Living in a fairytale town.

By which I mean we made it to Cesky.  Currenty the two of us are sitting in the window sill looking up towards the castle tower as the last light disappears, and lightening flickers in the background.  No rain or thunder, just lightening for now. 

The rain came earlier today, caught us a bit short actually.  When we arrived at the hostel they told us it was supposed to rain tomorrow, so we decided to head up the castle tower today while the weather was nice.  By the time we headed down a few clouds had started to gather.  It was still hot as we ambled about so we decided to find a cold drink in the town square.  By the time we left large rain drops had started to fall (and I mean large).  So we ducked into the closest cafe to have a coffee and wait, hoping it would clear for long enough for us to get back to the hostel.  The waiter out front laughed as we ran in looking cold, and obviously just choosing the closest cafe.  It did pass enough for us to get back, and has remained merely cloudy for the last few hours. 

The tower was great.  It gave a view over all of Cesky, which isn't very big.  But thats what I love about it.  Its quaint - without the condesending conotations the word usually includes.  An almost all old town, nestled into the surrounding green hills.  It really is a fairytale like place.  Theres also a river running around the town, separating the main town from the castle (the second biggest in Europe after Prague apparently), and the river looks clean, and sounds like a real river.  I was a little sad when I first arrived that we are only here for one and a halfish days.  I think its enough though, we'll get through all the 'things to do' in that time.  Particularly with the hostel guy writing half of them off as pointless or overpriced.  If I was here for a week though I think I could be quite happy here. 

Tonight we ate at a vegetarian restaurant (yes family, vegetarian, NO meat), down by the river.  Restaurants and cafes by the river are a dime a dozen around here.  Someone said theres 164 cafes/restaurants in Cesky, and I just about believe it.  We also finally asked the waiter how to say thank you, we still got it wrong, and I think he thought we were a bit odd, but at least we've got it better than before. 

Darkness has taken over in the time its taken me to write this, but the lightening still flashes occassionally.  One big advantage to being the types to not go out drinking out every night is that most others do, so we've got the dorm to ourselves, so lovely and peaceful.  Just stevie on the panda keeping us company.  (To explain - Stevie Ray Vaughan playing on my little panda speaker)

Nameless.

A nameless blog for a somewhat aimless day.  A guidebook I read at some point said the best time to visit Charles Bridge was dawn - before it got flooded with tourists.  Having passed by it a couple of times in the last few days we thought that sounded like a good idea.  We didn't manage dawn, because around here its some stupid time like 5 am.  However we did make it there by around 7.30, and there were a few tourists around, but not many.  It was also quite nice to see the city that early, and it was shaping up to be a beautiful day.

It remained a beautiful day, almost too beautiful as there was little shade to be had up at the castle.  Which is where we spent the rest of the morning.  We walked from the hostel to the castle, coming in the back entrance some what by accident (wandering a bit far on a street one step to far over, but as is Pragues way ending up there anyway).  We wandered about the grounds for a while, in search of the guards.  It was a great place, I liked how it was a palace surrounded by tons of buildings, the way you think of those old set ups being, not just an isolated castle.  Anyway we found some guards, but it was still too early for the supposed noon changing, so we walked on down to the bottom hoping to find an entrance to the gardens, which we didn't.  We did manage to find a seat though upon which to sit and read for an hour.  After being slightly shuffled off by some old people we managed the hike back up to wait for noon.  Now the changing of the guard has been about the only thing I had planned to see before I left, it was mentioned in a guide book that theres an amazing fanfare of pomp and ceremony in the 12 o'clock changing of the guard.  At almost 12.10 we thought, damn we must have got the wrong guard station or something, and began to wander off, when we ran into the new guards coming the other way.  It wasn't quite the spectacule I was expecting, but it was still fun, and funny.  I have to say though I felt incredibly sorry for those guards, watching as all these tourists wandered around in shorts with ice creams, posing for photos with them, while they had to stand there, in their jackets and pants and hats and white gloves, standing still.  Torture for me.

Post guard watching we tried again to get into the gardens, the aim being to read/sleep away the afternoon in a pleasant surrounding.  We did get a little way down, but discovered you had to pay to get down to the bottom, and they didn't look like quite what we were after so we changed our minds and headed off to get an ice cream and sit in the senate gardens again while we ate it.  Then true to Prague fashion, we decided to see if we could walk along that side of the river till we got to one of the bridges further down, just to see something different, and we came across a perfect little park.  So we lay down and went to sleep for an hour.  I will say one thing for European parks and grass, they're full of bloody ants, not so good for the rest factor.

I've gotten quite used to what appears to be the Czech way of pedestrians crossing roads.  Perhaps a little too used to it.  Cars don't often seem to stop at pedestrian crossings, pedestrians just walk out into the middle of the road and assume that if they do the car will stop.  Which it does.  It's a nerve racking way to cross the bigger roads, but it seems to work.

What also worked here, though perhaps not quite so well, was hostel dinners.  We had two, and of course had problems with both, but managed to turn out something edible and not too bad tasting.  Yesterdays issues were that we discovered the bag of veges we'd bought had cooking instructions, we still ate them raw, but they did taste better when we cooked them up for a stirfry tonight.  Yesterdays other problem was that this place didn't have a can opener, which baffled us.  A potato masher but no can opener.  So we couldn't add our can of tomatos to our pasta, but still, edible.  Tonight we just had issues with cooking the rice, and dodging around the other 2 guys cooking at the same time.  But they offered to do our dishes for us so I'm not complaining.  In fact I'm rather thankful, we couldn't quite believe our luck.

So here I am in bed, last night in Prague.  Another early start in the morning to make it to the bus, but at least its only a short one tomorrow, we should be in Cesky by around 12. 

Creepy Men and pissing statues.

Despite neither of us having finshed a Kafka novel - Sophies made it half way through one and I, well I've thought about reading one - we made our way to the Franz Kafka museum.  Outside the museum is the famous pissing statue.  Quite a surprise when you're not expecting it.  Weirder though was the man that came up to us as we got distracted by it.  It took me a while to figure out what he wanted, he was speaking in broken English.  At first I thought he wanted us to take a picture of him, then I thought he was offering to take a picture for us, but no.  I'm pretty sure he wanted to take a picture of us by the statue.  I looked at the statue, heard him say something about us looking pretty 'with the little black dress' (this comment was directed at Soph) and decided no it was too strange and made a weak excuse about being in a hurry to see the museum and walked off. 

Not the last old guy with a camera today.  I saw another taking a picture of us sitting in the senate grounds eating our lunch.  Though I think he just thought we were odd.  

But I digress. The Kafka museum.  It was a little strange, they had a soundtrack made up especially for it that played as you wandered around.  It as a great museum however, though at times I felt not quite smart enough to be there.

After that we went for a nosey around that side of the bridge (the opposite to where we've spent almost all our time so far) to find some lunch.  In doing so we stumbled across the Czech senate and its lovely grounds.  So being us we found a cafe bought lunch and took it back there to eat and read our books for a while.  It was finally a nice day as well, its been a bit cloudy and cold apart from the day we arrived.  Its amazing how a bit of sunshine can lift your spirits.


Following lunch we crossed the bridge and dived back into the little streets of old town to try and find the gallery we couldn't find yesterday.  We found it.  Turns out we walked past it yesterday, its just a bit strange because you seem to have to go through a cafe to get to it.  We thought we'd be able to get discount tickets but the woman said no.  We were standing there humming and harring (spelling?) over whether to pay full price to see it and t woman said she sell us one ticket for the both of us.  So half price, pretty good.  I could see why though.  The only other people we meet were the workers, of whom there were a lot, and who liked to follow us from room to room suspiciuosly, and 2 other people just before we left. It was an...interesting gallery.  Above my artisitic appreciation a bit.  It was czech 20th century, and largely conceptual art.  Meaning to me, a bit weird and beyond my understanding (occassionally to my benefit I thought).

That brings us to here.  Back at the hostel.  We plan to do dinner at 'home' tonight.  But we'll get a cocktail first.

A few more photos.

Sorry the photos are pretty slack guys, its a little fiddly to get them up so I keep putting it off, or plain forgetting.  Believe me, there are so many more than this, and I can bore you all to death with them when I get home again.

But for now....

East Berlin gallery - longest part of the wall still standing.

Soph in front of the .... it has a proper German name but I fell into the habit of calling it the Golden Angel

Squirrel!  Charlottenburg palace grounds

First picture we've managed to get together, in front of Charlottenburg palace.

Birthday dinner!  Minus my main meal....

The boat upon which we had my birthday dinner.  Thats right, a boat.

Pragues clock, rather gorgeous right?  Poor man who built it had his eyes gauged out so he couldn't make another.  Thats what you get for doing your job well.

Prague palace, we plan to head there on Monday.  And a very tired me, I swear its impossible to get a decent photo of me at the moment, too little sleep (though we go to bed early)

Annoying Brazilian boys can be useful...

...to open jars of pickles.

The annoying Brazilians are our new room mates, gained last night, just after Soph and I had gone to bed.  They didn't have much respect for sleeping people.  I think they can be summed up by the fact that one of them just walked by wearing a jacket with no shirt.  Though maybe thats a little unfair, a couple of them seem alright, and they did open the pickles.

We started today with the Museum of Communism, which was fantastic because it was just so DIY.  Also despite the DIY nature, and the occassional grammar/spelling mistake (Bertrand Russell became Bernard Russell), it was actually very informative. 

We came home for lunch and after that had plans to wander up to an exhibition of Czech 20th century artists, but after wandering with resonable success - I managed to pick up a tshirt for the brother, and a piece of amber to get a chain for and turn into a necklace as part of my parental supported birthday present, and stumbling across a real marionette store - we tried to locate where we were actually going.  Soph managed that, I just got slightly confused.  When we found the right street we couldn't find the gallery.  I assume I put down the wrong address or something.  It wasn't a total disaster though, we enjoyed wandering through Prague, its a very easy city to waste a couple of hours wandering.  Someone asked me how to get Old Town Square.  I couldn't tell him, we just head off down a street and end up there at some point.  We even found the Jewish cemetery again after thinking we'd passed it and deciding to just head home.  Unfortunately its minimum 12 euros to see the museum and cemetery, you can't just see the cemetery, and we're feeling a little over done with the Jewish attractions after Berlin.  We found a little door in the back wall though, so managed to get a bit of a look, and some photos.

Oh that was something I forgot to write about yesterday, the police in ski masks.  We were walking up to collect our laundry and I noticed a man wearing a ski mask and thought 'thats odd, a bit open for a robber' and then the guy behind him turned around and had policie written on his back.  There were a group of maybe 10 of them, all hanging around with ski masks on, looking rather intimidating.  A case of put your head down and keep walking, don't do anything that could be perceived as dodgy.  Though their interest in a couple of girls from NZ would have been zero I'm sure. 

In our travels today I've noticed bars advertising the UEFA final, so tonight we're going to try and find a spot in our local bar and see if we can watch at least part of the game.  It'll be strange watching it at night rather than 6.30 in the morning. 

3 weeks since we left home.  It feels longer.  But tomorrow we'll be a third of the way through our trip!  If we can just get a few last things booked I'll fell a lot safer, however we've at least got the worst things booked, Paris, Munich, London, and flights from Paris to Dublin.

Ahoj!

I really like Prague so far.  Partly because its quite a fairytale like city, and partly because we seem to have this magic thing here where we walk around with no real idea where we are, and end up where we want to be.  Like getting to Old Town square, we just strolled in an upwards direction, and suddenly there we were standing in front of the clock.

But I'm getting a head of myself, our day didn't start quite so interestingly.  it started with laundry.  The hostel man had marked a couple of places on the map that he said were laundromats, so we took a walk to the closest one, and discovered a dry cleaners.  So we went on to the next one and discovered a dry cleaners that also had washing machines.  It seems that Prague doesn't really have do it yourself laundromats, just dry cleaning places which also do laundry.  So it was a bit expensive, but we just left our laundry with the lady and came back a couple of hours later after lunch and were handed a bag full of freshly cleaned, dryed and folded clothing.  Rather nice actually.  It also meant we were around the hostel for lunch, so managed to put together a rough pasta meal aka a lunch that wasn't a bread roll.

After laundry and lunch we went for our stroll.  Prague is very walkable.  Quite aside from the strange quality where you end up where you want to be without knowing how, it didn't take us long and we made it up to the Jewish cemetery (though not in, still tossing up whether 12 euro is worth it).  Prague is so gorgeous though, theres just lovely buildings every where, and on the walk home we walked by the river and you get an amazing view across the river and up the hill to Prague castle. 

I also bought today a coin from 1800 (It may be fake but I choose to believe the sweet girl in the cute antique store) to make into a necklace, something you really couldn't do in NZ.

It's me birthday.

We made it to Prague.  It was touch and go for a while, we got up in plenty of time, but that made us a bit slack so we were late leaving and that made me freak out, when we were sitting at the station at 7.25 still waiting for a train.  We got to the bus though, and were actually booked on it this time.  It was a short trip as well, so we got to our hostel here at around 4.  The hostels pretty good, very central, kitchen and wifi.  The showers however...not so great.  Its nice to have a shower that stays warm the whole way through though, instead of switching between boiling and freezing which they did in Berlin.

We went wandering around to find somewhere nice to have dinner.  Typical of us, we found somewhere nice down by the river, or on the river, but you needed reservations.  So we crossed the river and found that restaurants slightly poorer younger brother.  The decor wasn't as nice, and we had to eat inside instead of on the deck, but we got a table next to the window (oh yea did I say these places were both boats?  No?  Well you know now.)  And then they brought over the cocktail list, and that made up for everything.  We plan to go back there at least once, if not every night to try the different cocktails.  The food was also very good, and we had a resonably good bottle of czech wine.  But being Prague it was all so cheap!  In the end including leaving the change for a tip I think I spent about 36 euros for 2 mains, 2 sides, a bottle of wine and a cocktail.  I'm going to really love the czech republic.  It started to rain as we planned to leave, but the waiter took so long in bringing the check that it had stopped by the time we actually left.  Very good luck indeed.

Anyway probably time for bed.  Laundry and sightseeing to do tomorrow! 

Squirrel!

For a moment today Sophie and I turned into the dog from the movie Up.  Squirrel!  We walked up to the Charlottenburg palace this morning, to see the grounds and have lunch there.  I don't know about the rest of the palace, but the grounds really were beautiful.  We had our lunch lying on the grass by the lake, which it turns out we weren't supposed to.  It wasn't very clear where you were and weren't allowed on the grass, strange for the Germans.  After our lunch, and cake, we located the S-bahn station to make our way back into town.  Thankfully we also passed a post box so I could post the next round of postcards, instead of having to restamp them like I did with the ones from Barcelona (which is why, those of you who got them, they had two stamps). 

The rest of the afternoon wasn't quite so successful.  We headed to one of the main streets because there was an artist there Sophie wanted to see, but when we located the building there was no sign of his name anywhere on the list outside.  So on to the Topography of terror we went, which we had substituted for the Stasi museum because it was a long way out and we didn't know if we'd have time to get there and the terror place was free.  Unfortunately I had assumed it was East/West germany based, but it was Nazi based, which we've already seen quite a bit of here, so we didn't spend long there.  Instead we fell back on the good ol' fav, we ended up in Tiergarten reading.  Killing time till it was late enough to go and find a beer at a place Eugen recommended to me.  Again we couldn't find it, I had forgotten to write down the street address or the name of the place so we couldn't even ask anyone.  We found a nice bar on a corner though and got our beer.  Sophie had the Berliner Pilsner, which I tried last night, a really nice beer, surprisingly light though for a German beer.  I tried something I can't remember the name of, mainly because it claimed to be brewed locally.

For dinner we ended up where we ate last night.  Where the food was very good, and in large portions, and cheap.  And where the restaurant also had the advantage of being 5 minutes from the hostel.  I also tried the Awa...nope forgotten the German name for it, but its this thing that keeps popping up on their menus, where they mix beer with sprite.  It was very drinkable which was a nice surprise.

I feel like I've been very unentertaining tonight.  I apologise for that, I'm very sleepy.  We've got to get all packed up tonight because we need to be out of here at 7 am tomorrow so we can get to the bus on time.  Not the best start to a birthday ever, but with a nice dinner to look forward to in Prague I'm sure it will improve.

Abrupt change.

The abrupt change was in the weather.  We walked inside the museum and it was sunny and warm, we were in shorts and singlets.  We walked out of the museum and it had clouded over and was freezing cold.  I had at least remembered my jacket, poor Soph had forgotten hers.  So we abandoned out evening plans and high tailed it back to the hostel to warm clothing.  Hopefully we can still do the things we wanted to tomorrow, theres a gallery we should be able to fit in, and we can just switch our dinner plans.  It would be rather more annyoing if the weather change caused us to miss out on things we wanted to do.

We did get through a bit today though.  Firstly we found the German equivalent of the warehouse just around the corner from our hostel, which was great because I was desperately in need of a wallet - having left mine safely at home and having ended up using my camera bag for the last couple of weeks - and Soph needed some more socks and some jandals - she left hers at the last hostel.  Having gotten that, and chocolate, sorted,  (I've bought a big block of this German chocolate I love and am going to shove it in the bottom of my bag and hopefully get it home.  Fingers crossed...)  we headed off for the East side gallery.  It's the longest section of the wall still standing, and its covered in artwork.  It's pretty amazing, I think I took 70 photos.  That landed us perfectly by the river for lunch.  We seem to keep ending up in good lunch spots which is fantastic. 

A wee shimmy up to Hackescher market (I'm sick of saying 'and then') brought us to a fancy shopping district in search of an art deco jewellry store I found a card for, to have a look mainly, and perhaps find something cheapish.  When we eventually got to the shop there wasn't anything cheapish but it was very pretty.  I say eventually because we got distracted by another shop on our way.  There we were just meandering along the street lookig for number seven when our heads got turned by a shop window.  It was full of wooden toys/decorations.  Gasping with delight we found the door.  It was a dangerous shop.  The items weren't cheap but man were they gorgeous.  I could have blown all my remaining money there I think.  I didn't, but it was a struggle.

Leaving the jewellry store we saw a seat in a little courtyard and decided to grab it and eat while we had the chance.  Turns out we were in the Hackesche Hofe courtyards, a tourist attraction, something we were only alerted to when large groups of tourists started passing us by.  Thats really something to love about these cities, you can stumble upon amazing places by accident, and enjoy them for reasons other than that they're a marked on the map tourist attraction.

The rest of the afternoon we spent at the Pergamonmuseum, which my friend Eugen recommended as his favourite museum.  It was a great museum, full of Roman, Greek, Turkish and Babylonian architecture and artifacts.  Something I don't think we'll run into much further east.  We flashed through the Islamic stuff though unfortunately, being fairly tired and thirsty by that point.  It was when we left there that we got hit by the cold, and by the offended stares at our bare limbs.

So tonight we'll eat locally, theres a couple of decent looking restaurants near by, and I plan to try my first German beer (well possibly second, I don't actually know what kind of beer I was drinking in Maastricht).

I found my little green man.

And no its not a leprechaun.  It's the little man the signals pedestrians to cross the street.  The one they have in Berlin is very cool, if I heard the busabout man right he was designed by the East Germans because they couldn't have him looking down, so he looks jaunty, with a hat.  I'm a very big fan.  I noticed that the hostel sells a mug with him on it, but I thought it would be a pain to lug around, so wanted to see if they had anything else.  So we went in to a souviner shop this afternoon and sure enough they had an entire wall of stuff.  So I caved and got myself both a key ring and a bag. 

We started the day quite slowly, sorting breakfast, lunch and what we want to do for the next few days.  Todays plan brought us first to the Jewish museum.  I didn't enjoy this quite as much as I thought I would, I found it a little bogged down in pessimism at times.  But it was a nicely set out museum, and had some interesting things like the Holocaust tower which was this empty space, with only a narrow opening of natural light, and only muffled sounds making their way in.  It was certainly eerie.


Just around the corner was the modern art museum.  When leaving we were aksed by a Japanese tourist whether it was worth it, we tried to be fair but basically the answer was no.  We managed to get discount tickets at least.  There was some great art, but half the building was closed because of reconstruction, so there was very little to see in the end.


We headed for checkpoint Charlie after that.  According to wikipedia (yes I know) the last remaining structure was destroyed in 2000.  So now its just a little house in the centre of the road, and a museum off to the side which we didn't visit.  I did find it quite amusing that what would have been just inside the East side was now a massive billboard for the new ipad 2.  Another visit to Tiergarten for a quiet read was defintely in order after this so we walked back up to there, and then on to the golden angel (not the correct name) for some great touristy style photos. 


We unfortunately left eating a little late so poor Sophie had to put up with mild melt down Chloe.  We planned to find food near our s-bahn stop, but despite there being a wealth of places to eat in Berlin, there were none around the Tiergarten stop.  We tried the next stop, which we walked to, but by this time I was getting over walking, and very hungry.  So we managed to find a Chinese noodle box type place and grabbed something and jumped on the train home.  When we headed back to the hostel to eat instead of sitting in the garden Soph replaced her food with a sandwhich, which left me feeling very guilty.  Hopefully it teaches me to keep myself in check next time. 

Well it's 10.45 and i'm very sleepy, I meant to be in bed a while ago but got distracted looking up and booking accomodation for the next few cities.  At least we've got it sorted now, right up to Pula.  And busabout finally got back to us and admitted it was their problem we weren't booked on the buses properly and its now sorted.  So getting organised!  Lots to do!

Fill the gap.

Wow so it's been a couple of days since I last posted, how have you guys coped?  You better tell me you had withdrawl symptoms or I'm going to be hurt. 

So fill the gap.  Thats my new catch phrase, beware I will probably still be saying this when I get home.  It describes eating.  Around here its very easy to get hungry, food is a bit of a mission every time you want to eat.  Many of the hostels don't have kitchen facilities, though a lot do breakfast which helps considerably.  However even sorting lunch and dinner, and trying to do it on a budget can be tricky.  So quite often you find yourself wandering around for long periods of time fairly desperate because your hungry and just want to eat and go to bed.  Not tonight though, Sophie thought to check the places in town before we headed back to the hostel and we found a kebab place, or Doner as they're called here.  It was cheap and very good, and filled the gap nicely.  We haven't always been quite so lucky, our first meal in Barcelona is an example, one minute rice with a bit of tuna thrown on top.  It filled the gap but thats about it.

Things are defintely improving.  We found our way to the second hostel in Amsterdam with no trouble, and even to both of the hostels in Berlin with no problems.  Big success for us.  The hostel in Amsterdam was a bit strange but good.  It was just four beds which was a nice change, though the other two were filled with 40 year old English guys away for a weekend.  One of whom was very chatty, with a full on 'Lock stock and two smoking barrels' accent.  So we saw Anne Frank house. It was a little disappointing, not because of the place, because we were hussled around by French and English school children who were large in number and not good at being quiet and respectful.  So I didn't enjoy it as much as I could have.  We then wandered up to the red light district.  Lunch time was an interesing time to go I guess, but it was the time we had.  To be honest I found it a little underwhelming.  The sex shops basically reminded me of Krd, there were just more.  And the prostitutes standing in windows just depressed me.  I guess it being so open I expected it to be a little more classy or something, but its still the sex trade and the girls still looked as dull eyed as I'd expect a hooker to anywhere in the world.  One was even wearing playboy bunny underwear.  We didn't hang around for long, just took a stroll through and then headed off to the Van Gogh museum.  Which was huge, and very full.  It was quite a nice building, and did house a lot of Van Gogh paintings.  They'd also done quite amazing work into collecting items and artwork from around his time, things that influenced him and that he influenced, so I got to see a couple of Monets as well.

We left Amsterdam..yesterday, though it really doesn't feel like it.  We turned up to catch the bus, having gotten up at 6.30 so we could be on the tram at 7, to discover it was going to be an hour late because they didn't get in till 11 the night before (they were due at 6) and Europe has strict laws around bus drivers and rest periods.  So we waited on the street outside the hostel in the cold for an extra hour, not so fun.  Also it turns out we're still not getting booked on the bus properly which is a pain, so it was lucky we got seats. 

We arrived late in Berlin, 7.30, but thank god its light till so late around here, so we had plenty of daylight left to find the hostel.  We stayed at one last night, a place called Amstel house.  It was ok, but the one we're at now is more our speed, smaller and a little more peaceful.  Amstel was near a very good restaurant however which we ate at last night.  It was Italian, sort of.  They had a steak menu a page long, so you could choose what kind of cut, and how much of it you wanted.  I could have eaten at that place for a week and still not have tried all the things on the menu I wanted to.

Today we spent the morning finding our way to the new hostel, and then the early afternoon getting confused in the laundromat, but managing to get our clothes clean and mostly dry.  We then headed off into town and lay in Tiergarten reading for a while.  I finally finished the Obama book, which I plan to leave behind here because I'm tired of carrying it.  By the time we'd done that it was 5 o'clock so we decided it was time to have a quick look at the Holocaust memorial and head back to the hostel to find food.  Two hours later we started to head towards the train station (before turning off and finding the kebab place).  The Holocaust memorial has been by far one of my favourite things to this point.  There is an exhibition below it talking about the Holocaust, in which the Germans do not shy away from talking about the horrible things that the Germans of that time did.  It was set out really well I thought.  However the exhibition had nothing on the memorial.  Its hard to describe, and photos don't really cover it properly.  Its a whole lot of concrete blocks varying in size, getting quite tall in the middle, and the ground underneath is uneven.  You can stand in the middle and forget your in the centre of a huge city.  I think they did a fantastic job designing it. 


Off to the side, just inside Tiergarten is the memorial for the gays and lesbians killed in the Holocaust.  Some what humble compared to the other it was still quite nice, and I'm glad we found it. 


It rained tonight, we made it back to the hostel just in time.  Luckily it looks like the weather will be quite good for the rest of our time here, which I'm thankful for, I think I'm going to really like Berlin, I do so far.  And thank god its warmer here, I've managed to get out of my jeans and into shorts for the first time since Barcelona.  The only day I haven't worn them was the one I was washing them.  A bit of a problem it always being cold when you only have one pair of long pants.


Over and out from me for now.  With free wifi I'm sure I'll be back soon.  However I think Sophie and I might actually manage to venture out at night tomorrow, to go and try a German beer.  Maybe. 

A couple more from Barcelona

Our hostel room in Barcelona.  Well mine at least, Sophie was in the next room.  My bed is the one on the left.

Our hostel door in Barcelona.  The Spanish apparently don't know about basic physics, having the handle in the middle makes it very heavy to open.

Our day at Montjuiec castle.

Italian restaurant, Turkish quarter, Amsterdam.

Yeup we're going for the cosmopolitan mix.  I'm back in Amsterdam, managed to meet up with Sophie at the train station and even make it to the hostel without getting lost.  Our hostel is way out in the suburbs, but that suits us just fine.  Even being in Amsterdam the party centre of the world isn't encouraging us to go and join the fray, sleep is far more appealing.  The area we're in seems to be the centre of the Turkish area.  We stand out here more than any where else we've been.  Theres an endless supply of 'Dutch style' eatery places.  I treated Sophie to the typical Dutch food of double fried chips and mayo for lunch.  Not sure what she thought of it, but you've got to indulge in these things you know.  Much to my delight right across from our hostel (/hotel this place can't really decide what it is) is a market.  I found my self a gawdy but great ring. 

We've just been joined by our room mates, I knew it was too much to hope that we'd have the room to ourselves, but at least its only a four bed room.  They're 30+ year old English guys, in Amsterdam for the weekend, hilariously stereotypical low brow accents.  Thankfully for us they've gone for 'a beer'.  Let's hope they don't role back in here till 2 am when we're well asleep. 

My afternoon in partyville has involved wandering around the neighbourhood waiting for check in time, reading, and now I'm watching Castle with Dutch subtitles.  Perfect night.  Well perfect for me, being a little sick, very sleepy and having a full day of touristing tomorrow.  Tomorrow will be spent wandering around Amsterdam seeing the Anne Frank museum, maybe the red light district, because we should probably see it, and whatever else we come across in our wandering. 

Oh so the Italian restaurant.  We went out to find dinner tonight, and having already done the fries thing didn't want to do that again.  We found a couple of places, but ended up at a cheap but nice Italian restaurant just around the corner.  Eating in an Italian restaurant, in a Turkish area in the Netherlands delighted me so much.

...yea I may be blogging to much, nothing else interesting to fill you in on. 

Dutch club, german people, Indonesian bouncer.

People always say that you should try and eat the local cuisine in a place.   Clarissa helped me to do this last night.  Apparently Dutch food is basically take anything, and deep fry it.  Especially common is chips which they serve most often with mayo, and because chips are already fried, to make them Dutch, they fry them again.  I'm not kidding. 

Clarissa also took me out last night, to meet a few of her friends and go to a club.  It was crazy how many of the people in the room at the pre-drinks had been to NZ.  Anyway so I ended up at this little Dutch club with a group of Germans (Clarissa and her friends).  Then when I was standing in the doorway the bouncer got talking to me and asked me where I was from, I said NZ and he told me he was from Indonesia. so we were souhern hemisphere buddies.  Each time he saw me after that he would wink and say 'hey New Zealand'.

Tonight will be dinner with Clarissa and a few of her friends, and tomorrow back to Amsterdam, to hopefully meet up with Sophie with no hitches.  This is the point in time it would be very useful to have cell phones that worked.  I have a cell phone but no sim card yet, and Sophie has no credit on her phone. 

Finally Photos.

Our expensive meal in Barcelona - Hake with garlic sauce and grilled veges.

My new fav wine.  Seriously good.

Bruge, like the movie.

Maastricht - apparently the cars mean someone important was visiting, no idea who though.

The light coming in one of the windows of Sagrada Familia.

Sagrada Familia itself

The cherries you can get for 1 euro over here.

Sorry the first 3 should come after the last three but this computer is being slow.  And only a very few so far for the same reason.

Thank god for helpful Dutch people.

So I'm here in Maastricht, and its lovely here.  But it would seem even getting to here without dramas is impossible.  I got to the train station in Amsterdam ok, bought my ticket and said goodbye to Soph for a couple of days.  I then killed an hour or two there as I arrived way earlier than I needed to.  Finally the 10.30 train arrives, the platform says Heelner/Maastricht, I was a little confused by that but just jumped on the first carriage that I came to.  Mistake.  I did ask someone if the train was going to Maastricht and she said yes, so I sat down feeling settled that I had finally managed to get myself sorted.  Two and a half hours later we arrive in Heelner and I think hold on...I asked the other people on the carriage who were getting off, well I basically said 'Maastricht?' and they said no you're on the wrong train, to which I replied 'oh no, oh god really, oh my god'.  Here the lovely (and perfect English speaking) Dutch people really pulled through for me.  They told me I'd need to get a train back, so I got off with them and they walked me to the next platform and pointed to the train sign and said this would get me to Maastricht and that I wanted Maastricht central not the one written on the board.  I thanked them profusely and jumped on the train still shaking.

By this time Clarissa who I was on my way to visit had checked to incoming trains and I still hadn't arrived so she was starting to get worried.  I arrived at Maastricht with no phone, and no idea where to go.  Luckily the station has wireless so I jumped on there, really not caring how much it cost, and managed to get her on facebook.

From there Maastricht has been fantastic, its a lovely peaceful city, though apparently not at night, which I may get to experience tonight.  Clarissa has taken me for a walk around town, and taken me to an amazing ice cream store - I had an apple flavoured ice cream it was fantastical. 

Seems like this trip is a never ending series of mistakes.  I completely forgot it was going to be the weekend when we left, so accomodation expensive and hard to come by.  We've managed to find somewhere not out of this world expensive, but its still more than we're used to, and not nearly as convieniant as where we first stayed and where Sophie is now.  The guy at reception there is the one that clued us in, and was so very helpful, he even printed a series of instructions of how to get from there to the new hostel.

So we've booked a head for Berlin (we have to change hostels but at least we have cheapish beds), and Prague and Cskey.  Hoping there are a few less nasty shocks from here on out.

Bonjour

Ok just a quick one this time.  Well I say that now...  Anyhoo we made it to Paris.  A bit of a mission.  We made it to the airport, and then to the tube.  That took about an hour to get into our stop, which is a bit rough when your as tired as we were.  We only got a tiny bit lost, we walked into a hotel to ask for help and he said 'oh yeah you're about an hour away.  Just kidding' great timing for a bit of a typical british sense of humor.  In the end it was just up the road.  The hostel...was probably a typical hostel, but not so much to our liking.  The people at reception were not the most helpful.  The 24 bed dorm involved having bunks stacked three high, and considering we arrived at 11.30, we didn't luck out with bottom bunks.  You also had to make your own bed, which on a top bunk in the dark in a room full of sleeping people is not the simplest task.  Breakfast was a badly toasted piece of bread and some average instant coffee, a disappointment after the good coffee we got in Barcelona.

 So we left there by 9 to head to the station.  Buying our tickets for the eurostar was a pretty big shock, 179 pounds was the cheapest we could get, unless we waited till 8.30pm and still it was only 140 pounds.  And then we realised that was per person.  Ouch said the bank account.  It should be ok though, I sat on the train furiosly doing mental sums to work out how much we needed to save on our daily budget to cover it and its only about 3 euros so no big deal.  Still a nasty surprise, particularly for someone as anal about being organised as me, to just not realise how much it would cost, and to have not sorted out cheaper tickets earlier.  Second panic of the day was discovering that we were supposed to inform our hostel in Paris if we were arriving later than 12 ot they may cancel our booking.  After trying Sophs phone, which didn't work, feeling frustrated that I didn't have my phone which had been topped up for just this thing, and trying and failing with a pay phone upon arriving in Paris, we just legged it to the hostel.  Turns out no big panic they didn't even mention it.

The hostel here is much better than London, though half of you have stayed here before haven't you.  Its clean and the beds are only two high.  Plus as a bonus we got our washing done at a laundromat just down the road, and got the hostel dinner for 6 Euros, cheap and hassle free.

After eating, which we didn't do enough of today (you know you need more fuel in your body when you start getting annoyed with Sophie, I mean its Sophie), we went for a walk along the canal, which was pretty enough despite the rubbish.  Can't say I've had the best first impression of Paris though, so far its been noisy (a lot of car horns), cold, smelly, and we walked past a guy pissing against a wall (probably accounts for the smell).  Hopefully we'll see a better side when we pass back through.  For now, sleep, as it is an early start for Amsterdam tomorrow. 

Adios Barcelona.

Just sitting here in the hostel - which isn't really our hostel any more as we checked out this morning but left our bags in the lockers - eating one last mildly rushed meal before heading towards the airport and off to London.  Thought I should do one more post before we head out as I don't know when we'll get such good internet access again, or time.  Its pretty hectic for a while from here.  London tonight, Paris tomorrow, Amsterdam the next day and Maastricht the day after that. 

So before we fly I must tell you about last nights dinner.  We had funds for a nice meal provided by my padre.  We went off in search of somewhere to eat at around 8, but do you think we could find any where open before 9?  Not a chance.  I just about decided to pack it in, but we managed to hold out till 9 and head back to a place that we'd seen that looked quite good.  The waiter seemed mildly annoyed with us English speaking people, but he spoke english and they had a menu in english.  We both ordered a meal of hake with garlic sauce and grilled vegetables, which I thought was good, Soph thought was amazing.  I also ordered us a bottle of wine, I tried to order a Catalunyan wine but the waiter told me I should get another one, so I did.  Best decision ever.  It was the nicest wine I have ever had.  So good in fact that Sophie and I finished it between us, even drinking it while eating our lemon sorbet, not such a good mix but I couldn't help it.  While selecting our food tonight in the one place that was open, I saw they had little bottles of it, so I've bought one, and am going to try and bring it home so you can try it parentals. 

Today we took it a little slower, we headed up to the gondola which took us up to Montjueic castle.  By the way family who have been there, we WALKED up the hill to the gondola.  We then killed a couple of hours just lying around reading books in the castle grounds, it was incredibly relaxing. 

Thats it for now.  I better stop so I can scoff the rest of my food and we can leg it to the airport.  Hope everyone back home is good.  Type to you soon.

Legs.

So it looks like my last post has disappeared.  Thats some what annoying, it was one I wanted to remember too, and have already forgotten.  You may find me repeating myself, sorry for that, my brain is still rather disorientated - overloaded and sleep deprived. 

This is a blog dedicated to my legs, yeup my legs, deal with it.  Most of you will know just how unfit I was when I left, exercise was not a part of my life.  So the sudden influx of walking hours has left them rather sore.  Particularly after the long flight which left my whole body aching, and the lugging around of my big pack.  Something I look on with dread for all the hours we will have to do so again after this. 

To give you an example of this walking, this morning we visited Park Guell (or I should probably say Parc Guell...I think).  It is a UNESCO world heritage site, 13 ha of land with 'decoration' by Gaudi.  I say 'decoration' because to call it that is to severly under-sell it.  We mananged to sneaky up a side street and come in at a side entrance, so got to use the esculators that go up the hill to the park, but it was still a fair way up.  Once at the park we meandered to the main section above the front gates, then on up to the look out, then back to the front gates, and then over to the Gaudi museum.  The museum was sort of interesting, but not worth 5.50 euro which is what they were charging - we got in for 2 because we got the double ticket at Sagrada Familia.  Anyways, then we left because by this time it was lunch time and we were hungry and the crowds were growing.  So by the time we got home via the supermarket, we had been walking for almost 2 and a half hours.  And that was just this morning.  No wonder my legs are protesting.

This afternoon we went to the Catalunyan history museum for a bit of a flying visit.  It was actually pretty good, interactive which is nice considering most of the other museums we will visit will have 'touch this and have your legs removed' type atmospheres. 

Lastly, we gained new room mates last night, and I am not impressed by them.  My facebook status 'oh to slap a french girl' is a dedication to them.  Though girl is rather generous, they're women really.  The reason they have earned my disapproval is because of their entrance last night.  Once again Sophie and I (I got it right aren't you proud dad) had gone to bed earlyish.  I was just about to finally fall asleep around 10.30 and they arrived.  They turned on all the lights, saw they'd disrupted me and apologised, but then proceded to turn on the bathroom light, with its connectedfan, and which is right by my head, and leave it on while they mucked around.  They also went through their bags over and over again, which are full of plastic bags so make tons of noise.  They'd also begin by talking in whispers but very quickly ascend to full talking.  So basically they don't do quiet, despite being in a room with people sleeping. 

Anyway I should sign off.  It's about time for Soph and I to go find a nice dinner - thanks to my dad and his 'couple of nice dinners fund'.

I love google.

Ok I know this seems like overkill with the blogging, but in my defense this hostel has free wifi so I want to make the most of it while I can.  Also I'm writing this while sitting in bed, and also everythings new so seems worth talking about.

The hostel is pretty great, I was worried it might be pretty awful considering its price, but it works pretty well for me.  The owner is lovely, and speaks english very well.  Though the hostel is quite far from the centre of town, the metro station is 2 mins down the road, and it only takes about 15 mins to get into town.  It also feels very safe here, our dorm is 6 beds, but split into two rooms, and the door to it locks, so I feel ok about leaving our bags just shoved under the bed when we go wandering about.  Also we get breakfast, admitedly its only half a bagette, coffee and orange juice, but it saves a lot of hassle.  And did I mention the free wifi?  There is also a supermarket very close by, though it took us many attempts to find.  The man at reception when we arrived tried to explain where it was to us, but considering the state we were in I'm surprised I even realised he was talking about a supermarket.  Thats where google comes in.  I googled 'supermarket near reina elisenda' (the name of our metro stop) and it found it for us.  When we still couldn't find it I googled it again and got directions, which lead us straight to it.  Turns out the main reason we couldn't find it is that we hadn't realised there was a road that passed over the top of ours.

However the wandering to find the supermarket wasn't all bad, it lead us to a street that had a great fruit shop, and bakery, and chocolate shop, though I haven't visited that one yet.  We also went for a wander around our neighbourhood this afternoon which turned into a wander to find dinner, which saw us walk quite a long way, and accidently end up right where we wanted to.  I can't say the dinner we had was the best food I've ever eaten, but it was warm, edible, cheap, and we managed to order it despite the wner not understanding english and us not recognising anything on the menu.

Finally, as I'm about to fall asleep, we visited Sagrada Familia.  I can't describe it, its incredible.  Even better than last time because they've finishd the floor and opened it up.  I think I took 100 photos.  I'll post some of them soon.

Hope the weather is getting better where you are.

Barcelona wandering.

Day one and I'm already sunburnt.  I suppose that's what you get when you're a red head -even if you're one that tans well-and you spend the afternoon wandering around in the sun.  Thats what we did today, after getting up slightly late, well me at least, it would seem Sophie is still a morning person, even after two days of solid travelling to get here.  We also stopped to ask the man that runs the hostel if he had any idea how I could get my cell phone back.  He was very helpful, called a couple of different people and left his number with someone, but I don't think I'll be seeing it again (sorry Janisha, I loved that phone and it makes it all the more frustrating to use it knowing it was a gift). 

We wandered fairly far during the course of the afternoon.  Down the full length of La Ramblas which as packed.  Then we wandered along the waterfront and up to the Arc de Triumf.  Walking along the main road past the cathedral I had a memory spark, and headed down the back alleys to find the place where we stayed last time.  I found it, the door has changed though, but the little courtyard right by it hasn't, and best of all the woman in the bakery around the corner hasn't either. 

We did get lost quite a few times today, for some reason my map reading skills in NZ haven't translated to here.  I wouldn't mind so much except that last nights debacle has left me a little on edge. 

As we turned towards coming home we decided that we should try and go to the Picasso museum as we were in the area.  It's a lovely museum, Sophie loved it and I'd recommend it to any one.

I'd post some pictures but the camera chord is in my bag and I've already shoved it back under the bed (aka I'm lazy and I want to have a shower and go to bed).  I will try and post some soon however, partly because I want to show you the pictures of our dinner tonight.  Just as a teaser, think mini mart, spanish packaging, and only acccess to a microwave...

Taxis

Well it hasn't exactly been the start to the trip I would have liked.  Taxis, because our big drama centered around taxis.  So we landed in Barcelona (don't worry this is me I will back track), and got on the bus ok, and then off at the last stop.  All good.  Then we thought we just had to drop down into the closest metro station and jump on L6 till the last stop.  Bloody L6.  So standing confused in the station a very kind man comes over and helps us, and in broken english tells us the metro has changed and L6 is no longer there and tries to describe how to get there.  We wandered around for a while but couldn't find it.  So we are even more confused, absoltuley exhausted - its been about 40 hours since we left home - and the girl in the shop we asked tried to be helpful but didn't no what was going on.  So we went back down and asked the information man, who didn't speak english, and he gave us the same sort of directions as the last guy.  We tried again but still no luck, even with the help of the metro map, and the couple we asked on the street.  I tried calling the hostel, but turns out calling doesn't work on my phone, didn't set up global roaming.  I'm about to lose it completely by this stage, so we jumped in a taxi.  He was very nice, dropped us right off outside.  And can I just say taxis drive fast in Barcelona, or at least ours did.  And didn't pay much attention to road markings either.  I was so relieved when he dropped us off, and it didn't cost a hell of a lot either.  However the drama didn't end there.  We were finally in the hostel and getting ready to go to bed which we had been dreaming about for some time.  I went to pull out my phone to send a text that we had arrived, and couldn't find it.  I left in the taxi.  Awesome aye.  So thats the first task of the day, to see if we can get it back, but I don't hold high hopes.

So.  Still a bit shell shocked you can probably tell.  Hoping a day of wandering around Barcelona in a relaxed sort of fashion restores my faith in this trip, a faith which is dearly needed right about now.

The plane trip was ok (looking at it all now), just long.  It was tougher than I remember the last trip being.  I managed to get a bit of sleep, but of course on planes you could always do with more, and more comfort. 

Brunei airport was hilarious, the Westport of internationl airports.  It was so small, 6 gates all located off one room.  We also got our first experience at the 'hole in the ground' toilets, which was fun after a 10 hour flight.

The 9-10 hours in Heathrow were a bit of a struggle.  The terminal e arrived in, terminal 4 was pretty grotty.  And the line to UK border control was loooooong, and the decor a bit 1984 mixed with doctor who. 

The best part of the trip so far was in the leg between Dubai and London.  The day started to catch up with us again, and we got to see the sun begin to rise over Baghdad.  It was utterly stunning.  I took photos but of course they don't do it any justice.  I'll try and post them at some point, but now I should start seeing what I can do about my phone, and actually get out into Barcelona.

Fingers crossed for more fun experiences from here.