biggest accomplishment of our lives in many ways.

Pesto is famous in Cinque Terre so we decided to share a bowl of pasta and pesto and a caprese salad in an outdoor covered restaurant full of locals and visitors from all over the world with the bright pink and orange and indigo sky as our backdrop. It was delicious!!

Kel experienced some awkward eye contact with a woman a few tables away at dinner. The staring lady then approaches Kelly and says she is just so beautiful and would like to take a picture of her face in order to paint a portrait of it. We wish we could see the finished masterpiece but we realized we have no way to ever contact this woman again. Keep your eyes peeled for a painting of K.P.'s sexy mug guys! That bad boy is priceless for sure! Kelly, who is always awkward when complimented must have reacted strangely because the woman later apologized for embarrassing her. Oops!

Back to our hostel well before curfew...yes, we have a lights out heads down curfew here, which we don't mind a bit as Cinque Terre is a place for the day and as it is reminiscent of being at a summer camp. We each used our shower coin, which provides exactly 5 minutes of water showers. As the old church clock outside out window struck midnight we were already half asleep.

Wednesday April 6 The one with the pirate shart

It's strange, because now that we wake up to alarm clocks, in rooms full of snoring smelly boys, we kind of miss the roosters in Samara. Our bodies were on natural clocks with the earth there and we took it for granted, so note to selves: we loved that. Anyway...

Erin woke Kelly up this morning requesting her clutch back- again, what a sweetheart. To which Kelly woke up Jenny. Once again we were a bit foggy as the 4 young Asian guys in our bunks and all around us, along with the still creepy Lithuanian, had been some of the loudest move-arounders possible all morning! Strange lives we lead, waking up with strange men speaking chinese sleeping above us. Nonetheless, we set off on a train to Cannes. This is the place where Cannes film festival takes place in one month and we wanted to see celebrity signatures that line the staircase to the famous spot.

Cannes is really lovely. Immediately the vibe was different from nice; much more posh and Beverly hills. There was a huge conference happening by the festival sights for MipTV...? We don't know either, but it turned out to be blocking our access to the signatures... Booooo MipTV!

We took a turn down the port hoping to find a way to our destination and ended up on jealousy-island. Parked in this harbor was yacht after yacht, where people sat on deck lunching and drinking wine. It looked like a great day, but then we remembered we were having a great day! So we admired a few more sailboats and lavish decks, all the while picturing the film festival celebs sitting along here soon, and walked over to the public beach. This crowd was much more seedy and watch-worthy...much more our style. We took off our kicks and ate our packed lunch of... You guessed it- pb sandwhiches! It was awesome. Then two men, one middle aged and the other older, stumbled drunkenly passed us, Weaving around and plopping down right by us. Homeless? No. Pirates? For sure. The older one watched his friend head in for a swim so he then decided to walk down the long Pier for what geared up as a great jump. In actuality it was a painful bellyflop, so of course we were engaged. As his friend came back up, he must've decided to swim off his embarrassment. At one point we thought maybe he was taking himself out (literally) or thinkig he could "jack sparrow" a ship that wasn't too far out. He must have swam 200 yards out to sea! All the while his friend (camo pants and lots of tattoos) piled on all his extra bling and multiple watches. Very piratey. He then ate some weird and sandy snacks as we all watched his older friend (captain? Boss? Dad?) swim back in, lost and stumbling to gain land legs. He found his way back over near us where his wet boxer briefs gave us much more of an old man show than we ever want to see... Then it happened. Standing, feet away from our heads, papa pirate let out the sickest shart we've ever heard. Stunned, Kelly looked away awkwardly and trying not to laugh while jenny quickly gathered all our things and moved us down the beach. We sat back down a little ways away, crying and shaking with laughter and disgust. We gave him a quick look and he gave us a thumbs up! WHAT! Down the road people were lunching on yachts... We were getting sharted on by pirates. Just another day in the life of a homeless nomad I suppose...?

We decided we should head back for our backpacks since the last train to Italy was at 5. Once we got to our hostel in Nice we would make a snap decision about where we would stay and some other details. Well this was becoming extremely stressful... Costs, timing, homelessness. We suddenly felt overwhelmed by our lack of planning. We either had to wing it like normal, getting somewhere late and in the dark, paying a ton to sleep somewhere random, or....not. We were over France, but Jenny suggested we eat some dinner and plan our Italian adventures like smart travelers, staying an extra night in the cheap nice hostel here. So we did. We ate some big pizzas, people watched as everyone else enjoyed happy hour and chain smoking (all the while judging our giant & early dinner), and planned as best we could. We made lists of places to stay, places we want to go, routes to Greece and then got to bed early and quietly (in a girl dorm:). It was a great decision and smart idea on Jennys part. Plus we needed a hot shower, dont forget about the all to recent pirate pooper pants incident. The two of us have wanted to visit italy since we met, it can wait one more night...

Tuesday April 5th Make it Rain

After what we thought would be an awesome nights sleep, we woke up still a bit groggy. Sleeping with one eye open on creep patrol isn't exactly restful. But that cereal bar got us out of bed and on our way! We walked less than 5 minutes to the famous fruit & flower market that lies on a road of one restaurant after another, parallel to the ocean. It was an awesome market, and we were really tempted to buy the tiny potted orange trees as a souvenir but decided they maaay not make it. Maybe next time. After the market we thought we should give the rocky riviera a try, so we walked down and sat right by the water. It was suprisingly comfortable! There were old Irish people burning to a crisp, studly couples enjoying the day in their banana hammocks, and of course lots of topless leathery-skinned ladies who mothered half of the baby boomers. Ah the French riviera... Where the beautiful people go.

We'd seen (and been scarred) by enough boobs, so on we went to climb le chateau...(flashback: insert pink haze around like saved by the bell episode- Kelly remembers being here at 8 years old and seeing a kid her age smoking a cigarette while her parents laughed and laughed overlooking the beach through the big 1euro binoculars. Mike, Jill, we get it now and it is still just as funny... End of pink-rimmed flashaback). After a billion stairs we were overlooking all of nice in a park sitting high above the coast line. In order to preserve the natural wild life, France decided to not use pesticides here so we walked up and around in silence... One word could have been the end of a thousand bugs life. Yes, we know, how considerate of us. We parked our bums on a bench and ate our peanut butter sandwhiches, avoiding the over priced cafe full of delicious snacks. Go us!

From here we decided we wanted to skim through our lonely planet Italy book (thanks patti and Simon), since it seemed we had done all the must-dos of Nice. We popped in our hostel to pick it up and then headed off to a very classy, popular and French spot for a coffee... McCafe! This is NOT a mcdonalds folks, it is the classy cafe part in front that resembles a starbucks but smells like French fries. The French sure know how to keep it classy. We mapped out a very general route of where we wanted to go and then headed home to get ready for a big night out in Monaco!

Under normal circumstances, these two primpers would have put on our best and done a fair share of pampering to go somewhere like Monte Carlo. But, we are backpackers. So we put on one of our two skirts/dresses and busted heels, applied some makeup and called it quits. While getting ready, a girl came into our all boy dorm! We chatted about her trip and ours to which Kelly asked "you don't have a clutch we could borrow do you?" (it never hurts to ask, right?!) and the girl said yes! To which Kelly exclaimed excitement and then asked her name. Oh the life of a nomad...

Our short train ride took us down the coast where the sun began to set. It was the most picturesque backdrop possible to the Yachts, sailboats and mountains which were covered in houses and some in snow. We jumped off in Monaco and followed winding signs towards what we hoped was the casino of monte carlo. After wandering around in awe of the spectacular hillside, yachts in the harbor and bentley after bentley passing us, there it was... The casino. To say that the building and square is gorgeous would be an understatement. Lights, fountains, every designer store and fancy cars surrounded us... We weren't in Kansas anymore. We talked to a nice Canadian couple who offered some advice and then perused the menus around the area as usual. We made friends with a doorman outside Big Buddha and he guided us around the hot spots on a quiet Tuesday. Then we decided to stay there for sushi. Inside everything was red, gold and dark and couches lined the first floor bar and lounge. We stayed down here, where we could see the Dj spin trippy tunes above in the restaurant. One glass of wine and a sushi roll later we were in glam heaven. A far cry from our day to day lives now (or ever) made for a fun field trip! Now, time to gamble.

We walked into the silent lobby at the casino of Monte Carlo, where Jenny (as usual) snapped illegal pics and then decided we didnt care to spend 10 euros to enter. We know what you're thinking, our potential sugar daddy could have been in there, but what if he wasn't? We can't afford to take bets like that and then be s.o.l. y'all. So we went to the slots! It took us awhile to pick the perfect one, and it didn't help that the security watched us like hawks (probably because once again Jenny was snapping pics). Finally we picked it. 5 euros was the minimum so in it went... More credits than we could count later, we cashed out with 26 euros! That's right blog followers, we finally made some money! (que awesome theme song now). We went to another building and played Russian roulette, well first we tried to be some pipsqueek-know-it-all boys lucky charm and they lost 50 bucks. Woops! We put in 5 and left with 9 :)

At this point we had to catch the last train back to nice; we did not want to leave but it was probably for the best. We made it home winners! Let us know what you think we should do with our fat new stack of cash!

Monaco is stunning, a really beautiful and clean Disney world for wealthy adults. Kelly, whos idol is grace Kelly, really wanted to go see her tomb at the cathedral, but we didn't have time. Bummer... BUT... we have already made and executive decision to come back to monte Carlo as adults, together, with great outfits and money to spend. Mmm... Sweet dreams bloggies :)

Monday, April 4th - Alex Foster wears jeans

Today we arrived in Nice in the French Riviera, how posh! We fit riight in with our scraggle hair and seemingly already dirty clothes. We forgot to tell you guys, big news, huge! We did laundry in Barcelona! We found a laundromat a 10 minute walk from our hotel and decided to head that way at 8am and wash every item of clothing. This left a serious dilemma...what to wear for these few hours in public? Fortunately the ever glam Alex Foster (Jen's 15 year old brother) had some clothes for us to borrow...but NOT jeans, ew, those are not appropriate high school attire these days we learned. If you wear jeans to IHHS you may get broken up with, hated on, no one will sit with you, and heck maybe even defreinded on facebook. He adorned us in sweatpants and some staple t-shits (for you Hangover fans out there, Kel's read "One Man Wolf Pack") Alex dreerily opened one eye and asked "Do I look as homeless as you guys in those clothes"...to which we simultaneiously replied "more." Okay so now to get our laundry there...we managed to tote our laundry across our side of town and sat back as it all washed and dried. We had crammed our clothes into mesh bags to get them there, which would not work for our return as these bags were also in need of a wash. Huge success, random junk store accross the street sells giant black trash bags, these shall work wonders. We need you to use your imaginations to paint this image in your minds. Dreary makeup-less Kelly and Jenny, both sporting a mean bedhead adorned in boys sweats each carrying 2 enormous trash bags through downtown Barcelona on a Friday morning....it had happened, we were the most homeless people on the planet. People in business suits on there way to work edged away from us and homeless men and gypsy women seemed to recognize us as one of their own :)

Anyway, que the haze to clear, flashback over. We have clean clothes and we are in Nice on a cloudy day with lead feet. We wandered around the city and saw all the major sites but we must admit we were lagging a little. We saw the insane port full of huuge yahts and we selected the ones we would obviously be sailing around the Riviera on in a few years. We people watched...well boob watched...the topless beach of pebbles strwen with sun seekers. Even for a cloudy day the water was a pretty shade of aqua! Next more people watching in the main plaza as we ate our packed lunch of peanut butter sandwiches and fruit comprised of stolen breakfast items from our hostel's breakfast.

Who says we can't siesta in France? No one we decided, so we did. We debated a shower but decided to save the whales instead, partially because the company that joined us in our room was less than favorable. We shall call this nameless guy Le McCreepster...he seemed not to have a personal bubble at all and was not bothered by anyone elses as he hopped right onto Jen's bed as he told us he likes to impregnate every woman that he meets ("a joke obviously" he later declared...but we weren't so sure about this nutter). This must be our que to get up and get out so headed out scruffy to explore Nice nightlife...which was pretty nonexistent We settled for a delicious and enormous salad at a crowded Tex Mex restaurant (Tex Mex is a Nice specialty if you guys didn't know. Jeez, get some culture in your lives!). We never seem to run out of things to blabber away about and here we we talked about the world, its crazy dynamics and mystery and places we wanted to see.

Early to bed for once! Well for us, shut eye before midnight is pretty impressive....until the 7 boys who bunk in our room returned like a herd of elephants and all began snoring in a variety of tones and decibels. We both dozed with one eye open keeping that peeper on Le McCreepster. Mixed dorms are not our fave but when you dont have a plan you dont get to be too picky. We like Nice but we hope we will be able to appreciate it fully when our feet and eyelids feel less heavy and the sun is shining a little more brightly.

We love our life, our travels, our supporters and these experiences more than our blogs can ever convey.

Sunday April 3rd - On the road again

Today we were back out on the open road, just the 2 of us and our "turtle shells" as jens mom calls our backpacks. After a whole week of family fun and being in one place we weren't sure how we would feel about being back in the hostel hopping world. We knew we would miss the fine dining, hot shower, clean hotel bit, and the Foster fam of course...but apart from that we felt great about the adventures to come as we headed to the train station to go to Nice, France. Only downside is Jen's back injury which has flaired up after an epic jumping picture taken yesterday. We think a backpacker with a bad back is less than ideal but a morning pill cocktail got Jen off the floor and ready to load up.

Trains were confusing today but the French men have redeemed themselves. We needed to take 4 trains to get to Nice, an all day journey. The first trains were no problem and we played some competitive card games, napped, stared at amazing views of Spanish villages and then French country side.

After arriving in Valence, where the smell of French people greeted us immediately, we were told by the frosty (we would call her something ruder but we will refrain) French ticket lady told us getting to Nice was impossible as all trains were full except a first class ticket to Aix En Provence (where we would get on another train) for a few hundred bucks each, not an option for us. We sat at the platform of the train we would not be on and discussed options of going to Italy or switzerland or somewhere north. We watched all the people pile on and the doors closed so we headed for the train station exit, defeated. Jen decided to make one last desperate attempt to get on the train by playing dumb to the conductor and claiming we thought we didn't need a ticket because of our eurail passes, what a ridiculous and stupid idea....until it worked. He pulled us both on the train through the only open door as the train pulled away and him and another guy sold us tickets for 20 bucks and then laughed at our stunned faces as they told us to go sit anywhere we wanted in the first class cabin...is this real life?! What a stroke of luck! And what a redemption for the less than pleasant Parisian men!

We had one more train to catch from Aix En Province to Nice...."impossible!" the young French ticket lady declared when she saw our eurail passes. Full price tickets only, all the eurail seats were sold out. We didn't dare go try our luck with this conductor too...or did we? We approached him without tickets and he waved us into the train saying he would come find us in a minute. We couldnt believe our luck when he walked up to where we were sitting and told us we owed him nothing and could sit where we pleased. These train conductors were really turning out to be alright guys!

Woot woot for the kind souls of the world. You really can change someones entire day with one gesture. This is a really important thing to remember and we have a LOT of good karma to pass on to people we meet both during and after our travels.

March 26th - April 3rd: "Guys I think I have vertigo...I am really scared of heights"

Ookay so a week of family vacay also became a week of no blogging. We had an awesome time in Barcelona with the Foster fam. Britt (Jennys sister) has become quite the saucy Spaniard and knows all the best things to do in Barcelona, many of which happen after midnight until the wee hours of the morning.

We stayed in a HOTEL with an awesome shower and a huge not-bunkbed and we were literally spoiled to death and fed like queens (fat queens at that) by Simon and Patti. Kelly has been an honorary Foster for years and gels with the family to the point that we all forget she isn't a relative in the first place. All we can say to Simon & Patti for taking our homeless nomad selves under their unbelievably generous wings is...

thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you
thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you
thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you
thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you
thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you
thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you

That really isnt enough thank you's so we will pay the rest off by simply saying that Simon is a fab dude and we owe him a stellar vacation, or a very classy nursing home in later years, the kind with a salad bar and nice toilet paper. And Plat, well we owe you many a generous cocktails at Embers... maybe we'll even be able to throw in a few sushi rolls too :)

Jenny is so happy to have such an amazing, fun, kind, wonderful family and Kelly is super grateful for being a temporary adoptee.

The first half of the week Jenny's super fun Auntie Sue and Uncle Rick made for some seriously great Barcelona company. We owe them a huge thank you for picking up bills that are far out of our budget, and for being such fun to spend time with!

On Wedesday Sue and Rick departed and Simons parents arrived. Some quality family time was had by all and we enjoyed talks about life, family, love, travels and the city that Britt has been calling home. A big thank you is owed here as well!!

We didn't realize how dirty and homeless we have become until we were around clean unhomeless people - when we arrived Jen's dad said he could visibly see dirt on her forehead. We made it our mission to become a little less homeless in this week of being sedentary by showering daily, making use of a blowdryer and some cosmetics, and even doing laundry! Sue was absolutely horrified that we were living in dirty clothes and she was not having it one bit. She said it had to be done asap or our clothes would start standing up ad waking around on their own shortly.

We spent a lot of time on the famous street, La Ramblas which had shops, tapas, cervezas, artists, people, and street performers (who Jennys brother Alex gave a run for their money with his seriously awesome breakdancing moves) galore. Side roads winded off to plazas and other huge boulevards and streets - Barcelona is a huuge city with an especially huuge and impressive market full of beautiful stands of fruit, candy, nuts, nicknacks, and not so beautiful skinned rabbits and plucked chickens with heads...ew.

It really was a great and packed week so we are going to highlight our favorite things:

1) Chapitos shots bar-- Imagine all of your favorite things turned into shots. Roasting marshmallows, whipped cream and MMs, pop rocks and even a head massage.... then set them all on fire and add some liqour. This is Brittany's favorite spot, for obvious reasons, and now ours as well. Shot after shot, it was a great family outing :) DELICIOUS!

2) The Craziest Cerveza Stop Ever -- After strolling Las Ramblas, we found ourselves in need of an afternoon cerveza. We stopped off at outdoor cafe where we sat in between 2 huge tables, one of drunk German women and one of drunk Norweigan men. We gave them a run for their money with our cerveza skills, but they were far ahead of us and we still had more sights to see. Jenny and Patti popped up for streetside purse purchases and Alex got a shanzy pair of Ray Bans (wink wink). A great afternoon pitstop on our first full day!

3) Chinese to-go on the beach -- cervezas didn't quite fill this group up, so a couple hours later we found ourselves beach side and hungry. We stopped in a to-go Wok restaurant, then sat on the beach eating our delicious boxed lunches with chop sticks. The Medditeranean and people watching weren't bad backgrounds.

4) Gaudi's architecture -- Gaudi was an amazing architect who created insane buildings that contain few straight lines and often look like they are melting or growing, or like a gingerbread house, or like a crazy treetop canopy....he did a lot of drugs obviously, but was killed when he got hit by a tram (this seems ot be a very important fact in Barcelona and we are sure that we aren't mistaken about the tram incident as we were all told about 10 times). Gaudi's most famous Barcelonana work is the Sagrada Familia, an enormous cathedral that he began working on over 100 years ago. It is still under construction and they have a looong way to go, but what has been completed in insane! Gaudi also attempted to build a neighborhood of strange houses which is now a park with lots of crazy stone architecture. All of our legs were made of lead the day of the park but it was an amazing sight nonetheless.

5) Dinner and champagne at the W - Britt's classy and awesome friend Elenor managed to use her in with the hotel industry to get an unbelievable room at the W. She invited us all over for dinner and champage in this crazy hotel built right on the coast. We all agreed that we would rather sleep in the lobby of this bad boy than just about any other hotel we had ever seen. Dinner and drinks were a delicious and fun time. Great family company and Elenor was her hilarious self as always.

6) Super Lazy rooftop hotel day - Today we did...nothing. We all went out for cafe breakfast and then headed up to our hotel roof with ice bucket pool. No swimming but lots of pink cheeks and noses as we soaked up the sunshine and drank some cervezas (to Plat's request of course). This was a great vacay day with a real break from stopping around the world and sightseeing.

7) Olympic park - Our last full day in Barcelona Britt dragged us out of bed to go sightseeing. We went up to an enormous beautiful museum on top of a mountain, opting for the hundreds of stairs rather than taking the outdoor escalators to the top (well, except the lazy ones of us). The view from the top was so pretty! From here we strolled through some beautiful and mostly deserted gardens, stopped for lunch and then went to the site of the Olympics in 1994. Underneath the Olympic torch we all had a lottle outfoor siesta, until we woke up and took a jumping picture which thre Jen's back out...backpacker with a bad back is no bueno, updates to come on this one.

8) Nightclubbing with Britt - Miss BFost is quite the nightime scenster so she took the 2 of us old grannies out on some late night adventures. After Chapitos shots we headed to one of Barcelona's huuuge clubs packed with people, mosh pit style, with house music blaring. Britt had never been there and taking us seemed to be a shot fueled decision as she later regretted it, but we had fun! We hit the town for round 2 with Elenor and Britt to go to an awesome club with the world's best DJ. Great tunes, ghetto dancing (by yours truly of course) and fire eating dancers wearing sparkly unitards...this place was nuts and our fave! Round 3, we decided to do a little pregaming, on a bench of La Rambla, turns out the cops didn't much like this idea and so they decided we should do something else. We decided to run into a nearby restaurtant and use their bathroom...but the owners didn't like this plan either and they pounded on the door while we took turns using the W.C. They didn't seem too pleased so we ran out again. Off to a big beachside nightclub until later than we thought when it was time for suspicious pastry and pizza snacks. We think we would have been better ngihtlife bunnies a few years ago...

On La Rambla there is a famous drinking fountain - ledgend says a sip of water from the fountain will ensure you return to Barcelona again. At first we avoided a sip from it as there are a lot of places in the world and we couldn't be committing to come back to this one. After an awesome week here, and the increasing possibility of Britt taking up residence in Barcelona, we decided we needed a gulp of this legendary water on our last night here. Bye for now Barelona! Guess we will both be seeing you again!

Friday March 25: Bust Measurements in Granada

Our 10am alarm came to soon this morning after late night heart to hearts and falafel binges. Kel popped in for the brief hot water shower and then we looked up train times; where to today? Valencia was out 1st option but there wasn't a train until tonight so we said screw Valencia, on to Barcelona! Another day in Granada seemed pretty awesome, and the weather wasn't ideal on thecoast for a quick beach trip to Malaga. We checked out, leaving our luggage, and set off to find breakfast. Honestly all we really wanted was a bug Starbucks, (sigh) but it seems they haven't conquered this part of Andalucia yet. Eggs instead... We surveyed the area spots until we picked one of the few spots still serving brunch items. We each had our coffee followed by eggs and asparagus, which turned out to be almost all asparagus (huge plate) and some eggs. It was delicious and we are in desperate need of green meals these days. Afterwards we knick knack shopped and cruised new areas of town. We watched some homeless men (?) and a she-man nap as people geared up for the big soccer game tonight against Czech republic, drinking 40s and kicking soccer balls around. Later we paused for 1euro ice cream cones (yum!) and sat in a park to enjoy out treats.

We made our way back to our neck of the woods where we decided to shop the countless stores of the Arabic tea street. They all sell these big pants/onesies that we bargained for with no luck. They are hott! Darn our frugal attitudes. Jenny decided to try on a bejeweled belly dancing bra top... Kelly said it was too big but she didn't care. Until the store owner, an older Arabic gentlemen emerged telling Jen she needed a different one. Kelly felt awkward immediately. He (in Spanish) suggested a more full coverage top and one that was obviously a small size. Que Kelly starting to geek out while Jenny remains calm. He then pointed to Jenny and the top saying "un pequena", or smaller, ALSO making a hand motion so that we were sure he was talking about Jennys boob size. Out we went. Yes you read this right, the old man told Jenny she needed a smaller and more modest bra. Hold on...

HahahahahhahahahahHhhhhahahahahhaahhahahahahahahahahahahahhahahahahahahahahahahahahhahaahahhahahahahahahahahaha.

We laughed so hard down the street that other store owners laughed with us. Hilarious. We kept shopping around and ended the afternoon back on top of the Arabic square we went to yesterday, overlooking Granada. It was packed today, but so clear! The snow covered mountains were the backdrop to a perfect sunset scene of Andalucia. Flamenco bands filled our ears as we sat on the wall, so happy to be taking in such a breath taking sight. We strolled back down the winding rocky, narrow roads of homes, turning corners as a guy playing steel drums made the whole scene feel surreal. This is why were here... These moments of magic in foreign places we don't know or understand. It's really awesome.

We grabbed our bags from the hostel and stopped at our 2 favorite pubs for beer and tapas. From there we caught a bus that we hoped went to the train station. After a few minutes on the jam packed bus we heard screams but couldn't figure it out. Then again, this time we realized a teenage girl with 3 friends had fainted but woke up quickly. The third time she was OUT. The bus driver stopped the bus, after letting them off and went back along with several others to help her. the Spanish people are amazing, never would you see such concern a big city bus at home.

We realized our bus had veered off to the wrong direction so we Inquired to our bus mates and hopped off. People stopped to help us an after 10 minutes or so we were there. The only available option for the overnight bus was an expensive sleeper cabin, but now that's where we are and were glad. Hopefully we can get some better than normal train sleep. We should be in Barcelona in about 10 hours if this janky train makes it :)

Time for lights out amigos... Buenos noches!

Thursday, March 24th - Give us some tapas....FOR FREE!!

Time for our favorite kind of breakfast, the free kind! In the hostel kitchen we met some real characters including the american version of Russel Brand who was rocking high tops, a retro leather jacket and wifebeater combo with some serious toucan hair as he poured milk over the enormous trough of cereal and ice cubes he had created out of a large plastic casserole dish. He seemed to have lots of wise words of crazy wisdom so we decided to hire him as our life coach...turns out he was the worst life coach ever but his friends were discussing their afternoon departure to Morocco. Turns out these guys weren't Russel's friends after all, which made him and his toucan hair even weirder. We talked to the Morocco guys about their plan of departure. Since we both always want to go everywhere we decided that Morocco had to be added to our travel itinerary at some point. Maybe today? We did some research and made no decisions on the matter, befriended our breakfast friends on Facebook and told them maybe we would see them shorty in Africa. Standard hostel breakfast conversation seems very strange when we think about it.

Then it was out for some good old fashioned wandering. Granada is unbelievable. White washed houses with tile roofs are eeeerywhere and the stone (not cobblestone) roads are accordingly winding and confusing. Granada is essentially built in a valley, 2 huge sloping hills packed with the houses perched dangerously at all angles with a small river in the middle. On one of these hills sits the magnificent and enormous Alambrah, a huge palace dating back to the 12th century. A pamphlet about the Alambrah claims it to be on par with the 7 wonders of the world. On the other hill is the Arabic district of hooka smoke filled tea shops, street front shops packed with bright silk pants and knitted tops, leather bags, mosaic jewelry boxes, and a strong smell of incense. Our hostel is located on one of these Arabic tea streets on the opposite side of the valley from Alambrah.

There is a very young alternative crowd in Granada, maybe even more dreadlocks than Samara and certainly more piercings. We dont quite understand the biggest hair trend in Spain at the moment, a buzz cut with long dreadlocks in the back, kind of an extreme rasta mullet. Girls and guys sport this look but who are we to judge? There is something so delightful in walking up an extremely old street with classic Andelucian houses with their white peeling walls and crooked flower boxes amongst young modern people with lip rings, dreads, and strategically ripped jeans and shirts.

We are really embracing the mantra "Life is about the journey not the destination." Going places on our feet and getting lost for hours beats taking a bus directly there any day. We find hidden jewels and local spots and turn left or right on a whim usually avoiding the most touristy and discovered spots. That's what led us here (see video later). Amazing amazing day!

Next we decided to check out the Alambrah, a walk that everyone deemed too far and too steep. We decided to give it a try. We weaved onward and upward and downward and every direction until we were in the valley where we ate a salad and discovered a crazy work out playground. We had made it down one side of the valley, next for the hike up. Impossible walk may have been a true statement but our overfed tapa bums were in need of this serious hike.

We finally made it to the top and stood at the Alambrah ticket office where we decided we didn't really care to go in here and stare around and take pictures. Instead we went to the gift shop and flipped through some Alambrah cofffee table books and admired the Moorish architecture and then left. Psh, 7 wonders of the world, just a bit of good PR we decided.

Our "only book hostels one night at a time in case we decide to go somewhere else" method had really screwed us and our home away from home, oasis backpackers, didnt have a single unbooked bed. After all the homeless jokes we had finally jinxed ourselves.

Dilemma: we are homeless. We were too indecisive to book a second night at our hostel and now they are full. So is every other hostel in town, which we understand because Granada is the shit.

We have 2 solutions for this problem...

Solution 1: take the train to a ferry to Morocco, Africa and find home there for a few days.

Solution 2: accept homeless state, eat cheap tapas dinner, and attend all night illegal underground rave outside of Granada, negating the need for a home at all.

We decided to make this important decision over beer and tapas. Grenada really gets tapas. With every beer you order they bring you a huge plate of food...for FREE! We had one too many tapas, and maybe one too many beers as we discussed our plans for the night.
Option 2 wins, Morocco will have to be a future destination on tour'de JenKel.

Dear parents, you're welcome. Although an all night illegal Spanish rave may not be your favorite, we're sure that an unplanned trip to Africa is lower on your favorite list.

Skip forward a few hours, HUGE buzzkill, Yan, the super tall bald Parisian manager of Oasis informed us that his employee who was going to take us out to the rave had bailed. Hmm, maybe we should have gone with option 1: skip town and head to Morocco, but it was too late to get a train or bus to the coast by this point. Luckily Yan had an idea and he walked us down the Arabic tea street and rang the buzzer at a huge door. We walked up a few flights of stairs and Yan banged on another door. A tiny super excited Spanish man peeked his face out of a sliding compartment in the door. Think in mafia movies when the badies bring a goodie into a secret building and their friend makes them say a password through the door. Yan told the guy we were there for a room and the tiny Spanish man opened his door looking puzzled. "A room for 3?" he asked, suspiciously eyeing super tall bald Yan with his hood up and the 2 of us with our huge inconspicuous backpacks on. This was one of those hilarious situations that our poor writing skills can't do justice to. The tiny Spanish man, who was moving and talking at 100 miles a minute, ushered us into a principal like office and sat us down to sort out a room while Yan sat in the corner with his arms crossed like a super scary body guard. The office was full of oragami swans and random books, we were in the Spanish Mr. Miagi's hostel. Mr. Miagi's got us a room in his pension and then scrambled around loudly telling us to be quiet and showing us the wifi zone (2 plastic chairs in the dark hallway) and best of all, the microwave which he gave a full demo of how to use as he proudly told us it was FREE for us to use! What a phenomenal perk as we were clearly laden with microwavable foods. Mr. Miagi said everything no less than 12 times before he was sure we understood and moved on to the next thing. Our room was awesome though and we controlled our hysterical laughter about the situation briefly and gave Yan a hug and a thank you before he peaced out. The comradery of people traveling is hard to explain but such an amazing thing to be a part of. People that you have known for only a few hours and will most likely never see again go out of their way to befriend and help you. Everyone watches out for everyone else in this little hostel hopping international subculture that we have become a part of.

Right dilemma resolved. We are no longer homeless, sadly rave is out, and even more sadly we had lost our great cerveza buzz from earlier. Solution, out for more beer, which came with more snacks, damn the Spanish! Then we fell into a classic 4 hour Kelly and Jenny heart to heart about all kinds of things. At 5am we decided the night was still pretty young, for Spain and all, so we went back out on the town.

We went to the biggest nightclub in Granada, so we had been told. It looked a lot more like an awkward teenage filled Bar mitzvah party to us and everyone sang along to terrible Spanish pop. Bed time...but first, a shared falafel for breakfast. In case you cant tell from reading our posts, we are really starving here in Spain, wasting away to nothing.

Overall and unbelievable day!! No Morocco, no rave, but the destination is in the journey remember?