The past few days have been crazy!! .. once again. We are now on our way to Vienna, Austria, home of The Sound of Music, Redbull, nazis and schnapps.. quite the combination. Since we last wrote we've been to nice, monte carlo, piza, florence, rome vatican and venice.

Nice (pronounced neece) was a nice place.. stupid pun i know but thats really the best way to descrribe it. It was little and quiet and had beautiful beaches. There was decent shopping but we were there on a sunday so we didnt get to experience. (in case we havent already mentionned this, all of europe shuts down on sundays, soooo annoying!) We spent our day there by sleeping in, going for a couple of walks and taking a ride on the ferris wheel at the fair which was there at the same time as us. That evening however we drove to Monte Carlo to see the casino! That was cool, its exactly like in James Bonde; there were bentleys, mercedes and ferarris everywhere. Kirsten lost 10 euros on the roulette and then 5 in the vlts, but taught two people how to play (which she was very proud of, as one girl who she was showing won 15$!!) Allison lost 10 in the vlts but had fun learning how to play.. until half way through when she just started picking random things so she could finish more quickly. She wanted to cash out at 5 but was told shed probably be laughed at considering there were pepole all around them blowing thousands of dollars like it was nothing. Eventually we drove back to Nice and spent the night in before our terribly long drive to italy the next day.

Our first impression of Italy was Piza... which was not a very good one. To completely honest Piza is a dump and the leaning tower is nothing amazing. It was nice to say we'd seen it, but both of us decided along with most of our group that we'd never go back again. It was crowded and dirty and the italian guys were.. not the most polite. We spent about an hour there before getting back onto the bus the finish our journey to florence.

Once again we lucked our with our hotel room, managing to snag a room with a balconny, a double and a queen size bed! We dumped our bags, got changed and were off to a traditional tuscan dinner! The dinner was very italian, there was an old man singing and playing the piano and the biggest bottles of wine we'd ever seen on the table. We started with brushetta, an olive spread and a bunch of cold cuts (Dad, Spence and Mac: salami is EVERYWHERE there). We then had some type of pasta followed by more pasta and then roast chicken,potatoes and vegetables. After that we had salad and then gelati, which hardly anyone ate as we were all stuffed and drunk. We went from the restaurant to this club called space electronic disco, one of the biggest bars in Florence. It was massive and there were lights everywhere and tons of people even though it was a monday. We had a great night there and then headed back to the hotel at what we thought was give 520 (our friend's watch was on backwards and there were no numbers on it).We realised afterwards it was luckily onlt 120. The next morning we got up waaay to early and headed to this beautiful hilltop in florence the get a group photo taken by a proffessional photographer. After that we had the afternoon to do what we wanted in florence. We went to an old florentine leather shop to learn how they make leather goods and how to tell real from fake. Kirsten volunteered for the demonstration and got to stamp the 24carrot gold finish onto the leather. After the demo we headed off the go shopping. Allison found a really cute shirt that Kirsten loved so much she bought in another colour. (of course, just cuz we're in europe doesnt mean we cant still do the same stupid things) After our short visit in Florence we got back on the coach around 2 and headed to rome.

Rome was aaaamazing! The architecture and the history is unbelievable. Once upon a time the romans basically had control over all of europe and they were incredibly rich, the remains of their empire are mostly still there today (ancient rome). We drove past all the big sites when we arrived and then went on an hour long walking tour passing the colleseum, pantheon, roman forum and many other important buildings. On the wall of the forum there were 4 maps, the first showing what europe was like before the roman emprie and the last showing the territory which the romas occupied before the 2nd world war. We were told there used to be a fith map which showed what they would have if they joined hitler, but it was removed after the nazis were defeated in WWII. Our next day was completely free so we headed to the colleseum with a few other members of our tour group where we purchased a guided tour through the colleseum, palletine hills and forum. The begginning of the tour started off well, our tour guide spoke decent english and she told us the legend of how rome became... it went south soon after though when she started talking about dates and small details no one cared about. We suffered through it for a while so we could see the inside of the colleseum but ended up leaving an hour early deciding it was worse to waste our time then our money. We grabbed some pizza, pasta and wine for lunch and then met up with the group to get into the forum. Again we left before the tour was finished as our guide told the exact same story as the first one. A long long time ago the God Mars transformed himself into a beautiful man and impregnated one of the sacred virgins. She gave birth to twins and named the romelus and remius. Because she had comitted a terrible crime as her body was holy, she was buried alive and her babies were put into a basket in the river and sent to find their own destiny. A shewolf (which is now the symbol of rome) found them and raised them, then when they became older they started to build civilization on the palatine hill. Romelus killed remius for some reason (we zoned out during this part) and thats why the city was called Rome. This is only a legend but we later found out that shewolf and prostitute mean the same thing in latin, so no one knows whether it was a shewolf or a prostitute that raised them. That night we went out to a bar that was 20euros unlimited drinks and had.. a really fun time. ... and an even better morning. After that Rome was over and we were on to Venice! (which by now was like 5 days ago, sorry for the delay guys!)

Stories about Venice, Vienna, Munich and Prague to come soon :)