A Little Piece of Italy - Tuscan Adventure!

Before we disappear into the Canadian ether, I'd like to include a few posts about trips we've made in the last few years around Europe. Since 2011 we've had some great journeys and experienced some amazing places, all of which I would definitely love to return to in the future.

I'll start from the beginning!
Our first holiday as a couple came in October 2011, the destination: Pisa, Italy.

Ian had visited before, and was pretty adamant that he wanted to show me Pisa and that I would love it. And he was right. I did!

For a start it's stunning, almost everywhere you look is picture perfect and everything is so stereotypically Italian, it's almost like walking into an advert for olive oil.

There are of course the typical tourist traps. The area directly surrounding the Leaning Tower (the piazza del tuomo) is awash with stalls selling the plastic towers and snow globes, t-shirts, hats, you name it, they sell it, and restaurants who charge twice as much as they should. The Tower itself was lovely to see, though during the day the square was heaving with visitors, and lots of people posing for the standard 'I'm holding the leaning tower up with my hands' photo. We decided to go up the tower and took some great photos from the top, we also got tickets to go into the duomo (the cathedral) and the baptistry, both stunning in their own right but with not quite the star power of the tower. We went back to the square late at night, it was floodlit and nearly empty, so we wandered slowly and got great views with less of the hustle and bustle.

Lovely as it is, step away the Cathedral Square and walk round any corner and down a side road and your suddenly in Italian heaven.

Here the vibe is very different, its relaxed, quiet, and unquestionably beautiful. The side streets are peaceful and for us the weather was perfect, it was warm but not too hot, the gentle onset of autumn was palpable in the air, the kind of weather that makes you want to twirl in a skirt and make it fan out around you and then burst into song. I'm not even kidding, I twirled.

A Pisa side street

Other things I loved about Pisa, the food. My goodness the food was good. I ate so much gelato (I'm talking once or twice daily) drank copious amounts of coffee, (and found a new friend in espresso's) and ate some delicious dishes. We tried to eat moderately during the day so we could enjoy a big meal most evenings, with my favorite being the night we had steak wrapped in pork cheek (yes, I'm a huge carnivore) on a bed of mash, and then Illy coffee creme brulee for dessert. It was the most luxurious meal I think I've ever had, and I wish I could remember the name and location of the restaurant so I can go back. If I return to Pisa I will track it down!

On our little Tuscan journey we also took in other areas, we nipped on the train (I must say I was impressed with their train service, certainly no worse than ours in the UK!) to Lucca, a little town with gorgeous architecture, and surrounded by a huge wall which we spent a large portion of the day wandering around. Here the streets are tiny and quiet, and everything seems so compact, even the cars are teeny. Lots more gelato, lots of churches and we ate outside a restaurant being serenaded by a violinist. The place screamed Tuscany.

On another day trip we took the train to Florence. I must say I was looking forward to this, but we arrived without a map and got lost very, very quickly. We ended up going back to the train station to buy one and start all over again, by which time half the day had gone. Florence is...well it's pretty, but it's very tourist orientated. The whole city feels like an invasion, I'm sure you could go a week without speaking to a real Italian there. But it is pretty. The Duomo is magnificent, we took refuge in a University library where I took photos from a balcony. The other thing about Florence is the abundance of shops! And not just any shops but very exclusive shops, you name a designer I'm pretty sure they'll have a shop there. It'd be a great place to spend a few grand, if you were that way inclined.

Florence shops + me trying to look casual.

Ponte Vecchio

My favorite thing about Florence was the Ponte Vecchio bridge. Standing in the centre and looking either up or down river gave some unforgettable views and the bridge itself was pretty, if a little overcrowded with jewellery shops!

For me Florence couldn't outshine Pisa, which was just so chilled out, but I did enjoy it. I have hopes to visit Italy again, I would like to visit Naples and see Vesuvius and Pompeii, and possibly Rome. Any other Italian recommendations?

Raider Rachel in London

With (hopefully) just a under 2 months before we go, it's important to take some time to appreciate the country we are leaving behind. I know we're taking an exciting step into unknown territory, but it's easy to forget that there are beautiful and impressive things surrounding us right now.

In February we took a week off. It came post IEC Kompass stage of our visa application, and I must say I really needed a break! Despite the fact we live less than an hour away from London by train, I very rarely go there, so we took the opportunity to have a day sightseeing.

Our first point of call, the newly opened Shard! At £25 each, it's not a cheap attraction, but it is impressive. The day we had chosen to visit was unfortunately a little misty. We arrived at our allotted time and were led in, tickets in hand. Security into the building is tight, with visitors required to go through scanners and put coats and bags through separately, much like an airport! The ride to the 33rd floor takes mere seconds, and then you're ushered into a second rapid lift that takes you to the top. Our first impressions were a little disappointing, mostly because we couldn't see anything. A wall of white surrounded us on all sides! The binocular/telescope system kept us occupied though, and we spent some time trying them all out and checking out the landscape through different times of the day. After about 45 minutes the mist slowly began to lift, and the view widened until we could see a generous distance. There is only so much sightseeing you can do there though, we spent about an hour and a half at the Shard, and it was definitely enough. If you ever check it out, check the weather and make sure you go on a clear day, also I would consider going after dusk, the images we saw of London at night were stunning!

After a quick dart on the Tube (which I adore!) we had a quick dash to one of my favourite shops, Forbidden Planet. For those of you who aren't familiar with it, it's the best place to go and geek out (http://forbiddenplanet.com/) I seriously hope we find an equally nerdy shop in Vancouver! I prohibited myself from buying anything this time, I could spend a huge amount of money there.

Next on the agenda, the Natural History Museum! Having never been here before, we ran around the dinosaur exhibition like kids, took lots of pictures of bones with no recollection of what they actually are and got annoyed with the bugs exhibit (it was filled with squabbling school children.) I loved the architecture of the building, but not so much the prices in the cafe, so when we got hungry we hotfooted it out of there, grabbed a sandwich at Piccadilly Circus and ended the day in a bar with a glass of wine.

 

Abseil

The second and more recent London excursion also explains the name of the blog. At the beginning of 2013 I promised myself that this year I would stir things up and do exciting things! And so I threw caution to the wind and signed up to a charity abseil for a children's cancer charity, CLIC Sargent.

This initiated lots of comments about Lara Croft/Indiana Jones/stunt woman and voila, the nickname Raider Rachel cropped up.

The event involved me abseiling 130ft down Battersea Power Station, a great London landmark which is currently being developed, so possibly a once in a lifetime opportunity.

We turned up with plenty of time to spare and then they were running a little behind, which meant we were standing around in the bitter cold for quite some time, poor Ian froze! But after a bit of a wait I got suited up (it was surprisingly heavy, walking up the stairs made you feel like a spaceman!) and given a 5 minute safety chat. Then it was up the top, and somehow found myself being one of the first people coming over the side. Despite the fact my heart was pounding in my ears, I did love it. At one point I had to cross a window, and my shoes kept getting caught in the net covering it, I had to keep shaking my feet to get away from it, which put me off balance. I've seen the video and it's not very elegantly done. But ah well, in the end I raised £503 (and counting!) for a great cause, and I had an amazing day. If anyones interested in further pictures, they can be seen on my sponsor page here: http://uk.virginmoneygiving.com/RachelBrownAbseil

The Canadian Visa, the story so far!

I've heard a lot about getting into Canada, I spent a good portion of Autumn 2012 reading and researching the hell out of everything IEC related so that when the time came and this years quota opened I'd have an easy, no stress process, I was going to sit back, relax and wait for a visa to drop into my inbox. No such luck!

This year they decided to shake up the system, and long story short, it's been a stressful and confusing time
all round, and for many has placed them in an uncertain position. For the first time, the IEC have decided to do away with paper based applications and do everything online. So far, so simple. I spent the whole of  December checking the website daily...and then well into January. Then joy of joys, on the 17th they announced that the applications would most definitely, absolutely 100% open before February. Great!

January 29th rolls around and the Irish applications opened. I think the IEC seriously underestimated how many people would be waiting to apply (considering they were already a month late opening you'd think they'd realise people would be clamoring to get them!) All 6000+ visas went in an unprecedented 3 days. The February deadline came and went for the UK visas with no information, other than the fact that our visas would now be released in 3 batches to spread the work, and then for a frustrating 2 weeks we had nothing..

14th February - Valentines Day (thanks for that one IEC) the first 1000 visas are released at 5pm. I quite literally ran home. Created our accounts, uploaded everything they needed and dashed through the questions, then pressed send. Then I did my boyfriend Ian's. They were both completed and sent by 6:30, (which was good timing, as all of them had gone by 8) sat back and waited for the confirmation emails. Mine came through 10 minutes later, and it was perfect, happy days! An hour and a half later Ian's came through. I checked the message.

Afghanistan.
I mistakenly listed my boyfriends country of residence as Afghanistan.
Oh hell.

I cried, then calmed down and messaged the IEC, then cried again. Then I had to tell Ian I'd stuffed up his application (lots more tears on my part, not the best valentine's night I must say) but he was very gallant about it. We decided to continue with our applications as normal, and to keep messaging the IEC to rectify it. So we paid the high commission (they made that rather complicated as well!) had our payment verified, and then got our conditional letters of acceptance. Ian's still had Afghanistan on it. *sigh*  We had no idea if we should continue with Stage 2, or if the CIC would not accept the letter with an incorrect address, or if we should start again in the next round...so we messaged the IEC again, and again we waited. After 2 weeks of impatience, worrying and continuous checking of his Kompass account, he got a replacement conditional letter, with the United Kingdom as his country. Happy tears!

From then on it's been smoother. We completed Stage 2 and sent that off at the beginning of March. (We sat and did that together, and double checked everything!) And now, we wait... we're on day 12. Fingers crossed for everyone that they start trickling through.

I must say, despite the stress of rushing and making such an stupid mistake, I'm very glad we got in on Round 1. The dates for Rounds 2 + 3 were announced ahead of them opening, which meant everyone knew when to be online, the system crashed a heck of a lot as people tried to get on, making it difficult to know what was happening. Round 3's quota (with +2000 places) was filled in 20 minutes, and a lot of people from Round 3 are still unsure as to whether they have got onto the program, or even the waiting list. I really do feel for them, those few uncertain weeks where I was unsure if I'd ruined all our plans was hell. Good luck to everyone still waiting.

2013, the year of making stuff happen.

 The boyfriend and I have always agreed that we'd go traveling, but following uni we were pretty broke and had minimal work experience, so it was into the 9-5 grind for us. I graduated from uni nearly three years ago, and have spent the last 2 and a half years working in a quiet office in a quiet town, and doing not much else.

So now we have some experience and funds, it's definitely time for our travel plans to start coming together! We both have the travel bug, and with international Work Holiday programs only lasting till your 30-35 years old (depending on the country) the time to go is definitely now. There are so many areas of the world I'd love to see, I need to get out there and start enjoying it all!

So, the plan...
Our first stop is going to be Canada. We're aiming for Vancouver at the beginning of May (visa dependent, more on that beauty later!) which sounds oddly not far away. After all the talking, reading and researching, the sudden realisation that in 8-9 weeks you hope to actually be there is quite intimidating! The visa will be valid for a year from the day we enter the country, but we have no idea if we'll end up staying the full term. I'm hoping if we stay till at least December we'll have enough money to make a visit home for Christmas! We're not going to plan too much ahead, we're going to fly out there with a few weeks accommodation booked up, then look for somewhere more permanent to rent and start the job hunt, so it's pretty uncertain where we will end up. Though I'm sure I'll look into areas before we go, to check out which districts might appeal to us the most. When it comes to traveling, I'm notorious for planning.

I'd love to experience as much as possible out there, I made a news years resolution of sorts to make 2013 an exciting year. I want to look back and see all the things that excited, challenged and taught me something new. So far, I've abseiled down the side of Battersea Power Station (which produced the blog name, and yes it's also got a World of Warcraft reference.) I'm getting a tattoo soon, and then its the Canada adventure! Things I'd like to do once we're out there includes trying my hand at snowboarding, joining a gym, seeing the Rocky Mountains, visiting Seattle (there's some potential to see some NHRA drag racing there in August!) and taking in as much of Canadian life as possible. I should probably warn you I might end up talking about food a lot!

Long term plans...you can get 2 IEC (International Experience Canada) visas, perhaps if we love it we'll attempt to get a second next year. Right now the plans are loose. After Canada, I'd love to see New Zealand, and then perhaps Australia. I'd love to see parts of Asia as well, but as they don't have work programs, that might have to be more short term. We've also talked about countries in Europe, on a holiday to Stockholm last year we fell in love with Sweden, so who knows where this first step will lead!