Day 17: My First Post in Europe

this post should read as follows: dear me and friends, my sincerest apologies for letting myself and my small, but elite group of readers down. I have had ZERO coherent downtime on this trip... till today... in Paris... where I've barely set foot outside my 5th arrondisement , humble hotel's door.

At this point I've burned through 5 cities in 3 countries in a little over 2 weeks. My buddy justin and I are putting together a day by day comprehensive digest of what we actually did do in the last 2 weeks, otherwise we'll forget the details. And oh how many details there are!

Some highlights:

Shared bunks, chocolate, cookies, and stories with Sudanese/Eritrean Refugee's on an overnight train from Milano to Paris.

Uttered Catzo & Figa innumerable times with two great Milanese friends I made while hiking to the hilltop granary in Ollantaytambo, Peru.

Justin and I were nearly incommunicado by one of the above mentioned friends for dining at MacDonalds for lunch one day in Milan (where the local food is second to none, we are very guilty, mi dispiache FP)

Justin, Frank, and I have discovered the most fantastic word in the english language: Chav.

Started dinner with friends at a legitimate family restaurant in Barcelona at midnight. People eat only after 10Pm here...

I took my first mass on Ash Wednesday at San Pietro in the Vatican. Not a bad place to take mass, I have set aside no prohibitions for lent though.

After mass we saw the pope. He was being driven in the back seat of a BMW, there was a rapid street closure as they approached and people barely knew what was happening, they took such a fast turn towards San Pietro it was just awesome. He had the light on and windows rolled down and was waving to anyone who recognized him. They must've been hitting 50-60mph on narrow Roman streets that evening...

I visited the largest Gothic Cathedral in the world.

Have already purchased three expensive Eurostar Train tickets and not yet purchased my EuroRail global pass. Que idiota.

Admired the most expensive marble colummns and perhaps the oldest working lock/key doors in the Roman paladino.

The vatican art collection (see photo top right) is incredible.

On a Jet-Plane to London Tomorrow!

Hi loyal readers! (aka my friends under extreme duress)

I'm back after a travel hiatus of just under 30 days.

First of all, there's a glitch in my posterous account that's posting from my new concept facebads.posterous.com (the service is really awesome, a buddy of mine started it, and you should sign up at www.posterous.com) I will fix that shortly. I'm not converting this blog into a facebook ad critique circus... yet.

So I just checked in online at BA.com and got my travel companions back row seats in the premium economy section. Only 36 in our premium economy cabin versus 227 in the back two cabins of coach. Woo hoo! Apparently our back row seats will recline all the way... crossing my fingers. The gang and I scored RT tickets for around $500 which also includes a $50 one way upgrade to Premium Economy on my SFO to London leg. I went for it because of peer pressure, but secondarily because there's 2'' extra legroom 2-4-2 seat rows instead o 3-4-3 rows and electrical plugs in all the seats. I haven't flown BA since I was 10 years old and I don't have great memories (because Singapore Air just rocks the house) so I hope to make some good one's tomorrow!

Most of you know I'm headed to Europe for 2 months, but what you may not know is that I've only planned out 10 of those days, the other 50 are quite up in the air although plans are starting to coalesce around cities where I've got some college buddies and dare I say it, the middle east! More on that when things get finalized.

Our high school crew, which will be 6 people strong on Monday, will be in London for 4 days and then 5 of us will be moving on to Barcelona for another 4-5 days.

Please post any "must see" attractions in the comments section and a question I have for anyone reading this is: what's your take on the value of a EuroRail Pass? There are several types and I'm considering picking one up since I'll be in Europe for so long, but with 1 way flights relatively cheap (avg around $50) I'm wondering if it makes sense. Thanks for any input!