The Good, The Bad and The Near Death Experience

Rik and I love Europe. The culture, the people, the architecture, the history, the shopping and the food fill our tank every single time. This trip certainly filled it, though not always in the ways we had planned. So here it is, the full report, in three parts.

The Good

Our route took us through some of the most stunning (and financially crippling) parts of Europe. Como, Milan, Modena, Venice, Florence, Nice, Monaco and Paris. Milan delivered on the shopping front, as Milan does. Venice remains like no other place in the world, and this time we visited the Venice Biennale art exhibition. My highlight was the Austrian installation, a naked woman on a jet ski in purified urine. Yip, that's right. Google it.

Florence gave us culture and architecture on every corner, plus a day riding a Vespa through the Chianti wine district, which I highly recommend. Nice and its surrounding areas were absolutely stunning, the kind of place Rik and I could easily live. We swam in the turquoise Mediterranean sea, where the colour of the water has to be seen to be believed. We visited the casino in Monaco and quickly quit while we were ahead, and ate our way through French cuisine, snails included.

Paris always delivers. This time we got up close and personal with Lisa at the Louvre (Mona, to her friends). We stayed in an incredible home exchange apartment in Saint Michel and walked through the Luxembourg Gardens every day. Autumn was just arriving, with leaves falling and the air cooling, which felt like heaven after the rest of the trip. Europe was in a full heatwave, and I have never been so hot in all my life.

One of the loveliest surprises was unexpectedly bumping into three different friends along the way. In the laneways of Old Town Nice, we ran into Marg Foster from Christchurch. In Paris, we crossed paths with Hilary Muir, a very good friend Rik worked with in radio for many years. Then, walking up a really quiet street in Paris, we heard a Kiwi accent, and there was Belinda, another longtime colleague of Rik's. It just goes to show that the world is small and Kiwis love to travel.

The Bad

The curveballs started early. We missed our connecting flight in Singapore by ten minutes and were rerouted to Frankfurt instead of Milan. When we finally landed in Milan only six hours late, our luggage did not. We were told it was on the next flight, so we waited three hours. It wasn't. We headed to Como in what we were wearing, which was now well-worn activewear, and discovered that Como was completely sold out of any decent summer clothes. We made do, and eventually left early to go back to Milan for our bags. We never even made it out on the lake, so Como, we will be back.

On our last night in Venice, a storm rolled in. We headed out for dinner, and in the restaurant my shoe slipped and two of my toes ended up wedged against a metal table leg. The pain was excruciating. The verdict was a fractured little toe, a week of hobbling, and four weeks wearing the same pair of green Archie slides because they were the only thing I could walk in. The next day, unable to walk very far, we casually stopped in St Mark's Square for two black coffees and two small pastries. The bill was an eye watering $68 NZD. Possibly the most expensive way anyone has ever rested a fractured toe.

By Florence I was a little frazzled, and I arrived at the Gucci museum in my unfashionable slides, feeling about as far from Gucci as a woman can get. It got worse. Halfway through the tour, I realised I was wearing my knockoff cap, a confused blend of the Adidas and Gucci logos. Honestly, I am surprised they let me in.

Then came Pisa, or rather, the absence of Pisa. We woke up one morning all set to see the famous leaning tower, totally confident with the train schedules and, to be fair, probably a little smug. An hour in, Pisa wasn't showing up anywhere on our phones or the train information. It turns out we were heading to the wrong coast. We jumped off, only to find the station had just closed, and grabbed the last two seats on a bus back to Florence. I had a very full bladder and the bus had no stops for the next two hours. The leaning tower was not the only thing under pressure that day. We never did make it to Pisa.

The Near Death Experience

Lost luggage, fractured toe and wrong trains are all part of travelling, and we get that. This last one, though, I would never wish on anyone.

We were in our apartment in Nice, heading out to the beach, and I was finishing a small mouthful of tuna as we walked out the door. Rik didn't know I had food in my mouth. Halfway down the stairs, I coughed and the tuna lodged in my throat. I coughed and spluttered, and then I tried to breathe and nothing happened. I tried through my nose and got nothing. I tried through my mouth again and still nothing. By now Rik had stopped and could see the pure fear in my eyes. I pointed to the bag for the water bottle and slowly poured water down my throat. Rik had no idea what was happening, and I was too panicked to tell him to hit my back. Luckily, the water worked.

It was honestly one of the scariest moments of my life. If you have ever experienced choking where you genuinely think this is how it ends, you will know exactly what I mean.

Once my legs had stopped shaking, my next thought was about my eulogy. After everything, a book still waiting to be finished and a life spent helping women choose themselves, the final line would read, "She died choking on a piece of tuna." Not even a beautifully seared tuna steak on the French Riviera. Just a hurried mouthful of canned tuna on the way down the stairs. Perhaps that is exactly why it wasn't my time. The universe clearly has standards.

On a serious note, choking can happen to anyone in a matter of seconds, and the person standing right beside you may have no idea what is going on. I would really encourage everyone to learn basic first aid. If someone is choking but can still cough, encourage them to keep coughing. If they can't cough, speak or breathe, call emergency services straight away (111 in New Zealand, 000 in Australia, 112 in Indonesia and Europe). Then, give up to five sharp blows between their shoulder blades with the heel of your hand, checking after each one to see if the blockage has cleared. If it hasn't, give up to five chest thrusts, pressing sharply into the centre of their chest. Keep alternating back blows and chest thrusts until the blockage clears or help arrives. If they become unresponsive, start CPR.

I have since learned that drinking water is not the recommended response to choking, and that back blows would have been the better option. I was lucky. A first aid course through St John or the Red Cross takes only a few hours, and it could mean you are the person who knows exactly what to do. And perhaps let your travel companion know when you have food in your mouth.

Home Sweet Bali

We are now back in Bali and settling into Island life. My toe has healed, and I’ve packed away my faithful green Archies for a while. I am also chewing every mouthful of food a ridiculous number of times.

Our next trip will be home to New Zealand in December for Christmas and New Year, and I can't wait to spend time with family and friends. I am also starting to dream about next year's holiday, and I have a feeling South America is calling. If you have been and have any tips, favourite places or hard lessons learnt, I would love to hear them. Send me a message through my contact page.

The Good

Not So Good