cities and towns

once again i'm sitting in the office just before dinner time, with lovely food smells wafting in from the other room. today was our second day off, so peter dropped alex and me off in the nearby town of le ville, where we caught a bus into arezzo. we arrived around noon and headed first for the ruins of what was once a rather large roman amphitheater, and now looks a bit like a soccer field with some rubble on one side vaguely resembling a wall. alex then went into the adjoining archeological museum, but i decided the one in florence was enough for me and instead wandered, found a cute little coffee shop, and read for a while. the hour or so alone was refreshing, and i think made it nicer to meet up again and take on the rest of the city. i'm actually rather proud of how well alex and i have been getting along - our bickering in vienna seems to really be a thing of the past.
yikes! dinner... more tomorrow!

farm livin is the life for me (forget manhattan, just gimme that countryside!)

or something like that... today i kind of felt overwhelmed and tired out, but quickly got a second wind. so the deal with helpx is that you work for 4 hours a day, 5 days a week, but lucie suggested the ingenious idea of "working forward," meaning we work 5 hours a day for 4 days and then get an extra day off. so, we worked on the drainage ditch for 4 days (which we actually became quite proud of, as its glorious rock lining is something of a mosaic) and then spent our day off in florence with dinner in nearby arrezo. someone told alex that if we wanted to spend our time in italy with americans we should head for florence, and we found this to be regretfully true. we figured tourism would have slacked off a bit by this time of year, but the tour groups (the kind where guides hold up a little flag while they walk around and everyone is wearing matching numbered stickers) were rampant. nonetheless, we managed to see all the big sights we were interested in, including the archeological museum, which housed tons of egyptian, greek, etruscan, and roman artifacts, much to alex's delight. i came to florence with elena, julia, and jarvis the summer after senior year of high school, but have to say i hardly remember the place. that trip seems ages ago, with the focus on our tenuous relationships rather than the sights we saw. so going again was nice, and good to do it with alex. after much wandering we headed for the train station which took us back to arrezo, the nearest city to where we are now, where we enjoyed a leisurely meal at a restaurant recommended to us by lucie.
today we returned to work on the land, though not on the ditch. it was cloudy today, really beginning to feel like fall. still beautiful though, and only cool enough to warrant a sweatshirt, with sleeves pushed up while hauling old stones from a broken down wall to a pile in the garage. the kind of work i wouldn't want to do forever, but am somehow happy to be doing now. so much physical labor also renews my respect for my father, who somehow manages to battle through 12 hour days and 6 day work weeks. true work.
well, now it's time to be rewarded for our minimal work with lucie's delicous cooking...

austria pictures!

hooray, finally pictures!
sorry they're not on the blog, but that takes forever... so go here:
http://s530.photobucket.com/albums/dd345/ursulove/way%20back%20when%20in%20austria/

out in the country

im sitting at a big old dell computer with alex looking over my shoulder while holding ginger, one of the absolutely adorable kittens owned by our hosts lucie and peter (they've got nine cats total). we're on our first farm, which is actually just 75 acres of intensely beautiful but run-down land in the heart of tuscany. today we worked for five hours digging and clearing a run-off ditch next to the long and rocky driveway up to the house, lining it with rocks to make it a bit sturdier. today's work resulted in about 15 feet of lined ditch, with perhaps 500 or so to go. but we've got two weeks! we got here yesterday and were picked up by lucie, with two other american helpxers in tow. they're older women from arizona and california, both kind of loud but entertaining - good story tellers. they're leaving tomorrow morning though, so then we've got the run of the place (all the more room for napping and kittie-cuddling, horray!). lucie and peter are a rather laid-back and friendly english couple, who've been having helpers come to get things going around their newly purchased homestead. last night we all packed into their little renault and drove down to the nearby town of monterchi, where there was a polenta festival complete with a terrible italian band playing what were apparently hits here in the '70s. it was kind of entertaining, especially watching all of the locals dance around to the awful pop as though it were traditional music. the idea of a festival dedicated to polenta also greatly amused me, although we actually went for delicious local pizza instead, perhaps to get out of the cold. luckily lucie's cooking is also quite tasty, and refreshingly not consisting solely of pasta, cheese, and bread, which my vegetarian diet has largely consisted of thus far. hopefully in the next few days i'll post more pictures, though for now i'll go help with dinner prep while alex checks his email.

crrrrroatia

so were finally in a place with real internet rather than shitty wireless (updating from alexs iphone is impossible...) but alas no usb port, so i cant put up any pictures at the moment. i also have to use like four buttons to get an apostrophe, so thats out too. right now were in dubrovnik, our last stop on our little croatian tour. im not sure where to start at this point, i feel like its been ages since i last posted, though i guess its really only been a bit over a week. so, here goes...

when we arrived in graz we recognized veronika immediately out of the window of the train, and once we had hauled all of our multitudinous baggage onto the little austrian platform we were greeted with hugs and a warm, australian-accented hello. we spent the next two days in a sort of relaxed stupor, finally getting over jet-lag and the exhaustion-induced bickering that had unfortunately factored largely into our four days in vienna. veronika happily showed us her adorable little city, took us out with her friends, and spent an afternoon with us lazily reading books in the stadtpark. graz is exactly what one might imagine when trying to conjure up an image of a traditional germanic town - clean and tidy, full of beautiful churches and impressive architecture, and packed with happy-seeming people in hip euro clothing who like to eat ice cream but somehow manage to stay fashionably thin. all in all graz was a calm success, though money-wise we were happy to move on to the slightly cheaper land of true eastern europe.

and thus we arrived in croatia. we took a train from graz to zagreb - a surprisingly quick journey that cuts through slovenia and plonks you down in the very metropolitan old town area. from there we took a street car (some of which seem to be from the 1950s, others from the future...) and arrived at our hostel, where we had booked 2 beds in a 6 bed room. only late that night did we realize that we unfortunately did not have the luxury of having the whole room. we immediately headed towards the old city, assuming wed wander and go to some museums. we had noticed a large group of english people on the train, but it was not until we reached the old town that it became clear why this was the case - that particular night there was a soccer game in zagreb between the english and croatian national teams. we were quickly swept up in the fanmania, which consisted mostly of beer drinking and singing, with a lot of croatian vs. english group songs, one group trying to out-sing the other. this was all happening with the continual reminder that if any of the competition went beyond drunken vocal chord capabilities it would be taken care of efficiently, as hundreds of cops in full riot gear wandered the streets looking alert. that night we followed the swarms of people decked out in soccer gear towards the stadium and tried to get tickets, but unfortunately the game was sold out. it was an experience just being there though - what dedication those fans have! we found out the next day that england won 4-1, which left zagreb somber and mostly empty, allowing us to have our day of museums and wandering. aside from the obvious language difficulties, i found the city to be incredibly appealing and open, with a much less pompous, museumesque feeling than vienna.

after leaving zagreb we spent the afternoon at the plitviče lakes, which lived up all of the hype id heard. there are 13 lakes all joined by waterfall, all crystal clear, and all surrounded by intricately built wooden-plank pathways that make you truly feel as though youve just inadvertantly stepped into middle earth. we kept waiting to see the procession of elves cross in the jungly forrest behind one of the lakes.
we decided to head straight to split after a good afternoon of hiking and viewing, which meant another 4 hours on a bus. at one stop the driver yelled something in croatian and turned off the motor, apparently signaling that there would be a bit of a break. after a few minutes we decided to go to the bathroom, since it seemed that we werent leaving anytime soon. i got back on the bus when i was done, and just as i sat down the driver pulled out of the parking lot. without alex. i kind of shouted something unintelligable, since i knew the driver didnt speak english, and luckily the man sitting behind us got the gist and translated, so we came to a screeching halt just as alex meandered out of the bathroom, aloof to all of this. he got back on and we thanked the man behind us, which turned into a rather one-sided 45 minute discussion in thickly accented german about the croatian countryside and its history. i tried to listen as best i could with a craned neck and translate the interesting stuff for alex. the man got off the bus one stop before us and happily gave us his business card. though i enjoyed his company, i dont think ill call him.

split proved rather uneventful, as the main attraction - the roman emporer diocletions palace - has been steadily built upon for about the last 5 centuries, leaving alex close to tears once he saw the terrible damage. it now houses many bars, restaurants, kitsch shops, and apartments. yikes. so we saw what we could and spent the next day at the beach, though it was rather rocky and far away, the water was incredibly clear and beautiful.

from split we took a ferry to the island of korčula, which was recommended to us by a woman at our hostel in zagreb. when we went to buy the tickets, however, we were confronted with the fact that there are multiple towns on this island, so we just picked the one with the earliest ferry departure. so we were off to vela luka! we got there just as it was getting dark, and just as it was starting to rain. hard. we took respite in a little cafe with a big awning, and since we didnt have any hostel reserved here we asked the bartender about reasonable hotels. reasonable? hmm, that one with the green cuppola, he says. we look across the bay to a nice looking place, but so far away. considering that the only other option wed come across was a man who kind of chased us down and said in broken english that hed cook for us, we took the chance and started the trek. the bay went in even further than wed thought, so about 35 minutes later we arrived at the hotel, soaking wet, tired, and wanting a room. but they were full. and the next hotel was 2 km back around the bay and up the hill away from the water. so, we started walking back when an old lady poked her head out of a house with a bed sign on the gate, and we were welcomed into her-her daughters-her grandsons house. for roughly $40 a night for the two of us they gave us a lovely room with a big bed (under a big painting of the virgin mary...) homemade wine, local figs, and entertaining non-conversation consisting of a lot of gesturing and smiles.
the next day the sky cleared, however, and we were able to find a secluded swimming cove where we could jump right from gorgeous white rocks into slightly storm chilled, but sharp clear water, lazily floating away the afternoon. quite nice.

and, at last, we come to dubrovnik. how to get here from vela luka? one bus. one? what time? 5am. so, we were up at 3:45 to begin the journey back around the bay, down to the empty bus station, where we sat anxiously and listened to drunken sailors sing and drink til just about the break of day, when we boarded and headed across the little island, across a little water on a car ferry, and down the rocky coast of croatia. dubrovnik is a fortified town overlooking the sea, and is apparently tourist heaven. so now its time to go lose ourselves amongst the throngs and see what its all about. pictures soon!

this is how it began... with our last meal in the u.s. at a japanese restaurant in sfo, with mr. gimpy doing some face grabbing. right, so alex smashed his hand two nights before we left, and after the swelling continued at a grand rate the day before departure, our last night at home was spent getting two rounds of x-rays (revealing a fractured 5th metacarpal) and a sort of DIY cast thing made by 3M, which has to stay on for about 3 - 4 weeks. which means lovely mummy hand photos and a bit of help getting in and out of his jacket.
we arrived in vienna in the afternoon last thursday after a rather cramped early 90s style flight courtesy of united airlines. once settled in our hostel we retired at 3:30 for what we initially thought would be a pre-dinner nap, but instead turned into a good night's sleep until about oh, maybe 2:45am. luckily alex has a splendid voice for lord of the rings read-alouds, so that got us through to nearly 5am, when we decided it was time to get up, get showered, and get ready for the 7:30 hostel breakfast, a bit of shopping, and an 11am walking tour. our guide was a laid-back portuguese guy who gave us good history and stories, and hit what seemed to be all of the important sites in the older parts of the city. he also brought us to a 350 year old wine cellar, where an adorable old austrian man gave us a brief history of the place and introduced us to "sturm," a seasonal wine that's highly alcoholic for something that tastes rather like juice. quite yummy. yesterday was spent at the MAK, the museum of applied art, which i was really into. it had rooms full of furniture, textiles, and some paintings, mostly modern and contemporary. mostly furniture, really, and lots of art deco. quite nice. we also swung by the hunderwasserhaus, built by this crazy austrian architect who also designed a high school in the town where i lived in germany. his buildings are sort of like the creative musings of a child come to life.





we finished the day by wandering through the egyptian, greek, and roman rooms of the fine arts museum - formerly the private collection of the hapsburgs, and therefore housed in what can be described as nothing less than a palace.

today we got up incredibly early yet again, after having gone to sleep at a rather ridiculously early hour, and headed to the true hapsburg palace - schoenbrunn. there we wandered the impressively large grounds and watched some sort of viennese track meet meander its way all over the area. after getting our fill of palatial exorbitance we took the #6 streetcar all the way across town to the central cemetery, the final resting place of such greats as mozart, beethoven, and strauss.


right now, however, i'm running low on internet time here at the hostel and will upload some more photos and then update further next week from croatia! tomorrow we head down to graz, where we're staying with veronika, our first couchsurf buddy. hope that works out!