Past Couple of Months in Review

I wanted to highlight 5 of my favorite posts from the past couple of months:

• 100 Days on the Road
• A True French Dinner
• Two Months on the Road, Travel Planning Secrets
• How to Deal with Your Mail While Traveling the World
• How to Pack Your Backpack for a 9 Month Trip

Hope you enjoy!

Where We’ve Been

As expected, our trip has changed shape a couple times. We have only been planning about 1-2 weeks in advance, sometimes less. This is easy to do when you are open to all forms of accommodations. The Eurail pass helps as well as  we can decide to pickup and leave whenever, oftentimes without even needing even a reservation. The following is a list of all the places we visited during our trip and day-trips we took from each location.

Our Itinerary over the last couple months.

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Coming Back Home

We are returning to South Florida after 5 months of travel for a short break before we spend a couple more weeks on the road. This trip has taught me a lot about life and I am really glad to have been able to spend the time traveling, seeing friends and family and enjoying new experiences. I really needed some time off to recharge my batteries after 10 years of uninterrupted work. I feel ready to tackle the new challenges ahead. I am not yet sure where we are going to live, or what ventures I’ll get involved in, but whatever it is I am ready to kick ass.

Out of all the places we visited, I would have to say my favorite ones were Asheville, La Palma, Sevilla, Toulouse and Berlin. Our budget averaged at around $70 day per person, just under what we had planned. I grew to hate my backpack even more as time went on, and I have to say I am pretty tired of wearing the same clothes over and over. Our bags are about 30% lighter than when we started, last week they weighted in a 15 kilos each, just over 30 pounds.

An experience like this is really a once in a lifetime sort of thing.

Some Stats.:

• 4500+ Pictures
• 16 Countries
• About 35 Cities
• About 65 Train Rides

She was posing for me, so I couldn’t help but to snap a couple shots.

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Where We’ve Slept

In the past six months we have sleep in (in no particular order):

• Hotel (1 thru 5 stars)
• Friend’s and family houses
• Hostel
• Hostal
• Tent at a campground
• Mobile home at a campground
• Train seats
• Train sleeper car (2, 3, 4, and 6 person sleepers)
• Ferry
• Airplane
• Bed and Breakfast
• Rented apartment

Some of those accommodations were booked in advance, some were not. We spent about 40% of our nights in a campground, another 20% split between hotel/hostal/hostel, 10% in rented apartments, 15% with friends and family and the last 15% divided amongst the rest.

Some nights were very comfortable, others not so much. We have stayed at campground complexes that offered anything you could possibly want, even excellent restaurants. Overnight train rides can be though, we’ve had good nights and then a tight sleeper with no air conditioning and 90 degree temperatures. Sometimes Paula and I were separated in the sleeper trains, other times we were together.

Hostels are usually very centrally located, but you have no privacy. Campgrounds are normally out in the middle of nowhere, but they usually have a lot to offer and are very inexpensive. We’ve camped in beach, rural and urban areas. We pretty much mastered the public transportation system of any of the cities we visited. A lot of times I hated camping, other times I enjoyed it.

Staying with friends and family is a real treat, so is a nice hotel. We couldn’t have traveled 5 months without a budget conscious mix of accommodations thought. Not only was it healthy for the budget but it also made us appreciate things a lot more. There is something to be said about not being jaded by the norm.

Ciao Italy, Hello Greece

Today we embark in what will likely be one of the most difficult and unpredictable legs of the entire trip. We are leaving from Sorrento, Italy to Athens, Greece in something like an amazing race. From Sorrento we take a train to Napoli, then to Benevento, then Foggia then another one to Bari. From Bari we must get from the train station to the port, take a 16 hour ferry to Patras. Once we arrive in Patras we go from the port to the train station and then take a train to Athens. Once in Athens we’ll take the metro to the apartment we rented in the city. The whole trip should take no more than 30 hours.

One of the reasons we are making this cumbersome route is to use our Eurail pass to the fullest. The pass was very expensive and it gives us most of the trips mentioned above for free. A sane person would have just taken a car from Sorrento to the Naples airport and then a flight to Athens. That’s just too easy.

Italy was incredible. We spent just short of 2 weeks from Venice to Sorrento with stops in Cinque Terre, Siena, and Rome. The food was pretty incredible and the people were nice and helpful. Transportation is not as exact as say Germany or Switzerland but who would expect that. My ancestors are from Italy and I have always wanted to come. I can say it was everything I expected it to be. The fresh seafood, incredible pastas and deliciously fresh seasonal ingredients made my day.

I am not sure what to expect of Greece but I am looking forward to a little relaxation. Italy was packed full of attractions and sightseeing. After Athens I am looking forward to spending a couple days in Mykonos relaxing by the beach. That is if we ever make it there :)

Tuscany

We camped at the awesome camping Colleverde in Siena.

We hiked to the top of the Siena Cathedral and got an amazing view of the city.

We tasted wine inside a cave at Enoteca Italiana.

We drank some delicious coffee (Caffé Lungo Macchiato)

We enjoyed a great Jazz band inside a fortress.



We relaxed under the leaning tower of Pisa.

We visited Florence and its world wonder cathedral.

We took a beautiful scenic route from Siena to Chiusi and then Rome.

Tuscany is incredible!