The end of our 2006 trip

If there's anyone left reading this blog, we would like to thankyou for travelling with us. We hope it was interesting for you. We had a fantastic time, although perhaps we would not try to fit some much in - we came back absolutely exhausted! Hopefully you understand why we were always behind with uploading our entries.

Everywhere we travelled was absolutely facinating. The two pleasant suprises of the trip were Avignon and Budapest: Avignon was a pleasant break after busy Paris, and the warm Provencal weather was a treat. Budapest was a beautiful city with so much to explore and experience.

We'll have to visit both Paris and Budapest again before two long, but there are also many other parts of Europe, and the rest of the world, that are also beckoning...

We had so much good food while we were away, but one thing we couldn't find was decent Asian foods. It was so nice to treat ourselves with a very good Thai meal back in Australia: We're so lucky to have such a wealth of good restaurants. It's a shame that such fantastic pastries and cakes are so difficult to get here... or perhaps it's good for our waistlines that it is.

The cities compared

Here's a light-hearted take on some of the best and worst things about the cities we visited. Do you think we got it wrong? Comment at let us know!

Paris

Advantages:

• Amazing patisseries on every corner.
• Fantastic shops: Les Salons du Palais Royal, La Maison du Chocolat, Laderée...
• Great metro system with lots of character.
• The Musée d'Orsay.
• The stunning Sainte Chappelle.

Disadvantages:

• Lots of long lines to get into any tourist attraction.
• Indifferent shop assistants.
• Châtelet - Les Halles RER station at night.
• As historic and grand as it is, the palace at Versailles was a little disappointing: Huge crowds and grand but mostly empty rooms.

Avignon

Advantages:

• Relaxed Provençal atmosphere.
• Everything is in walking distance.
• Narrow winding alleyways in the shadow of the Palais des Papes.
• The pretty streets of Villeneurve-les-Avignon.

Disadvantages:

• Vegetarian food is hard to find.
• Everything is closed for a couple of hours at lunch.

Venice

Advantages:

• Amazing history.
• Beautiful canals.
• No cars.
• Some fantastic masks and Murano glass, if you look.

Disadvantages:

• Huge crowds between the main tourist spots: San Marco, Rialto and Ferrovia.
• The smell of the canals.
• Everything is overpriced.
• The service in most shops, restaurants and cafes is appauling.

Vienna

Advantages:

• Very efficient public transport, especially the U-Bahn.
• Locals are friendly.
• Schönbrunn Palace is beautiful and very well presented.
• Very clean: The only city in Europe we visited where there weren't awful drain smells!
• The Hundertwasserhaus and Kunsthaus.
• Lots of vegetarian restaurants.

Disadvantages:

• Shops have restrictive opening hours.
• Most of the architecture is dull.

Bratislava

Advantages:

• Nice examples of art nouveau architecture around the city.
• Locals who are thrilled that you take an interest in the history of their city.
• The historic city center is easy to get around by foot.

Disadvantages:

• Most cafes and restaurants are aiming at the 'beer and chips brigade' (i.e., British backpackers).
• Bratislava Castle is virtually a shell.
• Soviet-style archtecture that looks completely out of place.
• Huge communist-era housing estates.

Budapest

Advantages:

• Fantastic fin de siècle architecture everywhere.
• History everywhere - fantastic National Museum.
• Good public transport: Fun contrast between the histroic M1 and the communist-era M2 and M3.
• The thermal baths.
• Everyone we met was amazingly polite and helpful.
• The State Opera.
• Azerbaijani food at Maquis des Salade.
• Less expensive than the rest of Europe.

Disadvantages:

• Problem with air pollution.
• Trying to change the 20000 Forint notes the ATMS give you.

Top Fives

Here, for a bit of fun, are our lists of top five experiences from our trip in Europe.

Top five best restaurants

1. Marquis de Salade, Budapest.
2. Le Petit Chatelet, Paris.
3. Antica Besseta, Venice.
4. Tempus Fugit, Bratislava.
5. La Victoire Suprême du Coeur, Paris.

Top five most frightening moments

1. Climbing Tour Magne, Nîmes.
2. Riding in a taxi with an insane Parisian driver.
3. Using a pedestrian crossing across the Boulevard de l'Oulle, Avignon.
4. Walking around the arena, Nîmes.
5. The speeding 'escalators-of-death' on the Budapest Metro.

Top five best art galleries

1. Musée d'Orsay, Paris.
2. Kunsthaus, Vienna.
3. The Louvre, Paris.
4. Ca' Pesaro, Venice.
5. Secession Building, Vienna.

Top five strangest museums

1. Esperanto Museum, Vienna.
2. Statue Park, Budapest.
3. Clock Museum, Vienna.
4. Old Town Hall, Bratislava.
5. Lace Museum, Burano, Venice.

Top five churches

1. Sainte Chappelle, Paris.
2. Santa Maria dei Miracoli, Venice.
3. La Madeleine, Paris.
4. Basilica San Marco, Venice.
5. Stephansdom, Vienna.

Top five Art Nouveau spots.

1. Exhibition at the Musée d'Orsay, Paris.
2. Gustav Klimt's Beethoven Frieze, Secession Building, Vienna.
3. The thermal baths at the Gellért Hotel, Budapest.
4. Kaiser Pavillion, Vienna.
5. Andrássy út, Budapest.

Top five best shops

1. La Maison du Chocolat, Paris (chocolate).
2. Les Salons du Palais Royal, Paris (perfume).
3. Ca' Macana, Venice (papier-mâché masks).
4. Shakespeare & Co., Paris (bookshop).
5. Barovier e Toso, Murano (modern glass).