European Highlights (2013 Trip)

European Highlights: July 26-August 10, 2013

Introduction
For many summers, I had been saying that THIS was the summer I would go to Europe. This summer, I didn’t say that and I went. I had planned on traveling somewhere because I had a window between July 25 and August 11 in which to travel. In early July, I noticed that Contiki, a travel company for eighteen to thirty-five year olds, had a special on a trip in my available window. So I booked it because I wanted a guided tour for my first trip to Europe. It was a sprint through Europe and I saw many “highlights.”

Itinerary
Friday, July 26: Travel day: DSM-ORD and ORD to Heathrow.
Saturday, July 27: See London. Stay in London.
Sunday, July 28: Travel to Paris via the Dover to Calais ferry. See Paris. Stay in Paris
Monday, July 29: See Paris. Stay in Paris.
Tuesday, July 30: See French countryside. Stay near Lyon in a frat house that was purportedly a sixteenth-century chateau.
Wednesday, July 31: See Avignon. Go to the Beach. Stay in Antibes.
Thursday, August 1: See Nice. See Monaco. Stay in Antibes.
Friday, August 2: See Pisa. See Florence. Stay in Florence.
Saturday, August 3: See Florence. See Rome. Stay in Rome.
Sunday, August 4: See Rome. Stay in Rome.
Monday, August 5: See Venice. Stay in Venice.
Tuesday, August 6: See Munich. Stay in Munich.
Wednesday, August 7: See Dachau concentration camp. See Rhine Valley. Stay in small German town.
Thursday, August 8: See small Dutch towns. See Amsterdam. Stay in Amsterdam
Friday, August 9: See Amsterdam. Stay in Amsterdam.
Saturday, August 10: Travel Day. AMS-ORD, ORD-DSM, Drive back to Boji.

Ranking of cities
1. Paris: Some cities have monuments. Paris is a monument. It is a grand city and the square mileage of the city that is covered with eighteenth and nineteenth-century buildings is amazing. I can’t wait to reread David McCullough’s The Greater Journey: Americans in Paris now that I know some of the places he’ll be talking about.
2. Venice: What city will be destroyed first? Venice? New Orleans? Amsterdam? Seoul? Damascus? My money is on Venice. But it’s an amazing city…
3. Rome: You walk down the street and turn the corner and there’s something ancient. Then you turn the corner and there’s a gelato store. And then something ancient. Then some more gelato.
4. Florence: Some historians say that there was not a Renaissance or that its influence was very limited. If they haven’t been to Florence, they need to go. If they have, then they need to go again.
5. Nice: I laid out on the rock beach and swam in the Mediterranean. I liked the rocks much better than sand.
6. Amsterdam: It’s known for the red-light district, at least among young tourists, but I preferred the other areas of the city.
7. Munich: The city is relatively modern since most of it was bombed in WWII. They drink beer by the liter.
8. London: It’s low on the ranking primarily because I arrived there at 10:00 in the morning without much sleep. So I was not able to experience the city fully.
9. Cairo and Athens: I didn’t actually visit Egypt or Greece, but from the amount of Egyptian and Greek statues and artifacts in Paris, London, and even Rome, I wonder how there’s anything left in Egypt or Greece.

Great Experiences (ranked in order)
1. Colosseum and Forum in Rome: There’s a line from Gladiator in which one of the slaves says “I cannot believe men could build such things.” Even today, that line is true.
2. Wine, baguette, and crepes at a French Café: Of all the things I did in Paris, this was the most Parisian thing I did. Though the waitress was surprised I wanted wine instead of coffee at 9:30 in the morning. It was peaceful and I felt very refined and cultured. After reading #3 below, you’ll understand why France and Germany fought three wars between 1870 and 1940 and Germany won them all.
3. German Beer Hall in Munich: In 1929, Georges Clemenceau, the prime minister of France during WWI, wrote his memoir, Grandeur and Misery of Victory, which was then published posthumously. In it, he wrote that” I have sometimes penetrated into the sacred cave of the Germanic cult, which is, as every one knows, the Bierhaus. A great aisle of massive humanity where there accumulate, amid the fumes of tobacco and beer, the popular rumblings of a nationalism upheld by the sonorous brasses blaring to the heavens the supreme voice of Germany, Germany above everything! Men, women, and children…drink in long draughts the celestial hope of vague expectations.” Obviously, he wasn’t impressed. I was. I loved it. It was a lot of Germans sitting at picnic tables drinking massive amounts of beer—just like Remsen.
4. Unnamed small town in Germany: I thoroughly enjoyed the simplicity. We had a wine tasting. Then I walked around town. Then I had some wheat beer (in Germany, you have three choices: beer, dark beer, and wheat beer).
5. British Museum: One of the most brilliantly conceived books I’ve ever read is A History of the World in One Hundred Objects. In it, Neil MacGregor, the director of the museum uses one hundred objects to illuminate a particular aspect and area of world history. I teach about ten of the objects in class so I spent my time race around the museum taking pictures of these objects. I needed three days to see everything. I had an hour.
6. Louvre in Paris: It’s lower ranked because the British Museum had no admission price. I needed three days to see everything. I had three hours. But I did see Napoleon’s Coronation and a lot of people looking at the Mona Lisa.
7. The streets of Nice: They were more like alleys, but it amazed me the number of restaurants and shops there were.
8. Dachau: This was a German concentration camp near Munich. It was rather harrowing to see the crematorium.
9. Swimming in the Mediterranean: We swam in the evening as the sun went down. The air was hot and humid and the water was warm.
10. Wine at a café in Florence: For some reason, the group activity on our evening in Florence was to go to…a karaoke. WTF. So I went to café with a girl from Massachusetts and we drank wine. Much better.
11. Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam: Another museum! But when I go to American cities I have two places I want to see: a baseball game and the major art museum. So obviously, I was going to do that in Europe. Normally, I don’t enjoy Dutch art when I see it in American museums, but there’s a reason for that…the Dutch kept all of the good stuff in the Netherlands!
12. Vatican: Some people in our group saw the Pope make an unannounced appearance. I was still at the Forum.
13. Avignon, France: The Pope (or at least one of the Popes) lived here from 1309-1417. The fortress was much bigger than the cathedral. Obviously, the Italians weren’t happy about him living there.
14. Fountainebleu, France: This is a huge estate that a French king had built for his MISTRESS. It is amazing. It was a brilliant move by the king as women then competed with each other to be his official mistress. Yes, the kings of France had an official mistress. I didn’t get to go to Versailles so I can’t imagine what that’s like. No wonder the French destroyed the monarchy.
15. Tower of London: The Tower of London was the home of the British kings the same time that the Popes were in Avignon. The Popes were clearly more powerful.
16. Tourist Trap #1: Perfumery in Antibes: This is ranked as high as it is because the French woman explaining perfume to us looked exactly the way I would imagine a French woman explaining perfume to us would look. Of course, I didn’t have my camera.
17. Tourist Trap #2: Leather Shop in Florence. This is ranked as high as it is because the Italian woman explaining leather to us looked exactly the way I would imagine an Italian woman explaining leather to us would look. Of course, I didn’t have my camera.
18. Dover to Calais Ferry: This was my biggest surprise. The ferry was huge. It had almost everything—café, restaurant, bar, arcade, gambling, shopping, an observation deck that provided justification for bringing a jacket to Europe.
19. Tourist Trap Meals #1: French Cuisine in Paris: The food was really good, the wine was really good, and the atmosphere was great.
20. The French amusement park: This near our campground in Antibes (French Riveria). It reminded me Arnolds Park except their rides were much more dangerous. And there were pictures of naked women on the rides. Seriously. The French are not uptight.

Mediocre Experiences
21. Heineken Expierence: Just another brewery. Heineken dominates the European beer market. And it’s a really good beer.
22. Leaning Tower of Pisa: During the late Middle Ages and Renaissance, Pisa thrived economically. Then the river it’s on dried up diminishing economic activity. Now it’s a shithole. The Leaning Tower is a very apt metaphor for the city.
23. Trevi Fountain and Spanish Steppes: Like the Leaning Tower of Pisa, I’m not sure what the big deal was.
24. Tourist Trap #3: Stein shop: At least the guy here gave us the straight up sell job, skipping over the demonstration. And yes, he looked exactly the way I would imagine a German guy explaining beer steins to us would look. Fortunately, I didn’t have my camera.
25. Tourist Trap #4: Clog and cheese shop: At least I got to eat a lot of really good cheese.
26. Tourist Trap #5: Munich Bike Ride: At least the tour guides were funny and we ended it at a beer garden.

Sucky Experiences
27. Monte Carlo Casino in Monaco: High class casinos aren’t as interesting as casinos in, say, Emmetsburg. At least the drive from Antibes to Monaco was really cool.
28. Tourist Trap #6: Small Dutch town Bike Ride: I think we rode about a mile and it cost us about three hours of time we could have spent in Amsterdam.
29. Tourist Traps Meals #2: Italian Cuisine in Florence. The food was fine, but not worth whatever we paid for it.
30. Tourist Trap Meals #4: Chinese food in Amsterdam. The food was mediocre. The Chinese in Iowa was much better. And if you’re wondering why we ate Chinese in Amsterdam, it’s because the Dutch dominated Asian trade in the 17th century.
31. Security at the Amsterdam Airport: Let’s just say that Europeans don’t have a 4th amendment.
32. Clubbing: It was a group activity in Paris, Florence, and Amsterdam. I only participated in Paris. I couldn’t hear or see a thing and it gave me a headache. Did I mention I was the oldest person on the tour—tour manager and bus drive included?
33. Eiffel Tower at night: This needs to be experienced with a woman.
34. Sex show in Amsterdam: There are people having sex right in front of you or doing other grotesque things. It was stupid and gross and I wasn’t entertained or turned on. The people having sex didn’t look like they were having fun—they were just doing a job.
35. Contiki Chateau: This was a huge fucking (Sorry, Mom. Sometimes the F-bomb is the only word that will do.) disappointment. Going into the trip, I was most excited to experience wine country. Instead we’re bussed out to the middle of nowhere to the “chateau” which was a big frat house where some people got obnoxiously drunk.

My impression of European culture, society, politics, and economics
There’s a reason the British North American colonies declared and fought a war for independence: SPACE. It seems to me that everyone crams into as small an area as possible, even in small towns. I suspect it’s because there was/is not a lot of land available to the lowest four quintiles of the population.
It’s amazing the living conditions and the price of goods that Europeans will put up, but I suppose it’s all relative. Even though I really missed cold milk and air conditioning, it was a great trip. I can’t wait to go again—only this time I’m planning it on my own.