Brett & Megan

After 3 1/2 weeks, 7 countries, 11 hotels & hostels, and countless sausages we have completed our European travels and are back in the U.S.. We had a great trip but are happy to be home. Since internet access was a bit spotty and some of the cafes had dial-up, we weren’t able to get as many posts in as we’d hoped, so we thought we would give a recap of our trip.

Aug. 4 Travel

1. Flight from LAX to London Heathrow
2. Underground subway, AKA “the Tube” to St. Pancras International train station
3. Eurostar high speed train to Brussels, Belgium (through the ‘Chunnel’)

Belgium - 3 days, stayed in Brussels and Bruges. The chocolate was the best of any country we went to. Even the cheap stuff was good. A little rain kept us indoors in Bruges but we got some nice weather for the canal tour through the city. Brussels had some amazing architecture.

Holland - 2 days, so we were on a train for Amsterdam when we approached the airport. I quickly looked at a map and saw that the airport was close to a town called Aalsmeer. At the last second I told Megan to get her backpack and we quickly jumped off at the airport station. I had read about this place in the book Flower Confidential – Aalsmeer is home to the world’s biggest flower auction. Nearly 80% of the world’s flowers are bought/sold through the famous Dutch flower auction house, which also happens to be the largest building in the world, basically an enormous warehouse. The flowers sitting in your centerpiece right now probably came through here. Flowers are brought in truckloads and briefly carted through 1 of 5 auction rooms where buyers from dozens of countries get about 5 seconds to look and decide if they want to purchase a few thousand dollars worth. It’s fast. The Dutch were very friendly and the town has its share of wealthy (thanks to the auction) but down-to-earth people.

Germany - 2 days in Köln, AKA Cologne. This houses one of the largest cathedrals in Europe and is Germany’s #1 most visited attraction. Stayed right on the Rhine and toured the underground Roman foundations of the city, which weren’t discovered until cleanup of destroyed buildings began after WWII. The 1 meter bratwurst on a pile of mashed potatoes at the pub was probably the best food we had the whole trip.

Stayed in Freiburg for about 5 days. We mostly enjoyed the Schwarzvald, or “Black Forest”. We rented bikes from a bike shop in a small town where the shop owner was ecstatic to have two cyclists from LA in his shop. I think this guy wanted us to move in with him he was so excited. We spent about 4 hours biking through gorgeous valleys and hillsides. It got a little rainy on us at the end, but we did some hiking in the higher areas of the forest. This was the kind of stuff we came for.

Switzerland - we stayed 4 days in the beautiful alpine town of Interlaken. This place is a feast for the eyes. One afternoon we just sat out on a patio and watched paragliders drift like tiny pieces of paper in the wind, passing granite cliffs, glacier-topped peaks, meadows and of course, the two lakes (Interlaken means in between lakes). We biked all over, ate fondue, and hiked up to the Matterhorn (not the summit, just the base, we’re not that in shape).

England - spent about 9 days in this beautiful country. After flying in from Switzerland on Easyjet, or as Megan referred to it, the ‘Southwest Airlines of Europe’ we rented a car and drove up to Birmingham, home of Brett’s mission. The next day we headed over to the small town of Kidderminster, Brett’s second mission area. The reunion with the church branch there was joyous as we met so many friendly people. We got numerous dinner invitations and ended up spending the day with 3 families. It was just like any family Sunday dinner and brought back a lot of fond memories for Brett. Norman and Val Mills graciously put us up for 3 nights while we used our rental car to explore Bristol, Bath, Wales, Worcester, Gatfield Elm (where the church in England flourished), and Stratford-upon-Avon (home of William Shakespeare).

We moved on to Preston to visit the new temple. After touring for nearly 3 weeks, we felt we needed a break to do some ‘normal’ hanging out, so we went to see Mama Mia (the movie) and ate dinner at an ‘American’ pizza restaurant, or at least that’s what the British think is pizza. The bangers and mash is definitely the better fare in England.

We made an unexpected stay in the Yorkshire Dales which turned out to be a highlight. We hiked through pastures of sheep and cattle and ancient rock walls. The trail meanders on thick grass and limestone. We had beautiful weather on this hike. We even got to be sheepherders for a few minutes when a sheepherder was unloading his trailer, the sheep turning out of the trailer and into a gate. One missed the turn and starting off down the street. The sheperd, not wanting to lose other exiting the trailer, quickly asked us to help retrieve the stray. I guess the Bible is wrong – the sheepherd doesn’t seek out the one but stays with the 99! Megan and I leaped into action, headed off the wandering sheep and corralled it through the pasture gate. Feeling proud of our first sheepherding accomplishment, we spent the next few minutes directing the sheep into the pasture. Afterwards we chatted with the amiable farmer, who quickly became our best friends, and learned about some of the troubles of organic livestock (not much money and land prices are skyrocketing). We were surprised by the fact that National Parks in England actually have towns and the land is all privately owned, but they have restrictions to prevent over-development.

From there we moved on to York where we stayed with Sheldon & Sarah Hawkshaw. Brett served with Sheldon in the England Birmingham mission. We had great fun (a British term) on a day trip to Whitby Beach, where we toured the Abbey, which Bram Stoker used as the setting for the novel Dracula. We stopped in the small town of Robin Hood Bay and walked along the beach. People in full wetsuits & booties looked at us like we were bonkers as we waded in shorts and sandals – “crazy Californians”.

Our trip ended with a jam-packed 3 days and two nights in London. Let’s see: the Tower of London, London Eye, British Museum, London Dungeon (disappointing amusement ‘park’), Hamley’s toy store (since 1790), Westminster Abbey, boat paddling in Hyde Park, Monty Python’s Spamalot (Holy Grail the musical), shopping at Harrod’s. Yeah, we did a lot at the end. On our final day of the trip, we were on our way to Heathrow airport on the Tube, which we had used the whole time in London, when suddenly a broken switch signal caused backups through the subway system. After not moving for nearly 20min. we jumped off, quickly got our bearings with the map, and started running in what we thought was the direction of the airport looking for a taxi. We must have gotten off in the most dead part of town – no taxis in sight. Luckily, with one hour left before takeoff, we found a cab drive filling up at a ‘petrol’ station just on his way home. He kindly agreed to take us but we had calculated our spending to get rid of every foreign note that we had. So we had to pull cash out of an ATM. The driver was nice enough to not run the meter and charge us a flat fare. Just goes to show how important kindness is – it can be repaid when you’re in a foreign country with less than an hour to catch your flight. We made it, of course, and 11 hours later we touched down at LAX with weary legs and sleepy eyes.

Here’s a few logistical details, FYI:

Transport – before leaving we purchased a Eurail Global Pass. This allowed us to travel in any country in Europe (except the UK) by just hopping on trains. This was super convenient and the timetable they sent us with the passes was indispensable. We also traveled via bike, bus, car, plane and a lot of walking. Driving in Germany was especially crazy as they turn off traffic lights and night and you self-police your driving. I thought about writing to our city council to consider a similar idea, but then I think there was some apocalyptic horror movie where the plot involved LA motorists driving around without traffic lights.

Sleeping – 11 different hostels and hotels + 2 guest bedrooms in friends’ houses. Twice we even stayed in two different rooms in the same hotel. While we may have done hostels 10 years ago, age has made us less adventurous travellers. Private bedrooms were a must and we also liked having our own shower. The few hostels we did stay in were clean and comfortable, though. Worst night – in Bruges a 7 hour non-stop thunderstorm + a mattress made of slinky’s and time change-induced insomnia kept us up all night long. We paid for it the next day.

Money – Dollar to Euro bites. We should have gone to Latin America instead. VISA and Mastercards are accepted everywhere we realized when we got home that the bank charges all sorts of foreign purchase fees. We were charged anywhere from $0.54 to $1.76 for individual purchases. Traveler cheques got us through but we certainly needed to use credit cards and pull more cash out (see end of London). The UK got rid of magnetic stripe cards and now all debit cards have a small, gold microchip on them which is used everywhere. A few shops still had magnetic swipe machines but they’re largely being phased out.

Language – it’s a shame that we don’t put nearly the emphasis on learning a second language in the U.S., unless it’s foreigners learning English as a second-language. Everyone in Europe speaks decent English. And I mean everyone. You expect hotel receptionists in tourist towns to know some but we talked fluently with bus drivers, bakers, waitresses, a boatman in Aalsmeer Holland, – basically everyone we ran into. Ironically, the one exception was a tour guide in Germany. We were touring the Roman underground ruins in Köln and the guide knew very little English. After some frustration, he asked if we spoke Spanish. Megan can converse fairly fluently in Spanish, so he gave her the Spanish tour and she translated into English for me. That was funny.

Until our next adventure . . .