Final Thoughts Europe 2008
Trip Start
Jun 14, 2008
1
13
Trip End
Jul 02, 2008
Lansing, Michigan
Saturday, July 5, 2008
This year's trip was bittersweet for a couple of reasons. I lost my precious dog Sasha while I was gone. She was a wonderful companion for almost 14 years and it will be difficult not to have her around. Sandy also was home and traveling solo has many advantages, but her companionship on the road was missed.
I saw many wonderful sights, met many great people, saw old friends and made new ones. The weather was probably the best I have ever had on a European continent trip. The weather in the Greek Isles is still hard to beat. I had rain one night in Zermatt and other than that the sun shone most of the rest of the trip.
The transportation and hotels went off without many hitches and the food was great as always. I am always amazed at the transportation methods that Europeans have at their disposal and once again ran into many people who laugh at Americans getting upset at $4.00 a gallon of gas. The price in Europe is around $8.50 to $9.00 a gallon, so they have no sympathy for our outcries of the injustice of $4.00 gas. The public transit system throughout Europe is superb and unfortunately in my lifetime the US cannot catch up and establish a system that rivals what Europe has to offer.
I also greatly enjoyed sharing my trip through this blog, with my thoughts, pictures and videos. Sometimes finding wifi for uploading my entries was a challenge, but as time goes on, Europe and the world is becoming very Internet friendly. Traveling with an Asus eeePC sub notebook that weighs less than 2 pounds, is not much bigger than a large paperback book and costs $399 was a joy. If you do any kind of traveling and want to stay connected, you may want to check them out.
I intend to continue with my travel blogging in the future, the next trip is with Charlie back to Switzerland in September for some fall hiking in the Alps. If you would rather not receive e mails for the entries, just let me know and I can take you off the list.
Thanks for hitching a ride as I traveled around my European playground. Hope you enjoyed it, I sure did!!!
Until next trip.
Ned
For those anal types (such as me):
Daily Walking Distance (miles)
6-15 5.55
6-16 4.91
6-17 3.99
6-18 4.01
6-19 2.99
6-20 6.01
6-21 7.23
6-22 6.99
6-23 3.22
6-24 6.60
6-25 6.84
6-26 6.25
6-27 4.78
6-28 6.56
6-29 5.63
6-30 5.25
7-1 6.66
7-2 3.60
Total 97.07
