I hate Mondays

After all the exciting Friday evening, still relaxed Saturday, then comes the Sunday. I spend all of sunday dreading Monday. The most I hate about monday is the routine.Get up at 6:30; get the lunch ready ;pack and leave by 7:45; reach office at 8:00; so on and so on. It never changes. It is such a contrast to Saturday when there is no single waking time; wake up whenever, eat whatever; do nothing on the weekly chores "To do" list and do everything else. How comfortable. Extra cheese if someone invites for lunch/dinner. All the gossip, fun and shopping. And the movies into the night, until the next days ticks. On a more serious thought, I probably wouldn't appreciate weekends if it wasn't for the Monday. Five more days until the next one :).

Back home

Reached Albuquerque.

Day 8 - Paris - Eiffel Tower, Arc de Triomphe, Château de Versailles, Seine river cruise

Day 7 Paris - Louvre Museum, Cathédrale Notre Dame

Yet another day. Regardless of how tired we were, how bad our feet hurt, how badly sleep deprived we felt, every day holds a promise of something new, something worthwhile to explore and something to marvel at. I love vacations. Bonjour Paris!!

Day 6 Venice

St.Mark's Basilica

St.Marks Square

Today is our third anniversary and what more special than to celebrate it in Venice.Our day started with a 4.5 hour train journey from Rome to Venice. We arrived at the Santa Lucia station and got in a long queue to check-in our suitcases. Sure cannot drag these along on the narrow streets and bridges of Venice. Then we get into another queue to get tickets to a vaporetto(water-bus). We take line1 which does a 45 min trip down the Grand canal (the main canal of Venice). Venice, once the most wealthiest city of Europe is completely built on water.It was built on the riches of the expanding Roman empire.

Gondolas

As we cruise in our end seats of the vaporetto, we get an awesome view of this water city., where every building touches the water, giving us the impression that they merely float on it.Imagine your door-steps directly dropping down to a canal. After crossing about 16 stops, each of which had at least one historical building on site, we disembark on the stop to St.Mark's Square. By this time, the Grand canal has opened up into a beautiful lagoon. The landscape here is beautiful, with blue waters in the background, marginally decorated by colorful buildings and numerous gondolas, water taxis and water buses studded on it like stars. Anyone with a little artistic mind, will just want to sit down and paint it.

St Marks Square - St Mark's square hosts the St.Marks cathedral, Dodge's palace and the clock tower. Oops I forgot to mention the pigeons, thousands of them. There is a gelato shop here again and since my craving for gelatos has not yet ended, we stop by one and get 2 new flavors. Devouring it all the way, we then play with the pigeons for at least half an hour. Jeevan gets all excited in feeding the pigeons. The pigeons find their loyal home and never leave his shoulder. When we didn't have any more biscuits to feed, we leave the pigeons alone and get a short trip of the St.Mark's Basilica. This is another impressive monument with all its gold marbled ceilings. It has hundreds of thousands of marbles(of the size of a contact lens) paved on a roof top about the size of 2 football fields(courtesy Rick Steves). It was an amazing piece of architecture. With no energy left to climb another monument,we skip the Dodge's palace and the Clock tower. Heard that the clock tower holds the world's first digital clock. It is refreshed every 5 minutes. We then opt to walk all the way back to the train station. This 2.5 hour walk takes through narrow streets of Venice. The streets are lined with all kinds of shops ranging from souvenirs to sweets. I especially liked all the masks from Milan. They come in a wide range of colors and designs.

After reaching the Rialto bridge, we stop at a small open restaurant there and order a pizza and cappuccino. The pizza turned out to be not so good. Rome had the best pizzas.

After loosing our way more than a couple of times, we zip away through the streets and back to the train station. There our overnight train to Paris awaits us. Jeevan makes a final stunt, by disappearing at the last minute to get another gelato. hmm. What is with Italy and gelatos. We ate atleast a dozen in just 2 days. Off the whistle goes, and with that we bid bye to Italy.

Day 5 Rome, Italy

Day 4 - Entering Italy - Pisa

Leaving Swiss from Spiez, we take the overnight train to Florence, Italy. Pisa is just a 1 hour ride from this Florence(Firenze).
We made it a point to include Italy in our itenary. Having come this far, we had to see the pages of history coming to life. We trimmed the list only to include the most famous of all, and the "The Leaning Tower" as we know it, is definetly on the list. '
We then take the local bus to the Cathedral Square in Pisa(Piazza dei Miracoli ). As we walk inside the square, the collection of monuments start to show up one by one. There is the tower, beautifully inclined, just like we have seen in it in numerous of photographs. It was smaller than I had expected, but more beautiful and dimensional than in pictures. The gap between the pillars of the tower are so perfectly proportioned and the pillars just pop right-out.
We then took our customary photos, faking to hold the tower straight. It was so funny, when 1000's of others nearby were trying to do exactly the same :) . After taking a dozen shots, we sat on the cold marble slabs nearby. admiring the pure whiteness of the monuments rising over the lush green lawns.
There is a cathedral, baptistery and a museum included in the square. The visit wouldn't have been complete if we didn’t climb it. So climb did we, all of the 8 stories,300 steep steps until the top. The marble steps inside are so slippery and stamped with ages of time, people climbing up and down.
With the climb down, we bid bye to the "The leaning tower" . For more on why the tower leaned, go to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leaning_Tower_of_Pisa

Day 3 Jungfraujoch

Day 2 Trummelbach falls

the rightly named Cork screw falls -- see from right to left. This is the place where the falls is horizontally below you.. Totally unique

Day 2 - Trummelbach Today was a slow-run day. That means we didn’t plan to do much. Our itenary was, check out of Zurich, go to Trummelbach falls and if time permits, roam Interlaken. I got up a whole 2 hours late(blame the jet lag),so we ended up leaving Zurich at noon. Jeevan got me a Swatch(the paper thin battery types). Happy me, we boarded the train and left for Interlaken. Checked in Krebs Hotel Interlaken and boarded the next train to Lauterbrunnen. Lauterbrunnen shows the other side of Swiss alps, the glacier white snowy side. We totally enjoyed the views from the train and then took a 10 min bus ride to Trummelbach falls. I guess Trummel means 10, this was a zig-zag series of 10 waterfalls. The falls were one of a kind, it is not a vertical one, but flows through a series of obscure, interesting shaped caves and rocks. I loved the sound of gushing water echoing on the rocks. The climate was crisp, naturally freezing cold and the caves were dark and well, cavy all giving a mystic feel to it. I wouldnt dare to compare it to Niagara, but it was a beauty by itself and is definitely worth a visit.
I still have to write about Lucerne and Interlaken.
Tomorrow is a big day - Here I come Jungfraujoch.

Day 1 - Mount Pilatus continued

Writing on the way to Interlaken. Yesterday was one awesome day. We got our first taste of Swiss alps and a feel for Swiss. We had booked the golden round trip to Mount Pilatus from Lucerne. This trip comes with a 90 min ride in a ferry + 30 min ride in a cogwheel railway + return trip 10 min in aerial tram + 20 min personal aerial gondola ride + a 10 min bus ride back to Lucerne. Can you see why that was a "golden" roundtrip ? :) We started from the shores of Lucerne with a ferry ride to Alpnachstad.(More on Lucerne in the next post). The slow moving ferry staged a series of alps, one more beautiful than the other. I lost my count of "wow"s somwhere after the 20th alps. These alps without snow, look more like miles and miles of golf courses with thick patch of forests in between. They look so lush, so green with no hint of industrialization. The house are stacked from shore down(remember I am in a ferry now) and extend till the peaks. I probably shouldn't have said stacked, the houses were minimal and scattered. Some houses on the shore had a two boat garage much like our car garages and all the houses had colorful flowers in the front yard, making it a really scenic beauty. Once the ferry ride is over, we hopped on to the Cogwheel railway. This had a 45% gradient and snaked till the top. As we move, a cloud of mist surrounds us. It travels with us to the peak and never leaves us all day. Mount Pilatus, once on the top is just like any other hill station. You get an awesome 360 degree view, all the Swiss pastures and all the Swiss cattle. We did a couple of hikes, Jeevan dragging me through the last two. Back on the tram again. Being in Albuquerque(home of the Sandia tram), the tram really didn’t excite me much and then we took the personal aerial gondola, and back to Lucerne. I had fish and chips for lunch at the summit. Was alright. Nothing to die for. Mt Pilatus is one spectacular day trip when you are in Swiss. I enjoyed the journey to reach the top, rather than the mount itself. We ended the day with a Swiss truffle cream and whole big bar of Swiss choc. Chockie bye for now.

Day 1 - more photos from Mt Pilatus

Day 1 -Mt Pilatus - Golden round trip

I am exhausted with

-- all the beauty that switzerland has to offer

--counting all the mist covered alps

--taking infinite number of photos ..even my camera was dead by end of the day

--all the action packed adventure Mt Pilatus had in store

--finally the jet lag

Will update more later today when I am on the train to Trummelbach falls.

Adding some photos for now.

Transit through LHR

photo 1 :view from my flight window - LHR ; photo 2: Radisson Blu, Zurich

London continued...

Had a good lunch at Giraffe cafe. I liked my falaffel deluxe burger. But the french fries and onion rings were the ones that hit the spot.. They had a sauce which was just like our "kara chutney". The waiter didn't know what ranch was. Gave him a quick explanation and rushed to our gates.



On the flight to Zurich..

I just witnessed something spectacular. We must be atleast 25,000 feet high and I was admirring all the heavenly clouds. Up pops a rainbow lying on the clouds. I swear I saw a 3/4 rainbow and not the usual semi-circle ones that we see. Jeevan tells me it is just a reflection of sorts. I really don't understand.. Year of poor physics reflects :)

Watching clouds below you with the moon travelling with you and not having to look up to it is such a magical thing. ohh. and when the setting sun starts its multi color light show on the clouds, words fall short.

Safely reached Zurich at around 9:30 pm. Best immigration procedues ever, we just walked through with a small stamp. The airport is small and we walk straight into our Radisson Blu hotel which is inside the airport. I am impressed. Its all modern and magnificient. Got to our room and plugged in the US-Europe convertor plugs into the sockets. tut...... the line trips. All the power except for the lights is out. No charging of our mobiles, camera or netbook. Here we wait, for some electrician to turn up.

Starting the vacation

photo - interesting looking shops at Dallas Fort worth

Starting the vacation Sep 3 - I am starting this journal as we finally depart from Dallas to London. The plane is jittery and my writing is getting worse with every word. This was the worst departure I ever had. This AA flight should be at least 15 years old. It shows all of its age. No seat back entertainment for a 10 hour flight. Guess we have to spend all of it sleeping. What was supposed be a 10 hour flight started with a 4 hour delay. We were stranded in the run way, trapped inside our little economy cabin for 4 hours. First it was maintenance issues with a panel for 3 hours and then a weather delay for one hour. Even more annoying was the captain who announced every 10min that we were ready for departure. We almost started and backed out 3 time. One good thing about the delay was that we got to know some of our fellow passengers. We chatted up with this old lady who had traveled to dozens of countries in all the continents except for Australia. She is now taking a cruise from Stockholm covering 8 countries in 26 days. I am thinking.. ."One day............." hmm.


Update from London Heathrow: Missed our flight to Zurich, as expected.Thankfully we were re booked with another flight after 3 hours. Will have to hunt for food in Terminal 5. Was hoping to meet my cousin Karthick, but we couldn’t come out of the terminal and he couldn't get inside, though he was just 10 min away :(