I'm Home!

Yes, I have come home now. Since the south of France I have been to Switzerland, southern Germany, Great Britain and then to Paris. I have really had an enjoyable time. Since I was having so much fun (and of course I didn't have internet all the time) I haven't done much on the blog. So I apologise.


I feel good to be home after such a long time. Even though I miss Europe, there is nothing better than home.

If you have any questions, please ask by posting a comment on the blog.

bye for now.

Denby and Sherwood

Yesterday we planned on going to the Denby pottery factory tour starting at 10:30, when we finished, we would eat lunch a go see some robin hood sites. We made it to the Factory just in time, but a class of daycare or something already booked a tour at that time, so we couldn't go. We reserved spots for us all at the next tour, which was at 1:00, ate lunch and looked at other stuff in the area to pass time. At 1:00, we came back for the tour. I thought the tour was pretty cool, it show you how their pottery is shaped, glazed and fired. Unlike most tours you actually get to go inside the factory where everything is made. After looking at the factory, we made frogs and painted plates.




Since we had to have a later tour, we didn't have much time for Robin Hood stuff. We went Sherwood forest tried out archery and saw the supposed meeting tree for Robin Hood and his gang. I thought the tree looked funny because it had metal poles to hold it up and cables to hold it together.

I will try to make up for what I have skipped.

From June 7th to 12th

On June 7th we headed to a nearby ruin of a Roman house. What there was to see was the remains of mosaics from the floors of the house. There were also some artifacts in the museum. The house was pretty interesting. Here is one mosaic.

The next day we took a look at some natural sites in the area. First, we checked out a cool circle shaped valley with a hill in the middle. As you can see from the picture, it is quite a site.

After that, we went to a cave called La Grotte des Demoiselles. My favourite part was when we entered the last and largest room of all. In this room stalactites and stalagmites of every sort surround you! I found the stalactites and stalagmites were rather fascinating. Pictures can't capture the beauty of these caves.

The last thing we looked at that day was not a natural site. We went to Le Pont du Diable. This bridge is from the medieval period and was built for travel between two monasteries.

The next day was a "stay home and do schoolwork day". In the evening, we discovered a funny smell. It was the smell of burning plastic. My mom and dad searched for the source and found out that there was an electrical problem. We went outside because the fumes were toxic. When we saw our neighbours coming home we asked them what to do. They went to ask a different neighbour, who was an electrician. The electrician examined the problem and then called an electric company. By the time someone came it was eleven o'clock, and we were getting tired. And by the time the smell was gone and my siblings and I went to bed, it was past twelve. Take a look at the main fuse box. It was a model from the 1940s!

Two days later, on the eleventh, we all got in the car and headed to the city of Avignon. When we arrived there, we were greeted by the city walls. After eating, we went to "Le Pont d'Avignon". It was a really cool experience to be on the world famous bridge! In the past, when I heard the song I thought of the bridge as a dream, and I never thought I would actually see it. We also visited Le Palais des Papes. It looked better on the outside then the inside. Over all, I found Avignon very interesting.

The next day, we saw one of France's traditions, La Course Camarguaise. We could have seen bullfighting, but we all thought it would be too gory to have a bull be stabbed and then run around until it bled to death. During La Course Camarguaise, the competitors try to snatch stuff off the bull or cow’s horns with a metal tool. Every time someone get something off, they win a certain amount of money (which is raised every five minutes or so). There are also people who don't have a tool and help get the bull in the right place for the people who have metal tools. We all enjoyed the show, except for my mom.

I haven't updated up to today, so I will update more soon.

Carcassonne

Yesterday we visited Carcassonne. Carcassonne is a fascinating medieval city restored in the 1800s. It is the largest fortified city in Europe. Carcassonne was very interesting. Old stone buildings surrounded us, and the walls were cool, too. We walked along the parapets of the outer wall and looked out the arrow slits. We also went into the church. The church was elaborate both inside and out, and the stained glass windows were stunning. We went into a few shops and I begged to buy a chain mail suit of armour, but it was 495€ and my parents didn't want me to have it. Matthew wanted a horn and he wasn't allowed, either. We didn't look inside the castle, but the outside looked cool. You can't really fully appreciate Carcassonne until you see for yourself, so I will post some pictures soon. Even so, I suggest you see it if you get the chance.

Italy and France

After touring around eastern Germany and a few places in Austria, we went to Venice, Italy. On the drive there, we saw many mountains. It is so different there because there are no cars. Instead, there are canals and everyone has a boat parked beside their house. For tourists there are gondola services (gondolas are kind of like a fancy canoe that someone rows with an oar and were originally used for daily transportation), but we didn't go because they are now an overpriced, tourist trap.

Venice is a small island that is fun to walk about. It would take you no more than an hour to walk all the way across it. To get there, we took a water bus. One of the coolest places there is San Marco Square. At San Marco Square, there is a beautiful palace, a fantastic old basilica (big church), fancy parliament buildings and a pretty brick clock tower. Also, there was a 24 hour clock with Roman numerals.

After Venice, we went to Rome. Rome was amazing! You can see ancient Roman ruins that have been standing for millennia! Being inside the Coliseum was one of the best parts of Rome for me and for Matthew. It boggled my mind that it could still be standing after almost 2000 years! Some of it was rebuilt recently for stability, but it is mostly original. We also went to the Forum, the center of the old city, which is across the road from the Coliseum. Inside the Forum were most of the important buildings of the ancient city of Rome, including the temples of Castor and Pollux, Romulus, and the ruins of the temples of Julius Caesar, Jupiter, and Vesta, among others. There are also many government buildings, including the Senate and the ruins of some courts. Beside the Forum is the Palatine, the hill that Romulus founded Rome on. It is also where some of the houses of the Emperors were located. We saw the ruins of the houses of Nero and Augustus Caesar. They were very big and probably fancy.

We also went to the smallest country in the world, Vatican City! It was beautiful! We saw Saint Peter's Basilica and the Vatican Museum. Inside the museum was one of the most beautiful things I've seen in the world. Can you guess what it was? The Sistine Chapel. All over the ceiling and one of the walls were Michelangelo's frescos. The rest of the walls were covered by frescos of other artists that predated Michelangelo. The floor was covered in patterns of coloured marble. Vatican City was seriously amazing.

Next we went to Tuscany and stayed at a winery with a wonderful view. After the hustle and bustle of the other parts of the trip, Tuscany seemed extremely relaxing. For the time that we weren't relaxing, we visited towns and cities in the area. My favourite city was Florence. There was a lot to see, but a highlight was seeing the "David" statue by Michelangelo.

Here are two pictures of meat that we saw at the market in Florence. Can you guess what they are?

Another fun thing was wine tasting during the tour of the winery that we were staying at. Most of the wines were very bitter and not tasty. They wrinkled up the inside of my mouth. But the last drink we tried, a vin santo from 1999, tasted like syrup. In addition to wine tasting, there was a freezing pool without a heater, scorpions and "ginormous" spiders.

After staying at the winery, we travelled to the south of France. And on the way, we visited the city of Pisa. In Pisa we went to the Leaning Tower. It surprised me that the tower was white. In all of the pictures that I had seen, the tower looked yellow. We wanted to go in the tower, but Matthew was too young and we would have had to wait for three hours to get in. However, we looked inside the adjacent cathedral and baptistery. The cathedral was especially beautiful, with fancy stained glass windows, well done paintings, elaborate ceilings and floors, and a spectacularly carved pulpit of stone. After about two hours of looking around, we went back to the car and continued on the long journey to Marseillan in the south of France.

Now we are in Marseillan, staying in a medieval townhouse. There is finally English TV! We are going to be staying here for a month. Marseillan is a little town near the Mediterranean Sea and only a few hours from Cannes where Mr. Bean went to the beach (Mr. Bean's Holiday). I'm off to the beach in Marseillan, so good bye for now.

Since Last Blog

I haven't had reliable internet for a long time up till now, so I haven't updated my blog. Now I'm going to talk  about all my family and I have done and seen since I last updated the blog.

For the first week and a bit, we were in and out of Germany and Austria. We went to Passau, St. Valentin, Vienna, Salzburg and Munich (Passau and Munich are in Germany); Most of the hostels were okay (except for the one in Vienna) and the one bed and breakfast was decent. In Germany and Austria, we saw lots of mountains, tried different foods, saw old buildings and ate lots of delicious bakery treats and gelato (really good ice cream that is in the middle of soft serve and hard). Here are some of the mountains we saw.

We didn't have very good weather in Germany and Austria.

Here are some of the things we ate in Germany and Austria.

Here are some of the beautiful, old buildings we've seen in Germany and Austria.

 We had fun at museums.

got to go now I will update more later