On your way out of Austria Contiki will take you to the Swarovski Crystal World Museum where you can buy a ticket as a Me time option. They make you through the museum and show you some weird movie from what I was told. Phil and I did not go on the tour, neither one of us are into Swarovski so we went to the cafe and got hot chocolate which was perfect for another rainy, cold day.
After that short break, it was back on the bus where we made our way to Dachau concentration camp. This was one of the more humbling experiences of the trip for me. I had begun a masters in European Studies and all of my classes that semester had been about the Holocaust. My dad is also German and yes, my grandfather was technically a Nazi as most young men were forced to be under Hitler. It destroyed my grandfather as he was captured early on by the Russians and was held on the Black Sea at a POW camp for seven years. It fragmented my family in more then one ways and I have always felt that.
In some way, I knew by going to Dachau I would make a sort of peace with who I was. It was a very sobering experience. You enter the grounds and it is almost like a park. You walk past the gift shop and down a path until you hit the main gate.
Me at the gates of Dachau
The words on the gate reads, "Work makes you free." However, we all know what a big lie that was. After you walk through the gates, you can feel a change in the air. It's cooler there and there is such a stillness that you can only associate it with the mass death and devastation that occurred there. There is a heavy sadness, but at the same time, it doesn't have the burden, but rather the peace that come after such a sadness.
Most of the buildings are gone, but there are still a few to walk through. One has the bunks of the Jews that were imprisoned here:
You can see how they progressively got smaller as the Nazis move forward with their ideas for the Final Solution. Very terrible. I also noticed how quiet everyone was in walking around, people were very polite and very much to themselves. It is a very personal experience.
Guard Tower
Inside the prison where high-ranking captives were held
The grounds.
After walking around, we walked back to the gift shop and we bought a handmade yarmulke for a friend. We had to rush back to the bus because from here, Contiki takes you into Munich.
I had mixed feelings about Florence. I had been there before when I was 19. I had done a trip with my college and we travelled all over Italy. That trip, Florence was my least favorite, but it was also the trip that would decide one of my college majors-- Art History.
So, I felt like I owed Florence a second chance and besides, it was my birthday. We spent much of the day traveling, but we did get to Florence at a reasonable time and we got to walk around a little. This campsite was really nice and clean. I was happy to be there and felt a lot safer there than I had when we stayed outside of Monaco.
It was a long day and with my body still on full-blown bloat mode Phil took me back to our cabin and rubbed my feet for probably a good hour after we had another crappy Contiki dinner. We eventually headed back towards the main area, got a real dinner, a couple of beers and sat outside in the Florence night air. Everyone else had gone back into the city and took part in the Contiki orchestrated karaoke night where a lot of people regretted going the following day when the hangover hit from the 2-liter drinks that the bar your TM takes you to sells you "on special." To me, this seemed like a concerning night when one girl from our tour went unaccounted for (and a guy from our tour went to look for her, no one from Contiki) while others were driven back by strange Italian men that picked them up after they drank 2 liters of alcohol in a bar.
That just seemed like a huge recipe for disaster and in many ways could have been had it gone differently.
I was glad to have stayed in that night and had a quiet birthday with my man who really is the best foot rubber, ever...no really, like EVER.
Phil on the other hand was just overjoyed to be out of France where small portions dominate. Phil couldn't wait to be in his country, Italy and immediately fell in love with Joe Pinette's take on France vs. Italy:
Overall, 28 began probably the best any other age had began up until the point. I was in Europe, with the love of my life and we had an entire trip to still go!
We said goodbye to the chateau and began our journey towards our final French-related stop, but the chateau would be a huge part of our trip because it's where so many of us came together as a group and started to make our friendships. These girls became my best friends and my magnet sister (we were on a mission to get a magnet from every stop):
P Party at the Chateau.
I was particularly excited about this leg of the trip because this leg also meant my birthday. I turned 28 in Monaco and spent the rest of my birthday in Florence. I was excited for Monaco because of Grace Kelly. As an American myself, it's a very romantic story that an American was picked by a prince and married into royalty even if her end was tragic. I couldn't wait, I had even packed a really great dress just for this part of the trip.
The views were beautiful driving from our camp site into town.
By Phil. (philgoestothemovies.blogspot.com)
Beaches in New Jersey do not look like that and the clear blue of the water was absolutely breath taking. Oceans in New Jersey are green and dull, but in Monaco it looked like a beautiful painting.
We walked up to the castle and Phil, Kelsey, Ellie and I all went on to look for magnets after we took our pictures.
By Phil. (philgoestothemovies.blogspot.com)
I was at this point suffering from what some travelers get: body bloat. It started in my feet and then my ankles and then my entire body blew up. It was very uncomfortable and also most unattractive, so I won't be posting pictures of myself, but here's Phil's selfie:
By Phil (philgoestothemovies.blogspot.com)
After the castle, we went back down to the casino areas which was just boring. Neither Phil nor I are gamblers so this was a bust. We walked down to the McDonald's and stood in an insane line to buy overpriced fast food. I was so let down and annoyed for having to have packed a dress that I just walked around in and then sat in McDonald's wearing as we used the WiFi.
We went back to the campsite after that as a cab ride back would have been way too much money and there was nothing to do there unless you wanted to gamble. We stayed at the campsite and hung out at the bar. We drank and laughed and then at midnight, those from the group that had come back with us, all sang me happy birthday. It was a fun night!
This was also one of the two worst camp sites of the trip so we wound up staying up really late because sleeping was scary. The bar closed and we had to go stand by the laundry rooms. Tipsy and tired, we stayed up talking and then the bright idea of what would be referred to as Mission 3AM was born. A guy on our trip brought with him a blue Angry Bird and he would take a picture of it wherever we went and wanted to get a picture with everyone on the trip. So, tipsy on my birthday we all decided it would be a great idea to steal the bird. We did and for the next couple of days we would pass the bird between us and whisper "3AM" to know that Blue was in transit. The bird was eventually given back to him and he was able to finish his mission with Blue.
I was pretty sad leaving Paris because I just love that city so much. I had some of my best memories there in college and then again with Phil. I was excited though to leave because our next stop would be in the Beaujolais. As a former French teacher, I taught my students all about the Beaujolais nouveau and how this is such a big thing. Obviously we were there in summer so we missed the festivities, but we were still going to stay in the wine region and we were going to be sleeping in a chateau. I have always had a love for chateaus, I always found them to be so beautiful and I loved the history behind them and how families would pass these homes down through generations. We stayed in a chateau that is now owned by our tour company, but that doesn't mean it doesn't have a racy past...
Chateau de Cruix. 8/2014
It was originally constructed by the Sarron family, a notorious family plagued with scandal in the medieval period before being sold to the Bellet family where it remained until 1936 when it was again sold, this time to the Bernard family who sold it in 1955 to a cruise company that used it for their employees before Contiki purchased the property (and pretty much turned it into a party house) in 1980. It was a pretty neat place to walk around, there was even an old chapel on site and the architecture was amazing. It's fairly empty now with bunk beds built out of two-by-fours crammed into rooms that were crappily divided to fit in more people. In it's day though, it must have been something.
I felt okay walking around though you could feel the building's history around you and I am sure it is haunted to some extent. We had windows that would just close on their own. I didn't feel anything sinister there, but Phil did have this weird nightmare about something trying to pull us out of our window as we slept. That night, the window kept rattling even though there was no wind and if you looked at it, it would stop. Creepy!
The views are still amazing. I spent a lot of time outside. It was pretty cold still, but I didn't mind.
Beyond the Chateau. 8/2014
My favorite time though, was at night. It was just so quiet and beautiful. It was beyond romantic to be there despite all of the craziness that other people staying there created, it was simply magical.
Twilight at the Chateau. 8/2014
After we arrived at the Chateau, we were rushed into the cuvage, where we had our first wine tasting of the trip. Beaujolais wine is young wine and it is red. So, if you like red wine this is where you buy it. We bought a bottle for Phil's mom and one for us. We're saving it for our anniversary in January, but every time I look at it sitting on the dining room hutch, I just want to sneak a little sip.
Phil, forever being the star of most things, got volunteered to be in the demonstration of how they cut the grapes from the vines. I really wish I had videotaped it, but I just got pictures:
Phil, the grape man. 8/2014
After the demonstration we had wine and hung out for a little and talked. I also am not big on being in huge groups for very long so I started to wander around and take more pictures. I got some more of the grounds and then the view from our window:
Chateau roses. 8/2014
Beaujolais road. 8/2014
From our window. 8/2014
Afterwards, we made our way down to the dining room for dinner. My birthday is still upcoming so we buy a bottle of white wine (which is also delicious) and we have it with dinner. Then we all sat outside drinking wine and getting acquainted with one another. Looking back our time at the chateau is where we all began to bound as a group. Later that night, Phil and I would get separated. I spent much of the night outside because I was just so in love with being in the wine region while he had a fun time in the chateau's basement that they turned into a club. To me, though, it reminded me of every frat basement party I had ever been to over the course of my time at Rutgers. I was okay in missing that. Kelsey would spend much of the night running into either Phil or me and asking us where the other was. We finally found each other long enough for him to give me our room key and for me to go to bed. He eventually followed.
The next day, we stayed by the pool and just hung out with Kelsey while Ellie went on a hike where it seems everyone got lost doing. At the end of your hike you got a small lunch that they were nice enough to bring back for us. The one thing I did not like about the chateau was how wine fueled it was, but if you were hungry there was no food and there was no place to walk to to buy it. A good portion of our tour was prepaying for food, but Contiki meals sucked. They often were flavorless and insanely small portions especially when they took you to the Chateau where the only meals were their meals and you had to wait for specific meal times to then be fed things that weren't all that wonderful. I would have liked to not have had to pay them any money for food and just bought my own as we went. I also did not like how when you were in a Contiki property, they would pick people to serve the food and to bus the tables, on their vacation that they just paid all of this money to do. I felt especially bad for the people who in real life are servers and were enjoying not having to do that while they were away.
Panorama of the chateau (and Phil). 8/2014
Regardless though, our time there was beautiful and I just loved getting to have that experience as a whole and with Phil. I became very relaxed there and just enjoyed it which was huge for me because coming into our trip, I was totally burnt out from moving and from my job. I really needed to get away and have a fun time with the man I love and we did just that.
Disclaimer: I really love France and Chateaus. I blame Lifetime and Danielle Steel because growing up I saw the Jewels mini-series with Anthony Andrews and thus began my adoration for this place and my dream that one day I would marry a duke...
We flew out of New Jersey into London-Heathrow. I had been so busy with moving and everything else that I had going on over the summer that I had forgotten to pre-select our seats on the airplane. I wasn't able to check in online either because of the terms of our tickets. Best laid plains, right? So, we got stuck with crappy seats in the middle of the plane.
This was also the first time that I went through airport security and was nearly stopped....so they could search my bun. Yes, that bun in my hair. I was shocked but they checked, found nothing and we were allowed to board.
It was very early in the morning when we left, we actually watched the sun come up over the runway at Newark airport. We hung out and waited until we were finally able to board our plan. I have flown transatlantic before so I was ready for a nap and to wake up in Europe, however, Phil had not flown that kind of flight before and so began his exclamations every time we hit turbulence that we were going down and going to die.
I had to remind him that these were things you do not say on a plane in a post-9/11 world, even if you're terrified....suck it up! Which he did and after several movies and an okay meal, we landed at Heathrow.
Wherein we have our first argument over a sim card, but I find one and we are able to tell everyone we landed. Then we had to take the 45 minute ride on the metro into Camden where we were staying. We stayed at the Royal National Hotel which was clean enough, but really had some elements of "The Shining" that I could have lived without. We showered and met up with some other people we would be traveling with at the pub in the courtyard. We didn't stay long because we were exhausted.
Phil & I on the ferry after we just left the port of Dover. 8/2014
The next day, we planned on sleeping which we did and booked a bus tour for later. We walked around, found nothing really in the immediate area and wound up being annoyed with London. It did not help that the staff at the Royal National was awful and so rude. They would not help us whatsoever and were more into talking to each other than answering any questions. We wound up having to even get a refund on our bus tour because we could not get help in finding where it was. I found most of London flat out rude.
We retreated to our hotel room with hard cider which we drank out of tea cups and listed all of our London based grievances. I fell a little more in love with Phil that day because he really tried to make it better even though London was such a let down. It was just expensive and abrasive! We even did the classic red phone booth pictures to find how awful those booths really are-- they reek of piss and vomit.
The next day, we were up early to begin our trip. We met up with our Contiki group and we were off for my city...Paris. We took a bus to the ferry where we got to see the cliffs of Dover and we floated off to France! The ferry trip was a bit of a haze because we were so jetlagged, but I will never forget how exciting it was, knowing that we had our entire trip ahead of us.
Last year, I was in a brand new school district teaching a subject that I hadn't taught since student teaching. I had finally left world language and was at last working on my standard certificate in English. It was a crazy year filled with the unknown, so many challenges and changes.
And one of those changes was meeting Phil. Now, I made a good amount of money in my early writing career writing about dating, heartbreak and what it was like to be an adrift 20-something. However, this is not one of those overly dramatic stories that you might be used to reading from me. This is the beginning of a true love story and one that I hope gives those adrift 20-somethings that are still navigating the uncertainty of this age, are looking for.
Our first Valentine's Day, February 2014.
It was January when I met Phil. It was a blind date set up by a teacher in my building who at the time I barely knew, but felt gutsy enough to put it out there because as she would tell me, every time she talked to me all she could think of was her friend Phil. In her mind, we had to meet.
Only, Phil never facebooked me like she told him to do. I was also pretty much done with men, having had another bad relationship the year before and since then, every date I went on or guy I dated turn out to be a total and complete dipshit. I really was just enjoying teaching and being alone, finding it easier than putting myself out there and either getting hurt or finding myself disappointed by someone else.
However, my teacher friend was persistent and asked me if he ever contacted me. When I said that he hadn't, we decided that I would message him and I did. Then he responded and we talked for days. We had our first date where he will tell you I was cold and closed off, but I wouldn't have sat there for six hours if I wasn't interested. We had dinner and then coffee and we saw American Hustle where the usher nearly carded me and charged him for a child's ticket. We laughed about it though and it became a running joke. I knew I was attracted to him at dinner, but I knew I liked him by coffee and then for sure in the movies. Then he nearly broke the reclining seat in the theater by pulling the button instead of pushing and we both nearly got motion sickness because that is not a movie you should see when the only seats left were the front row. The end to the date was awkward with neither one of us sure how to end it, but I am glad I said I had a fun time and that he then said we should do it again.
It was our third date where we sat at a bar, tipsy on beer and playing the infamous "napkin game" which is just like never have I ever, but with a napkin. He gave me a ridiculous card and in it he wrote a poem that both rhymed and included every major thing that we had talked about up until the point and left it with the idea of a relationship. Here's where we have yet to find common ground on it. I say that he asked me out and he says I did when we then got into a pissing match and I updated my relationship status on facebook. I still say, he asked me out.
And nearly a year later, and we are more in love with each other than ever. Though, we have found the past month awfully stressful with my return to teaching and writing my master's thesis and he taking six classes this semester, but we're doing it! I do wish sometimes though on the really hard days that we can go back to the dream of a summer we had. We backpacked through Europe over the course of August and it was just a long standing dream come true for me.
Which will be what I focus my first bunch of entries on. Our first stop will be London and the horrible time we had there, but Phil made it special in the end. Stay tuned!
