Our travels in France, Italy, and Spain

Dan and I decided to take a trip through the south of France while we were both homeless in Huskvarna. We dropped our bags off at the school, and flew to Milan on the 12th of July. Here are some of the highlights!

Milan, Italy

Our first stop just outside of Milan, aside from the car rental shop, was a lovely small town restaurant. Our first experience dining in Italy was just about as wonderful as it could be. Our hosts were so excited (we think by the fact that they had English speaking visitors, which clearly wasn't very common) that although they couldn't understand a word of what we tried to communicate in English, they gave us an extremely warm welcome. I used a tiny bit of my Italian knowledge that I had learned from waitressing in Italian restaurants to order a glass of red wine and a pizza. Our waiter began by bringing us two glasses of champagne, “gratis” and followed by a wonderful meal. When we inquired about dessert, we had an amazing gelato dish, and two shots (again complimentary) of a liquor ice cream mix. They were gracious enough to let us use a cell phone to call our hostel in Turin, and basically showed us every ounce of kindness they possibly could have.

Turin - our first real destination

We arrived in Turin around 10 pm that evening, which seemed quite unbelievable considering we had been enjoying a leisurely breakfast in Stockholm just that morning. The hostel must have been a convent in the past, as there were gorgeous marble staircases, and the building just had that kind of feel. It was a great way to start our trip, and we woke up relaxed and ready to explore Turin the next day. A gorgeous place, nestled in the mountains, and much cooler than we were going to experience for the rest of our trip, didn’t seem like much of a tourist destination during the season that we were there. The river flowing through the city was absolutely lovely, and the natural landscape offered quite a bit more than any shops or cafes that we stopped in. In my ‘all girls’ dorm in the hostel in Turin, there were two German sisters who were University students enjoying the summer to travel through France and Italy. They suggested we change our final planned destination, Genova, and instead begin our trip in Cinque Terra. Following their advice, we decided to completely change our plans, and head straight for Cinque Terra to see what all their excitement was about.

Stockholm view from the little red boat

During our stay in Stockholm, we slept at a hostel called "the little red boat." We must have arrived in Stockholm during a heat wave, because although for the rest of our trip we were in Italy and France, I don't think any nights were quite as hot and unbearable than Stockholm! These photos were taken from the deck of our 'red boat' as we tried to get some air outside of our 'cabins.' Stockholm was a great place to be... All of the shops and restaurant were unique in their own way. We really didn't have a sense of how many islands made up Stockholm, and how surrounded by water we would be.

Huskvarna and our travels

We arrived in Huskvarna after spending one full 24 hour day travelling from Frankfurt to Copenhagen. Our stay in Copenhagen was great...it was a good thing we had booked a place to stay in advance there after all of the travelling we had to do with about 170 kilos of luggage between us. Copenhagen was gorgeous. People biked abosolutely everywhere, and somehow many bikes were unlocked and yet they sat on the street... Very strange. The buildings were brightly coloured And the town was filled with beautiful waterways. We had to indulge in some carlsberg, which did manage to taste even better than usual. it was pretty astounding to see how beautiful Danish women are. Fashion is clearly high on the agenda here, and they can pull off some things I couldn't have imagined people wearing, but they do it so well. Getting used to the breakfasts in scandanavia in general has been a bit of a challenge. Eggs everywhere... On salads, on their own, even in fancy entrees at restaurants. Pickles and cucumbers are also a popular treat at breakfast. Mostly we get meat and cheese and pickles. Overall people have really gone out of their way to help us and be friendly.

One of the neatest parts of our trip from Denmark to Sweden was the trip across the bridge between copenhagen and Malmo. For part of the journey you are completely underwater in a tunnel. The Danish and swedish landscape were gorgeous to watch out of the train window. For the most part we saw lush flat farmland, with a nice mix of trees (I was worried it would be rocky with coniferous trees like the Canadian north). During part of our train ride to huskvarna Dan and I had fallen asleep and we woke up to our train having driven on to a ferry. We were quite distraught as we couldn't understand where everyone was going and why it was dark. When we came to and realized what had happened we were on a lovely trip (we think across the north sea?)

we have been so lucky in the way that lierally everyone here known english. At the same time, we can see how hard we will have to work to learn Swedish because of that. On a food note swedes love to help you to pronounce Swedish words and they are incredibly friendly and patient with any questions we ask about their language.

Perhaps the most exciting days so far we spent in Huskvarna seeing the place that is now our new home. It is quite small ... About 15000 people (the same as cobourg!!) but the city centre jonkoping (for those of you who know the same distance from cobourg to grafton ) is about 120 000 people and has a whole lot going on. Huskvarna is a town that is almost 100 years old. The main industry there is building machinery like lawnmowers, chainsaws and sewing machines. There also seem to be enough factories and quite a bit of logging. Huskvarna is in a valley, so some people live on either of the two mountains, and some people live down in the valley. Many of the houses are made from red sides which makes them look very quaint and cute. It has a very rural look to it, but only some people have a very large property, usually a large private plot along the vattern (a salt water lake that formed from a melted glacier). The people are all proud to tell us, especially once they hear we are Canadian, that they host the best hockey team in Sweden.

The other best part has been seeing the school and meeting one of my new colleagues at IES. The building is coming along so well (it is a renovated factory) and the staff member I met has been just wonderful and so welcoming. We are now in Stockholm heading on a trip to Italy France and Spain (more on that later) but are really looking forward to seeing our new pad in huskvarna.