Whirlwind Tour of Europe

James, Delos and I took a quick trip to Europe to accompany Delos on a business trip. (He is still there for another week - Misty flew out today (Monday) to meet him in Dublin and we're watching their kids). We were gone for 8 days, but since two of those were travel days we had to move fast to see a lot of country in a short time.

So here we are in Warsaw Poland

(There was a festival going on the day we landed in Warsaw. James wanted to dance with some of the performers, but they said he would have to settle for a picture!)

(The "Palace on the Isle"in beautiful Laziewski gardens - several hundred acres and the highlight of Warsaw. Below is the monument to Frederic Chopin in the gardens.)

(Old- rebuilt - Warsaw; Hitler systematically blew up the entire city block by block when the Poles rose up against him towards the end of WW II).






And then on to Ghent Belgium (the perfect European setting and ambience with few tourists)


(The view in front of our Hotel in Ghent)

(Flemish Castle)

And from there to Brussels (for a short lunch) at a sidewalk cafe in the "Grand Place"

From Brussels to Paris on a high-speed train (300 km/hr - which is about 200 miles per hour for you non-metric Americans). The speed at which the scenery went by made you dizzy.

(I think you recognize the locations)

(If you're wondering about the strange pose - this is Notre Dame Cathedral; surely you can guess!)

And then another high-speed train to London (including the 22 mile tunnel under the English Channel)

I could talk a lot about the trip and each location, but in summary, it was a great trip. We had a super good time. James and I walked about 6 to 10 miles a day while Delos was in his business meetings. Then when he got out, we all just kept going (he had no meetings in Paris or London). We had beautiful warm fall weather the entire week - very unusual for Europe. The subways systems in Paris and London were great and easy to use. James took over 700 pictures but I decided you might not want to see all of them! I took a few but all but one of the pictures above are from James.