Oktoberfest

Oktoberfest...where to begin. We had so much fun, we are already talking about going back in a few years (if you're interested, let me know, because the more the merrier). We met up with some friends from London to help the Germans rein in their 175th Oktoberfest. We were there for the first weekend of the 16 day celebration, which began with a huge parade that saw tons of barrels of beer being carted in by extravagantly decorated Clydesdale's for each of the major brewers in Munich. There were also other "floats", including this random one of mini London buses.



We kicked off the weekend in the real Hofbrauhaus. Rumor has it that HB can accomodate up to 5,000 people sitting at their picnic tables and drinking their steins at once, and was nearly full when we arrived on Saturday afternoon.


For dinner, we made our way to the Oktoberfest site, and squeezed into one of the little tents. The food was fantastic, but the singing and dancing on the tables was hands-down the best part.




We had lunch at Schneider's one day...also fantastic!


Then came the day where we had a reservation in the Hofbrauhaus tent from 11:30-4, which came with 2 litres of beer and a half chicken each. We arrived at 10:45 for a prompt start to the day. We drank....

and drank...

and drank...

and drank some more.






and without stopping for too long in the middle, made our way over to the Lowenbrau tent for the evening festivities, which would not have been half as fun if we had not found these 4 German-only speaking Germans that were willing to share their table with our crazy bunch. They were fantastic, and I'm pretty sure somehow related to me, because there was an instant connection when they found out that my last name was Schneider...frau Schneider...cheers!

Linlithgow, Scotland

Once we had tired of the hot weather in southern Europe, we made our way to Scotland, mainly for the art festival, but also to see a bit of the countryside. The first stop upon arriving in Scotland was a town called Linlithgow, just outside of Edinburgh and famous for being the birthplace of Mary Queen of Scots.

We stayed in a bed and breakfast (and bar) that served classic Scottish fare, even the scrumptous sticky toffee pudding. The reason we chose this place was for the walk in the country, which started along the canal that was built before trains and used for transport. Although it was a little muddy, and we ran into some cows on the wrong side of the fence, it was absolutely beautiful. The walk ended up at the Linlithgow Palace.

Vence, France

After having gotten our fill of sun, sand and frosty beverages in Nice we hopped on a bus and headed for the hill town of Vence. We read about it in a book of Mediterranean walks; it was supposed to be a great jumping-off point for hikes through the hills with views of the riviera. We were not disappointed! The town sits below three huge rock outcroppings - we went on a hike which took us all the way across the town, up one of the hills, across a ridge to the other one (also the site of a very old monastery) and then back down through the other side of town. We've very rarely been so tired and sweaty while at the same time grinning hugely. An interesting side note is that the monks were the ones who erected the cross you see in the picture - not an easy feat given the difficulty we had hiking up there.

The town itself is one of the great old walled European towns. Outside the wall it is a fairly normal town, but when you get inside the old wall you realize not much has changed - it is all cobblestone streets, tiny houses (complete with arrow slits on the outside wall) and great restaurants.

Pictures of the town:


And our hike:

French Riviera

Next stop for us was the French Riviera. We only made it because the nice Portugese kids sitting next to us told us to get off the train we were on because it had changed its direction (announced only in French). In the end, we made it to Nice, our destination for 4 days. While we had been in Vernazza, a couple of Australians had recommended a beach just east of Nice because of its tranquil solitude and beautiful sand. We hiked the ~1 km from the train station and found it just as lovely as they had discribed.



(It was a topless beach.)


Our entire Nice trip was spent on the beach, drinking, and drinking, and enjoying the sun.

Cinque Terre, Italy

After scootering in Siena, Chris and I took a series of trains to get to this picturesque haven of 5 little cliff towns on the coast of Northern Italy. We stayed in a spare bedroom at Paula's house in Vernazza, who kindly met us at the train station and escorted us to our room over the tracks. Despite the frequent trains that went by, we had a beautiful view of the hill side:


Within a 5 minute walk of Paula's was the welcoming Mediterranean Sea, spotted with all of these cute little boats that they actually used for commercial and recreational purposes.


The second night that we were there we ate at the old castle and watched the sunset over the sea...amazing.



On our last full day in these parts, we made the 9 km trek from town to town, up and down the cliffs, resting frequently because it was well over 100 degrees. Some of the best shots of the towns: