Got picked up by a lovely guy called Terry, as Emirates offer a free pickup for Business class passengers. He was on time and got us to the airport quickly.

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Our next flight from Dubai to Paris was on the new A380 and so we were upstairs in the Business class section. It was a bit strange having the whole of the top level as Business and First, and the service was definitely lacking compared to our first flight.

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We like staying close to the airport and crashing early, so we picked up our hire car and drove 5 mins to the Radisson, where we stayed a few nights 2 years ago. Being in a little town, but close to the airport is good for us.

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We had a nice drive to Brussels, stopping off at a service station for a delicious croissant and vienoisse au chocolate. Why are the pastries so much better in Europe?

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Had a really nice sleep and woke up at a reasonable hour, 8.30am. We had a few things to do/visit/eat today - waffles, pomme frittes, chocolates, leffe blonde and Manneken Pis.

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This hotel was about 15mins walk from the Grand Platz, or centre of town. It is a fairly modern hotel, and the room and bathroom were both huge.

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We left Brussels around 9am, for our road trip to Munich, Germany. Yes it is about an 800km drive, and it took us about 9 hrs in total. Quick stop for morning croissants.

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We started off our first full day in Munich by going around the corner for a quick bite.

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We decided that today we would accomplish two things - have the best apfel strudel in Munchen and go see Neuschwanstein Castle, which the Disney castle is based on.

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This place was a bit strange. Strange flat pillows, two individual doonas, an umbrella/hat rack, but it was convenient for us. It definitely grew on us.

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So we decided not to end our German tour on a low note, so headed back to ArzMiller for breakfast. This time we didn’t make the same rookie mistake, and we had an apfel strudel each. It was kind of like a baklava but instead of nuts, apple. And crumble.

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Our first day in Bologna started with breakfast at the hotel, which ranged from cakes to boiled eggs and everything in between.

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We thought that we might take a day trip to Pisa, and check out the leaning tower. Touristy - yes, hilarious - yes.

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After realising the best food is in the country, we left around 11am, heading 2 hours north, near Parma to check out some cool Trattorias.

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We decided that we would just hang out in Bologna today, as we had been doing a bit of driving and gallivanting around and we just needed some time to relax and rest our sore feet.

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We had planned on going to Venice by train, but figured out it would cost around 120E and take 1.5hrs on the train, and driving would only take 2 hrs and not much in tolls. So driving it was.

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So it was time to leave Bologna, we had a good time, and great pasta - but there was still more to come! I had read about this cool little place on the internets and convinced a friend to ring up and reserve us lunch there (in Italiano). This place was about 4.5 hrs drive from Bologna and only 30 mins from Monaco, but still just in Italy.

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So our hotel is pretty crazy, and so is Monaco.

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We slept in a little the next morning and had a nice breakfast at the hotel near my Russian friend. I met him the night before while I was waiting for Ben to grab our passports (you need them to enter the Casino, citizens of Monaco are not allowed in). He was coaching his friend on how to sell their idea to some Minister or something - it was quite interesting.

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Last time in Barcelona we found a cool churros place that makes churros for you, and then a few doors down you can get a hot chocolate to dip them in. So that was the mission of the day.

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After eventually getting out of our hotel (half and hour wait in reception to get through 2 couples in front of us) we headed to Valencia, about a 4 hr drive from Barcelona.

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This was about a 7ish hour drive so we left around 9am and headed across. For some reason this area has lots of sunflowers - sunflower fields and solar panel fields. It is very strange.

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