25th June, Paris, France.

We started the day by walking down Rue de la Huchette, and down Petit Pont to the Cathedral of Notre Dame - we went into have a look around Notre Dame early before the crowds make it impossible to see everything.. and get some photos of the outside of Notre Dame before the crowds became too much, and the likelihood of our camera being stolen while we were taking a photo was decreased (in Mary's opinion!!)




Mary & Clare outside Notre Dame Cathedral (Photo: Celine).

Celine suddenly spots something gold on the ground.. what is it?




A lost euro? someone's necklace? a ufo?..........



Ahhhh....! It's the centre point of Paris - every measurement is taken from here, as Notre Dame Cathedral is considered the 'heart' of Paris. We pose for a 'Circus Maximus' style shot. (If you don't know what this is.. keep waiting for our Rome blogs) :D




Part of the detail above the main door at Notre Dame Cathedral. They have stone sculptures of many saints all over the cathedral. The detail is amazing! :)




Above the door...... so much detail you can't even begin to comprehend it...

Ciao Ciao we are leaving Roma...

Ciao Ciao to everyone from the gelato capital of the world - today we had

a choice of 100 different gelato flavours - and we got to choose 3 different sorts to be put into a plastic cup.

Clare chose: Limone gelato x 1, meringue gelato x 2 Clare liked both equally.

Celine chose: Peach and orange gelato x 1, cream and strawberry gelato x 1, and fruit di bosch, which had almonds in it as well. Celine liked the peach and orange gelato best.

I chose: Watermelon gelato x 1, Banana and chocolate gelato x 1, and coconut gelato x 1. I LOVED all the gelato, but if I had to pick only 1, the watermelon was so gorgeous.

So many people eat gelato here - businessmen and women, priests and nuns, schoolkids, policemen, tourists - especially in the area of Centro Historico and then Pantheon you are very out of place if you aren't licking a gelato.

Today after we had taken a quick metro ride to Termini station we brought tickets to Assisi, where we are going tomorrow. That was so easy as there are automatic ticket machines, so Clare decided to purchase our tickets for 3 days time when we go to Lucca as well.

After getting the tickets we wandered around Termini station looking at all the gorgeous bag shops they have here in Italy. Celine brought a cream-coloured bag which is covered in flowers. very pretty. I brought a HUGE bag which will be big enough for all my Uni books and laptop for when I start at Curtin Uni in July. It's black with flowers/braiding and very pretty and unlike ANYTHING I would find in Australia, so I'm happy with that.

For lunch we had decided to take the 117 bus to Piazza di Popolo, and wander around the gardens of the Villa Borghese, and have a picnic lunch there. We got flat bread pizzas with a home-style tomato sauce spread on it - very healthy as it was just bread spread with tomato! and very yummy. and then we had bananas and tropical juice.

Clare & I in the Villa gardens.

This afternoon as well as eating the icecream, we just wandered the streets of Centro Historico - a really lovely area of Rome - we went inside the Pantheon and dicovered that it is in fact a Basilica!!!!!! wow, we never, ever knew that!

Clare and Celine sitting near the fountain opposite the Pantheon.

And then we took the leisurely walk home through the streets of Rome at about 5.30pm past some beautiful monuments...

Interesting shop windows..

Ancient ruins..

the Colesseum..

Well there it is - 7 days in Rome! I had hoped to be able to write more on this blog about each day in Rome, but was simply either too exhuasted or wanting to spend time in Rome! Looking back on the experience, It was great considering when we first arrived here at about 2pm West Australian time we were confronted with a stuffed trains (I kid you not we nearly saw a guy lose his nose because he couldn't be squished any further into a train before its doors closed!), and had been without a hotel since 12pm the previous day, were sleepy because we didn't sleep much on the plane from Hong Kong, and dehydrated because we couldn't find safe water to drink in Hong Kong!

Some of the unique things about Rome was the maniacal traffic, the way people look to see if traffic is coming, and even if it is, cross the road, the way traffic signals mean nothing, the way that bussses just make it through tiny cobblestone alleyways, the way that Italian restaurants here play cheesy English music, when I've been told by a (reliable source , my sister! ;) ) that back home they play Italian music.. the beautifully dressed people, the icecream-eating priests, the crazy tourist groups..

I would say what I'll miss most will be St. Peter's Square and the Basilica, Our beautiful walk past the Colessuem and the strolling around the Palantine, and eating icecreams in front of the Pantheon....

Arrivederci Roma.. Assisi and Lucca here we come!

- Mary

Food in Rome

Hi everyone, I've been way too tired to write up any blog posts for the last few days (sorry!) so I thought I would post up what we've been eating - enjoy! We are really missing our homemade pasta and curries though! I want pasta!!!! please send me some!!!!!!! and how is this - we have never ordered food from any English speaking places!


Chinese sweets purchased in Hong Kong - these came in useful to eat when we were starving over the past few days while waiting in lines in Rome!



Our 'famous' dog noodles in Hong Kong (Mummy said they probably used dog!!) too bad we loved them.. the Chinese lady running the restaurant who couldn't even speak English gave us free cool drinks AND looked after us so well.. all for under $10 Australian.. we gave her a cute little card with a koala on and wrote 'lovely noodles, thanks! :) ' she loved it so much and kept nodding her head, smiling and waving as we left..

Some type of flat bread with salami while sitting on the side street next to the Panetheon we brought this from a store called 'Despar'( they don't speak English there. )

Pizza at St. Peter's Square - we brought this from a little tiny bakery near the Vatican where they didn't speak any English

Pizza in a park near the Colloseum. We had tomato pizza, potato and rosemary pizza and artichoke pizza. When Clare brought this pizza the old Italian owner had a chat with her, his brother is from Australia and he wondered where in Australia we were from - he had travelled to Sydney, Melbourne and Hobart. He also asked how the weather was back in Aus! :D

Tomatoes, Cheese, Lettuce and bread for dinner in our room, brought from the local shop.

Italian style breakfast - cappachino with a pastry! (they make lovely, lovely tasting coffee here! I usually have coffee with 2 sugars at home and here can drink it with none!) I manage to pick chocolate-filled breakfast every morning! :S but we are walking soooo much that I don't think breakfast is hurting us! We all can't wait for Lucca when we have a kitchen though.. not being able to prepare your own food is bad.

Lunch today - we brought a salad pack of carrot, purple cabbage, lettuce and something else green, and had it with fresh bread rolls and a huge container of fresh strawberries.

- Mary

Hong Kong posts

Hi everyone, I've just posted 2 new posts from the start of our travels below!

- Mary

Are you Cassie?

After we had got through arrivals at the Hong Kong airport, we were in the main concourse. As we walked through suddenly a tall Chinese man asked me "Are you Cassie?" I thought - what is this place? first I'm French and now I'm called Cassie! I replied "No, I'm not Cassie" Clare then informed me that they were infact taxi drivers and were asking "Do you want a taxi?"!!! .. another typical 'Mary moment' for me! :P

After searching for about 10 minutes we found an ATM and withdrew HK$500 each. Clare found the Park Lane Shuttle bus and we took the 1 hour drive into Hong Kong and Causeway Bay.

Our first glimpses of Hong Kong from the air as we were landing were very exciting - it was just so huge, so glittery, and just so foreign. It felt like watching a huge Christmas light show.

As we drove thought Lantau Island over the 2.2km suspension bridge and onto Kowloon, then Hong Kong Island, my first observation was that they live in high rise buildings - in one small space I counted 26 buildings all of 25 stories high! :O and you could see into the buildings with their twinkling lights and observe people eating dinner or hanging their washing from opened windows. Other very 'new' things were

People live in these!!

• Square shaped cars, instead of the curvy shaped cars we have in Australia



• Lights everywhere! even in the middle of the night everything seems like daytime



• Mickey Mouse displays of soft toys and figurines in the back of car windows



• High rise schools!



• People playing soccer in tiny outdoor spaces at 10pm at night!



• Seemingly thousands of people wandering the streets at 11pm on a Sunday night!!



• Heaps of old, crumbly buildings and street markets.

- Mary

Bongiorno from Citta Del Vaticano, Basilica Di San Pietro

Today I woke up at 4.45am, all ready for our day at the Vatican. Many emails later to family, friends and Vodafone (I was trying to get my phone to work in Rome!) We headed off for our first full day in Italy. Our breakfast which comes free with our rome in Arena House, is served at a Bar on Via Celimontana.. it is cappachino and pastry! The cappachino was simply lovely - I really loved it. I chose a flat-shaped pasty, which tasted of orange, and had little bits of chocolate in it, and it was covered in a glace icing. Clare had a donut, and Celine a custard filled flat pasty with icing sugar sprinkled on top. After that not so filling breakfast (remember, we didn't have any dinner the night before!) we came back to our room quickly and ate some bread - the bread in Rome is nice and sweet! yummy :)

We decided that we wern't going to walk to the Vatican, so we brought a 1£ ticket for the bus - now you all probably know that the roads and traffic in Rome are crazy - well I think it is acutally more dangerous to be a pedestrain - crossing roads is like playing a game of 'chicken' with cars.. it is terrifying. So we caught our first bus in Rome. It is so rough going along the cobblestone street! these buses must have great suspension. I didn't look at the road, instead focusing on the gigantic architechtual masterpieces all along the streets.

Within about 20 minutes we arrived at Piazza Risorginento, and a short walk later were in Piazza Di San Pietro - St. Peter's Square. We noticed that every one in the crowd had an orange ticket, so after a little bit of searching we found a Swiss Guard and Clare got 3 tickets - we couldn't believe it - we were going to see Pope Benedict!! I was so excited I skipped all the way into the square.

Clare & Celine in St. Peter's Square

We got a seat in the square about 7 rows back from the front. It was 8.30am and we had to wait for the Pope to arrive at 10.30am. We were sitting next to an Indian family of 4 who were also very excited about seeing the Pope.

I'm so excited! I can't wait to see Il Papa..!

It was pretty hot in the sun waiting, but luckily I had packed my umbrella incase it rained - it was the perfect sun shade. We had a parish from Germany sitting in front of us and they were practicing a song that ended in 'Halleluzjah' (German pronunciation!) to sing for Pope Benedict. They were enthusiastic and managed to get the Indian family and an Italian group sitting 2 rows in front of us to all join in too! A big group of sailors from the American Navy were also in attendance, and the crowd enthusiastically cheered them.

We were all wearing pretty dresses and skirts today - and so many fellow tourists thought we were Italians - saying 'Grazie' and 'Prego' to us :) ! Even Italians think we are Italian! :)

At 10.40am we got our first glimpse of Pope Benedict! it was pretty exciting. They then proceeded to have a reading in Italian, English, German, French and Polish (it took a while) and then the Pope gave a 20 or so minute speech in Italian. After that they announced all the different groups to the Pope and he gave the crowd his blessings. At about 12pm it all ended and we proceeded to try and find some water! we were so exhausted.... but we had to some how make our way through a crushing crowd - for the first time in my life I felt like I was going to be trampled! The secret to getting out quicker was to follow someone from the American Navy, as people seemed to let them through!

Clare filling our drinks at a Roman fountain.

We found some water at an Italian fountain - (watch out the splash!) and then wandered around the streets trying to find something to eat! We bravely resisted all the tourist-y restaurants and found a lovely little Italian bakery/supermarket which sold slabs of fresh Pizza. The man behind the desk was very friendly - but all in Italian! between us and him we managed to buy 4 large slices of pizza for £5.50.

Our first ever proper Italian pizza.. sitting on a column in St. Peter's

We wandered back to St. Peters to eat our pizza - we sat on the base of the columns and watched the kilometers-long line of people trying to get into the Basilica... The pizza was very plain and covered with fresh tomatoes and a little bit of mozarella.. but it tasted divine! It was almost surreal gazing into St Peters and watching everything happen - Rome has just been like a dream so far!

After lunch we decided we had enough energy to brave the lines to enter the Basilica. We managed to get in after just 15 minutes. The Basilica was awe-inspiring. Words can't even begin to describe how overwhelmed and amazed were were.. even the pictures or videos you see just don't do it justice. When we first entered we just stood quietly by the side of a column and stared for a good 5 minutes. We looked around the Basilica for around 1 1/2 hours.. and even then we still couldn't really digest what we had seen. Thousands upon thousands of awesome monuments to Popes, Saints, and beautiful paintings.. I think this is one of the most amazing places that anyone could ever see.. We prayed in the beautiful divine mercy chapel and then kept on looking around the Basilica

In the Basilica. In my opinion the most amazing place in the entire world - I don't think I'll ever see anything that can top this.

We were feeling very tired after that but checked out the Basilica's bookstore. I found some lovely postcards of the Vatican and Rome, and a present for Guy. Then I wrote out some postcards and sent them from the Vatican, while Clare & Celine went looking for some food or drink - they wandered around and decided not to get anything. Now we were all feeling faint and really wanted to collapse and go home - but we had a look at a shop called 'Rosari' and found a few things.. (Mummy, Daddy, Pete and Guy.. we'll show you what we got when we get home! you guys have to wait ;) ) We then brought some more tickets for the bus home.... 20 minutes later we were back at Via Claudia and about a 500m walk home.. EXCEPT.. we wanted to find an ATM!! we thought there would be one near where we lived so walked up 4 streets - no ATM! so then we walked back to the Metro near the Colleseum (about 2km) and there wasn't one there either! so we were hobbling along slowly by now utterly exhuasted and decided to go straight home.. luckily we did find that we are quite near a supermarket so we are going to go there tomorrow morning to get some food (Note to home: WE HAVE BEEN STARVING!! why don't people give us the advice 'remember to eat and drink' instead of 'remember to be safe!' )

We then collapsed at home at 6.30pm.. phew what a day! 11 1/2 hours around Rome! We are now relaxing drinking some coffee and eating a sponge finger - deciding what (and if) we are going to have dinner tonight.. we all feel so tired and don't want to find anywhere, but then again maybe we'll feel better if we eat something! :)

Ciao Ciao from Roma..

- Mary

Off to Hong Kong!

Waiting for our flight.


Flight CX170 Perth to Hong Kong departed Perth International Airport at 12.29pm Sunday. When we first arrived at the airport we didn't even know how to check in! we eventually worked our that we were early! After the Cathay Pacific check in counter opened and we got through, we met up with Mummy, Daddy, Guy, Gran & Pop. Pop joked to me asking me if I had got lost yet! (I am famous for it! :P) Mummy replied that so far, pretty good - I had only got lost finding the check in and the toilets!





We all headed off to the Dome coffee shop to have a drink and say goodbye. I chose a latte.





Guy got Clare to take him up and down the escalators a few times, even though he hated going up them with Daddy, he loved doing it with Clare! :)





At nearly 11am we said goodbye to Gran & Pop and then Mummy, Daddy and Guy - Guy gave us huge hugs and kisses.. then we were off! First we waited in line at customs where they checked our passports, and then we went through security. I was pulled aside by the Indian security guide for an explosives check - I had to hold my arms out and be scanned He was nice and chatted with me and wished me a nice trip. Finally after all that we had made it to the depature lounge. We walked up and down the small area for the next hour, and I spotted the Cathay Pacific flight attendants trying the perfumes on from one of the duty free stores.





12pm and we are on board our flight! We will be served lunch but not dinner on this flight - maybe we'll find dinner after we reach Hong Kong. Our flight is fairly empty - and Clare sits across the aisle from Celine and I. To entertain myself I decide to listen to the Hindi radio station. On this flight we are provided with some a pillow, blanket, toothbrush and socks - the socks are really NICE :)





There is a gorgeous Chinese girl of about 2 sitting in front of me, she likes peeking through the seat and smiling at me, and then jumping up and looking over the top of her seat.





For lunch I had rice with vegetables and for dessert there was rice pudding, which was so smooth and creamy - I absolutely love it and could eat this all day! When flying over Borneo we hit some turbulence and have to all sit still. Now it's 5.32pm and we are flying over the South China Sea.