I’m having a real lazy day today, the first one I’ve had since… Australia? I think. It’s been a while. I slept in late, ate snacks for breakfast, and spent way too much time on Facebook. I realize it’s a gorgeous sunny day outside in Barcelona, but it’ll have to wait until tomorrow – today is my weekend.

I’ve wanted this break more and more since writing my last blog post. This really came to a head on my birthday, this past Wednesday: I sat down and honestly realized that what I wanted for my birthday was to see some friends and family, not to go see St. Mark’s Square in Venice. Of course, I did go see St. Mark’s Square – it was our one full day in Venice, and Haruki and I got an early start so we could see the square, the basilica, the campanile, and the Palazzo Ducale. But by about 3pm I couldn’t do it anymore, and I went back to my room and watched two movies on my netbook. It was a real treat for me to just take a couple hours off.

I know this all sounds glum, but let me qualify it by saying that I’m still having a fantastic time on this trip. I’m just starting to feel the strain of this amount and pace of travel – to put it in perspective, I’ve averaged less than 2 nights in any one place, for the past 11 weeks. At this point, it isn’t so much a lack-of-sleep tiredness as a bones-are-weary tiredness. I love what I’m doing and am incredibly thankful for it – and I wouldn’t dream of quitting for a moment – but I’ll also be happy to have some rest and stability once it’s all over.

Anyway, this “weekend” of mine (which happens to be a Monday) is also a good opportunity to write this next blog post =). So I’ll rewind a bit, and start back on June 19, when Haruki and I packed up and rolled out of Cinque Terre. After a quick lunch, we discovered that our regional train to nearby La Spezia had been canceled. We ended up waiting over an hour for the next train, and missed our connection – oh well. We still got to Pisa by about 5pm, and did what every good tourist does when they arrive in Pisa: walk over to the leaning tower, take some silly pictures, and leave. After about 20 minutes at the tower, we felt like we’d seen enough. On the way back to the station, however, we got drawn into a restaurant advertising gluten-free pasta and pizza; although we were keen to make like the rest of the tourists and scram (Pisa has sadly little of note besides the tower), it was already 6pm, so we went for it. By 8pm, we were already back on the train headed for Florence.

We got a later start the next morning, and met up just before lunch at Mercato Centrale, one of Florence’s bigger street markets. Florence is known for its leather products, so I bought myself a new leather wallet as an early birthday present; Haruki shopped for leather jackets, but didn’t ultimately buy one. After shopping we ate lunch at a little mom-and-pop eatery advertising gluten-free pasta =). I’m loving all this pasta! They even had a gluten-free beer, which I enjoyed for the first time since I left home.

Haruki decided he was too tired to do sightseeing that afternoon, so he went back to his hotel while I wandered around the city. My first stop was the Duomo; designed by Brunelleschi, its dome is completely supported by the walls (no extra supports or beams), making it a major architectural achievement for its time. It’s also yet another building I studied during my history of architecture class, of course. =)

I could have waited in the long line to go up into the dome or the campanile, but opted to see more of the smaller nearby attractions. I first visited the Duomo’s counter-part museum, which houses its most famous relics and artwork; its main claim-to-fame is Michelangelo’s The Deposition. Next, I visited a small, dark little church where Dante was married. After that I made a trip to a local supermarket, where for the first time in months I found gluten-free breakfast bars! I got so excited that I bought 12. You can never have too much snack food when you’re traveling.

I finally reached the other main tourist center of Florence: the Piazza della Signora and the Palazzo Vecchio. I would have gone to see the Uffizi as well, which is right next door, but our timing in Florence was bad – our one full day there, a Monday, was the one day of the week that most of the town’s famous museums are closed! Rats. I moved on, and found my way to the Ponte Vecchio, a famous old Florentine bridge (and modern-day shopping center). After a quick walk along the south bank of the river and a few moments to scope out a nearby gluten-free-friendly restaurant, I made my way back towards the hotels and met up with Haruki for dinner. We ended up coming back to the same GF-friendly restaurant I’d just discovered, enjoying some particularly good food and wine, and then calling it a night.

Determined to see the Uffizi, Haruki and I woke up early the next morning and got to the entrance before the museum even opened. We’d heard that the lines were long, and it was no exaggeration. Even after arriving so early, we had to wait 45 minutes to get in. But at least we did it! The Uffizi is certainly a world-class museum, and I particularly enjoyed seeing its most famous piece – and my brother’s favorite work of art – Botticelli’s The Birth of Venus. What a treat! Once we’d taken our time wandering through the whole museum, we had just a couple hours left to eat, grab our bags, and head for Venice. By dinner time, we’d already had a stroll through Venice and found our way to yet another GF-friendly eatery along the canals.

The next day was my birthday, and I felt obligated to make it a fun day. But with my bones feeling wearier than ever, I ultimately treated myself to a couple hours off in the middle of the afternoon. That night Haruki and I met up for dinner, and I opted to break my dairy-free diet with a panna cotta for dessert. It was exceptionally delicious… even Haruki, who’s had the dish many times before, said it was the best he’d ever had. Given that I was already being “bad”, I figured I’d keep going and order some with-dairy gelato – a big bowl with four scoops =). I’d previously been ordering the without-dairy flavors, like strawberry and dark chocolate; this time I went for caramel, mint chip, milk chocolate… sinfully delicious. I paid the price for it that night and the next day, but no regrets. I loved every bite.

As I packed up the next morning, I made a horrible realization. At dinner on our first night in Venice, I’d tried to use my GPS to add another marker to the Where are we now map. I’d set it down on the ground next to the table, so it could finish transmitting, and forgot to pick it up. That morning, before heading back to the train station, I ran back to the restaurant and left a note with my email and phone number underneath their closed door. I haven’t heard back from them, so I’m assuming it’s gone for good.

Bummed, Haruki and I boarded the train for Milan and set off once again. I started to realize that, although it sucked that I’d lost the GPS, it didn’t have to mean the end of the map; I can manually add markers to it if I know the time and location (and I’ve already done this a handful of times before, when the GPS failed to transmit). So now, instead of pulling out the GPS device, I’ll pull out my iPod and write down the exact time and some notes about where I happen to be. Later, once I’ve got an internet connection, I find the latitude/longitude of the place on a map, and add a marker with the right time and location. So far it’s been working pretty well – you can’t tell the difference.

It was time to leave Italy and the GPS behind; after a quick lunch at the Milan train station, we boarded a sleek Swiss train and headed north.

The differences between Italy and Switzerland are… many. And very apparent. From the get-go, our train out of Milan – the one Swiss train in the station – looked noticeably newer and cleaner than its Italian counterparts. And of course it ran exactly on-time… it’s the Swiss, after all. But more drastic than the difference in trains was the difference in landscape. Once we got out of Milan, we started going through northern Italy, which was much more hilly but still very lush and Italian-looking: just a little scuffed, but with character. Then, after our last stop in Italy, the train ducked into a tunnel in the side of a mountain and zipped away. Swiss border control agents came through with dogs to sniff everyone’s stuff (no passport control, though – even though Switzerland is not part of the EU, they are part of the Schengen Area). Fifteen minutes later, we suddenly emerged in Brig: steep snow-covered mountains, alpine trees, clean, smoothly-paved roads, and lots of Volvo station wagons. Not quite as much light or warmth either. After a couple more hours and trains, we rolled up to our new home in Lauterbrunnen, at the base of the Swiss Alps just south of Interlaken.

Lauterbrunnen, and the entire surrounding Jungfrau region, is about as cute as they come. Very, very stereotypically Swiss. I won’t even bother trying to describe it; just do an image search for Lauterbrunnen and you’ll know what I mean. Everything from the landscape to the buildings to the Swiss watch shops… it’s like it came out of a story-book. Lauterbrunnen, and that whole part of Switzerland, is also very German – yet another big contrast from Italy. Forget gluten-free pasta and wine, for the next three days it was a combination of rosti (a potato dish that lies somewhere between a latke and hash browns) and bratwurst. And beer, of course… but no beer for me. Welcome to the land of hearty Germanic mountain food.

I had a somewhat-surprise waiting for me when we checked in at the hostel: a birthday package from my parents! I knew they were sending me something, but I wasn’t sure what. Much to my delight it turned out to be an assortment of gluten-free dairy-free food: cookies, crostini, biscotti, and granola. YUM! Thanks Mom and Dad! I’ve been slowly nibbling away at it all; what’s left is still sitting here with me in Barcelona =).

After a nice big rosti for dinner (topped with a fried egg), we took advantage of the free in-room wifi and went to bed. The next morning, I got to work on a few pieces of business (“its business time”, anyone?): doing my laundry at the local laundromat/café, and mailing a massive 8.25lb package of souvenirs back to California. Unlike the last time I mailed a package home, way back in Bangkok, this process was quick, easy, and expensive. The Swiss postal system is the best in Europe (no surprise), and even their cheapest shipping guaranteed to deliver my package in 2 weeks. Talk about a difference from Thailand, where the cheapest option will hopefully get your package delivered in the next 4 months…

Once I’d taken care of business, Haruki and I took a quick stroll through the Lauterbrunnen Valley and ate lunch. That afternoon we took a cable car up to the town of Grütschalp (way up on one of the cliffs overlooking Lauterbrunnen) and then a little train to the town of Mürren. We walked over to a hill just outside of town, where we had a stunning view of the Alps and the Lauterbrunnen Valley. Amazing! As we passed some cows, clanging their cowbells out in the field, I suddenly had an “omg” moment and burst out laughing. There we were, in this beautiful alpine setting, with these happy healthy cows eating grass. And I realized that just 5 weeks earlier, I’d been looking at starving cows eating garbage, on the arid plains of India in the sweltering heat. In that moment, I suddenly felt like I’d seen so much of the world. What a trip, literally and figuratively!

After my little existential moment, Haruki and I started our hike down the mountain and back to Lauterbrunnen. Two hours later, we’d finished the 2800ft descent and were ready for dinner. I was quickly getting tired of the all-bratwurst-and-potato diet, so I opted for a sausage salad instead… at least this way I got some vegetables…

Once we got ourselves out of bed the next morning, Haruki and I headed for the train station and bought two tickets to the Jungfraujoch: the highest train station in Europe, way up in the Alps. It’s also a notorious tourist trap; my round-trip ticket, even with the Eurail Pass discount, cost a whopping $150US. Yikes!! Switzerland is a very expensive place – so far, at least, it’s done more wallet damage per day than any other country I’ve visited. After gritting our teeth and swiping our credit cards, we headed for the mountains. I’d seen a weather forecast projecting sun at the top of the mountain, but boy was it wrong – two hours later when we got to the top, the only view we had was of blazing-white cloud cover. Aagh! We ate lunch and still at least enjoyed the available tourist attractions, including an Ice Palace and a walk out onto a glacier (where the ferocious freezing-cold winds made me think I might literally blow away). After a few hours we’d done what there was to do, and took the train back down the mountain. We made the most of it, though, and got off at various stops along the way down. At Kleine Sheidegg, a tiny outpost at a saddle-point in the mountains, we took a stroll in a field of wildflowers. And at Wengen, an adorable little tourist town on the cliffs overlooking Lauterbrunnen, we bought some chocolate and just enjoyed the view. We took our time and didn’t get back until dinner, at which point we were ready for a warm meal.

And, just like clockwork, our time in Switzerland had come to a close. It went by too quickly. We got up early the next morning and headed for Interlaken, where we spent an hour doing some last-minute souvenir shopping, and wandering around the town where my parents got engaged (yep – way back in 1983!). From there we took the train to the Geneva Airport, where Haruki and I parted ways after almost two weeks of traveling together. His next stop: Poland, where he started his first day at Google today. My next stop, of course, was Barcelona. I got here yesterday evening, wandered around the area near my hotel (Poble Sec), and had ribs for dinner. And today, as you know, was my wonderful “weekend” =). Aside from a brief outing to get some paella for lunch, I’ve thoroughly enjoyed my lazy time here in the hotel room, nibbling on my birthday present food and writing up this post.

A few last notes:

• I don’t know Italian, but my knowledge of Spanish was occasionally very useful in Italy. At one point I was in a supermarket and tried explaining to someone that I was looking for gluten-free food. When English didn’t work, I tried Spanish – and suddenly we could more or less understand each other. Of course, now that I’m in Spain, my day-to-day interactions are that much easier. Unfortunately, I’ve realized how much vocabulary I’ve forgotten; my more ambitious attempts at conversation have gotten muddled with English.
• Florence itself is more or less an art town, but it also has a much bigger youth presence than anywhere else we visited in Italy. I’m sure this is because so many US colleges send their kids there for study-abroad programs – Stanford included – and as such the bar and club infrastructure is much more substantial.
• Venice, on the other hand, is a complete tourist trap. Everything costs money (even different rooms within St. Mark’s Basilica), and the souvenir shops are endless. To give you an idea, the instructions for how to get to my hotel included “turn right at the Disney store”…
• There were a huge number of Indian and Japanese tourists in Switzerland. I was really surprised! There was even an Indian restaurant at the top of the Jungfraujoch…

Until next time!

-Izaak