Florence is beautiful

So it has almost been a week into my travels..
I went to Cinque Terre which is an area where there are 5 italian villages along the coast. It's really pretty there and scenery is beautiful. The villages are small but touristy. Things are quite expensive because of all the tourism and the first day I bust my food budget. Thankfully, I have managed to even it out by cutting other expenses. It was very sunny and I went trekking along the coastline from one village to another. It usually takes 5 hours, but because we stopped along the way to explore the villages, we took a day instead. I met several people there, and they were friendly so we hung out together.

After Cinque Terre, we went to Pisa to see the leaning tower. It is quite a wonder because it tower really looks like it would fall over! I didn't thik it was worth going in so we just took photos and left. We missed the train to Rome and had to wait for 2 hours. I was quite upset and sian about it because we didn't have much time in Rome.

When we got to Rome, I met up with Charles and Mike for dinner. They were there for holiday and we arranged to meet up for dinner. It was a very late but yummy dinner at a very reasonable price. I had pork chop with porcini mushrooms, Charles had carbonara, and Mike had veal cutlet. We shared a bruschetta for appetizer and had gelato for dessert. They were very kind to pick up the bill. I had a very relaxing and nice evening with them.

The next day we went to the Vatican city. when we got to the museum, we had to join the queue in the sun and I felt like I couldn't enjoy the museum as much as I would have liked. There were just too many tourists.. Then the same thing happened at Saint Peter's Basilica. Too many people. But I must say it's a really grand and magnificent church. We also tried to join the free walking tour but the guide couldn't speak very good English so we gave up.

We got to Florence yesterday afternoon. Then we went exploring the city and it's quite beautiful. The weather was good and the place was comfortable. Lots of tourists but not like Rome; Florence is filled with nice buildings, less immigrants, more art and it is compact as most sights within walking distance.

Today, we joined the walking tour organised by the hostel and it was really good. I learnt stuff on the tour and I appreciate Florence better. After the tour, we got to know Vivian and Gary. We went around together and saw a few places like the Duomo (big church) and the replicas of David by Michaelangelo. It was not a very fruitful day cause there's really not much to see unless I go out of Florence. But I guess it would be really nice to shop and hangout by the river.

Tomorrow I'll head to venice. For now, I'm finally ahead of schedule and ready to take it easy. Need to do laundry soon...

Coming to an (exciting) end

It's my last week in Tilburg! I can't believe it. The last sunday I'm going to be in Tilburg. The best part is, I'm still (a little bit) sick. The weather forecast says it's going to rain tomorrow. What horrible weather, the temperature is still hovering below 20 degrees. It's still too cold to just wear shorts and a t-shirt. The thought of packing is dreadful. First, I need to find a box so that I can mail some stuff back! I've started packing already and my suitcase is full!!! Damn, now everything has to fit into my backpack... which is highly impossible. I just need to recover quickly so that I can go out there, look for a box, pack my stuff in there and ship/fly it back.

Yup, so this Friday is my last exam, I'm constantly trying to study yet at the same time finish planning my epic journey. Today, I finally got down to booking all hostels and the possible transport tickets. My cousin Jerry will join me in Barcelona when I'm there! Yay! Looking forward to that. Seems like this 1 month trip is going to cost quite a bit.. The estimated cost for this trip is around 1800 euros. Aiyo.. I feel guilty for spending so much money..

Okay.. so the trip goes like this:

June
15th-16th: Cinque Terre
17th-18th: Rome
19th - 20th: Florence
21st - 22nd: Venice
23rd - 24th: Vienna
25th - 26th: Nice
27th - 30th: Barcelona
July
1st - 2nd: Granada
3rd - 4th: Seville
5th - 7th: Lisbon
8th: Porto
9th - 12th : Madrid
13th - 16th: Netherlands
17th: Home Sweet Home!!

I'm anticipating so so so much hassle getting around... these people just don't speak English. I'm going to countries where their languages are so widely spoken they don't bother learning English. I just hope I won't run into too much trouble. Basically from July onwards, I'm traveling on my own so I think it'll be a bit scary yet exciting. I definitely need to be super careful.

Bad timing...

After being in Europe for so long, I'm finally sick. Urgh. Not that I have been looking forward to it, but I'm surprised how I survive winter through spring without falling sick but suddenly, two days ago I woke up with a dry (sore) throat. Initially I thought it's just dry airway but when it didn't go away in the afternoon, I kind of expected it will worsen and more will follow. True enough, yesterday I woke up with semi-blocked nose, by afternoon I could only breathe through one side and feeling slightly achy. I started my medication at night before I slept and forced myself to sleep early (i.e. before 1am). I woke up at 2a.m and took another 2 tablets of Febs and drank more water. Today, I woke up with a totally blocked nose, didn't get much better and I'm still drinking lots of water, taking my flu tablets. It's just so difficult to study with a headache, an aching body and breathing obstruction. Today is public holiday, everything is closed and I ran out of groceries. Left with bread, cheese, eggs and instant noodles. Sigh.. looks like it's instant noodles tonight..