Ok, well, we’ve been back a while – myself (Ben) since early December and Will since the middle of December. We parted ways in mid-November in Paris as Will wanted to head to Spain to do a voluntary project near Barcelona and I wanted to spend some time in Paris with my girlfriend studying French. Since then we’ve both had a fun time living apart for the first time since August with other people, but now after some time to rest and recuperate we’re both occasionally missing van life!

We (I) have been a bit lazy in finishing off this blog (it was supposed to be my job!), but I feel it’s a bit late now to describe the end of the trip in detail after our last post. After Berlin we basically meandered along the North coast of Germany to Amsterdam, then took in Belgium, Luxembourg and some Champagne before returning to Paris. A bit of time in one place with a focus (french for me, making stuff out of trash for Will) was really welcome as we both felt we had sucumbed to “travelitis” by the last week or so. There are only so many sites, beautiful places and interesting people you can take in in one go. Fact!

We have now had a Christmas to reflect and remember and still seem to be talking; it must have been good! In the New Year we hope to get together for a party (any excuse) and perhaps put up a slideshow (non compulsory viewing:) for anyone who’s interested. There, its on the blog, we’ve got to do it…

We now plan to sell Nevil the van and move on… So VAN FOR SALE!! A Mercedes 308d with excellent paint work is available to anyone who fancies a camper/oddjob van on the cheap – its ready to leave on that road trip right now! England, Scotland, France, the world! I reckon it would be much nicer to go in the summer, but we want to sell it now as we have no further use for it and it’s just taking up space on Will’s parents driveway (Mum pressure). We wouldn’t be selling if we didn’t think it would make it a lot further – it’s got many more miles on it yet! A few hundred quid would be nice for it, make us an offer!!

Use my website to get in touch if you’re interested, all the photos of the van can be found on this blog so I’m not going to say any more other than if you’re thinking of doing a roadtrip sometime in 2008 THIS IS THE VAN FOR YOU!!

Nikolas kindly put us up for our remaining three days in Berlin. He lives in Wedding (a Berlin district, not perpetual nuptials) in an amazing top floor flat that he’s been evolving for almost ten years! Wooden floors, wood burning heaters in every room, and the best selection of spices I’ve seen outside of mum’s nuclear fallout preparation pantry. We quickly discovered where the spices came from as the shop down stairs stocked them in bulk alongside hair extensions and coconut milk. I (will) attempted to create a classic english dish and succeeded in making a suitably bland pumpkin curry.

We could see much more of Berlin when it was actually daylight and made the first proper use of the bicycles that we’ve been carrying around with us. Ben learnt all recorded German and central European history in a large museum whilst I explored Berlin’s corners and entirely rebuilt neighbourhood of consulates. Saudi Arabia wins my vote for the architecture prize, although that’s not counting the Norman Foster dome on the Reichstag which was well worth the queue in the cold for. You can look down through the glass and see the politians making decisions, signifying the transparency of democracy and the openess of the German paliament. Very honourable. The free heavyweight pamphlet/small paperback which describes everything from the material of the seat covers in the debating hall to the percentage of people in parliament with Kenyan grandmothers almost makes you realise why politians don’t tell us everything. ITS BORING.

The extensive queue to the dome introduced us to another Berliner, this time someone under 25 actually living in the West of the city. She took us to a brilliant example of the annoying German habit of taking an idea from somewhere else and making it much, much better. Italian food that you pointed at the ingredients for and watched being cooked. Ben especially liked the swipe card we were each given to bill us for what we were eating, and the flashing, vibrating disc that when brought back to the table magically told him his pizza was ready.

It started raining a couple of days later, so after I’d quickly done the Bauhaus archive we decided to head for the famous German coastline…

On nights spent in the van in the middle of nowhere, when it gets dark at six in the evening, when boardgames become bored games, when even the new games you made become old, when the extensive limits of the ukelele have been reached, we have found ourselves in bed asleep at ever earlier hours. Quarter to eight if its raining… Bearing this in mind, when we arrived at a (bloody) student flat in the trendy area of Berlin at past eleven o’clock being greeted by a flat full of electro, cold beer, cartons of wine and “we’re going out, are you coming?” was exactly what was required.

After being led through an unknown dark city in circles to ensure we definitely couldn’t back out, the second “club” come warehouse came good and we saw the night out to some techno – Mr. Oizo was there and so was some good sound and some inventive german dance moves!

Unfortunately the couch was taken and the flat floor was full so we slept the day in the van before making use of the bathroom facilities and the in house Berlin tour guide. Avril from Ireland is a good tour guide and we did her four hour walking tour in hyperdrive on bikes, I’d swear she was even talking faster, learnt a lot about the buildings and understood some of the reasons for bits of the city! When the second nights entertainment was aimed at surpassing the first nights our plans of seeing all the corners of Berlin in daylight didn’t look likely. Satisfied that we’d confirmed that Berlin is indeed party capital we executed an escape to somewhere with a better toilet to person ratio and a different city quarter.

Took me a little longer this time as we’ve been chilling out on beaches away from big towns more than before so internet cafes are not so plentiful, but here is the link to the next Facebook album of photos from our trip…

http://bristol.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2124536&l=10874&id=193107027

Probably the best thing that’s ever happened occured. We went to Perugia on our way back up North and encountered a Fiat Cinquecento 50th anniversary procession!! Also the best accordian player I’ve ever seen (apologies Maria, but you’ve never played for us ) all witnessed whilst sitting quietly in a sunny piazza chatting to Wiebke, a lucky perugian erasmus student on her first day! There were so many fiats I had to sit down.

We’ve since spent a really nice couple of days with John and Laura on the beach and in Pisa, and 24 hours of luxury on Elba with Yas and her extensive family. I discovered that the nets around the entrance to the swimming area were to stop large jelly fish, John managed to prop the toy-like tower up so no one has to worry. Elba is really beautiful, I’m quite jealous of old Napolean, he had quite a nice gaff. Yas and a few select members of her family snuck us into a flat with seaview belonging to Grandpa, we had to keep it quiet to avoid over stressing Grandma, who at 86 had just been host to the whole family for 60th wedding celebrations! We had a little soiree off the very full “low season” beach and went rock jumping and snorkelling round the corner off the family boat, it was definitely worth the row home when the engine packed in. Thank you all Mowats and Barassi’s!

We’ve now kidnapped Yasmin and are waiting in Firenze for Mr. T Adcock to arrive this evening, there isn’t really much to see or do so we’re doing our washing and sitting in an internet cafe… (I did get up for a cycle and sunrise round the sights of florence, oh and we might do the Gallileo museum if we can find it – had enough of Catholic churches i think, I’m dying for a Mosque!)

Planning on getting out of Italy sharpish now, we’ve conquered the language and so things are far to easy. Just run out of gas,

- “Dove posso prenderi gas per favore?”

- “ddjkfd dlasfdf fkdjj ere ti dkf tkjdkjf”

hmmm, i think she said left…

ps. Fi-Pi-Li is the main road from Fi__ to Pi_ to Li___… descriptive!

Buon giorno di napoli! We had an interesting night a couple of days ago as we approached naples passing many well-dressed young ladies on the way who were providing a seemingly popular local service. Naples is well known for the best pizza in the world, the best buffalo-milk mozzarella and a mafia more industrious than most. It is not the place you want to park a big white british van – it doesnt really blend in. For starters it hasnt got nearly enough scrapes, dents to look napolitan (this may suprise those who have actually seen our van!). Anyway we had been warned not to leave a vehicle in the city at anytime of the day, so for the night we managed to find a beach side car park outside of the city surrounded by heroin-fuelled locals on crime sprees and which required a guard dog, a night watchman and a locked ring fence. When day broke Ben had great fun driving through the city unfortunately receiving no bonus points for hitting any crazy italian motorcyclists. After a hot but interesting visit to pompei we said sad farewells to Lucy and Sam who are heading home soon. Now heading back north beyond rome to meet up with Laura & John near Pisa, Yas in Elba and Tom somewhere as yet undecided!

Rome was amazing, particularly the pantheon. The history of the city was impressive, as was the number of tourists we saw! Quite a shock to hear the dulcet tones of the north london accent after several weeks of hearing mainly italian and french. As well as the tourist sites we couldnt resist that other popular tourist past time, being robbed. Will and Sam were both relieved of their wallets in a busy bus, which, in order to find the police station to report this led to some epic walks around the city thanks to the dubious talents of will and sams map reading! Two days in a hot city hostel away from our lake in bracciano where we left the van was enough though. We headed back after a slightly bemused visit to the st peters basilica, home of everyones favourite religion.

If you’re not on facebook here is a link to ben’s photos from the trip so far (very up to date! – most recent photo taken this afternoon in rome!)

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2119117&l=06aaa&id=193107027

I’m being technological and blogging frm my fon on a cliff top, italy, west coast! Made our way quickly south to find some sunshine-we’ve found it and its hot! Sam’s mate balthazar put us up in the alps and we began our italiano lessons. Posso parlare italiano? No. The van is holding out well, he’s only needed a little headlight adjustment and an oil top up so far… We’ve done the alps, bring on the carpathians! Heading to rome tomorrow for a campsite and shower, and the sistine chapel.

There is a slight disappointment for one of the expected highlights of our trip – there is a blanket of cloud over the alps at 3000m! stayed in Chamonix last night and Ben was really looking forward to showing us the mountains, there are none… Decided to keep going through and took a massive detour for Sam to visit “Beaumont”, his namesake, before testing out Nevil’s pedigree and tackling a 2500m pass to Lugano…