FRIDAY's FAVE FIVE

I had come back late due to my adventurous return by train, instead of a plane, because usually the   train takes less time as the plane ! But I had no luck, the first train had electricity problems and I missed my correspondence to Brussels it took me until 9 pm when I was finally home. Normally it should have been around 6 pm,  therefore I was very tired and slept longer as usual.

I quickly wrote a post about the countries I had seen and then I had to go to Nicole for our Scrabble group. I felt a bit strange, still half on holidays and half at home.

The next day it became hot around 30°. I stayed home, the windows and shutters closed, unpacked my suitcase and fell into pieces, because without air conditioning the slightest physical effort became very hard work ! I decided to do the rest next day and rather file the 400 pictures I had taken, into the right folders.  A part from that I was hanging in front of the TV with the fan on and suffered in silence. The cats suffered too.



It even went worse the temperature went higher and Northern Europe was suffering a heat wave. We started with 35° in the morning and I sent my cleaning lady home because it was too hot to clean. She insisted to clean at least the floors and then she said good bye for 3 weeks returning to Poland where she is coming from and there it is not cooler !

Nicole was fed up to sit in the dark in her apartment and came over and we could sit outside under the Pergola with the fan and the heat was supportable. Besides eating an ice cream and drinking a lot of water we didn't do anything else. The News were full of suggestions what to do against the heat, so that they nearly forgot to mention the new British Prime Minister, who not only looks like a brother to Mr. Trump, but who also wants to make the UK great again. We don't need circuses anymore we have enough clowns in world politics !

We had decided to continue our painting class, but it was so hot already in the morning, that most of us didn't come. We finally were four, but enjoyed the air conditioned room and stayed chatting instead of painting. It was so nice and cool.

Then came the (I hope) highest point of temperatures ! The thermometer climbed up to 40° (104 F) in Brussels and Paris even higher. Impossible to do something in this heat. Finally I had enough, took my air conditioned car, picked up Nicole and we went to the Carrefour Lunch Garden to have ice cream and coffee. It was so nice there that we stayed 3 hours and didn't even realize. Mr. G. called and wondered where I was !

I wanted to start my travel report, but in this heat it is impossible, so my head inside looks like this :



all towns and countries like a puzzle !

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MEETING THE GROUP IN MUNICH

The tour



Brussels - Munich

After one hour and a half I finally arrived by plane from Bruxelles to Munich It was probably the shortest flight of all group members, but the fact that I had to take a train in the Munich airport to pick up my suitcase and then taking the Lufthansa shuttle to the Main station and then a taxi to the hotel I arrived 2 hours later as foreseen and missed the group which had gone to visit Munich.

I was so tired that I was not hungry took a shower and went to bed. I had no clue who my room mate was, as single travellers share a room with another single. In the morning I woke up and saw a shape under the blanket but couldn't figure out if she was tall, short, blond or black until we both were awaken looked at each other and laughed a good morning. It turned out she was an Australian lady. For the whole trip we shared a room  without any problems. With my earplugs in my ears (I am used to) I didn't hear her snoring and she pushed me if sometimes I started to snore. Happens in the best families !

The rest of the group I met in the morning at breakfast. I was the only European with the tour leader and English girl from Oxford. All the others came from different continents. Canada, USA, Australia, New Zealand, Filipinos and from the Caribbeans. Really a mixed bag ! Despite our different origins we had no troubles at all with each other, after a few days we became a big family and it was absolutely nice.

As I always said since I am blogging from wherever we come, we all have the same joys and worries. Maybe different breakfasts, but otherwise we all liked the same food which is different but delicious in these Eastern countries who were under communist regime for such a long time which means until the 90th !



This is our group, young and old we are all mixed together


Here we made our "comfort stop" which meant all two hours the bus stopped and we could go out and walk around or buy something to eat and drink.



The guide we had in Vienna was the lady with the yellow flag. She was the best for me. She explained very well, was full of humour and didn't run as if the devil was behind her, as the other guides used to do and unfortunately ours too. Everybody complained to each other but nobody dared to say something to our guide, except me of course. It was not a walking tour anymore but a marathon running tour, with me always at the end, because I wanted to take pictures.

Fortunately we had a lot of free time where I could go back or take a sightseeing tour which I did in Budapest. 

But I was very well taken care of, if our guide walked like a robot and never looked back if we were all following, a good soul showed up and showed me the direction. There was always a man who carried my suitcase up the stairs when there were stairs to get to the reception. Everybody was very friendly, polite and kind.



We  were often exploring together. The first came from New Zealand, me from Belgium, Los Angeles and my roommate from Australia.

When the tour was over it was very hot in Salzburg, but then when we arrived where we started in Munich in the rain, it rained again !

After breakfast we disappeared in all directions to get home and now ... we meet each other on Facebook !

The result of my tour was 2.700 km by bus and I walked nearly 90 km !

WORDLESS WEDNESDAY - CAT CAFE

When I stayed two days in Budapest (Hungary) I discovered a "Cat Café" just opposite our hotel !

Of course I went there to have a coffee and a very nice piece of cake. The cats were walking around and the huge ginger cat came to my table and sat on the chair besides me. There were quite a lot of people in this café !


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and Image-in-ing

EIGHT COUNTRIES IN 10 DAYS

I am just back from my 10 days tour through 8 Eastern European countries. This is the second tour I made in this region. Now I think I have seen them all, at least all the things a tourist should see and the wonderful landscapes in this area.

We started in Munich



Here I am ready for the tour, unfortunately I have no pictures from Munich, as I arrived late and missed the start of the tour. I didn't know that it took so long to get out of the Munich airport, and that I had to take a train to pick up my luggage ! This and the heavy traffic in Munich delayed my arrival. I only saw the members of my group the next day.

From Munich we went to Nürnberg,





Nürnberg




In Prague unfortunately it rained cats and dogs and I even had to buy an umbrella.



The rain stopped in Ausschwitz, which some of our group visited. I stayed outside this site of horror and saw enough. I also knew and had seen expositions before and was too much involved, that I just couldn't go inside.






Vienna



In Budapest we stayed two days ! A very beautiful city





Ljubiliana in Slovenia, would have been a lovely city, if the houses were not full of graffitis. Apparently after the communists had left young people expressed their "freedom of speach" in "writing" !

This is just a little overview of what I have seen, of course I will write about my trip more in details.
We drove 2700 km by bus through the 8 countries, and I have walked 90 km according to somebody's podometer, but I am sure it must have been more !

I took around 400 pictures and have to see what is where and where is what. It will take a little time until everything will be there were it should be. For the moment I have a puzzle in my head !

Detailed cities description is COUNTRIES & CITIES

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