woooh so tons to catch up on!

in short, since i last posted we spent a few days in Paris (which was... a little better than i expected, but surprisingly boring and very hot), went to Switzerland (Lucerne, Bern, Lausanne for a short break, and Geneva) for a few days, to Amsterdam (which was also surprisingly dull, even though that was where we saw the final of the world cup... not to mention that we were rooming with 3 french girls who weren't happy about the outcome at all, haha), to Cologne which was great, and now we are in Berlin which is also very fun and interesting.

High- and low- lights...:
Paris - walked up the Eiffel Tower, which was fun but tiring, saw Notre Dame, Sacre Coeur, had a very rude waiter in a restaurant with really bad food, ate lots of picnics and drank lots of wine in parks which was nice and ate tons of cherries


Switzerland - we had a car here, which turned out really well for the most part, except for some trouble in Lausanne, and the fact that the underground parking is disturbingly expensive.

Lucerne - gorgeous city, spent part of the day at a pay beach (which is pretty ridiculous in my opinion... who pays to be at the beach??? also, the staff played dumb when we asked them if there was any non-paying beach in the area, because there was a little bit right next to it.) loved it, except for the fact that there were bed bugs in one of the two beds we used. also, saw the germany/italy game at the central station, which was very fun and high-energy. incidentally, the stockholm central station also had a tv set up for the world cup matches, which i think is a really cool idea. we only stayed in Lucerne for one night, because while it is stunning, there really isn't a whole lot to do there.

Bern
we drove to Bern thru Interlaken, which should have been a very beautiful city. sadly, interlaken has been ruined by tourism: it is simply store after store of clothing and things. i have nowhere to put any more clothing, so shopping would have been stupid. also, the fact that my allergies were seriously acting up there, didn't help a tiny bit. we stopped for lunch in a cute little town called Lungern (they have a website -- there was a sign on a bench for it --i haven't checked it, but i think it was lungern.se). this is the kind of place that only has one butcher, one bakery, a general store, 2 restaurants, and a hotel, and is on a mountain in switzerland. very pretty and cute.

Bern was also beautiful. we were there for 2 nights and we stayed in acute little cottage on a camp ground. basically it was a cozy 4-person chalet with 2 beds on the main floor, and then 2 more in a loft. very basic, but very nice. our first night it rained, so we mostly relaxed in our room. the next day, we went to see the downtown where we saw their bear pit. although it was sad to see the bears all cramped up in the small amount of space, but there was a trainer there (i think) that was getting one of the bears to basically do tricks for the crowd, which was very cute. we also saw their famous clock, which wasn't that amazing really, and tracked down a fountain with a statue of an ogre eating children. again, could've been better.

after taht, we headed off to Lausanne, which was basically just a big city that brought us much disappointment. basically we had lunch, made it to a tourism office, were heading over to a museum in the car (after paying waaaay too much for parking of course) when we caught the side of the car on the wall in the ramp up. that put a serious damper on things, so we decided to head straight to Geneva because we definately weren't enchanted with Lausanne at that point.

Once in Geneva and annoyed by the driving (super frustrating especially because so many things simply aren't marked on the maps... such as streets ending because of markets that have clearly been there for years and the such), we promptly got a parking ticket. after that was paid, we headed over to our accomodation at L'Universite de la Cite de Geneve. the accomodation was excellent, although it was extremely sketchy because basically one guy was running the hostel out of his backpack where he held a binder and a money box. but i can't really complain because it was cheap, comfortable, and the parking was free.

the next night was our final night and we opted to sleep at the airport in our spiffy car (a Leon Seat... haven't mentioned that yet, but apparantly it's the same thing as a VW Golf) before flying into amsterdam.

amsterdam was, as i mentioned earlier, lame. i've heard really great things about the city about how it's so much fun and not to miss... but to be honest, it's dirty, cramped, and really not that special. i'm happy we went, but would i go back? probably not. our hostel was surprisingly nice, although i felt a little old (old! at 22! wtf!!!) but once we settled in, it was comfortable, clean, with a good breakfast, and clean sheets. our first day was spent walking around in a tired daze, and our second day was spent essentially revisiting all the places we really didn't notice because of our tired daze. i should mention that my first thought when we left the central station was that it looks like toronto, but more cramped. the only really compelling thing was the Anne Frank House, which was very interesting and worth visiting.

We headed to Cologne by train (yes, our first train of the vacation, haha!) and went to bed soon after that. we had 4 days in Cologne, which was... basically sufficient. there was more to be seen, but we covered the essentials. most of our time was spent exploring the Cathedral (Dom), which is massive and filled with history. we went on a guided tour of the cathedral, which was very informative and interesting, where the guide discussed the history of the building, the significance, the architecture, the artwork... well, everything. after that we headed up to the top (509 steps i hear) to see the view, which was impressive. we also went to the roman-germanic museum, which was a waste of time since we don't speak german and the displays are almost exclusively in german, saw a fountain of a girl with a lantern which relates to a legend from Cologne, went to 4711 (where they make the famous cologne) where we saw their clock which was very cute (and nicer than the one in Bern!), and went to the Chocolate Museum which was awesome. we also walked around their pedestrian shopping district and spent some time sampling their local beer, Kolsch. we stayed in Cologne at my parents' friends' place, which was very pleasant. they took excellent care of us - explained the public transit, fed and bathed us, gave us a comfortable place to sleep, picked us up at the train station, dropped us off at the airport, let us use their computers... really very sweet.

We are now inBerlin and while there is still more to mention, the internet may not be working right now so i don't even know if this will end up making it online so there's no point in going any further!

barcelona

so it's been awhile since we left barcelona, but it was fantastic. the reason i didn't update from there, was because i was too busy having a great time there. i'm in paris now. i should be able to get all caught up before we leave. (haha)

so we got to barcelona on the evening of the 23rd, checked into our hostel, Sun & Moon. The hostel was in an excellent location: on c. de Ferran, right off of La Ramblas just north of Placa Reial, which is a beautiful square with lots of restaurants and cafes. after checking in, we headed over to the square and got a pitcher of sangria and a lobster paella. all i have to say about that, is that catalonians know how to eat. it was amazing. from there, we went on to walk around the city some more, before heading to bed early.

We arrived just in time for a festival of theirs, called San Juan (Saint John), wherein lots of people lit fire crackers and then there was a big bonfire on the beach and fireworks. lots of fun.

Saturday we went to La Pedrera, which is a Gaudi museum along with a model apartment from the 20's to complement the way his design of the building. i should of course mention that he designed the building, intending it as an apartment building for wealthy people. the museum was very well done, and included a fantastic audio guide which took you step-by-step through everything there was to see.

Sunday we didn't do much, except for shopping a little (mostly for dinner, and browsing) and then a little time on the beach.

Monday we made our way to Parc Guell, another one of Gaudi's masterpieces. this is a big park that he intended to be used a sort of city for the rich, although it was never completed due to lack of funding. the park is beautiful, but very hilly. one thing that i haven't mentioned so far, is the heat in barcelona. it is obscenely hot there, especially around 3-6pm. climbing up the hill ot get there was really tiring, even though it was morning. i'm glad that we had plans for the afternoon, because it kept us out of the hot mid-day sun. we also went to the gaudi museum at the park, but it was pretty lame. if you go to barcelona, skip it. there are lots of better ways to spend your time there. the afternoon was actually spent at a spanish cooking class, where we had a lot of fun making sangria, tapas, paella, and gaspacho. i really enjoyed it. supposedly they're supposed to email us the recipes... they haven't yet, but it hasn't been a week yet, so i'll be patient still! we met some really nice people there too, which was cool.

that evening we had some hostel drama... apparantly the people running our hostel can't count to 8. that's the number of beds in our room. amazingly, they tended to manage to overbook them. i don't really get it. i remember the first or second night, a guy came in and looked around. i didn't really know what he was doing. on second thought though, i think he was actually physically checking if any beds were free, because they don't know how to keep track of that stuff.

but let me tell you - there is nothing quite as fun as people having melodramas about where they're going to sleep at 12.30am in your room, and having the staff pretend to understand what's being said to them (although they clearly didn't!) ah, good times. thank god it's such a nice city; otherwise i'd be pissed!

Tuesday we saw the Sagrada Familia, which was gorgeous. we also went into the tower, which was gorgeous but scary. it was extremely high up and cramped in the tower. Kevin, in all of his sensitivity, pointed out a crack in one of the bricks to me on our way up. i just about threw him out of the window. lucky for both of us that i was too scared to take both hands off of the wall at once =)

after that we had to prepare for our departure. we mailed a package home, which my parents can expect within the next week, and did some laundry after which we had a nice dinner before heading to bed.

Wednesday we just walked around the city for the last time, before taking a bus back to the airport. we saw the Arc de Triomphe (Barcelona edition), the Botanical Garden, walked by the zoo, and saw the olympic garden, as well as the beach. sadly (and i know my family will scoff), we didn't make it for a proper day at the beach with bathing suits and swimming. however, i'm sure that there will be more than enough time for that later on in the trip.

We are now in Paris, and although we set up a tentative itinerary for this part of the trip, we are way ahead of our plans and will likely just end up lounging around tomorrow, or spending more time planning for switzerland as we've left it up in the air for now.

other than that, i hope everyone is doing well, and that my mother has mailed my international driver's license which i forgot at home =) and that my dad has called his friends in Vienna so i don't have to worry about booking a hostel =)

more about Paris probably tomorrow.

mkay, the plan.

june 13 - land in london
june 17 - stockholm
june 20 - brussels
june 23 - barcelona
june 28 - paris
july 4 - basel (switzerland) - by car
july 9 - fly geneva - amsterdam
july 11 - cologne
july 15 - berlin
july 18 - rome
july 22 - venice
july 23 - 30 mediterranean cruise
july 31 - budapest

from then, poland (warsaw, krakow, kielce, biecz, zakopane) and vienna and prague by car.

so far, so good.

ok so maybe brussels wasn't all bad...

the food was good. the restaurants were rather nice, and the beer was great. can't really complain about the music museum too much, and the pastries were awesome. and there's that one area... Grand Place, which is the main square. that looks really nice. at night. when the weather is good. and i guess i understood their french, which is a good sign. they speak more slowly than parisians do.

but even so, brussels has got nothing on barcelona. more on that later... we are in paris now, and on the way to the louvre. we're staying at the Hotel Utrillo, and so far, it like a very nice hotel.

brussels

dear brussels,

so sorry you suck. the weather is crappy, the subway is sketchy, and everything for some reason seems more difficult and less enjoyable here.

i guess it's hard, since the last city i was in was stockholm, but come on. this is ridiculous. granted, the musique instrument was pretty cool, as was the brewery, but both were pretty difficult to find and the music museum was basically useless after the 3rd floor. don't know why i wasted my breath getting up there. the atomitron should have been amazing. whose idea was it to not make it about the chemistry, but about the history of a building instead though? i should've just looked at it from outdoors. what a waste of time. i felt bad for the people who worked there; they must've felt like crap taking my money. the hostel, centre van gogh, is, however, ok. but it was also impossible to find, and the lady at the info desk didn't really want to help. at 10.20pm. from a train/subway station with no info or directions to speak of.

i know i'm not coming back here, and that is sad. but i'm betting barcelona will be better tomorrow. well, it'd better be, anyway.

good luck, brussels, maybe yoiu will become a better place. maybe. i doubt it, but maybe.

london, stockholm

so london seems like FOREVER ago. in reality, we flew out on monday. merely a week ago. got into london fine, and immediately went to see the sights, starting with buckingham palace. the subway in london is so fantastic. but i was so dead on that tuesday, that we decided to let me take a nap in the park in the afternoon so that i could revive myself. well, about ten minutes after i lay down and closed my eyes, it started raining like you wouldn't believe. first, we hid under a tree in the hopes that it would pass... but it just got worse and worse and we ended up drenched and running for shelter. not a good start.

but it got better from there. after the rain (haha) we went to the Portrait Museum, which was fantastic. but it was starting to get late at that point, so we headed home after that and were in bed and asleep by 9. 2 hours before my 4 year-old cousin, haha.

the next day, we saw a bunch more of the sights. we ended up seeing a billion museums, all of which were fantastic. we saw the natural history museum, westminster abbey, the imperial war museum (a ton better than the name would have you believe!) and went to a couple of pubs for dinner. all in all, i can't remember all of the details anymore, except that it was fantastic. also got to see my good friend Shain and his girlfriend in london, which was a wicked treat.

friday was our goodbye to London. we had a flight at 6:30 the next morning, so we took off to the airport for the night. it was a lot more tiring than i thought it would be, but we survived and live to tell stories of it.



we arrived in stockholm at around noon on saturday, and promptly checked into our hostel, The Red Boat. it has a much more complicated name in swedish, and a website, but you'll have to look it up yourself if you really care. the hostel is really nice actually. very clean, and comfortable, but slightly on the pricey side... but everything is in stockholm, so no surprise there. stockholm has got to be one of the most picturesque cities in the world. it is very colourful, and has a beautiful river running through it. we are staying right by a bridge (on a boat) that takes you straight into the old part of town, which is very charming and beautiful. mostly we have been walking around exploring the pretty old town, but we also took a boat trip around the islands (stockholm is made up of many islands linked together by bridges), which was beautiful.


next up is brussels, belgium. we leave tomorrow. good beer and chocolate, at the very least!

This blog is for my big fancy europe trip.

If you didn't get the joke, don't worry - that means you're much cooler than me.

Travel itinerary coming soon!!!