To Russia...and Beyond!

November 22nd--It's currently 7:30 in Munich, and my flight leaves for St. Petersburg at 8:10 AM tomorrow. However, since it's an international flight and the airport is 40 minutes away, my sleeping behavior is going to be a little weird tonight.

I'll probably take a nap and then stay up, go out to the airport and then sleep on the plane. There are enough variables in the trip there that I don't want to take any chances on missing my flight.

I recently realized that I've never really described where I was going much in advance of the fact, so I thought I might describe the general outline of my trip for the rest of the time.

I'll fly into St. Petersburg via Berlin, then spend two nights there before taking a train to Moscow and spending two nights there. On the 27th, I'll fly to Athens.

I'll spend one night in Athens, and then take the ferry to the island of Naxos, where I'll spend three nights, maybe visiting one of the other islands before returning to Athens.

From Athens, I'll take a train to the port of Patras, then a ferry from Patras to Bari, Italy, and a train to Naples. Then it's two nights in Naples and two in Rome before a long trip to Barcelona.

I'll have to stop off for a night in Nice on the way around, and then I'll stay for two nights with my old friend Liz in Barcelona before going to Madrid for two nights.

For the last leg of my trip, I'll head down to Marrakesh, Morocco, by train and ferry. I'd like to be able to spend three nights there, but I think I'll have to stop off in Casablanca first. From Marrakesh I'll fly to Dublin on December 15th so I can catch my return flight to Chicago on the 16th.

And there you have it. If you have any suggestions for any of these places, or comments about how I'm going too quickly, let me have it. Otherwise, I want to wish everyone a very Happy Thanksgiving.

Now if I could just find some cranberry sauce...