Honeymoon

Today is our last full day in Greece, as we fly out tomorrow at lunch time - meaning an early start to make sure we get to the airport on time. Today was another reasonably relaxed and laid back day - we visited the National History Museum, and ate out for lunch in a lovely street side cafe adorned by fans and misting water to keep us cool. Lunch started with a traditional glass of Ozzo (for me at least, Laura wasn’t too keen). We followed this with a seafood plater and a lamb souvlaki to share, both were fantastic. ...

Today we headed out early to catch a cruise around three of the Greek islands closest to Athens. Leaving port this morning at about 8.30am, the sun was up and had a fair sting in it - needless to say we took the opportunity to sit on the outer deck and soak up some of the fine rays. The first thing that stuck us, once we had left the docks and headed out to sea, was the brilliant blue colour of the water - it was absolutely amazing. People have told us about the water over here, but its something you don’t really appreciate until you see it (and later swim in it :) . ...

We got into Athens yesterday afternoon - great weather, we managed to escape the bad weather that has been forecast for the UK! Yesterday basically involved getting from the airport to the hotel and checking in. Today we decided to take an easy day - we have been on the go for so long you just need to recharge the batteries every now and then. So a slow day involved heading into the Acropolis and seeing a number of the other sites that surround it. We then had a bite of lunch at a local cafe before heading back to the hotel for the afternoon - where we hav spent hours attempting to plan how to get from Finland to Germany without it costing a fortune. Unfortunately this is just not possible, so we booked the first flight out (which was the cheapest by far, but still relatively expensive :( ). ...

London - Our initial taste While we were briefly in London before departing to Ireland for a week, we managed to squeeze in some sight seeing - jumping on a ‘Fat Tire’ bike tour. This was a leisurely 4 hour bike ride around central London, and was a great way of getting oriented. While we didn’t go into any of the sights on the tour, we were given a pretty good commentary on each sight and its history. This gave us a pretty good idea of what we should come back and see. ...

Sorry it’s been a while since out last update, but it can be hectic on the road - never knowing when and where you will get a chance to have 5 minutes free to post a message or two (and I have to say touring in Ireland, with its many pubs does create a pretty big distraction :) ). Anyway - to start with, no one will believe us when we say that the weather in Ireland at the moment is bloody great - its actually sunny and hot - none of us expected to get sun burnt on the north coast of Ireland, but most of us did - it must have been at least 25-28c here - its been bloody great. ...

We have now left the Spanish speaking countries behind us after about 7 weeks of traveling. We find it hard to stop saying ‘Gracias’ to people - but I’m sure we will get over it. Our flight out of Barcelona was delayed by about 30min, but we managed to touch down on British soil fine. We were dreading hitting Heathrow a little - you never seem to hear a good story about that place - but we were very surprised when we only queued for about 5min in immigration and waled straight through customs. Literally took us about 10min! We spent longer in the duty free grog shop buying gifts for our hosts here in London. ...

So after a reasonably restful sleep overnight we got into exploring Madrid early – eager to use the remainder of the time available on our 24hr Madrid Vision card (we had until about 2pm) – first on the list was a coffee at one of the many local cafe’s, then onto the Royal Palace for a tour. The Royal Palace was spectacular. We we allowed access to about 50 of the 2,800 rooms in the palace. We started in the royal armory where armor that had been worn by or gifted to the kings of Spain was housed. This was a very interesting exhibition – you could even see how some of the kings had grown around the waist over time by the re-sizing of their armor ;). ...

We have now left South America behind us, and moved onto the European leg of our trip. Our flight from Buenos Aires to Madrid was with the Spanish Iberia airline - an 11 hour flight that was probably our worst yet… lucky us to get the worst one on a long flight. Based on our experience I would try to avoid flying with them again. The entertainment system was communal, no personal entertainment system that you seem to get on most other flights these days. The hostesses were not really interested, and the air conditioning was set to about 35c… even Laura was hot! ...

We have left Peru behind after a month of travel through the country – along the way making some great friendships. So onto Argentina it is. Day 1 – Meeting the Argentinean Pruscino’s We arrived in Buenos Aires, after what was definitely the best flight we have had yet – lots of room, a nice new plane, and not many passengers – to be greeted warmly by the Argentinian Pruscino’s (Laura’s distant relatives). ...

Our time in Peru has come to an end - we are moving on and leaving behind some awesome memories and great new friends. I thought it would be good to try and review and reflect on our time here in Peru, and ponder some of the highlights, and the lowlights of what we have seen (in some cases the highlights and lowlights run together). Initially landing in Lima we were a little concerned about what we had got ourselves into - the airport, as with many big cities is surrounded by poorer districts. So our first impression of Peru was a wild taxi ride through the slum areas of Lima. We both looked at each other and said - ¨This is what we wanted!¨. ...