The Beach.

So the beach. What can I say? A place to spend soaking up the sun, to swim, relax and just have fun. Well Roman beaches are slightly different. Sure there is a lot of sun, swimming, and relaxing. Heck, there's even a lot of fun, but some times, just some times, it can be a right pain in the bottom!

Today's beach experience started off hot. Then it got even hotter. We decided to take the metro line from Piramide all the way to Cristoforo Columbo, thinking that the beach there would be slightly better than the last time. This was not to be the case. 

Italy has this unnaturally annoying habit of making every section of sea-side a private beach. Something we had known before, but did not fully known to what extent. The result had us walking  back in the direction the train had come, maybe 2 or 3 kilometers, before the private beaches gave way to a public beach. Just to clarify, a "private" beach can be attended by anyone willing to pay the entrance fee. And a "public" beach, well just imagine Durban beach on boxing day. Need I say more.

The beach we eventually found, right next to one of the public beaches, ended up costing us €3 (the 600ml Peroni we bought was €3 too). The experience in the end was actually quite pleasant. Lots of brown bodies, warm water, and tiny-winey speedos... The first two being a great deal better than the last. Oh, and we only saw one pair of boobies this time.

Private beaches on the left.

Mat keeping off the hot tar.

What's that? A public beach??

You know when its a public beach when you hear "Biera Aqua!"

Another public beach!

And finally our spot!

"Bombing" Gran Sasso.

Today we decided to go and skate Gran Sasso. Translated it means Great Stone. Well on this fine sunny Summer Saturday afternoon there was none of the snow that usually covers these rocks during the Winter months. All that was to be found were literally a great load of stones. Even the road was stoned. 

After not adventuring to faraway places to skate in some time we headed to this "unknown" location. The only thing we had to go on were some images from Google Earth, showing some amazing turns, but as we know all to well the old Google can be a bit deceiving. 

The hill itself is situated about 160 km outside of Rome. Without access to a car, journeys like this would never be possible, but luckily fellow Roman skater, Andrea, allowed us a lift in his car so all was good.

Top: Image on Google of the mountain.

One of the many tunnels you have to take to get there.

Head up and behind that "hill".

The first hill we skated.

And off we head. Left to Right: Antonio, Me, and Andrea.

Antonio and I at the bottom. My feet were itching my board was vibrating so much.

The second hill had this sexy sign at the top.

And my already Holy shoe became even Holier.

Taking in a cold one at the bottom. Note the ice-pack on Antonio's shoulder...

SEE MORE HERE

Special thanks to Tam and Mat for taking the photos. 

Switzerland das good ja



flower arrangements in Yverdon



highways for you cally

eating buffet at Migros in Yverdon

The reason for the visit to Yverdon, to see my great gran for her 100th year birthday this year!

and shes still going strong and very very sharp, theres no fooling her or paying for your own coffee!

missing one person...

Ben found this rubbish bin unlike no other

enroute to Interlaken

swiss countryside view from a very high cable car near Grindelwald

the parents car behind ours, look at the altitude we are at!

cows and their clanking bells around their necks

swiss explorer

the mist enveloped us in seconds

we nearly lost ben to the mountain

surveying the land 

happy chappies

what a walk

mom and a double Eiger in the reflection

the train station where they said we were going and the hill behind it which we ended up climbing...

we found a deserted svis cabin (Eiger face and Monch the mountain peak on the right in the background)

Mamfred and the crystal lake

a most cool museum type place with hundreds of cameras on the ceiling, flashing and making camera noises at random

conquering the mountain

about halfway up that hill i was talking about, is this ice cold pool with benches in the pool where weary travellers can rest their hot, swollen feet in the frozen pools. the sviss are very considerate and think of everything. each bench is also named according to which mountain peak you will be looking at when you sit on it. while we were here we heard a rumbling which sounded like a helicopter and were lucky enough to see a medium sied avalanche as a part of a glacier fell down the Jungfrau.

The mommy bear in Bern. the town is named after bears and they still keep  live bears there. they have a mommy, and two large cubs in one area and the daddy in the other. the cubs are going to be sent to Czech republic soon, because there are too many bears for the space.

 

Bern

ben was disguised as a frog that day

ooo, aaaaaaaah

this is a statue which is a bit controversial. its a statue of a guy eating children, he has them strapped around his belt and everything. as this is a german part of switzerland and this statue is quite old... the lady next to us told us that he is a jew and it was a kind of beware-the-jew-they're-evil example

and what would svitzerland be wizout zi chocolate?

christmas came early!

id like a slab of that and a slab of this with your edible gold printed logo on the back, thank you very much

lots and lots of cable pollution

i couldnt believe my eyes and neither could all the japanese tourists. this is a... urinal, in the street. thats ben on the right and manfred on the left.

so cute! this was my breakfast from the bakery

bikes are all the rage in switzerland

High on the hill lived a lonely goat.... yodelay, yodelay, yodelow

Susan in the smart. smart cars are relly spacious inside? who would have guessed! i nearly killed us trying to drive on the righthandside when my lefthandside instincts kicked in

Susan at Werners house

you get this picture on chocolate wrappers too

all the rage eco land art and alex. we modified some already existing stone structures

plankton got his top wet

ben skateboarding, minus the skateboard.. it only really works in photos

hangwoman

we found a magic broomstick!!

alex had lots of fun zooming around

watch out potter, here she comes

more than even ben, could handle

there was a yodelling festival on in Interlaken the weekend we were there! so everyone was walking around in this traditional dress. (pretending to take a photo of someone but having alterior motives is such fun)

very precious swiss farmers hay bales  and some monkey

Susan with mom who was clearly having the time of her life on this contraption where you run and move the disk while holding on. it gets faster and faster.

the reason for the visit to the awesome fun place... the human hamster wheel and the hamster, i shall call him... Alex

small horses, wooden horses, broomsticks, real horses, alex tried them all out

they even had a short zip line. this place was the best ever!

we look kind of spare without a third body

this is an insane bobsled thing. i cant believe its legal in switzerland. so many things can go wrong i think someone died on it last year, never the less, we all tried it, mom included at varying speeds controlled by our own brakes while it hurtled along a sheer track down the mountain.

the reason for the crying mother and a satisfied alex is... you will never know

for ben and my last night in Interlaken before flying back to rome we went out for dinner. it was so nice speaking english and even listening to german was refreshing although Manfred did put in a mexican accented italian sentance every now and then to make us feel at home. the are the perfect hosts and we had a lovely, energetic time in switzerland. i didnt see one fat swiss. thats all folks and now its back to italy...