Baratta Update

Hello friends and family-

Sorry we have been a bit out of touch lately. Between some technical difficulties and the Joe Baratta crack the whip schedule where we must see and learn and research and study everyplace we are going, there has been little time to update! (Sorry Joe, you know I love you very much but you are wild man and a bit crazy, but after 21 years I still love you and Sarina thinks you are totally normal and after all you are a scientist so you can do no wrong in her eyes). We have however, mastered at least 3 Rick Steves Travel guides (we recommend them highly) and can now critique his work as well!

This has been the first opportunity since June 24th to give you an update - as if you really care....but in case you were wondering where we have been, here it is...

June 24 - left Copenhagen for cruise.
Jun 25th - at sea
June 26th - Stockholm, Sweden
June 27th - Helsinki Finland
June 28th and 29th - the world win tour of Russia with Marina our tour guide who kept us on schedule - we saw just about everything possible in 48 hours - with very little sleep!
June 30th - Tallin Estonia - cute little town for a short visit.
July 1st- Gdansk Poland - loved it, it was a nice surprise!
July 2nd - at sea
July 3rd - Oslo, Norway
July 4th - back to Denmark

The following pictures cover this period of time - See June 2005 as well since some of the pictures are in that file. Since then here is where we have been and we will post pictures soon.

July 5th - we picked up our car in Sweden.
July 6 and 7th - we headed for Norway and stayed at a B&B owned by a woman from Incline Village - we never met before but it was like going "home" when we got to Mette's place!

July 7th through the 10th - we headed up to the Fjords of Norway - what a beautiful place filled with beautiful people and lots of sun and light - we had about 2-3 hours of night time and even then it was not that dark.

This began our great "camping experience." Imagine the ugly americans with the king size air mattress that needs to be filled electronically - and it is LOUD......again, showing up in the LARGE SUV- someone said to me "americans like everything BIG don't they....I had to agree and even though I was a bit embarassed by our large bed - which by the way barely fits in the tent and is covered by a duvet cover - yes you heard me correctly - no not a couple of tiny roll away sleeping bags - you know the ones that all "campers" sleep on and the ones that Joe wanted to bring - no we are very comfortable with our version of camping baratta style!

So then we began our journey to Greece - yes Norway to Greece - many people think - wow, that's really far, have you checked a map? and then I tell them that Joe was looking into driving around the world - or at least he thought, maybe we could at least drive from Europe to China- I didn't know if I should laugh or cry so I consulted a map...I'm getting a lot better with Geography- Sarina is totally confused and asking if it possible to drive back to Lake Tahoe....Each day we give her a quick update about which country we in and what the date is so that she might have some idea where we are.

So on the 11th we camped in Ahrus Denmark and then headed to Germany. We stopped in Hamberg for a quick tour and then headed to Berlin. We drove into the camp site about 9:59PM. They were closing at 10:00. BUT, they cut us break, took our passports, locked them up, directed us to a very crowded camp site and went home. So, in the Sandy style of not ever accepting the first hotel room she is given, or in this case, the first camp site, we headed over to a nice grassy area by the bathhouse. Well, our new neighbor was not so happy with us, he stood up from the next grassy crowded area and said something in German. When we said we did not understand him, he pointed to crowded area and said, "You go there." I then asked him if he worked here? This is when Joe jumped in between us and said "ok. we will go to the other spot." At that point it was about 10:30 and we were driving the car from spot to spot, at which point we came across another friendly group who surrounded the car to inform us that driving was not permitted after 10PM. Now we felt really welcomed here....was considering inviting people over for a glass of wine and you know a kind of get to know one another thing.....

At this point, we knew we could not leave without the passports, so we headed back to our original site. I said to Joe I think I may have heard some people talking greek. We really needed a friendly face. Well, wouldn't you know it, we met our future cousins, Stella and Zissis! They were so nice, they took us under their wing, started trying to feed us, offered to help us set up the tent, showed us the way around town and worried about us when we came home late the next evening. Little did they know we were delayed trying to buy a bottle of Ouzo, some watermellon and feta cheese so we could enjoy some quality Greek time together.

Berlin was great and so was Dresden - we drove through a few days later on our way to Prague or what the locals and our navigation lady calls Praha.

It's getting late and I'm tired so I'll wrap up by saying that from July 14- 16 we were in Prague. We then found czech republic's wine country - leave it to Joe ..... and believe me it was not easy to find. At this point, we no longer have navigation because these places are not on the system.

Following wine country - we headed for Vienna - what a wonderful place - spent 2 days there and then headed to Budapest, Hungry....

We were in Hungary for 2 days and now we are in Slovania.

We have our blackberry working again, good news. We are staying in a nice hotel in Ljubanja and our room even has a bathtub- Sarina was so excited, she immediately took a bath (although she says she enjoys camping more because she gets to help daddy put up the tent).

Will update with some more pictures and comments soon.

Thank you for all your responses and e-mails it has been nice hearing from everyone. Since the responses come to annon., it would be great if you could add your e-mail onto the end of your message so that we can write back.

Hope all is well back home,

We miss everyone and love you,

Joe, Sandy and Sarina


P.S. DON'T FOGET TO CLICK ON JUNE 2005 ON THE LEFT SIDE FOR MORE PICTURES....