Triumphant Return from Europe!

Well, it seems that I've a lot to catch up on as far as your blogs go. It looks as though everyone has been busy getting married and having kids, getting jobs, turning into grown-ups...

As for me, I have had the busiest year of my life, I think. I spent the majority of the past year working as many overtime shifts as humanly possible in order to save up enough money to go to Europe for 3 months with 3 of my friends this summer. We went, we saw, we conquered (well, ok, maybe I only conquered a wine bottle or two, but that's a start).

Everyone is always wanting to know the details about the trip, so here goes! We rented an excellent station wagon/minivan crossover from Peugeot, as a long-term vacation rental/lease. We were planning to drive everywhere, and camp instead of staying in hostels, to make our money stretch further, so we went out, bought the smallest tents I have ever seen, and some basic camping gear and set off!

We started off in Paris, which I adored. I love the city. If you've never been, I highly suggest springing for one of those week-long vacation packages. We drove through France, down through Spain and into Morocco, where we spent 9 days. I absolutely loved it in Morocco; once you get over the culture shock, (especially being a woman, everything was so alien) you realize how beautiful the country is, how exotic, and how friendly the people are. Probably my best time on the entire trip was in Morocco, when we went on an overnight camel trek into the Sahara. The desert was unbelievable. So vast, and empty. It really helped put my life into perspective, which was something I definitely needed, since I'd been suffering from a case of the 'Omg, I just graduated with a degree I can't use to get a job...what do I do now?' anxiety.

Leaving Morocco, we drove back through Spain, where we celebrated the Spanish triumph at the Soccer World Cup with the frenzied crowds in Barcelona. Driving back up the coast of Spain, we spent many days on the Mediterranean beaches, sunning, and relaxing. The beaches were so beautiful, the sea that clear blue, with pure white sand and sun umbrellas lining the busy shoreline as far as the eye could see...the kind of beaches you see in calendars, really.

Next, we made a beeline for Munich, via Andorra, France, Lichtenstein (yes, it IS a real place, although it's a micronation, and I got a speeding ticket there...I got a speeding ticket in a country that you can drive across in about 40 minutes. Now THAT'S a good dinner-party story!), Austria and Switzerland. We met some really friendly folks in Switzerland, who gave us a ton of free beer and let us party with them for the night. One of the guys had a 70 L keg and tap system. In the back of his van.

I think we spent about a total of 12 hours in Munich, since we were just there to catch a flight to Istanbul. We spent a week in Istanbul, saw all the important sights, went swimming in the Black Sea, and stepped foot in Asia (Istanbul is on both sides of the Bosphorus, which divides Europe and Asia). After Turkey, we drove down to Italy, where we'd rented an apartment in Tuscany for 4 days. We spent a ton of time in Italy, and it is possibly my new favorite country. I have never felt quite so relaxed as I did in Italy.


After Italy, we hit up Slovenia for a few days, before I took a train back to Paris, for my flight back to Canada. I was only there for a total of 9 weeks, as I erm...ran out of funds, and had to return for the start of the school year.

Went to NYC for a week, met someone...we're trying the long-distance thing at the moment, which seems to be going quite nicely, and that's about it.

I have a few pictures that I've posted here, but unfortunately, not as many as I wish I had, since my laptop with the pictures on it was stolen. Alas.

Back in Canada, I set about readying myself to start the CNC/UNBC Nursing program (which I'm busily working away at right this second). Now, I spend all my days reading textbooks and being a student all over again.