We're Back!

Well, we're back from our crazy honeymoon adventure safe and sound!

This picture might look like we're wearing fuzzy robes, just out of the hot stone massage at some seaside spa in Greece, but in reality we are in Macedonia about to enter an Orthodox church and were given these robes by the caretaker to to don before entering. We were quite pleased to do it!

Keep reading to hear about our honeymoon, or check out the wedding pictures on the right to relive the magic.

A big thanks to EVERYONE for being at our wedding to support us and celebrate with us. You all amaze us!

Our Route

Just a reminder about our route - we flew into Greece, hopped a ferry to Albania, took several buses which amounted to 18 hours on the road to get into Macedonia, flew over to Croatia, took a bus into Sarajevo, trained on the longest most horrid train ride ever to Budapest, grabbed an overnight train into Poland and flew out of Krakow back to the U.S. This map should make that all pretty clear. . .

Corfu, Greece

Well, we were kindof using Corfu as a springboard to Albania. But we had a nice dinner in the evening and a quiet, beautiful walk in the morning before our cab whisked us away to the Port to catch our ferry.

I recommend that everyone take a cab ride in Greece. If the g-forces aren't enough to thrill you, you will be amazed by the number of times that Greek drivers feel compelled to stop their vehicles, get out, and yell at each other in the middle of the street.

The ferry office was crammed with Albanians heading home with groceries, laundry detergent and the like. It was a sweltering morning, but finally we all got aboard the noble Santa III (pictured above) and like Team Zissou we took off for open waters.

Saranda, Albania

I'll tell you, one of the weirdest things about Albania is the concrete mushrooms that dot the landscape. It's said that 700,000 of these Smurfish structures were built as bomb-shelters under the communist government of Enver Hoxha. Because they were designed and constructed with enough concrete and rebar to withstand a full-on tank assault, they remain to this day a monument to the strangeness of human beings.

We ventured from out of Saranda to a town called Ksamill. The bus to Ksamill lets you off at an intersection that is marked only by some olive trees and a pile of trash, but as intrepid explorers we found our way to the beautiful blue green sea and had a wonderful swim.

Then it was off to Tirana: it is vast, strange and Soviet, but we're told it's nice if you give it a chance. We only swung through because you have to go there first in order to get a bus to Macedonia. Below you can see our very important collection of bus food, which certainly beat the roasting lamb rotating over open fires at the bus stop and the accompanying lamb soup that is the staple food of the Macedonian diet.

At right is a picture of Lu with a street kid from Tirana who was trying very ambitiously to sell us ball point pens. We wound up paying him the equivalent of about 50 US cents to leave us alone.

Oh, Albania. I absolutely recommend going there to experience it for yourself. The people are exceptional, the landscape is breathtaking. In this country you can experience everything from used shoe markets to trendy internet cafes to cows grazing in a dumpster. I think Albania should erect a sign at their border which says "Hi there! We're Under Construction."

Ohrid, Macedonia

Well, the bus didn't stop in Ohrid, so much as it threw us out at the highway off-ramp to the town at about 11pm. We had to take several cabs and then walk the rest of the way to our hostel in the Old City.
But, the photo on your right was the view from our terrace the next morning, so we were not that sad.

Lake Ohrid is the deepest lake in the Balkans, and one of the oldest in the world - it was reportedly formed 5 million years ago, and has been settled by people for many thousands of years. Ohrid is the spiritual heart of Orthodox Macedonia and is filled with beautiful churches, staffed by men who look as old and sad as the icons housed inside. When we went into the church of the Evangelist below, the caretaker made sure before we left to share with us a shot of his homemade Rakija from a plastic pop bottle under his desk. Rakija is a plum brandy that everyone distills themselves and is certainly the official drink of Macedonia.


We voted Macedonia our favorite country in Eastern Europe, for the sweeping landscape, the amazing architecture, the variety of vegetarian cuisine (see photo below) and of course for the kindness and generosity of the folks we met. The lady on the right was the shopkeeper at the market near our hostel, where we would go every morning to buy eggs, cheese, fresh rolls, tomatoes and juice and every evening to buy a bottle of wine. She kindly obliged us in exchanging our large Euro bills into many, many Macedonian bills.



Pavel, the man to the left, was our host. One day he insisted we spend the day with his family and friends at his make-shift lean-to at the other end of the lake. You can see him cooking us an inspiring vegetarian mushroom stew and roasted peppers at his outdoor "kitchen". We swam, ate, and drank "Niagara Wine" with his friends--they found much enjoyment standing on the table to pour sparkling water into our wine glasses from great heights.

Dubrovnik, Croatia

Dubrovnik is a city where you don't really have to try to take good photographs. Almost every shot seems to produce National Geographic caliber results (not an endorsement of National Geographic). We stayed a 20 minute walk away from the old city, with a lovely woman named Mladenka who offered us a glorious array of pretzels and cookies when we arrived. She was also brewing many fine rakijas on her porch which we declined to sample, preferring to keep our wits about us at least for the afternoon.

Inside the city, we ate pizza and drank beer at outside tables lined up along the shining white stone streets. We took a stroll around the magnificent city walls in the evening (after the throngs of people and the sun both relented considerably) which turned out to be the best time for seeing the city's amazing colors - white stone and red tiled roofs. At one point, a huge, old wooden pirate ship came sailing out across the sea. At dusk, Dubrovnik's proud legions of stray cats began to appear, ducking in and out of shadows and crevices, leaping from walls.

Dubrovnik was mysteriously shelled during the war here, which no one understands given the city's general strategic irrelevance. Perhaps it was part of the effort that warring countries sometimes make to demoralize people by wrecking each other's cultural institutions. If you look at the roofs, you can see how local craftspeople have restored them with newer red tiles .

We left Dubrovnik on a bus that hugged the coastline for a while before heading inland across the hills for Bosnia. . .

Sarajevo, Bosnia & Hercegovina

Training into the heart of Bosnia, we followed a river valley through the mountains. As we passed through towns nestled along hillsides, the faces of the simple cottages were still riddled with bullet holes, reminding us of the recent, dark history of war here.

Arriving in Sarajevo, we made our way to our hostel, which was run by a lady called Umra. As we exchanged our shoes for slippers at the door, she embraced Peter and kind of lovingly grabbed my face in some version of the "pinch on the cheek" - they were very nice.

There are, according to some reports, over 100 mosques in Sarajevo proper - every time you turn a corner a you see another minaret piercing the sky. We loved the fact that a good portion of the heart of the city was pedestrian only--allowing for the large Turkish markets to spill into the streets with their wares of copper, rugs, and jewelery.

In the afternoon we took a walk to the cemetary, which was a sea of new graves and a silent testament to the town's history.

We ate our best lunch yet at a restaurant called "To Be (or not) To Be" (the 'or not' had been crossed out during the war). The kitchen made us roasted vegetables with blue cheese and we drank the dark Sarajevesko beer, we we voted our favorite beer in Eastern Europe. As dusk fell, we sat on a bench in the street and listened to the evening call to prayer (Sarajevo has a live Mufti who scurries from one mosque to the next, as opposed to a loudspeaker). And then we headed out to the large Sarajevsko brewery on the outskirts of the city - a building grander in scale than our Pearl Street Brewery with bars on each floor, a piano player and eleborately carved wooden railings - to enjoy some more!

Budapest, Hungary

The train from Sarajevo to Budapest was perhaps the worst train ride we had ever been on. First, it was a sweltering day. Second, the air condition did not work. Third, the train was being powered by an engine that belched great black smoke clouds, so when you opened the window your car filled up with exhaust. And finally, the ride itself was about 12 hours. Needless to say, we spent hours on end languishing in some sort of semi-conscious state in our seats with sweat dripping down our faces.

So you can imagine our joy upon arriving in Budapest! Our friends Bela and Blanca picked us up at the train station and took us to their flat, where they cooked us meal after delicious vegetarian meal of stewed peppers and mushrooms over dumplings and we drank palinka (that same fruit brandy from the Balkans just with a new name here) mixed with honey.

We toured Budapest with our friends over the next few days, taking in the old architecture and street musicians. Peter was running out of clean shirts by this point so we went thrift store hopping to find him something to wear.

In our mad search for some down-home gypsy music we ended up at the Sziget Festival, something akin to Lollapaloosa in Europe where literally hundreds of thousands of European rockers camped out on an island in the Danube River to hear music at over 12 stages for several days. We managed to join the dance party in the gypsy tent for few hours before we were totally overwhelmed and had to go home.

We topped off our tour of Budapest by taking a dip in the natural mineral baths before Bela and Blanca dropped us off back at the train station for our overnight to Krakow. . .

Krakow, Czestochowa and Zakopane, Poland

Last stop Krakow! We arrived at 6 something on a Sunday morning and Peter promptly ran to the city square and kissed the ground of his ancestoral motherland. We then wandered around with our backpacks on our backs until a breakfast shop opened and we could drink some coffee and eat some eggs.

Our hostel, only a few blocks from the main square, was full of young, sleepy travelers just waking up when we arrived. We promptly set out to explore the city, the multitude of churches and the emerging flea market opening up in across the cobblestoned town square where Peter bought a strange horn that he had trouble getting back through customs.

Poland has the highest percentage of Catholic religious people I have ever seen. It is not uncommon to see entire flocks of nuns and priest after robed priest strolling down the streets. It also has a great collection of great looking older people dressed to the nines.

We spent the afternoon in Kazimierz, the old Jewish quarter, visiting synogogues and museums. We bought tickets for a live Klezmer that evening and followed it with a dinner of blueberry pierogi and wine.







The next day we headed off by train for our long awaited pilgrimage to Czestochowa - home of the Black Madonna. Because of all the pilgrims at the monastery, we were only able to get within about 100 feet of the actual painting of this Polish Queen as mass was being said, but we felt sanctified nonetheless. Coming back to Krakow, our friend and Jesuit priest Artur picked us up for a tour of the Southern hills of Poland and some more pierogi, this time followed by vodka, before we called it a night. In the morning, we had time only for a short stroll before heading off to the airport to begin our journey home.

Thanks for Your Support!

I hope you had fun touring the real version of our "Virtual Honeymoon"! Res assured that we immensly enjoyed ourselves and remembered each of you who sponsored part of our trip when we got to the place you selected. In that sense, we carried you with us!

Again, thanks for your support and, more importantly, for being a part of our lives. Each one of you is a blessing to us. We look forward to deepening our relationship with you as a couple.

Love, Lu and Peter