Bonjour Paris!

The trend of crap weather continued he we arrived in Paris, and, for the first time in a long time, it was cold! Andrew met us at Gare du Nord train station, so we wouldn't get lost getting to his place (not that we would have anyways), and after a couple metro trains, we were perched up at his apartment.

Sly knew of this authentic French restaurant in town - good food and cheap-ish. Awesome place, they scribble your order on the table top and work the bill out from that. Pretty impressive, as the writing is nearly illegible! We hit that up for dinner, then hit up one of Sly's old locals - awesome little pub/bar with massive pints.

Paris has these rental bikes scattered across the city, where you pay €1.70 for 24 hours and you can pick up a bike from any station, ride it round for half hour, then drop it back at any other station. Awesome system, more cities should implement it. We ended up using these pretty often. Anyways, after a few beers, we jumped on the bikes and went on a bit of a biking mission through Paris - was pretty buzzy biking through Paris at 2 in the morning, especially with sly leading us out in front of cars!

Bastille's day, France's national day, was the next morning. We had intended on getting down and watching the procession, but that took a definite backseat when we woke up the next morning. Ended up watching some of it on tv. By lunch time, we thought we shud stop being lazy shits and do something, so we went for a bike round the town during day time and then had a good perch in the Luxembourg Gardens. 

At 11pm there was going to be a epic fireworks display at the Eiffel tower. We left with a decent amount of time in hand, but didn't factor in the jumper on the metro line, so that threw a spanner in the works.

We boosted outta the station, jumped on some bikes and boosted towards town. A puncture to my tyre juted us getting anywhere close to a good view. Nightmare! We ended up just metro'n to the champs élysées for the festivities - luckily, we managed to catch the end of the fireworks. The rest of the night turned out pretty messy - we met up with a few of Sly's friends and headed out in Grand Boulevardes. 

Sly is signed up to some car rental scheme where he gets car rental for €9 an hour, with no fuel or mileage charges. The only catch is you have to specify how long you will hav it for, and if you run over time, you get stung. We decided that we'd grab a car and head out to check out a Chateau outside of Paris. The chateau (Fontainebleau) was awesome - epic buildings and gardens. We didn't end up headin out til mid-afternoon, due to the festivities of the night before, but it was still worth the trip out there.

The Eiffel Tower, built in 1889, stands around 300m high. If you plan on getting the elevator to the top, you need to line up way before they open, otherwise deal with a 2+ hour long wait... We found out the hard way. The way better option (that we took) is to climb up to the second level and take the elevator from there. We only waited about half hour, but got to climb up around 500 sweet stairs - apparently the equivalent of 43 floors. It actually wasn't that bad, so if you plan on going up the tower, stop being a fatty and climb the stairs... or get up early... It's pretty chilly up top, but the views from there are awesome! I can see why people propose up there. I didn't see any proposals when I was up the tower, but gutted bout that. Also, didn't receive any proposals... Haha. 

Another site worth getting up early for are the catacombs. If you don't get there well before the opening time, you will wait over 2 hours. Asty was feeling bit under the weather, so I headed out solo dolo. I got there round 10:10am, 10 mins after they opened and waited in line for one and a half hours and made it halfway down the queue to the door. Time wasn't on my side tho, as I had to get back to to catch the train back to London, so after 2 hours had to call it quits. Guts.

And so with that concludes 4 and a half EPIC months on tour. Pretty mixed emotions about it. gutted to be at the end of it, but looking forward to set up in London.

I'm back in London now... Back to the real world... If anyone knows of any jobs, let me know, I'm down. Prob should go on a massive detox to sort out the last 4 and half months, but we'll see how that goes... Olympics and all... haha

I guess this will be the last blog for a while... but i'll still post the odd thing about london and any random trips that happen. 

Delirious on Delirium

The country of beer, mussels, frites, and chocolate. Our time in belgium would consist of 3 nights in Brussels. Locked in a hotel room near the centre, so everything is prettying within walking distance. The weather hasn't been amazing while we've been here. Got drenched on our first day, so much so we ended up buying umbrellas for €5.50. They were shit. Asty's didnt even stay open for one. Meh, they did the job. We cruised the streets checking out the main sites round central Brussels. The MIM (musical instruments museum) was recommended by Lonely Planet, but without an English audioguide, or any english-translated info, it wasn't really that informative. Pretty much a bunch of instruments in display cases. We found the Mannekin Pis and it's opposite, the Jeaneke Pis. They're both statutes, one of a boy taking a pee and the other of a girl taking a pee. Pretty classic. Mannekin Pis is located conveniently round a bunch of Belgium waffle and chocolate shops. Was rude not to get a waffle, even though we'd just had breakfast.

On our way to Jeaneke pis, we bumped into Mark Scott. Random as hell. He'd been at Delirium Cafe. I was keen to check it out, as it's the pub/cafe that held the Guiness World Record for most beers on its menu
(2500+, but at any one time they've got 2004 on offer). Awesome pub that plays sweet music. We had a couple of the delerium tremens (elected as the worlds best beer, apparently...) and one delirium nocturnum. Both beers were tasty, the tremens was very good. Turns out both beers were around 9%, so we were feeling pretty good after the pub. As per usual, after a couple beers you get a bit peckish. We hadn't had lunch, so decided to indulge in a bucket of mussels and frites. Rue de bouches is a street that is packed with all these restaurants that offer the same menu and same prices. One waiter was like "eat here, this whole street is the same shit, at least here I will look after you." we didn't eat there. We did find a place that did mussels tho, and man we were musseled out after... After the mussels, we pretty much wandered thru the grand place and back to hotel for a kip. Not much eventuated after the kip.

We'd heard good things bout Gent, but since we'd locked in accom in Brussels already, we decided that we'd day trip it to Gent. Gent was awesome, small place with cool buildings. They were gearing up for a festival on the weekend, so there were Marques and stands being out up all round the centre. There was supposed to be a sweet street art street in gent, but it was more graffiti then "art" - still worth a look tho. After a late afternoon beer on the river, we jumped on the train back to Brussels. Later that night, after a sweet feed of roast duck and char siu in rice, we headed back to delerium for some more tasty pints, one of which was a banana beer. it was interesting, definitely worth trying, but not one you'd want too many of.

The Cantillon Brewery is one of the last breweries to brew natural lambic beers. They run tours through there... well, they give you a book of info and let you wander round through the brewery. It's pretty cheap and they give you a couple free samples at the end. The brewery itself it pretty choice and informative, but the beers aren't really my kinda beer - slightly sour and have no sugar in them. Not that good. 

Next stop (and last stop) is ol' Paris. Staying with Andrew, so that shud cut down on accom costs. We've got five nights here before we head back to London. We also have managed to keep up our ability to stumble upon random festivals; Bastille's day in France happens while we're there, so that shud make things interesting!

Ein Masse, Prost!

As nearly two weeks in Germany winds down, I'll try recap what's been happening...

Munich

Crossing from Austria into Germany wasn't much of a change - both countries speak German and I don't understand a drop... Except "scheizen". München (or the land of the monks) is the capital of Bavaria and overall a pretty ideal place to be if you like beer and you like meat. Alex and I had pretty much hit the jackpot. Biergartens are everywhere, and the famous beerhalls are dotted round the place. There is an epic fresh produce market, where u can pick up ur fruit and vege, but also, you can grab some awesome freshly prepared food and perch up in the biergarten with ein masse (a stein) of beer.

First night in Munich (much like many places so far), we hit up a pub crawl. The actual crawl itself was lame, but we got to visit the famous Hofbäuhaus. Slow start the next day, our first activity was a bike tour at 4pm... It was worth the "wait", gave us a good summary of the history of Munich, saw some sweet buildings and statues, but even better was the swim in the river that runs through the English Gardens and the visit to the 2nd biggest biergarten in the world. Further up from where we swam was the famous free standing wave, where surfers can jump in and ride. The biergarten was just as good tho. I got beaten by a plate of ribs... Well more like two racks of ribs. One rack was enough, but two is ridiculous. These German really know how to do meat. Even after offloading a couple to Asty, I couldn't finish them!

Third day in Munich was a pretty eye opening experience. Dachau, one of the longest operating concentration camps used by the Nazis, was a half hour train NW of Munich. So much wrong doing went down there (and even more so at other camps). We got a guided tour round the grounds, which was LONG (3+ hours) but worth the €3 we paid. Our guide didn't hold back on his opinions of international government and politics, so by then end I was a bit over his preaching. After getting back to munich, we needed some beers to unwind from the day. We ended up at the Augustina beer hall and luckily for us they showed the Euro final, where Spain destroy Italy 4-0.

We ended up locked an extra night in the hostel so we could train up and see the Neuschwanstein castle. This castle is the one Walt Disney based the Disney castle on. Crazy King Ludwig II blew a shitload of tax payers money to build this castle for no real purpose.It took an hour and a half to get up there, but it was worth it. The whole area is picturesque - there's actually another smaller castle and a wicked lake. The Neuschwanstein castle is awesome. You get a free tour included in your ticket, but you can only go at specific times. We got there round 2:45pm and out tour wasn't til 5:20pm. It's was sweet tho, gave us heaps of time to check out the lake, the other castle and time to hike up the mountain to the Neuschwanstein. We didn't end up getting back to Munich until after 10:30pm. It turned out the the German twins were in Munich as well, so we caught up with them (just Lena, as Sarah was busy) the next morning before our train up to Stuttgart.

Stuttgart

The first thing on the train you notice when you get near Stuttgart is the HUGE Mercedes-Benz Arena just south of the town. A direct quote from Lonely Planet's description of Stuttgart: "For tourists, come for the car museums and then leave." I have to somewhat agree with their description, all that's to offer there is the car museums.

Our first full day in Stuttgart, we spent an hour frantically wandering the streets tryna find a place that would air the State of Origin league game 3 decider... Nowhere showed it! The deceptive "SKY" sport signs don't actually mean that the bar will show sky sports! We ended up having to stream it at the hostel. Intense match, but NSW went down for the 7th year in a row... Pretty gutting that... After that devastating loss, we headed out to the Mercedes-Benz museum. This is definitely worth stopping in Stuttgart for - even if you're not big into cars. The museum doesn't just give you a run down f the company (or companies as we found out), you a bit of a run down of German history. Definitely good value - especially on a half price student ticket! It took us just over 2 1/2 hours to get thru it, which was lucky cos they were about to close when we left. There was still the Porsche museum to check out the next morning before we headed to Frankfurt.

Frankfurt (... Or Frankfurt-am-Main as the locals call it).

We arrived in Frankfurt a little delayed... 20 mins, first time that we experienced Germany INefficiency. There was a free pub crawl that night. Bang on! The pub crawl left at 10, so we had plenty of time to smash a feed and a couple beers before it. There was a pretty big crew, I guess there always is if it's free. The leader stopped us outside a convenience store so we could pick up a roadie, as the first pub was 20mins away. The 20 min walk turned into 45+mins... So everyone was pretty much sober by the time we hit the first pub. We ended up hitting only 3 pubs. Still a decent night out, but the 45 min return trip was death...

The next day, we wandered round Frankfurt and checked the sights - not that we knew what we were
looking at. Later that night, there was a free night walk, so we joined (why not? It was free!). There's this shopping mall that up you can go up to the roof for free and has a swt view of the Frankfurt skyline. Most of the other sites, we'd already covered during the day. Next day, we saved some euros and took a 3 hour local train to Cologne (or Köln, as the locals say). As we were packing up, there was a bit of commotion outside on the street. Bit of a scuffle between two groups. Words exchanged, bottles thrown. One dude was wearing red from some cuts on hit chest. The police rolled up 5 mins too late, but some good excitement for the morning. I guess that's what you gotta expect when you crash in the red light district!

Cologne (Köln)

We arrived in Köln late afternoon. Afta a small battle to locate the hostel, we were asked by the hostel owner if we were in town for the summer jam music festival. We weren't. He then paused and asked if we
were here for the other festival. We had no idea what he was on about, then he was like "the big gay pride festival." ...Apparently, one of the world's largest gay pride festivals was on on Köln this wknd... We weren't here for that, but it was definitely gonna make our visit to Köln a whole lot more interesting. We headed into town to check out the Cathedral (one of the largest in Germany) and for a couple beers and a feed, nothing too large, as we had to catch the last train back to the hostel before 11:30pm. After being dominated by a pork knuckle for dinner, we had a wander through the town/drinking area of town. There were gays everywhere. I'm not a homophobic person, but even this many of them weirded me out a bit.

The next day was the parade for the gay festival. We found out that the name of it was "Christopher Street Parade." this lead to a bit of stick from Alex... The parade was mental. So many people around... After  backing up the pork knuckle with two racks of ribs, we had a quick look at the parade and then tried to find a pub to watch the Wimbledon mens final. After many failures, we found a swt american themed bar and perched there and watched Federer take it out. Pretty satisfied, as we were going for Federer. The rest of the night was pretty chilled. Grabbed a feed at Früh (a local joint that sells pretty decent food) - I went easy with a schnitzel. Alex on the other hand, locked in another pork knuckle... 

Köln was our last stop in Germany. Just over a week before we're back in London... 

Next stop: Brussels. Time for some mussels and frites!!

P.S. Happy B'day to my Bro for the 5th! Hope you had a good one!

Once an Austrian went yodeling...

We scored a free train ticket to Vienna off the hostel in Bratislava, so we only needed to buy one at the station. The next train to Vienna departed at 12:46pm and we arrived at the platform just in time to see it roll off... Son of a bitch! The first thing I noticed about Austria is the greenness. Lots of trees around the place. Our hostel was west of the city, so we had a wander round the west side of the city. I needed to get some cash out, which turned out to be a semi-nightmare. Everything on a Sunday is closed. I found more cigarette vending machines than ATMs. After and hour, I finally found one and got my first €100 note. Looks pretty sweet in the wallet, but is a massive bane when you try to buy anything... Once I had my cash, first priority was an authentic wiener schnitzel. Found a joint nearby that did an authentic veal wiener schnitzel. it was alright, pretty damn expensive tho - definitely lock it the ribs next time, they looked EPIC! After dinner, we hit the local travel bar for the footy and watched England play like England and lose to the Italians. Even though it went to penalties, England didn't deserve to win.

The weather was shithouse the next morning - first shit house day we've had so far, but we manned up and went sightseeing anyways. By the time we got into town, the weather had cleared up a bit anyways. We spent most that day just aimlessly wandering round the centre. We managed to stumble upon statues and impressive building everywhere. When we checked later, it turned out that we'd pretty much nailed all the sights round the centre! We had dinner at a local restaurant nearby the hostel. It's been owned by this Austrian lady and her American husband for ages. The feeds there are decent and the guy is hard case. I can't explain what he's like, but he's a real beauty. After the feed, we hit up the travel bar again... No footy, but didn't hav anything else to do, so why not? After an hour or so, a contiki bus crew rocked in, so that Monday night turned out to be pretty messy.

I woke up feeling a little seedy, but after an ice coffee (probs best ice coffee I've had since leaving NZ), and a feed, I started to come right. While we were waiting for our feed, this guy on another table got pickpocketed by this kid. The kid bolted and the dude chased after him. Was pretty buzzy and happened so quick. The kid actually ditched the wallet in a garden next to the cafe, so must've just taken the cash and run. Was a pretty eye-opening experience. Def look after my wallet a bit more now!

A kiwi pair in our hostel told us bout this palace and gardens, where the royal family used to live, so that afternoon we went and had a look. The gardens were awesome, massive area, flowers, fountains, statues. There was a hill that you could walk up and get a view out over the whole grounds and Vienna. Wasn't real keen to tackle it, but glad I did. Didn't hit up the zoo that was there, but did hit up the mazes. They were pretty sweet, not too hard - although I made some pretty bad decisions and prob hit every dead end...


Next morning, we trained it to Salzburg. The train was a booster, highest speed I remember seeing was 180km/h. My reading had taken a backseat since I lost my book on Topdeck, so I picked one up written by an author with a particularly entertaining name: Patrick Woodhead. We got in round 2pm and checked into our hotel. No hostels had vacancy, so we had to splash out for two nights in a semi-hotel. Was pretty swt tho, got our own room with air-con, tv, bathroom. Best part was no bunk beds! We dumped our packs and went for a wander into old town. Old town is across the river from the main part of Salzburg, but all the boutique places are in old town, so if you want to shop, that's the place to go. We didn't want to shop, but there were still some sweet buildings and statues to see. We grabbed a late lunch, round 5pm to tie us over til the euro semifinal that night. Portugal put up a decent effort, pushing Spain to penalties, but ultimately stoked Spain won it. Especially cos Ronaldo is a crying sook.

We didn't cover the whole of old town the day before, so the next day we checked out the rest of it and tools the tram up the hill to the castle. The castle at the top of the hill is pretty much the symbol of Salzburg. It's pretty sweet. Awesome views out over Salzburg and to the south. The wait to get up the tower was over half an hour, too long, so we boosted. The Mirrabell gardens were pretty good. We perched up there for most of the afternoon... Well pretty much the whole afternoon. Tuffy moi-perched most of it. We met these Aussie chicks there who were tryna recreate a scene from sound of music... They looked like beauties, but I filmed whatever they were tryna do for them. I don't think I've seen sound of music, so can't tell u what scene they were doing... Germany played Italy in the other semi of the euro. If they won, it would've meant a good night and an epic final for us, especially cos we would be in Germany for the final! BUT they blew out BIG time. The Italians to their credit deserved it. There was a pretty sombre mood after the game. We didn't end up heading out, so got one of the morning trains to Munich.

We're in Stuttgart now, just checked out the Mercedes-Benz museum. Pretty choice, but i'll fill you in on Germany soon.