Europe Holga

Photos taken with a Holga TIM half frame camera. Sometimes I forget to take the second shot. Photos taken in Turkey, Italy and Barcelona.

Paris to London

Our arrival into Paris didn’t go quite to plan as huge thunderstorms meant flight delays and cancelled trains. After almost 9 hours of travel we finally made it from Barcelona to our AirBnb apartment in Montmartre. Luckily our host, Kasia, was lovely and gave us some great recommendations of where to find authentic French food nearby. (If you’re looking for a inexpensive and nice room in Paris then definitely check out Kasia’s place)

We spent the following day cycling around the Paris using the public bicycle scheme Vélib (for € 1.70 you can use the bikes all day, which is exceptional value!) We cycled along the River Seine to the Eiffel Tower for lunch (baguettes and cheese) and then up to the Catacoombes (which were unfortunately closed for restoration), the Latin Quarter and Notre Dame.

Paris isn’t cheap and to some extent we blew our budget, however we did find a couple of gems with the help of Kasia’s recommendations. For €12 you can enjoy an amazing two course lunch at Cèpe et Figue (the rabbit terrine with onion jam is ridiculously good!). Baguettes, croissants and pain au chocolat are good options – and of course cheese! Chez Virginie Fromagerie in Montmartre blew my mind.

A quick trip on the Eurostar landed us in London where we were lucky enough to be able to stay in our friend Panini’s bedroom while she was away at a music festival in Germany (thanks Nini!). First impressions of London were grey, cold and more grey. Luckily we had lots of friends to catch up with! A day of sightseeing was followed by a Mexican feast at Wahaca with Jess, a Kiwi who now lives in London.

Early morning pints were had on Saturday at the Walkabout (one of the trashiest bars I’ve been to) with mates Soph, Jay, Nick and James to watch the All Blacks play France. At midday we stumbled out of the bar and made our way to Portabello Markets in Nottinghill for lunch and an afternoon walk at Hyde Park.

A home cooked Sunday lunch by Doug and paddling down an English canal with him and Nick topped off our London experience.

Cinque Terre & the Côte d’Azur

Our final stop in Italy was the Cinque Terre, five tiny towns on the Italian Riviera that are separated by large cliffs. We stayed at the fourth town called Vernazza with our friends Sophie and Jay who had flown in from London for a long weekend. Cinque Terre involved lots of wine, a little exercise, pasta, a thunderstorm and catch ups with old friends.

Despite a slight red wine hangover, we spent our Saturday morning walking the hiking track between Vernazza and Montorosso. For someone who is ridiculously unfit it was quite a challenge but it made the frozen vodka limonatas at the end of the walk all the more rewarding. We spent the rest of the day drinking wine beside the Mediterranean Sea and partying at the local beach bar with Corona margaritas (I’m still don’t understand how a margarita with a Corona stuck in it tastes good but it just does).

Our next destination was Nice in the south of France. Nice is a pretty city with excellent food markets selling an array of fresh produce and of course fromage! We spent a lot of our time relaxing at Villefranche-sur-Mer, a beautiful beach a few stops by train from Nice. We also visited the town of Menton so Ryan could make the pilgrimage to the grave of the founder of rugby, William Webb Ellis.

I stumbled across the store Lou Froumai while on the hunt for the local specialty of mussels cooked in white wine and cream. Lou Froumai is the most beautiful fromagerie I have ever seen, with a big open cabinet of cheese. I chose a small goats cheese to sample that was produced by a farmer who milks his 40 goats by hand to produce small quantities of cheese. Amazing!