Well the summer's pretty much gotten boring by now. It's very relaxing. I am at the moment kickin it at my buddy Ben's apartment in the 16th, Paris. Today we're gonna go jam with some of his friends. Yesterday we tried to go up top of Notre Dame; we climbed up many stairs and got to the top and were rudely told that we had gone up the exit and had to go down. We're in lazy mode so we can only do about one thing per day. Tonight I'm moving to my friend Alexandre's apartment in Montmarte. As you can see shit is winding down. This will be the last post. It's not really worth reading I suppose, but I wanted closure. I'll try to see Sobel before I fly home on Friday. I also have cousins and uncles to see, blablabla...
Thanks to everyone who's read this. We'll see each other this weekend.
Take it easy,
Danny
Tuesday, July 31, 2007
Friday, July 27, 2007
Icht bin ein Berliner / I Am sterdam / "This is not my lint"
Ok. Our apologies. We truly have been way too busy reading HP, smoking dope, banging hookers, using drugs intravenously, and "sightseeing" to catch up on the ole blog. It was either that or we couldn't find a computer. But we've just read the tons of comments and they are endearing.
So yes we are alive and well, kickin it in Paris. But let us regress to far far back, to that last day in Berlin after Danny posted late at night.
So our last day in Berlin we split up. Charlie Rob and Dave stayed in bed at the hostel reading Harry Potter until 1:30. I couldn't abide by that so I set out. I walked through the Brandenburg Gate, through the length of the Tiergarten, and emerged where a massive church has had half of its dome blown off by war. It was left that way and it makes for sight. Then I took a bus to Schloss Charlottenburg, a "castle", the palacial residence of the Hohenzollerns (ruling dynasty in Prussia for some time). Then I took the bus back to the Kaiser Wilhelm Church (with the blown off top) to meet the guys who had dragged themselves out. I pointed out the person whom I believe to be the most beautiful woman in Germany. They disagreed but woulda gone for it anyway if given the chance.
On our way to lunch we peeked in your typical German sex shop, with three foot fist sized dildos. We were overwhelmed by these dildos. Anyway we had pizza/pasta and they read Harry Potter. At this point I realized that it was absurd for me to hold out on reading this excellent book cause it was clearly something big, so I borrowed David's copy when he finished it in less than 15 hours. Damn, kid. We walked back through the Tiergarten taking frequent reading stops (every bench) and proceeded to Hauptbahnhof to buy our train tickets for the next day. Then we had a leisurely streetside dinner, andwent to the Reichstag. We didn't burn it down but instead jumped at the opportunity to wait in line for like an hour. At this point we were thinking about everything in terms of reading (even Rob). In side the Reichstag we climbed this vast glass dome that is actually right over the assembly room for the German Parliament, the idea being that the people keep watch down on the government. Twas very, very impressive and informative.
Next stop, AMDAM! We got off the train and bought a fat bag of good but not outstanding chronic. Just kidding. We took the tram way down to our hostel, the Stayokay in Vondelpark. This was rather removed from the center of the city, but at least it wasn't Buttfuck so we got used to it with its quiet alley and sweet aromas. Just kidding. Anyway that night we had dinner and walked around to get our bearings. Amsterdam is a very quaint and picturesque town, with many canals and bridges and boats parked quayside. There are also many many bikers. Each sidewalk has its own bike lane and if you make the presumtuous mistake of walking down you will get rung at. You might even get a dirty look. Trams also abound here. And the preffered architectural style is brown brick. All in all its a very pretty place. Until we got lost and were approached by an old man who thouht we needed directions to the gay area. We did not need these directions or his foul presence. Some of us fled (Robbie was convinced the man was trying to hit on him and still tries to argue this case). He (the old bum) got really pissed at us and started ranting about how we were lying about some dumb shit. I realized I had forgotten my long and thin pocketkife at the hostel so I also fled. Anyway, we wanted to kee^p moving so we wound another street and realized that he was guarding the street crossing like a goddamned toll bridge troll. Crazy fucker. We continued on our evening stroll and found our way to bed safely.
Full day no. 1: On this day we woke up rather early and went to the Rijksmuseum, which featured sweet Dutch paintings and other shits, the Van Gogh Museum, which you can assume about, and the Heinekein Brewery Experience, which was really three free drinks and a sweet bottle opener. The tour was controversial, liked by some and deemed shitty by me. After this packed morning, we had lunch. After that we went to the sex museum, which wasn't all that exciting. We went back to the hostel and napped, building strength for our trek into the Red Light District that evening (ominous music). After the nap we readied our raincoats cause it was raining. We hqd a shitty dinner in the hostel's bar and started walking. Whatever you pictured is probably true; there actually are girls in windows through which you see, from the street, a small room with a bed and a blacklight. It looks like a vending machine. Later on we went to bed.
Full day no. 2: On this day we took it easy waking up and ambled on down to the two block long line outside the Anne Frank House. Rob and I read Harry Potter. By this time Charlie was reading Huck Finn and David Breakfast of Champions. Anyway it felt really unproductive to just stand there on line for hours. It wasn't moving at all. So Charlie and I decided to go the train station to buy our tickets for the ride to Paris. We realized there that another long line was already in place. He and I waited for over an hour (Charlie met and spoke with a girl going to Middlebury) and missed the A.F. House. Rob and David did go and thought it a meaningful experience. Anyway after this, we got a kebab lunch and headed towards Nemo, which I thought was a science museum but turned out to be a fucking kiddies playground. I thought it sucked. The rest enjoyed themselves interacting with experiments and other random shit. They had the time of their lives. In one experiment they kicked the shit out of some kids in a hydroenergy race. "IT WAS AWESOME!!!" After Nemo we split. They went to Stedelijkmuseum and I went to the Koninklijk Palace, which unfortunately I found to be closed. When Charlie Rob and David saw the signs at the museum with Picasso, Kandinsky, and the other big players crossed out, we thought it was a cool artsy poster. Turns out their permanent collection was not on display, so we only saw very contemporary art, that made no sense. It was hard to be impressed by a room filled with TV screens only showing monotone colors.
We met up back at the hostel. Danny and David wrote a postcard to Goldberg. Then we went out and found some dinner on a very quiet and secluded street in a lovely residential area. We sat for at long time kickin back and reflecting. We went back to the hostel and played lots of pool at the bar.
The next day we took our train to Paris. By now the weather has become nice and springy and there is sometime a breeze. It's more pleasant at present.
We arrived at our hostel in Paris, which in actuality is a "no star hotel". At check in, our receptionist informed us in very broken english and french that our four bed room was a room with two double beds. We argued for a while but he claimed that this was clear on hostelworld.com. Bullshit. We went to the room, and saw that it was really on double bed and one single. We argued a lot more with the guy, who was immensely retarted and pugnacious. This man is a lively copy of Mr. Win from Hey Arnold (move it football head). Does anyone get the "this is not my lint" reference now? In the end he agreed to "do us a favor" and gave us an extra mattress for the floor, so we switch off pairing in the double bed.
Anyway our first evening in Paris was quiet. We walked around the Ile de la Cite and the Latin Quarter, where we had dinner. Then we sat and chilled out at a hookah bar.
On our first full day (yesterday), we went on an ambitious walking tour of Paris. Danny led us through the Marais, our neighborhood where we stay, the Palais Royal, the Louvre (but we didn't go in), up the Champs Elysees and up to Arc de Triumph for a dank view. Then down Avenue de la Grande Armee where we walked down Rue des Acacias and Danny showed us his old apartment building, and then down Rue Colonel Mol, where his elementary school still stands. We had images of little Danny walking home and buying his Kinder Egg at the boulangerie. He showed us where his best friends used to live. We had lunch at the Place St. Ferdinand (food here is crazy expensive but good), and walked on to the Trocadero and under the Eiffel Tower. During this we stopped at the churches St. Eustache and the Madeleine. After the Eiffel Tower and the adjacent gardens we split up; Danny went to the Hotel des Invalides to see Napoleon's tomb and the rest went to the Musee D'Orsay for an impressionist exhibition. Danny also read in the Jardin du Luxembourg for some time. Both parties enjoyed very much and met up on the Ile de la Cite. We walked back to the hostel and some dudes showered while I (Danny) finished Harry Potter. It's the ballsack. Later on we had dinner, and went on a long quest for a bar with pool, or billiards. We walked a while to Quigley's Point, an Irish pub, only to find out that their table was broken. Blast! We had a drink and walked on to McBrides, another Irish pub, that had a pool table with the resident pool-playing badass, Mac. Luckily a girl beat him, Charlie beat the girl that beat Mac, Rob beat Charlie who beat the girl, but then got beat himself, by Alex. It was close. We went to bed.
This morning, we've only done this so far, but intend to actually go in the Louvre, St. Chappelle, Angelinas for hot chocolate, then go up to Monmartre, and eventually meet up with Danny's friend Alexandre.
We hope you continue to enjoy whatever you're doing, and we'll be home soon (some of us) to give you the real version of what went down (hint: museum means crack rocks).
Screamin Bob, your comments are dank!!
Tara and Jenny, thanks for the survival kit, it has now come in handy and we have proof.
Last but not least, there are still some of you woh we know are reading but still have not commented. This is probably our last post as the four of us, so make the best of it.
Anyway take it easy and stay in touch however you can
Team America
So yes we are alive and well, kickin it in Paris. But let us regress to far far back, to that last day in Berlin after Danny posted late at night.
So our last day in Berlin we split up. Charlie Rob and Dave stayed in bed at the hostel reading Harry Potter until 1:30. I couldn't abide by that so I set out. I walked through the Brandenburg Gate, through the length of the Tiergarten, and emerged where a massive church has had half of its dome blown off by war. It was left that way and it makes for sight. Then I took a bus to Schloss Charlottenburg, a "castle", the palacial residence of the Hohenzollerns (ruling dynasty in Prussia for some time). Then I took the bus back to the Kaiser Wilhelm Church (with the blown off top) to meet the guys who had dragged themselves out. I pointed out the person whom I believe to be the most beautiful woman in Germany. They disagreed but woulda gone for it anyway if given the chance.
On our way to lunch we peeked in your typical German sex shop, with three foot fist sized dildos. We were overwhelmed by these dildos. Anyway we had pizza/pasta and they read Harry Potter. At this point I realized that it was absurd for me to hold out on reading this excellent book cause it was clearly something big, so I borrowed David's copy when he finished it in less than 15 hours. Damn, kid. We walked back through the Tiergarten taking frequent reading stops (every bench) and proceeded to Hauptbahnhof to buy our train tickets for the next day. Then we had a leisurely streetside dinner, andwent to the Reichstag. We didn't burn it down but instead jumped at the opportunity to wait in line for like an hour. At this point we were thinking about everything in terms of reading (even Rob). In side the Reichstag we climbed this vast glass dome that is actually right over the assembly room for the German Parliament, the idea being that the people keep watch down on the government. Twas very, very impressive and informative.
Next stop, AMDAM! We got off the train and bought a fat bag of good but not outstanding chronic. Just kidding. We took the tram way down to our hostel, the Stayokay in Vondelpark. This was rather removed from the center of the city, but at least it wasn't Buttfuck so we got used to it with its quiet alley and sweet aromas. Just kidding. Anyway that night we had dinner and walked around to get our bearings. Amsterdam is a very quaint and picturesque town, with many canals and bridges and boats parked quayside. There are also many many bikers. Each sidewalk has its own bike lane and if you make the presumtuous mistake of walking down you will get rung at. You might even get a dirty look. Trams also abound here. And the preffered architectural style is brown brick. All in all its a very pretty place. Until we got lost and were approached by an old man who thouht we needed directions to the gay area. We did not need these directions or his foul presence. Some of us fled (Robbie was convinced the man was trying to hit on him and still tries to argue this case). He (the old bum) got really pissed at us and started ranting about how we were lying about some dumb shit. I realized I had forgotten my long and thin pocketkife at the hostel so I also fled. Anyway, we wanted to kee^p moving so we wound another street and realized that he was guarding the street crossing like a goddamned toll bridge troll. Crazy fucker. We continued on our evening stroll and found our way to bed safely.
Full day no. 1: On this day we woke up rather early and went to the Rijksmuseum, which featured sweet Dutch paintings and other shits, the Van Gogh Museum, which you can assume about, and the Heinekein Brewery Experience, which was really three free drinks and a sweet bottle opener. The tour was controversial, liked by some and deemed shitty by me. After this packed morning, we had lunch. After that we went to the sex museum, which wasn't all that exciting. We went back to the hostel and napped, building strength for our trek into the Red Light District that evening (ominous music). After the nap we readied our raincoats cause it was raining. We hqd a shitty dinner in the hostel's bar and started walking. Whatever you pictured is probably true; there actually are girls in windows through which you see, from the street, a small room with a bed and a blacklight. It looks like a vending machine. Later on we went to bed.
Full day no. 2: On this day we took it easy waking up and ambled on down to the two block long line outside the Anne Frank House. Rob and I read Harry Potter. By this time Charlie was reading Huck Finn and David Breakfast of Champions. Anyway it felt really unproductive to just stand there on line for hours. It wasn't moving at all. So Charlie and I decided to go the train station to buy our tickets for the ride to Paris. We realized there that another long line was already in place. He and I waited for over an hour (Charlie met and spoke with a girl going to Middlebury) and missed the A.F. House. Rob and David did go and thought it a meaningful experience. Anyway after this, we got a kebab lunch and headed towards Nemo, which I thought was a science museum but turned out to be a fucking kiddies playground. I thought it sucked. The rest enjoyed themselves interacting with experiments and other random shit. They had the time of their lives. In one experiment they kicked the shit out of some kids in a hydroenergy race. "IT WAS AWESOME!!!" After Nemo we split. They went to Stedelijkmuseum and I went to the Koninklijk Palace, which unfortunately I found to be closed. When Charlie Rob and David saw the signs at the museum with Picasso, Kandinsky, and the other big players crossed out, we thought it was a cool artsy poster. Turns out their permanent collection was not on display, so we only saw very contemporary art, that made no sense. It was hard to be impressed by a room filled with TV screens only showing monotone colors.
We met up back at the hostel. Danny and David wrote a postcard to Goldberg. Then we went out and found some dinner on a very quiet and secluded street in a lovely residential area. We sat for at long time kickin back and reflecting. We went back to the hostel and played lots of pool at the bar.
The next day we took our train to Paris. By now the weather has become nice and springy and there is sometime a breeze. It's more pleasant at present.
We arrived at our hostel in Paris, which in actuality is a "no star hotel". At check in, our receptionist informed us in very broken english and french that our four bed room was a room with two double beds. We argued for a while but he claimed that this was clear on hostelworld.com. Bullshit. We went to the room, and saw that it was really on double bed and one single. We argued a lot more with the guy, who was immensely retarted and pugnacious. This man is a lively copy of Mr. Win from Hey Arnold (move it football head). Does anyone get the "this is not my lint" reference now? In the end he agreed to "do us a favor" and gave us an extra mattress for the floor, so we switch off pairing in the double bed.
Anyway our first evening in Paris was quiet. We walked around the Ile de la Cite and the Latin Quarter, where we had dinner. Then we sat and chilled out at a hookah bar.
On our first full day (yesterday), we went on an ambitious walking tour of Paris. Danny led us through the Marais, our neighborhood where we stay, the Palais Royal, the Louvre (but we didn't go in), up the Champs Elysees and up to Arc de Triumph for a dank view. Then down Avenue de la Grande Armee where we walked down Rue des Acacias and Danny showed us his old apartment building, and then down Rue Colonel Mol, where his elementary school still stands. We had images of little Danny walking home and buying his Kinder Egg at the boulangerie. He showed us where his best friends used to live. We had lunch at the Place St. Ferdinand (food here is crazy expensive but good), and walked on to the Trocadero and under the Eiffel Tower. During this we stopped at the churches St. Eustache and the Madeleine. After the Eiffel Tower and the adjacent gardens we split up; Danny went to the Hotel des Invalides to see Napoleon's tomb and the rest went to the Musee D'Orsay for an impressionist exhibition. Danny also read in the Jardin du Luxembourg for some time. Both parties enjoyed very much and met up on the Ile de la Cite. We walked back to the hostel and some dudes showered while I (Danny) finished Harry Potter. It's the ballsack. Later on we had dinner, and went on a long quest for a bar with pool, or billiards. We walked a while to Quigley's Point, an Irish pub, only to find out that their table was broken. Blast! We had a drink and walked on to McBrides, another Irish pub, that had a pool table with the resident pool-playing badass, Mac. Luckily a girl beat him, Charlie beat the girl that beat Mac, Rob beat Charlie who beat the girl, but then got beat himself, by Alex. It was close. We went to bed.
This morning, we've only done this so far, but intend to actually go in the Louvre, St. Chappelle, Angelinas for hot chocolate, then go up to Monmartre, and eventually meet up with Danny's friend Alexandre.
We hope you continue to enjoy whatever you're doing, and we'll be home soon (some of us) to give you the real version of what went down (hint: museum means crack rocks).
Screamin Bob, your comments are dank!!
Tara and Jenny, thanks for the survival kit, it has now come in handy and we have proof.
Last but not least, there are still some of you woh we know are reading but still have not commented. This is probably our last post as the four of us, so make the best of it.
Anyway take it easy and stay in touch however you can
Team America
Friday, July 20, 2007
A Day Later in Berlin
Thus spake I: "It's like a more modern Vienna, or a cleaner Manhattan."
After last night's post we took a look at our choices of bedding: three bunks in the dorm and a double in a single room. Tim, the grandest man in the hostel business, naturally assumed two of us would take the single. We just left it to David, and we started out on a rabid dinner quest. In these phases of hunger we didn't have much curiosity about Berlin's streets as much as its restaurants. We walked by about half a dozen in the first two blocks-chinese, falafel, italian, pubs, kebab and thai- read all the menus and said we liked them. We settled on kebab. Always a good bet. We noticed here that for all the non-German speakers, communication in English is nearly always possible, and a universal common point.
After dinner we compared distances to various places from the comfort of the Oscar Wilde Pub (they've got Kilkenny Ale). They were playing the Beatles. We looked at maps but couldn't decide so we just went outside and walked for a while. Here most of the buildings are gray or steel colored and have been recently rebuilt. As we are in the former East Berlin there is communist architecture. 90% of Berlin was destroyed by 1945. So while there is a nighborhood with grand columns and old structures, all of them have been patched, renovated, and sometimes completely rebuilt (there is a tax break for building anew in the old neo-classical style). Sometimes in the middle of a block is an empty plot of land. These are fenced and overgrown with weeds. Before long we passed an open hallway leading to colors and thumping music and bottles clinking (basically every other door front in Berlin). We entered in and found an large "terrain vague" that had manifested a beach party. Several bars and music entertained a large crowd milling about and sitting in chairs or on wide metal sculptures. We enjoyed this scene for some time and got to talking to Daniel from Sarah Lawrence and his friend Rachel from, ummm, I think it might have been Harvard. Rachel was a German for her first fourteen years and an American for the last four. She spoke great Enlgish and knew tons of people. Eventually we decided to check out the big building that formed the aforementioned hallway. It was tall and had staircases with glass walls. As we got closer and then inside we saw that it was entirely covered with graffiti, There is a lot of this here; I think it isn't considered vandalism but modern expression, The place looked like a level in a videogame. Several floors hosted an art exhibit. On the top floor was the Sky Bar, a balcony overlooking the beach and its waves of traffic.
Here many of the taxis are Mercedes. There are many many cyclers, and many pretty ladies on bikes, though unfortunately none of them have required any fixing (the bikes I mean). The bike riders ride the streets and stop at red lights. Many tram lines run down the middles of the street. If you step on a rail you can sometimes feel it vibrating and you turn your head just in time to see the red cars, connected to wires overhead. They dingle a bell at you. The crosswalks are marked with a red and green soviet guy. On the streets there are many people kissing, especially under the trees; others are talking quietly or just holding hands. Streetlamps, trees, bikes, couples and tables and chairs make walking require attention. When I look down at the pavement it looks like Paris except these stones are smaller and sharper, less worn smooth. It got a bit cooler in the evening and we eagerly jumped at the chance to change up our sweaty paraphanalia,
This morning we got up early, got a ritzy breakfast across the street (Diana Krall is often heard in Europe, as is that other young woman who won all those grammys some years back). Then at 10:25 a person came by our hostel to pick us up, along with some other dudes. We walked and picked up another hostel load and met up with a big group at Brandenburg. This was where our free walking tour of Berlin left off from. We were in a group of about thirty with a 20 something British tourguide (Dave). He knew details and shit on Berlin in dumb amounts. The tour last several hours and ended on Museum's Island at three. Very informative and compelling. We tipped him and walked off into the BerlinDom, a huge Catholic Church with a great dome and two smaller ones on either side. The edifice sits at the tip of the island near both arms of the River Spree, and faces the Lust Gardens, a wide lawn with a fountain at the center and people playing volleyball and the digeridoo. The Dom itself was grand and we climbed up to the coppola balcony for a panoramic view. Then we ambled down the river a bit and into the Pergammon museum, which had dank sculpture and reconstructed structures from Ancient Greece, Babylonia and Turkey. An excellent "talking tour" told the stories of the battle between gods and giants while we followed the stone frieze's visual perspective. We got lost looking around and had to go searching for Rob, we got our backpacks at the free baggage check and bounced. It was officially afternoon now and some of us were in the mood for an afternoon chill sesh. Rob, David and Charlie were gonna stay up until 1 to go buy Harry Potter 7 at a big book store. I'm already reading a book so I'll wait. They decided to nap in a park and I went to do some laundry.
I had run out of clean shit so I was commando and in an old tshirt. This is managable with good reasoning but I need easy decisions. Back at the hostel I gathered the shit and asked a girl where the nearst- fuck it that's really not that interesting. The washing machines tumble and hiss here too. There was a a cafe adjoining the business. Here as you walk down past shops you here a lot of Slavic and other eastern languages, and Arabic and Spanish. All are clean and have clean bathrooms, though some require 5 or 10 cents for use. Children play on the street. Some are dark skinned and others are pale and blond. Many are barefoot. I'm trying to think of Berlin details but I don't know how good a picture I'm painting. I sat outside at the laundromat/cafe's tables and read, listened to music, and dozed.
When I got back to the hostel I found Dvaid Rob and Charlie cooking pasta in the hostel's kitchen. They were counting down the minutes until 1 AM. It was about 8:30. After dinner we cleaned up, invoking the roles of washer, dryer, passer, and putter-awayer. We went and took a walk around Torstrasse and Novalistrasse and talked. We went to sit in Oscar Wilde's to kill time. They didn't have Beatles tonight but a good rugby game on the tube. I say good out of coolness but I still haven't got a clue as to how it goes down, just they wear no pads and re psychos. At around 11 we proceeded to the large book store (akin to Fnac in France or Barnes and Nobles) for what we had heard would be a Harry Potter party. We expected people dressed up but there were only people waiting in line. We wandered the floors of the store trying to suggest a book for Rob but he didn't want to spend more than what he had to to get HP7. David and Charlie got on line (queue) and Rob and I went on a coffe run, in the process of which I inhaled a shwarma. Then I walked back here while the others stood on line.
The streets in our neighboorhood are wide and the sidewalks are wide, too. People ride bikes in suits and women in heels or snazzy dress. There is much snazzy dress. There are also many British people, and people walking in and out of places and to other places. It sort of looks the same as in daylight but it's louder.
At this point I don't know what else I can say. The guys got back with their books and are reading them in the kitchen.
Goodnight, old computer
Danny
After last night's post we took a look at our choices of bedding: three bunks in the dorm and a double in a single room. Tim, the grandest man in the hostel business, naturally assumed two of us would take the single. We just left it to David, and we started out on a rabid dinner quest. In these phases of hunger we didn't have much curiosity about Berlin's streets as much as its restaurants. We walked by about half a dozen in the first two blocks-chinese, falafel, italian, pubs, kebab and thai- read all the menus and said we liked them. We settled on kebab. Always a good bet. We noticed here that for all the non-German speakers, communication in English is nearly always possible, and a universal common point.
After dinner we compared distances to various places from the comfort of the Oscar Wilde Pub (they've got Kilkenny Ale). They were playing the Beatles. We looked at maps but couldn't decide so we just went outside and walked for a while. Here most of the buildings are gray or steel colored and have been recently rebuilt. As we are in the former East Berlin there is communist architecture. 90% of Berlin was destroyed by 1945. So while there is a nighborhood with grand columns and old structures, all of them have been patched, renovated, and sometimes completely rebuilt (there is a tax break for building anew in the old neo-classical style). Sometimes in the middle of a block is an empty plot of land. These are fenced and overgrown with weeds. Before long we passed an open hallway leading to colors and thumping music and bottles clinking (basically every other door front in Berlin). We entered in and found an large "terrain vague" that had manifested a beach party. Several bars and music entertained a large crowd milling about and sitting in chairs or on wide metal sculptures. We enjoyed this scene for some time and got to talking to Daniel from Sarah Lawrence and his friend Rachel from, ummm, I think it might have been Harvard. Rachel was a German for her first fourteen years and an American for the last four. She spoke great Enlgish and knew tons of people. Eventually we decided to check out the big building that formed the aforementioned hallway. It was tall and had staircases with glass walls. As we got closer and then inside we saw that it was entirely covered with graffiti, There is a lot of this here; I think it isn't considered vandalism but modern expression, The place looked like a level in a videogame. Several floors hosted an art exhibit. On the top floor was the Sky Bar, a balcony overlooking the beach and its waves of traffic.
Here many of the taxis are Mercedes. There are many many cyclers, and many pretty ladies on bikes, though unfortunately none of them have required any fixing (the bikes I mean). The bike riders ride the streets and stop at red lights. Many tram lines run down the middles of the street. If you step on a rail you can sometimes feel it vibrating and you turn your head just in time to see the red cars, connected to wires overhead. They dingle a bell at you. The crosswalks are marked with a red and green soviet guy. On the streets there are many people kissing, especially under the trees; others are talking quietly or just holding hands. Streetlamps, trees, bikes, couples and tables and chairs make walking require attention. When I look down at the pavement it looks like Paris except these stones are smaller and sharper, less worn smooth. It got a bit cooler in the evening and we eagerly jumped at the chance to change up our sweaty paraphanalia,
This morning we got up early, got a ritzy breakfast across the street (Diana Krall is often heard in Europe, as is that other young woman who won all those grammys some years back). Then at 10:25 a person came by our hostel to pick us up, along with some other dudes. We walked and picked up another hostel load and met up with a big group at Brandenburg. This was where our free walking tour of Berlin left off from. We were in a group of about thirty with a 20 something British tourguide (Dave). He knew details and shit on Berlin in dumb amounts. The tour last several hours and ended on Museum's Island at three. Very informative and compelling. We tipped him and walked off into the BerlinDom, a huge Catholic Church with a great dome and two smaller ones on either side. The edifice sits at the tip of the island near both arms of the River Spree, and faces the Lust Gardens, a wide lawn with a fountain at the center and people playing volleyball and the digeridoo. The Dom itself was grand and we climbed up to the coppola balcony for a panoramic view. Then we ambled down the river a bit and into the Pergammon museum, which had dank sculpture and reconstructed structures from Ancient Greece, Babylonia and Turkey. An excellent "talking tour" told the stories of the battle between gods and giants while we followed the stone frieze's visual perspective. We got lost looking around and had to go searching for Rob, we got our backpacks at the free baggage check and bounced. It was officially afternoon now and some of us were in the mood for an afternoon chill sesh. Rob, David and Charlie were gonna stay up until 1 to go buy Harry Potter 7 at a big book store. I'm already reading a book so I'll wait. They decided to nap in a park and I went to do some laundry.
I had run out of clean shit so I was commando and in an old tshirt. This is managable with good reasoning but I need easy decisions. Back at the hostel I gathered the shit and asked a girl where the nearst- fuck it that's really not that interesting. The washing machines tumble and hiss here too. There was a a cafe adjoining the business. Here as you walk down past shops you here a lot of Slavic and other eastern languages, and Arabic and Spanish. All are clean and have clean bathrooms, though some require 5 or 10 cents for use. Children play on the street. Some are dark skinned and others are pale and blond. Many are barefoot. I'm trying to think of Berlin details but I don't know how good a picture I'm painting. I sat outside at the laundromat/cafe's tables and read, listened to music, and dozed.
When I got back to the hostel I found Dvaid Rob and Charlie cooking pasta in the hostel's kitchen. They were counting down the minutes until 1 AM. It was about 8:30. After dinner we cleaned up, invoking the roles of washer, dryer, passer, and putter-awayer. We went and took a walk around Torstrasse and Novalistrasse and talked. We went to sit in Oscar Wilde's to kill time. They didn't have Beatles tonight but a good rugby game on the tube. I say good out of coolness but I still haven't got a clue as to how it goes down, just they wear no pads and re psychos. At around 11 we proceeded to the large book store (akin to Fnac in France or Barnes and Nobles) for what we had heard would be a Harry Potter party. We expected people dressed up but there were only people waiting in line. We wandered the floors of the store trying to suggest a book for Rob but he didn't want to spend more than what he had to to get HP7. David and Charlie got on line (queue) and Rob and I went on a coffe run, in the process of which I inhaled a shwarma. Then I walked back here while the others stood on line.
The streets in our neighboorhood are wide and the sidewalks are wide, too. People ride bikes in suits and women in heels or snazzy dress. There is much snazzy dress. There are also many British people, and people walking in and out of places and to other places. It sort of looks the same as in daylight but it's louder.
At this point I don't know what else I can say. The guys got back with their books and are reading them in the kitchen.
Goodnight, old computer
Danny
Thursday, July 19, 2007
Prahahahaha
We are in fucking Berlin. Before we were hot dirty and tired and now we're enraged because our Prague blog post got fucking deleted. AAAAArg. ANYWAY
Remember the Boathouse Hostel? We bounced out of that after a night. Here's what went down. As we said we would in the previous post, we went to meet Charlie's cousin Natalie and her friend Tess at their hostel (Condor Hostel). It was a few blocks from the main square in the Old Quarter, the center of the city. Condor's proximity to the main sights (Charles Bridge, Jewish Quarter, other old shit) instantly stripped us of our loyalty to the far and distant Boathouse. On the spot, we made reservations for our second and third nights in Prague.
The six of us proceeded to find an Italian dinner in the Old Quarter. Then we investigated a club called the Roxy. At this point it was eleven, which is European for early. We left and went to a bar called Harley's, which simulated a Hell's Angels hangout, complete with leatherclad bartenders. Nothing much to report here except that a dude jumped up on the bar and mooned everyone for a full two minutes while he signed the wall with his words: "NO PUSSY IS SAFE!" Rob took a picture. At a later hour we went back to see if the Roxy was hoppin. It was. Rob showed off his crazy techno moves. Later on we went to bed.
Our first full day in Prague, we woke up sweating, and continued to do so until bedtime. This sweltering heat sapped our energies and our will to walk around seeing shit. We pushed ourselves for about half a day before we collapsed. We saw Powder Gate, Tyn Church, Municipal House, St. James Church, and Staromestske Namesti. We also went to an exhibition of Salvator Dali. Having knocked off the essential Old Quarter things we went to the Jewish Quarter and saw four synagugoes, a names museum, and the famous Jewish cemetary. It is a rather small plot of land that the Jews had been reusing as a burial ground for centuries; consequently, it was so densely packed with graves upon graves that the tombstones are falling on each other. Very unique. We had lunch at a kosher New York deli to shut David up. He was happy. It felt rather strange to see tourists from various countries buy tickets and check out a synaguoge. I heard a French guy say it was his first time in one.
We walked back to the hostel, extremely tired, but unable to do more work. We would have liked to do more work, but our bodies simply could not take more F delta R. David, Rob and Charlie went to do laundry while I stayed in our room and said, "I'll just take a half hour nap." I woke up THREE HOUrS LATER when they got back. In that time the four of us sweated out all of our water weight.
That night, we once again met up with the girls, had a shitty "authentic Czech" dinner, and went back to our hostel room. We played cards, then went to bed.
On our second full day we told ourselves, "guys, we need to do mad work." We did, indeed, do dumb work. We took a subway to the main train station (Havni Nadrazi) to get tickets and reservations for our train to Berlin. Then we went back to the Old Quarter and walked across the famous Charles Bridge over the Vltava River. The bridge is the oldest of Prague's bridges; both sides feature elaborate statues every dozen feet of various saints and biblical scenes. Twas dank. Over the bridge, we climbed up through the Little Quarter to the Prague Castle, which is actually a large neighborhood in itself. There we checked out the huge St. Vitus' Church, St. Nicholas' Church, the Royal Palace, the Sahov Monastery, St. George's Convent and a really old and scary prison tower/torture chamber. This was all very very interesting and informative. No but seriously, picturesque cobblestone streets and all that, it was pretty dank.
After all this we declared that we had done work and that we were money. So we set ourselves on the path to the Royal Gardens for our afternoon chill sesh. We walked through some tiny streets and wound down a wooded ravine along a stream. So far, very nice. Then we got lost, and had to retrace our steps by stumbling down the steep side of the hill. No big deal. We continued on and passed the Belvedere, which I think was the king's summer palace or some shit. When we finally made it to a nice big green lawn under a tree in the Royal Garden. We got thrown off the grass by a douchebag guard. No worries. We stabbed his brother with an ice pick, and found some benches and read/napped. Later on we walked back down to the Little Quarter and had dinner at the leisurely European pace of two hours.
Once again we headed back to our hostel, met up with the girls, and killed time until midnight when there is, according to Naomi Cohen, a little mechanical show at the big clock tower in the Old Square. We waited. Nothing happened. We cursed out loud with all the other misled tourists. So we went to a bar. It was called U Sudu and several people had mentioned it in a good tone. It took us a while to get there but it was indeed pretty hoppin, with many different "areas", each with its own music and bar. We played a couple of games of foosball while a screen on the wall played an intensely pornographic music video. We left. Some dudes wanted to go to the Roxy so Danny went to bed. Later on everyone went to bed.
We woke up this morning and sweated our way to Holesovice train station. Waiting for the train, David got a Happy Meal. Two really loudly annoying British girls waited next to us and vied for conversation. All we could tell them was "1776, and 1812 bitches."
On the train, we saw that our reserved seats were in the one car without AC. And people were smoking, too. We sweated a lot more. At Berlin's train station named SudKreuz, Danny prematurely hopped off while the others stayed. Oops. We figured our shit out, met again at the Frederichstrasse subway stop, and walked to the Eastener's Hostel. We're now chillin with Tim, who's the man, with whom we had previously made a reservation with while he was riding his bike. Oh, and it also turns out that Natalie and Tess stayed at this hostel too before us: they signed the guestbook! Weird.
So here we are, about halfway done, and anxiously awaiting the release of HP7. Sam, we think your ideas sound pretty good, and we shall see the answer in mere hours. Also, thank you Sam for posting to us, unlike some other people. We are off to dinner, shoutout to Screamin Bob for his awesome comment and words of wisdom. Catch you all later. Yer.
Team America
Remember the Boathouse Hostel? We bounced out of that after a night. Here's what went down. As we said we would in the previous post, we went to meet Charlie's cousin Natalie and her friend Tess at their hostel (Condor Hostel). It was a few blocks from the main square in the Old Quarter, the center of the city. Condor's proximity to the main sights (Charles Bridge, Jewish Quarter, other old shit) instantly stripped us of our loyalty to the far and distant Boathouse. On the spot, we made reservations for our second and third nights in Prague.
The six of us proceeded to find an Italian dinner in the Old Quarter. Then we investigated a club called the Roxy. At this point it was eleven, which is European for early. We left and went to a bar called Harley's, which simulated a Hell's Angels hangout, complete with leatherclad bartenders. Nothing much to report here except that a dude jumped up on the bar and mooned everyone for a full two minutes while he signed the wall with his words: "NO PUSSY IS SAFE!" Rob took a picture. At a later hour we went back to see if the Roxy was hoppin. It was. Rob showed off his crazy techno moves. Later on we went to bed.
Our first full day in Prague, we woke up sweating, and continued to do so until bedtime. This sweltering heat sapped our energies and our will to walk around seeing shit. We pushed ourselves for about half a day before we collapsed. We saw Powder Gate, Tyn Church, Municipal House, St. James Church, and Staromestske Namesti. We also went to an exhibition of Salvator Dali. Having knocked off the essential Old Quarter things we went to the Jewish Quarter and saw four synagugoes, a names museum, and the famous Jewish cemetary. It is a rather small plot of land that the Jews had been reusing as a burial ground for centuries; consequently, it was so densely packed with graves upon graves that the tombstones are falling on each other. Very unique. We had lunch at a kosher New York deli to shut David up. He was happy. It felt rather strange to see tourists from various countries buy tickets and check out a synaguoge. I heard a French guy say it was his first time in one.
We walked back to the hostel, extremely tired, but unable to do more work. We would have liked to do more work, but our bodies simply could not take more F delta R. David, Rob and Charlie went to do laundry while I stayed in our room and said, "I'll just take a half hour nap." I woke up THREE HOUrS LATER when they got back. In that time the four of us sweated out all of our water weight.
That night, we once again met up with the girls, had a shitty "authentic Czech" dinner, and went back to our hostel room. We played cards, then went to bed.
On our second full day we told ourselves, "guys, we need to do mad work." We did, indeed, do dumb work. We took a subway to the main train station (Havni Nadrazi) to get tickets and reservations for our train to Berlin. Then we went back to the Old Quarter and walked across the famous Charles Bridge over the Vltava River. The bridge is the oldest of Prague's bridges; both sides feature elaborate statues every dozen feet of various saints and biblical scenes. Twas dank. Over the bridge, we climbed up through the Little Quarter to the Prague Castle, which is actually a large neighborhood in itself. There we checked out the huge St. Vitus' Church, St. Nicholas' Church, the Royal Palace, the Sahov Monastery, St. George's Convent and a really old and scary prison tower/torture chamber. This was all very very interesting and informative. No but seriously, picturesque cobblestone streets and all that, it was pretty dank.
After all this we declared that we had done work and that we were money. So we set ourselves on the path to the Royal Gardens for our afternoon chill sesh. We walked through some tiny streets and wound down a wooded ravine along a stream. So far, very nice. Then we got lost, and had to retrace our steps by stumbling down the steep side of the hill. No big deal. We continued on and passed the Belvedere, which I think was the king's summer palace or some shit. When we finally made it to a nice big green lawn under a tree in the Royal Garden. We got thrown off the grass by a douchebag guard. No worries. We stabbed his brother with an ice pick, and found some benches and read/napped. Later on we walked back down to the Little Quarter and had dinner at the leisurely European pace of two hours.
Once again we headed back to our hostel, met up with the girls, and killed time until midnight when there is, according to Naomi Cohen, a little mechanical show at the big clock tower in the Old Square. We waited. Nothing happened. We cursed out loud with all the other misled tourists. So we went to a bar. It was called U Sudu and several people had mentioned it in a good tone. It took us a while to get there but it was indeed pretty hoppin, with many different "areas", each with its own music and bar. We played a couple of games of foosball while a screen on the wall played an intensely pornographic music video. We left. Some dudes wanted to go to the Roxy so Danny went to bed. Later on everyone went to bed.
We woke up this morning and sweated our way to Holesovice train station. Waiting for the train, David got a Happy Meal. Two really loudly annoying British girls waited next to us and vied for conversation. All we could tell them was "1776, and 1812 bitches."
On the train, we saw that our reserved seats were in the one car without AC. And people were smoking, too. We sweated a lot more. At Berlin's train station named SudKreuz, Danny prematurely hopped off while the others stayed. Oops. We figured our shit out, met again at the Frederichstrasse subway stop, and walked to the Eastener's Hostel. We're now chillin with Tim, who's the man, with whom we had previously made a reservation with while he was riding his bike. Oh, and it also turns out that Natalie and Tess stayed at this hostel too before us: they signed the guestbook! Weird.
So here we are, about halfway done, and anxiously awaiting the release of HP7. Sam, we think your ideas sound pretty good, and we shall see the answer in mere hours. Also, thank you Sam for posting to us, unlike some other people. We are off to dinner, shoutout to Screamin Bob for his awesome comment and words of wisdom. Catch you all later. Yer.
Team America
Monday, July 16, 2007
Look back at Wien
We are now in the Boathouse Hostel in Prague. Actually, just outside of Prague. Actually, a good half hour tram ride outside of Prague. But let's regress to how we got here.
Vienna was quite action packed. We only had two full days there (not counting Danny's first day), so we were very ambitious in our sightseeing. On the first day, we had breakfast at the hostel and set out into Old Town, which is the heart and center of Vienna. To get there we walked down Mariahilferstrasse, which is the main shopping thoroughfare, all the way to the Ring Road, which circles the Old Town. We went on an architectural ecstasy tour: the Hoffburg Palace, about 7 churches, including Stephandsdom, with a very long trek up the South Tower, from which we saw the Vienna skyline. After a pizza lunch and a streetbreakdancing show at the platz, we went to the park behind the Hoffburg Palace. It was your regular park, with trees, lawns, a lake, and a big circle of potheads with four bongs. Welcome to Wien!! It was hot. We chilled in the shade, talked about Harry Potter, and read. The next stop, in the afternoon, was the uberdank Arms and Armour/Musical Intruments exhibition, inside the Hoffburg Palace. That was very very interesting.
Back at the hostel some bros showered, some napped, and all read, save for Rob, who refuses our books. Well he read one chapter but he only looked at the pictures. Anyway, we had dinner around the corner on Mariahilferstrasse, and spent the evening wandering around Old Town. We talked. Eventually Danny needed his Guinness fix so he dragged us on a quest for an Irish pub. We found one called Bockshorn's Irish something and they had pints of the black stuff. They were playing Tenacious D on the PA. We walked back to the hostel and called it a morning.
On Day 2, we planned an elaborate circle around Old Town that stopped at all the places people had forced us to go to [including Steven Roberts' clock museum (what a geek)]. This included: Museumsquartier, Parliament and City Hall, Clock Museum, and Haus der Musik.
We must brag about City Hall. To the common tourist, it is an outstanding piece of neo-Gothic architecture. To us, it was the meeting ground where we found our own Austrian cheerleaders, named Rika, Daisy, and last but not least, my precious, Allina (Danny). They were beautiful! What was actually going on was the final stretch of an international bike race that went right up to City Hall. While we went "backstage" to check out the columns and stone carvings, we found something waaay better: Euro-honeys. We chatted them up, and they recommended we go to Schonbrunn Palace. Of course, we obediently abided. Rob filmed their dance routine. Check Youtube. Just kidding. But we do have the video we're just not sharing it.
Anyway after we finished our museum tour (the Haus was dumb trippy), we took the metro to the Schonbrunn Palace, a sprawling estate complete with gardens, hedgemazes, a zoo, and lots of asian people. It was still pretty hot, but we got some dank-ass views. We ambled back to our little neighborhood via tram, had a delectable kebab dinner and cleansed ourselves at the hostel.
We decided to check out the night scene at the hostel itself this time. In europe some of the hostels have full-fledged bars/lounges within them. Wombats was no exception. We met up with the Brits Danny had befriended on his first night: Laura and Tom, James and Amy, and Katie (the brave single). That whole night was a cultural exchange between the two parties. We taught them thumper, and they taught us fuzzy duck and chinese takeout. We taught them our versions of kings, which they called ring of fire. Stupid foreigners. After a long night, we woke up.
We all expected to be woken up by Danny's watch's alarm sometime after eight. We had a train at ten. To no avail. Luckily Charlie's inner Steve woke him up and said, "hey guys, don't we have that train at ten?". Oops on the alarm. We bought bread and chease at a supermarket and went to Sudbahnhof, quickly. We got on the train. It was hot. We were quite literally sweating buckets and you know how stifling a train can get without proper American AC. We arrived in Prague, but at a station called Liben (pronounced Ribon), way outside of our destination. The train did not move on from there, because, as we found out, a dude had committed suicide by choosing this day to jump in front of a train. This train would not go any further. We took another train to Prague's oldest station.
Here the reality of hostelworld.com's directions crashed down on us: we didn't really know where the hell our hostel was. All we had to go on was a tram stop. Our tram, No. 3, showed up, and Charlie Dave and Rob got on while Danny asked the conductor if it was stopping at our stop, Cerny Kun. It was not. As Danny exclaimed "get off get off get off!", the three stared dumbly while the doors closed on them. Danny thought, "a smart person would get off at the next stop and take the 3 in the opposite direction. I'll just wait for them here." Well, they're smart, and it went down, and we found ourselves following the Vltava River, further and further from the city center. We got off at Cerny Kun, looked around, and said, "where the fuck are we?" Charlie answered, "Buttfuck, Prague". Then we saw the sign for our hostel. We followed the sign. No wonder we couldn't find our street on the map, it doesn't exist! So here we are at the Boathouse, a large, interesting structure with a sausage barbecue going on in the front, and a freezing cold river in the back. You don't know how freaking sweaty we were at this point. Rob and Danny swam in the river, then we all took turns showering naked in the communal shower, while the others stood guard over the curtain. David shaved (sorry Jon) and went through eleven blades, necessitating a slot for used razor blades. What a wolfman.
We had a sausage snack (except for Dave, obviously) to hold us over until we go into the city to have dinner with Charlie's cousin Natalie from Boston and her two friends.
Danny thinks that if you don't want to comment on the blog you don't have to (free choice!!) but everybody else disagrees. So the dudes that aren't commenting better get in line.
Surprisingly, there is very little time to blog, or little downtime at all. We're just always sightseeing!! So we'll probably catch up again in Berlin.
Take it easy,
Team America
Vienna was quite action packed. We only had two full days there (not counting Danny's first day), so we were very ambitious in our sightseeing. On the first day, we had breakfast at the hostel and set out into Old Town, which is the heart and center of Vienna. To get there we walked down Mariahilferstrasse, which is the main shopping thoroughfare, all the way to the Ring Road, which circles the Old Town. We went on an architectural ecstasy tour: the Hoffburg Palace, about 7 churches, including Stephandsdom, with a very long trek up the South Tower, from which we saw the Vienna skyline. After a pizza lunch and a streetbreakdancing show at the platz, we went to the park behind the Hoffburg Palace. It was your regular park, with trees, lawns, a lake, and a big circle of potheads with four bongs. Welcome to Wien!! It was hot. We chilled in the shade, talked about Harry Potter, and read. The next stop, in the afternoon, was the uberdank Arms and Armour/Musical Intruments exhibition, inside the Hoffburg Palace. That was very very interesting.
Back at the hostel some bros showered, some napped, and all read, save for Rob, who refuses our books. Well he read one chapter but he only looked at the pictures. Anyway, we had dinner around the corner on Mariahilferstrasse, and spent the evening wandering around Old Town. We talked. Eventually Danny needed his Guinness fix so he dragged us on a quest for an Irish pub. We found one called Bockshorn's Irish something and they had pints of the black stuff. They were playing Tenacious D on the PA. We walked back to the hostel and called it a morning.
On Day 2, we planned an elaborate circle around Old Town that stopped at all the places people had forced us to go to [including Steven Roberts' clock museum (what a geek)]. This included: Museumsquartier, Parliament and City Hall, Clock Museum, and Haus der Musik.
We must brag about City Hall. To the common tourist, it is an outstanding piece of neo-Gothic architecture. To us, it was the meeting ground where we found our own Austrian cheerleaders, named Rika, Daisy, and last but not least, my precious, Allina (Danny). They were beautiful! What was actually going on was the final stretch of an international bike race that went right up to City Hall. While we went "backstage" to check out the columns and stone carvings, we found something waaay better: Euro-honeys. We chatted them up, and they recommended we go to Schonbrunn Palace. Of course, we obediently abided. Rob filmed their dance routine. Check Youtube. Just kidding. But we do have the video we're just not sharing it.
Anyway after we finished our museum tour (the Haus was dumb trippy), we took the metro to the Schonbrunn Palace, a sprawling estate complete with gardens, hedgemazes, a zoo, and lots of asian people. It was still pretty hot, but we got some dank-ass views. We ambled back to our little neighborhood via tram, had a delectable kebab dinner and cleansed ourselves at the hostel.
We decided to check out the night scene at the hostel itself this time. In europe some of the hostels have full-fledged bars/lounges within them. Wombats was no exception. We met up with the Brits Danny had befriended on his first night: Laura and Tom, James and Amy, and Katie (the brave single). That whole night was a cultural exchange between the two parties. We taught them thumper, and they taught us fuzzy duck and chinese takeout. We taught them our versions of kings, which they called ring of fire. Stupid foreigners. After a long night, we woke up.
We all expected to be woken up by Danny's watch's alarm sometime after eight. We had a train at ten. To no avail. Luckily Charlie's inner Steve woke him up and said, "hey guys, don't we have that train at ten?". Oops on the alarm. We bought bread and chease at a supermarket and went to Sudbahnhof, quickly. We got on the train. It was hot. We were quite literally sweating buckets and you know how stifling a train can get without proper American AC. We arrived in Prague, but at a station called Liben (pronounced Ribon), way outside of our destination. The train did not move on from there, because, as we found out, a dude had committed suicide by choosing this day to jump in front of a train. This train would not go any further. We took another train to Prague's oldest station.
Here the reality of hostelworld.com's directions crashed down on us: we didn't really know where the hell our hostel was. All we had to go on was a tram stop. Our tram, No. 3, showed up, and Charlie Dave and Rob got on while Danny asked the conductor if it was stopping at our stop, Cerny Kun. It was not. As Danny exclaimed "get off get off get off!", the three stared dumbly while the doors closed on them. Danny thought, "a smart person would get off at the next stop and take the 3 in the opposite direction. I'll just wait for them here." Well, they're smart, and it went down, and we found ourselves following the Vltava River, further and further from the city center. We got off at Cerny Kun, looked around, and said, "where the fuck are we?" Charlie answered, "Buttfuck, Prague". Then we saw the sign for our hostel. We followed the sign. No wonder we couldn't find our street on the map, it doesn't exist! So here we are at the Boathouse, a large, interesting structure with a sausage barbecue going on in the front, and a freezing cold river in the back. You don't know how freaking sweaty we were at this point. Rob and Danny swam in the river, then we all took turns showering naked in the communal shower, while the others stood guard over the curtain. David shaved (sorry Jon) and went through eleven blades, necessitating a slot for used razor blades. What a wolfman.
We had a sausage snack (except for Dave, obviously) to hold us over until we go into the city to have dinner with Charlie's cousin Natalie from Boston and her two friends.
Danny thinks that if you don't want to comment on the blog you don't have to (free choice!!) but everybody else disagrees. So the dudes that aren't commenting better get in line.
Surprisingly, there is very little time to blog, or little downtime at all. We're just always sightseeing!! So we'll probably catch up again in Berlin.
Take it easy,
Team America
Friday, July 13, 2007
Surviving in Vienna/Where's JON?????
This is Danny. That last post from Galway, I thought at that point that was the end of Ireland proper (as in when you give in to events and end up where you didn't expect). You guys remember that girl from the first post on Dublin, who lent me her laptop.. well two weeks later, when I sat down in my hostel in Galway, was her, right there, Desirae!! Weird...!! Anyway the next day she drove me up to Donegal, which is a really dank town. Then from there, I took the bus to Dublin (instead of from a rather boring Galway), wandered in Temple Bar (again more people at night than at noon), and slept and then flew to Paris where my parents fed me well and housed in a posh hotel. Then the next day they sent off, via TGV, to Vienna (with a stopover in Zurich), and I finally arrived, a day (unecessarily) before the three other guys. No worries, I just got a bed in a room full of curious Brits ("does everybody really use those plastic red cups?") and spent the day meandering the Vinna Old Town. Then in the evening I had the emotional reunion with three guys I've know for about 70 lifetimes. But where's that other guy, the goofy one who we all thought for a while had ADD? Dude we think about you and in that way you're here already. Now on to Charlie->
Yer. Now it's the big guy (Charles). David, Rob and I made it to Venice (in case you weren't sure) and enjoyed about a day and a half there. We arrived at about 6 and hung out for a little as we were rather tired. At 8 however, we met up with the girls I had met in Nice. They were slightly surprised that we showed up in Venice(we were slightly surprised about this too) but we ultimately had a fun time with them. We ended up playing pong with this AMerican guy living in Venice. He was a frequent visitor at a bar we were in and set us up with tables, balls and dip cups. we played a couple of games before walking back to our hostel and just barely making our curfew. We, however, were far more punctual for our psycho hostel employees than we are for our parents. The next day we woke up relatively early to get our train tickets. We had to place our bags in lockers at the train station due to the whacky siestas taken by our hostel employees (the hostel completely shuts down from 12 to 3). We then head to San Marco's and checked the important sights in Venice. We also stopped at Harry's Bar which was fun to see, but slightly disappointing since the bar required pants and the restaurant required an outrageous amount of ducats. We had neither pants nor ducats.
In Vienna we arrived at the Sudbahnhof train station, while Danny waited for us at the Westbahnhof train station. By the time he realized the mistake and searched for us at the Sudbahnhof station, we had arrived at the hostel's room already. Whammy. Anyway, thanks to the magical powers of cell phones, we met up with Danny, hugged and walked off towards a greek dinner swapping stories.
Greeting Danny, we were reminded of how much we miss all of you guys back home. Your comments, messages, wall posts, survival kits, books and gifts have kept us well. We really do think about you often.
Honestly,
Team America
Goodnight
Yer. Now it's the big guy (Charles). David, Rob and I made it to Venice (in case you weren't sure) and enjoyed about a day and a half there. We arrived at about 6 and hung out for a little as we were rather tired. At 8 however, we met up with the girls I had met in Nice. They were slightly surprised that we showed up in Venice(we were slightly surprised about this too) but we ultimately had a fun time with them. We ended up playing pong with this AMerican guy living in Venice. He was a frequent visitor at a bar we were in and set us up with tables, balls and dip cups. we played a couple of games before walking back to our hostel and just barely making our curfew. We, however, were far more punctual for our psycho hostel employees than we are for our parents. The next day we woke up relatively early to get our train tickets. We had to place our bags in lockers at the train station due to the whacky siestas taken by our hostel employees (the hostel completely shuts down from 12 to 3). We then head to San Marco's and checked the important sights in Venice. We also stopped at Harry's Bar which was fun to see, but slightly disappointing since the bar required pants and the restaurant required an outrageous amount of ducats. We had neither pants nor ducats.
In Vienna we arrived at the Sudbahnhof train station, while Danny waited for us at the Westbahnhof train station. By the time he realized the mistake and searched for us at the Sudbahnhof station, we had arrived at the hostel's room already. Whammy. Anyway, thanks to the magical powers of cell phones, we met up with Danny, hugged and walked off towards a greek dinner swapping stories.
Greeting Danny, we were reminded of how much we miss all of you guys back home. Your comments, messages, wall posts, survival kits, books and gifts have kept us well. We really do think about you often.
Honestly,
Team America
Goodnight
Thursday, July 12, 2007
Florence Day 2 (and 3)
Yer to all and to all a good yer,
We woke up early yesterday to get on line for Della Academia. While I was in line , I honestly felt like I was basically paying 10 Euro so that all of you wouldn't call us cultureless jerks for not seeing the David. But the museum really lived up to its reputation and was worth both the money and the wait.
Our next stop was the Ufizzi Galeria, a tremendous art museum with an even longer wait. We passed the time by playing the longest game of fuck marry kill that I have ever been a part of (about an hour and a half). Once inside, the mood changed dramatically as we viewed some of the most impressive paintings and sculptures that we have ever seen including Botticelli's The Birth of Venus and The Annunciation.
We decided to check out an old science museum that was right next door to the Ufizzi, hoping for some awesome hands on Schmidt-esque experiments but the climax of the exhibit was actually Gallileo's middle finger that was preserved in a glass jar.
We ate a quick dinner and then went to the Odeon (with every other American in Florence) to see the Order of the Phoenix in English. On our way back to the hostel after the film, Charlie and David took a break from their ferociously deep Harry Potter conversation (which I opted out of thank god) to realize that Alexander Seife and his camp friend were right in front of us walking the other way. They had just arrived from Rome that day and were looking for something to do, so we invited them back to our hostel to chill in the courtyard for a little bit. After about an hour or so of swapping the few Euor-stories that we had we all decided to call it a night and they split.
Today we woke up a little bit later, checked out of the Ostello Archi Rossi and walked across the city to the Synagogue of Florence. Definitely worth the walk.
For future travelers staying here at Archi Rossi, check above room 54... "GET THERE!"
Passionately,
Rob (Charles and Z. Co)
We woke up early yesterday to get on line for Della Academia. While I was in line , I honestly felt like I was basically paying 10 Euro so that all of you wouldn't call us cultureless jerks for not seeing the David. But the museum really lived up to its reputation and was worth both the money and the wait.
Our next stop was the Ufizzi Galeria, a tremendous art museum with an even longer wait. We passed the time by playing the longest game of fuck marry kill that I have ever been a part of (about an hour and a half). Once inside, the mood changed dramatically as we viewed some of the most impressive paintings and sculptures that we have ever seen including Botticelli's The Birth of Venus and The Annunciation.
We decided to check out an old science museum that was right next door to the Ufizzi, hoping for some awesome hands on Schmidt-esque experiments but the climax of the exhibit was actually Gallileo's middle finger that was preserved in a glass jar.
We ate a quick dinner and then went to the Odeon (with every other American in Florence) to see the Order of the Phoenix in English. On our way back to the hostel after the film, Charlie and David took a break from their ferociously deep Harry Potter conversation (which I opted out of thank god) to realize that Alexander Seife and his camp friend were right in front of us walking the other way. They had just arrived from Rome that day and were looking for something to do, so we invited them back to our hostel to chill in the courtyard for a little bit. After about an hour or so of swapping the few Euor-stories that we had we all decided to call it a night and they split.
Today we woke up a little bit later, checked out of the Ostello Archi Rossi and walked across the city to the Synagogue of Florence. Definitely worth the walk.
For future travelers staying here at Archi Rossi, check above room 54... "GET THERE!"
Passionately,
Rob (Charles and Z. Co)
Tuesday, July 10, 2007
Today was quite an eventful day for me Charlie and Rob. After a seven hour flight, a half hour shuttle train, and a 1.5 hour train to Florence, Rob and I finally arrived at our hostel. We were pleased to find Charles playing cards in the garden, waiting for us. We swapped stories over a delicious lunch, and a long walk past the Duomo and over the Ponte Vecchio. Rob and I were slightly jetlagged, so we came back to the hostel and took a brief nap/chill session. We will fast forward to the good stuff...
After dinner (where I ate the most amazing pasta EVER) we returned to the hostel and bonded with a group of diverse travelers. In a group of about 8 Australians, Americans, and Chileans, we walked to the top of a hill on the far side of Florence, to enjoy a beautiful view of the city. The three of us then left the group in search of adventure and perhaps dancing. We stumbled upon a capoeira practice where we were invited to come in and watch. It was quite impressive. Our next stop was a bar named the Red Garter, where we had hoped to dance, but it was full of Americans, beer pong, and other things more easily found in America than in Italy. Frankly, it was a waste of time. So...we headed to an outdoor Salsa Festival that was right on the river. Unfortunately, it was a lot of older people, and we could not find any dance partners. We started heading back to the hostel when we ran into a group of American girls also looking for a dance club. We were lead by Italian friends of theirs to the "Andromeda Dance Club" where we danced for free (because we are students!) It was highly eventful, and surprisingly good music! But due to our mixed company, that's all we are going to say. And now we're back at the hostel, about to head to bed. Hopefully the jetlag won't kill us tomorrow. We're safe and alive, so be worry free!
Sincerely,
David (and Rob and Charlie)
After dinner (where I ate the most amazing pasta EVER) we returned to the hostel and bonded with a group of diverse travelers. In a group of about 8 Australians, Americans, and Chileans, we walked to the top of a hill on the far side of Florence, to enjoy a beautiful view of the city. The three of us then left the group in search of adventure and perhaps dancing. We stumbled upon a capoeira practice where we were invited to come in and watch. It was quite impressive. Our next stop was a bar named the Red Garter, where we had hoped to dance, but it was full of Americans, beer pong, and other things more easily found in America than in Italy. Frankly, it was a waste of time. So...we headed to an outdoor Salsa Festival that was right on the river. Unfortunately, it was a lot of older people, and we could not find any dance partners. We started heading back to the hostel when we ran into a group of American girls also looking for a dance club. We were lead by Italian friends of theirs to the "Andromeda Dance Club" where we danced for free (because we are students!) It was highly eventful, and surprisingly good music! But due to our mixed company, that's all we are going to say. And now we're back at the hostel, about to head to bed. Hopefully the jetlag won't kill us tomorrow. We're safe and alive, so be worry free!
Sincerely,
David (and Rob and Charlie)
Monday, July 9, 2007
Two disclaimers: 1)The title thing doesn't seem to be working anymore. 2)My time on the computer is limited, so if this suddenly stops, that's why.
I had a completely insane trip to my hostel in florence. To keep some of you from dealing with intense panic, I'll tell you now (all parents) i'm alive and well and at the hostel safely. So it all started in Nice where I pulled up to the bus stop as the bus was pulling up. This was the last bus to the train station, so thank god I didn't miss it. As we were going towards the train station, the bus seemed to have stopped strangely and when I looked up there was a car in our lane stopped about two inches away. She was going in the wrong direction. Our bus driver shouted a couple of french profanities and, meanwhile, the car behind her was impatiently moving forward, making it impossible for her to turn around. Ultimately the situation mitigated and everything was fine, but it was quite weird. I have no idea how this lady ended up on the wrong side of the street especially considering it wasn't even a one way road. Maybe she was British... crazy UK drivers.
Anyway, we made it to the train station, but my train wasn't listed on the arrivals. The times increased and my time was simply skipped over. So I walked over to someone working there holding my ticket. She tried to tell me something and I didn't really understand so she wrote on the back of my ticket, "you must go to vinti milli" and then wrote a little 'g' and circled it. I looked at her skeptically and tried to inquire further but was completely rejected. So with no other options and seemingly plenty of time i headed in the direction of platform 'G' to ask someone else. I was told the same thing so i hesitantly boarded the train going to this enigmatic "vinti milli." Once on the train I met a nice British family (although they probably drive on the wrong side of the road) and they were trying to go to Rome and were equally confused. Almost everyone on the train was in a similar situation so I had faith that we were all confused, but correct.
The train started moving and it passed through many of the cities I had visited while I was in Nice including Eze and Monacco so it was nice to look back and kind of review my trip so far.
We randomly stopped a couple minutes from the vinitmilli station and there dogs barking in the distance and I couldn't help but exclaim to my fellow riders that i was exceptionally confused and i wanted to know (excuse the profanity) "where the fuck we were" Anyway, the train eventually continued on until reached the correct (?) destination. I unloaded, finding myself now in Italy. I had no idea which train to board or which platform to board. My meager yet useful knowledge of French was not going to help me anymore and I found myself completely confused and incompetent. Some shrewd gesturing however led me to believe that i was to go to platform 4 and each official i asked seemed to be suggesting that platform 4 would be good. I had to cross some railroad tracks, despite not being supposed to. An Italian man warned me about something in Italian and then, took his hands to eyes suggesting that I should look both ways. I didn't get hit by a train, I'm glad to say.
Once on the train, I roomed with these two chill guys from Canada and again I'm glad to say that I woke up with all my luggage and money (i think). I got off at Campo di Marte thinking I was a three minute walk from the hostel. However, the directions i had made no sense. I was wandering around looking confused when the nicest woman in the world (except for maybe danny's nicest woman in the world) asked me if i needed help... in english! I of course said yes and told her I was looking for the Piazza Adua and via faenza. She told me I needed to go to the other train station in Florence, Station Maria Nouvella (sp?). I asked how long the walk was and she said half an hour and that i could take the bus. She proceeded to give me a bus ticket good for four rides and she showed me where the bus station was. I tried to refuse the tickets but eventually thanked her profusely and loaded a bus going in what i hoped was the right direction.
I got off at the correct train station and it took me awhile to find the hostel but I did and I'm proud, but very tired. Totally crazy experience. Anyway, I'm now waiting for David and Rob. It's 8:30 and we're meeting at the Hostel at noon so I have a couple of hours to burn. I'm really excited to meet up with them and I'm considering heading to the train station to meet them. I hope they get off at the correct station, which is why I'm hesitant to meet them there. (we said to meet at the hostel, so if i miss them at the train station or something...) I'll decide soon. Until then, keep it real, good luck on any voyages and I'm jealous of all of you catching fireflies (but not that jealous) peace and love,
"Chaz-bo"
I had a completely insane trip to my hostel in florence. To keep some of you from dealing with intense panic, I'll tell you now (all parents) i'm alive and well and at the hostel safely. So it all started in Nice where I pulled up to the bus stop as the bus was pulling up. This was the last bus to the train station, so thank god I didn't miss it. As we were going towards the train station, the bus seemed to have stopped strangely and when I looked up there was a car in our lane stopped about two inches away. She was going in the wrong direction. Our bus driver shouted a couple of french profanities and, meanwhile, the car behind her was impatiently moving forward, making it impossible for her to turn around. Ultimately the situation mitigated and everything was fine, but it was quite weird. I have no idea how this lady ended up on the wrong side of the street especially considering it wasn't even a one way road. Maybe she was British... crazy UK drivers.
Anyway, we made it to the train station, but my train wasn't listed on the arrivals. The times increased and my time was simply skipped over. So I walked over to someone working there holding my ticket. She tried to tell me something and I didn't really understand so she wrote on the back of my ticket, "you must go to vinti milli" and then wrote a little 'g' and circled it. I looked at her skeptically and tried to inquire further but was completely rejected. So with no other options and seemingly plenty of time i headed in the direction of platform 'G' to ask someone else. I was told the same thing so i hesitantly boarded the train going to this enigmatic "vinti milli." Once on the train I met a nice British family (although they probably drive on the wrong side of the road) and they were trying to go to Rome and were equally confused. Almost everyone on the train was in a similar situation so I had faith that we were all confused, but correct.
The train started moving and it passed through many of the cities I had visited while I was in Nice including Eze and Monacco so it was nice to look back and kind of review my trip so far.
We randomly stopped a couple minutes from the vinitmilli station and there dogs barking in the distance and I couldn't help but exclaim to my fellow riders that i was exceptionally confused and i wanted to know (excuse the profanity) "where the fuck we were" Anyway, the train eventually continued on until reached the correct (?) destination. I unloaded, finding myself now in Italy. I had no idea which train to board or which platform to board. My meager yet useful knowledge of French was not going to help me anymore and I found myself completely confused and incompetent. Some shrewd gesturing however led me to believe that i was to go to platform 4 and each official i asked seemed to be suggesting that platform 4 would be good. I had to cross some railroad tracks, despite not being supposed to. An Italian man warned me about something in Italian and then, took his hands to eyes suggesting that I should look both ways. I didn't get hit by a train, I'm glad to say.
Once on the train, I roomed with these two chill guys from Canada and again I'm glad to say that I woke up with all my luggage and money (i think). I got off at Campo di Marte thinking I was a three minute walk from the hostel. However, the directions i had made no sense. I was wandering around looking confused when the nicest woman in the world (except for maybe danny's nicest woman in the world) asked me if i needed help... in english! I of course said yes and told her I was looking for the Piazza Adua and via faenza. She told me I needed to go to the other train station in Florence, Station Maria Nouvella (sp?). I asked how long the walk was and she said half an hour and that i could take the bus. She proceeded to give me a bus ticket good for four rides and she showed me where the bus station was. I tried to refuse the tickets but eventually thanked her profusely and loaded a bus going in what i hoped was the right direction.
I got off at the correct train station and it took me awhile to find the hostel but I did and I'm proud, but very tired. Totally crazy experience. Anyway, I'm now waiting for David and Rob. It's 8:30 and we're meeting at the Hostel at noon so I have a couple of hours to burn. I'm really excited to meet up with them and I'm considering heading to the train station to meet them. I hope they get off at the correct station, which is why I'm hesitant to meet them there. (we said to meet at the hostel, so if i miss them at the train station or something...) I'll decide soon. Until then, keep it real, good luck on any voyages and I'm jealous of all of you catching fireflies (but not that jealous) peace and love,
"Chaz-bo"
Galway, the final stretch
It's starting to wind down, and heat up at the same time. The next few days are bittersweet for me, because I'm leaving Eire, but starting another great adventure.
Let's see now, where did I last fill you guys in... ah yes, Killarney. Here's what went down.
The day after that post I remained faithful to my goal of climbing a mountain. I wanted to hike up Carrantuhill, the highest mountain in Ireland at 3000 and some feet, but the hostel guy Mike, whom I befriended, forbade me. His brother is in the mountain rescue and made Mike swear to never let anybody climb Carrantuhill alone. To be honest all the reputation only made me want to do it more, but it was too far anyway. So instead I chose Mangerton Mountain, a measly 900 meters. I got up early, rented a bike, and headed off into the Killarney National Park. It took me about half an hour to get to the foot of the peak, in the rain, warming up nicely along the way. I had a sandwich, a bottle of water, and a printed out trail map. I started off.
If you read King Lear and wondered what the heath is, I'll tell you. It's miles of scraggly grasses weeds and bushes that are constantly whipped by fierce winds and bogged down in rain. No trees. That's Mangerton Mountain, a suitable site to film Acts 3 and 4. I couldn't even see the top of the mountain because it was submerged in cloud. Anyway I'm hiking up and periodically losing the trail; it just disappears and reappears. Trails in Ireland are actually just conveniently carved out paths for water, and soon become streams. This trail was no exception. My shoes (which I had blow-dried yesterday) were soaked within minutes. Up and up I go steeply until suddenly over a rise a lake appears. That was a signal that I was near the top. I just had to walk around the lake and up the steep cliff on its other side, and then around back down. I memorized these directions because my trail map had become a soggy ripped up mess. Anyway as I'm making my way up, not able to see ten feet in front of me for the fog/mist/rain/cloud, I turned around for a nice view of the lake. It had disappeared in the fog. I literally couldn't see a sizeable body of water that I had seen minutes before. And I wasn't even thinking about getting a nice view of the valley. Up on the top, the wind was dangerously strong. I was surrounded by cliffs but I couldn't see where they were. Also, the trail pulled another bout of convenient disappearing. Whatever. Long story short, I found it, got the hell off the top of Mangerton, and literally sprinted all the way down, because this shit was taking longer than I had bargained for, and I was drenched from head to toe, having been, not rained on, but inside a raincloud.
Later that day I, for some reason, thought Kenmare would be cool. It wasn't. I took a bus there, checked into the hostel, had dinner and went to bed. The next morning (before I found out Kenmare wasn't cool), I decided to do some hiking. That's when I discovered none of the good mountains where in the area. Fuck Kenmare. I killed some time wandering around farms, got a pint, and gladly got on a bus to Dingle.
Dingle. Now there's a place. It's a beautiful harbor town in the north of Co. Kerry, on the Dingle Peninsula, deep in the Gaeltacht (regions where Irish is the first language). I arrived and dropped my pack off at a very central hostel and still had time for some hiking so I headed off for the Connor Pass, the highest mountain pass in Ireland. Picture this: a valley with steep mountains on either side of it. The mouth of the valley leads to the sea and Dingle town. A new "highway" snakes up around the mountains. The old road goes straight up through the middle. That's what I walked up, with Dingle at my back and the Pass in front of me. Only halfway up the valley, the road abruptly ends. I thought, no worries, a trail must continue on the other side of this fence. Wrong. More heath. Fucking heath. And mountain goats. Well in these situations you can only go forward so I did just that. At parts there was a trail of sorts. It was actually just heath but lanes of rocks on either side suggested that it had been a road at some time. More soaked sneakers. But then it all became worth it when I hit this river, which for reasons that are hard to describe was very very lovely. Up beyond that a bit was a big mound of rocks. Legend has it that someone was buried there a long time ago, and the custom was to throw a rock on a grave when you pass it. Great idea. Anyway, a lot of heath later I climb over a rise and find myself in the Connor Pass parking lot/viewing area, with people stepping out of cars looking at me strangely. From here, dank-ass views of Dingle to the south and a grand grand valley to the north, and Brendan Mountain the east. It took me an hour and a half to get up. It took me ten minutes to get down. I did some pre-emptive hitchhiking by asking a couple to drive me down. Pre-emptive hitchhiking is very commendable.
That evening in Dingle, I walked around the town, reading menus of the many restaurants, deciding which I should go to. I still had time before dinner, so I wandered into this pub, which was actually an old hardware store with a counter and some drinks on tap. About a dozen people, all locals, where passing around a guitar and singing songs. I was mesmerized and lingered for an hour. When I left, at ten oclock, all the restaurants and pubs which had looked so good had stopped serving food. Fuck. I ate at chinese retaurant (bless their work ethic) and went to bed.
The next day I got up early and hiked up to Eask Tower, which overlooks Dingle harbor from the other side, on a high rise. It's a stone structure with a woonden arm sticking to guide ships into the harbor. Splendid views. Again, about an hour and a half to get up, and half an hour to get down, thanks to two friendly drivers.
Moving north, I took a bus to Adare. It's a town outside of Limerick, also near Old Kildimo, where Jim Hanley's cousin Martina lives with her husband Fergal (not Fergle, Phoebus). I stayed with them that night. We had dinner with Padhraig, another Hanley cousin. After dinner we went to Jared's house, another Hanley cousin, and a drum teacher. Jared and I totally hit it off, discussing at length his job, me filling him in on Phish, and talking about various drummers and cool beats. We went into his garage and drummed for each other for a long time. Eventually Martina and Jared's wife told us it was very late. Martina and I said goodbye and drove back to her house and we slept. The next day Martina and I covered a lot of ground: she has a car! She showed me a castle in the middle of nowwhere that Walt Disney used for that intro thingy before all his movies. Then we went to Limerick and toured King John's castle. Nice. Then we went to a neolithic site on a horshoe-shaped lake. Very nice. Then we went to Bunratty Castle to have lunch. Then she dropped me off in Ennis. If you're reading this Martina, THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!
From Ennis I took a bus to Doolin. This is County Clare now, still further north on the west coast of Ireland. Clare is beautiful. Sparse population and less farms allow for dank scenery. Doolin isn't a town as much as a street with three pubs and innumerable B&Bs, and a hostel, where I dropped my pack and went to McGann's for dinner. I had the luck to sit myself next to John and Sue from Dublin. We spent about three hours drinking and talking about Ireland, America, politics, and lots more that I can't clearly remember. All along a session of traditional music went on but the pub was so full and boisterous we could hardly hear it. That was a good time.
The next day, I rented a bike and went down to the Cliffs of Moher. The cliffs were nice, but the place was inundated with tourists. Busloads of Italian kids and Spanish kids. Shwatever. I continued down to Lahinch, where I had lunch, then up to Kilfenora, around to Lisdoonvarna (don't you love these names?) and back to Doolin, having formed a circle that took me a big part of the day. I was tired but satisfied with my accomplishments, especially considering I hate biking and my ass was sore. I'll just chill out until my bus to Galway at 7:30(PM), thought I. That's when I realized I had forgotten my book back in Lahinch. Fuck. The summary of this story is that i went back down to get the book, went back to Doolin and missed my bus. This was the low point of my trip. I was very, very, very angry that I had to spend an unnecessary night in Doolin, especially considering everybody along the way told me Galway's the shit. But I got over it, took the bus from Doolin this morning, and have been wasting time writing this post from the Claddagh Hostel. But it's only 12:42, so I still can see many things.
Tomorow I will take the bus to Dublin, where I will spend the night. On the morning of the 11th, I will fly to Paris and meet up with my parents. I will sleep in a nice hotel and eat in a nice restaurant. On the 12th I will take the train to Vienna to meet Rob, Charlie and David, and the ghost of Jon. I am still reeling from the shock that you won't be there Juan.
Also reeling from the realization that few of us will still live in Neck/Mont after September. Eric to Florida, J to LA (!!!) and myself to New Rochelle, probably.
I miss you too Phoebus.
Anna, Trinity is awesome and a guy who's read it told me there's a sequel. Did you know?
Charlie, your trip in Corsica and forays in Nice have made me very jealous. Good writing, but horrible spelling, man.
Dave and Rob, what can say. Enjoy your new sunglasses and Italy, also a cause of jealousy, and I'll see you soon.
Friends in Larchmont, we appreciate having you as our audience. We hope you continue to read our posts, and really like your comments.
Thanks everyone for reading about Ireland. We'll catch up from the continent.
Take it easy,
Danny
Let's see now, where did I last fill you guys in... ah yes, Killarney. Here's what went down.
The day after that post I remained faithful to my goal of climbing a mountain. I wanted to hike up Carrantuhill, the highest mountain in Ireland at 3000 and some feet, but the hostel guy Mike, whom I befriended, forbade me. His brother is in the mountain rescue and made Mike swear to never let anybody climb Carrantuhill alone. To be honest all the reputation only made me want to do it more, but it was too far anyway. So instead I chose Mangerton Mountain, a measly 900 meters. I got up early, rented a bike, and headed off into the Killarney National Park. It took me about half an hour to get to the foot of the peak, in the rain, warming up nicely along the way. I had a sandwich, a bottle of water, and a printed out trail map. I started off.
If you read King Lear and wondered what the heath is, I'll tell you. It's miles of scraggly grasses weeds and bushes that are constantly whipped by fierce winds and bogged down in rain. No trees. That's Mangerton Mountain, a suitable site to film Acts 3 and 4. I couldn't even see the top of the mountain because it was submerged in cloud. Anyway I'm hiking up and periodically losing the trail; it just disappears and reappears. Trails in Ireland are actually just conveniently carved out paths for water, and soon become streams. This trail was no exception. My shoes (which I had blow-dried yesterday) were soaked within minutes. Up and up I go steeply until suddenly over a rise a lake appears. That was a signal that I was near the top. I just had to walk around the lake and up the steep cliff on its other side, and then around back down. I memorized these directions because my trail map had become a soggy ripped up mess. Anyway as I'm making my way up, not able to see ten feet in front of me for the fog/mist/rain/cloud, I turned around for a nice view of the lake. It had disappeared in the fog. I literally couldn't see a sizeable body of water that I had seen minutes before. And I wasn't even thinking about getting a nice view of the valley. Up on the top, the wind was dangerously strong. I was surrounded by cliffs but I couldn't see where they were. Also, the trail pulled another bout of convenient disappearing. Whatever. Long story short, I found it, got the hell off the top of Mangerton, and literally sprinted all the way down, because this shit was taking longer than I had bargained for, and I was drenched from head to toe, having been, not rained on, but inside a raincloud.
Later that day I, for some reason, thought Kenmare would be cool. It wasn't. I took a bus there, checked into the hostel, had dinner and went to bed. The next morning (before I found out Kenmare wasn't cool), I decided to do some hiking. That's when I discovered none of the good mountains where in the area. Fuck Kenmare. I killed some time wandering around farms, got a pint, and gladly got on a bus to Dingle.
Dingle. Now there's a place. It's a beautiful harbor town in the north of Co. Kerry, on the Dingle Peninsula, deep in the Gaeltacht (regions where Irish is the first language). I arrived and dropped my pack off at a very central hostel and still had time for some hiking so I headed off for the Connor Pass, the highest mountain pass in Ireland. Picture this: a valley with steep mountains on either side of it. The mouth of the valley leads to the sea and Dingle town. A new "highway" snakes up around the mountains. The old road goes straight up through the middle. That's what I walked up, with Dingle at my back and the Pass in front of me. Only halfway up the valley, the road abruptly ends. I thought, no worries, a trail must continue on the other side of this fence. Wrong. More heath. Fucking heath. And mountain goats. Well in these situations you can only go forward so I did just that. At parts there was a trail of sorts. It was actually just heath but lanes of rocks on either side suggested that it had been a road at some time. More soaked sneakers. But then it all became worth it when I hit this river, which for reasons that are hard to describe was very very lovely. Up beyond that a bit was a big mound of rocks. Legend has it that someone was buried there a long time ago, and the custom was to throw a rock on a grave when you pass it. Great idea. Anyway, a lot of heath later I climb over a rise and find myself in the Connor Pass parking lot/viewing area, with people stepping out of cars looking at me strangely. From here, dank-ass views of Dingle to the south and a grand grand valley to the north, and Brendan Mountain the east. It took me an hour and a half to get up. It took me ten minutes to get down. I did some pre-emptive hitchhiking by asking a couple to drive me down. Pre-emptive hitchhiking is very commendable.
That evening in Dingle, I walked around the town, reading menus of the many restaurants, deciding which I should go to. I still had time before dinner, so I wandered into this pub, which was actually an old hardware store with a counter and some drinks on tap. About a dozen people, all locals, where passing around a guitar and singing songs. I was mesmerized and lingered for an hour. When I left, at ten oclock, all the restaurants and pubs which had looked so good had stopped serving food. Fuck. I ate at chinese retaurant (bless their work ethic) and went to bed.
The next day I got up early and hiked up to Eask Tower, which overlooks Dingle harbor from the other side, on a high rise. It's a stone structure with a woonden arm sticking to guide ships into the harbor. Splendid views. Again, about an hour and a half to get up, and half an hour to get down, thanks to two friendly drivers.
Moving north, I took a bus to Adare. It's a town outside of Limerick, also near Old Kildimo, where Jim Hanley's cousin Martina lives with her husband Fergal (not Fergle, Phoebus). I stayed with them that night. We had dinner with Padhraig, another Hanley cousin. After dinner we went to Jared's house, another Hanley cousin, and a drum teacher. Jared and I totally hit it off, discussing at length his job, me filling him in on Phish, and talking about various drummers and cool beats. We went into his garage and drummed for each other for a long time. Eventually Martina and Jared's wife told us it was very late. Martina and I said goodbye and drove back to her house and we slept. The next day Martina and I covered a lot of ground: she has a car! She showed me a castle in the middle of nowwhere that Walt Disney used for that intro thingy before all his movies. Then we went to Limerick and toured King John's castle. Nice. Then we went to a neolithic site on a horshoe-shaped lake. Very nice. Then we went to Bunratty Castle to have lunch. Then she dropped me off in Ennis. If you're reading this Martina, THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!
From Ennis I took a bus to Doolin. This is County Clare now, still further north on the west coast of Ireland. Clare is beautiful. Sparse population and less farms allow for dank scenery. Doolin isn't a town as much as a street with three pubs and innumerable B&Bs, and a hostel, where I dropped my pack and went to McGann's for dinner. I had the luck to sit myself next to John and Sue from Dublin. We spent about three hours drinking and talking about Ireland, America, politics, and lots more that I can't clearly remember. All along a session of traditional music went on but the pub was so full and boisterous we could hardly hear it. That was a good time.
The next day, I rented a bike and went down to the Cliffs of Moher. The cliffs were nice, but the place was inundated with tourists. Busloads of Italian kids and Spanish kids. Shwatever. I continued down to Lahinch, where I had lunch, then up to Kilfenora, around to Lisdoonvarna (don't you love these names?) and back to Doolin, having formed a circle that took me a big part of the day. I was tired but satisfied with my accomplishments, especially considering I hate biking and my ass was sore. I'll just chill out until my bus to Galway at 7:30(PM), thought I. That's when I realized I had forgotten my book back in Lahinch. Fuck. The summary of this story is that i went back down to get the book, went back to Doolin and missed my bus. This was the low point of my trip. I was very, very, very angry that I had to spend an unnecessary night in Doolin, especially considering everybody along the way told me Galway's the shit. But I got over it, took the bus from Doolin this morning, and have been wasting time writing this post from the Claddagh Hostel. But it's only 12:42, so I still can see many things.
Tomorow I will take the bus to Dublin, where I will spend the night. On the morning of the 11th, I will fly to Paris and meet up with my parents. I will sleep in a nice hotel and eat in a nice restaurant. On the 12th I will take the train to Vienna to meet Rob, Charlie and David, and the ghost of Jon. I am still reeling from the shock that you won't be there Juan.
Also reeling from the realization that few of us will still live in Neck/Mont after September. Eric to Florida, J to LA (!!!) and myself to New Rochelle, probably.
I miss you too Phoebus.
Anna, Trinity is awesome and a guy who's read it told me there's a sequel. Did you know?
Charlie, your trip in Corsica and forays in Nice have made me very jealous. Good writing, but horrible spelling, man.
Dave and Rob, what can say. Enjoy your new sunglasses and Italy, also a cause of jealousy, and I'll see you soon.
Friends in Larchmont, we appreciate having you as our audience. We hope you continue to read our posts, and really like your comments.
Thanks everyone for reading about Ireland. We'll catch up from the continent.
Take it easy,
Danny
Sunday, July 8, 2007
Hey guys, thanks for the comments. Travelling alone gets lonely at times and i think I must have been when i went off on that rant, but no matter. The past day or so has been pretty fun. I think we left off two nights ago.
People tend to stay in the hostel during the night as it's far removed from town and the local bars and things tend to be either completely french speaking or filled with sketchball Frenchmen trying to pick up/take advantage of girls. So we hung out in the hostel and I met a variety of interesting people. My first "friend" was an American who went to UNC who was pretty quiet but had done a fair amount of travelling. He later bounced to pick up his laundry so I moved over towards a group of Australians and one Canadian talking politics. I hung out with them for a while until we were told to go inside. After 10 pm here at the hostel the neighbors apparently complain at the drop of a pin so all the noise is restricted to the "chapel." There are big debates as to whether or not it's horribly sacreligious to basically party in a place called the chapel but people are ultimately not that concerned.
Anyway, the highlight personality was this Irish guy who hadn't paid for a room for two weeks and was just crashing, sleeping head to toe with a friend of his. I can only imagine what it's like for Danny, in a country of Irish characters.
The next morning I woke up early to head back to Vence to go to mass. I ended waiting an inordinate amount of time for a bus to the bus station and missed the mass (they had locked the door). I was pretty bummed because I had missed this potentially awesome thing and because i had taken a basically entirely unneccesary hour long bus ride. So I wondered Vence for a little before heading to the Maeght Foundation, which was really cool. I pulled a "dad" and took tons of pictures even though I think you were supposed buy a permit in order to do so.
On the way back to the hostel, I nearly ran into my first serious trouble. For some reason, when i switched over to the local bus from the bus that took me back from Vence, my day pass wasn't accepted and I couldn't discern why not. I didn't even try to get the french speaking driver to explain it to me. For the rest of the story it's important to know how the bus system works here. Basically you buy a ticket and you have it validated in a little machine in the bus. However, it's all almost entirely on the honor system. Supposedly people check randomly but in all the time i spent riding buses last year and this year so far they haven't been checked. Back to the story...
I was very tempted to leave things to chance and just stay on the train but I decided not to risk it and bought an "un voyage" pass. At the next stop a whole bunch of officially dressed men came in intimidatingly and chekced everyone's tickets... phew.
The rest of the day was mostly "managerial"- laundry and showering and stuff and I took a breif nap as well.
Last night I hung out with these two American girls who had just graduated from college. They're going to be in Venice when we will be so we might try to meet up. It's tough though to plan something like that when you nothing about the city and there are no cell phones or, phones at all really.
It's raining today for the first time since I've been here, but I'm gonn try and check out Eze and Monacco before boarding up to head to Florence tonight. Can't wait to meet up with Rob and David and later Danny, have fun in Lmont and Mamurdaneck,
Charlie
People tend to stay in the hostel during the night as it's far removed from town and the local bars and things tend to be either completely french speaking or filled with sketchball Frenchmen trying to pick up/take advantage of girls. So we hung out in the hostel and I met a variety of interesting people. My first "friend" was an American who went to UNC who was pretty quiet but had done a fair amount of travelling. He later bounced to pick up his laundry so I moved over towards a group of Australians and one Canadian talking politics. I hung out with them for a while until we were told to go inside. After 10 pm here at the hostel the neighbors apparently complain at the drop of a pin so all the noise is restricted to the "chapel." There are big debates as to whether or not it's horribly sacreligious to basically party in a place called the chapel but people are ultimately not that concerned.
Anyway, the highlight personality was this Irish guy who hadn't paid for a room for two weeks and was just crashing, sleeping head to toe with a friend of his. I can only imagine what it's like for Danny, in a country of Irish characters.
The next morning I woke up early to head back to Vence to go to mass. I ended waiting an inordinate amount of time for a bus to the bus station and missed the mass (they had locked the door). I was pretty bummed because I had missed this potentially awesome thing and because i had taken a basically entirely unneccesary hour long bus ride. So I wondered Vence for a little before heading to the Maeght Foundation, which was really cool. I pulled a "dad" and took tons of pictures even though I think you were supposed buy a permit in order to do so.
On the way back to the hostel, I nearly ran into my first serious trouble. For some reason, when i switched over to the local bus from the bus that took me back from Vence, my day pass wasn't accepted and I couldn't discern why not. I didn't even try to get the french speaking driver to explain it to me. For the rest of the story it's important to know how the bus system works here. Basically you buy a ticket and you have it validated in a little machine in the bus. However, it's all almost entirely on the honor system. Supposedly people check randomly but in all the time i spent riding buses last year and this year so far they haven't been checked. Back to the story...
I was very tempted to leave things to chance and just stay on the train but I decided not to risk it and bought an "un voyage" pass. At the next stop a whole bunch of officially dressed men came in intimidatingly and chekced everyone's tickets... phew.
The rest of the day was mostly "managerial"- laundry and showering and stuff and I took a breif nap as well.
Last night I hung out with these two American girls who had just graduated from college. They're going to be in Venice when we will be so we might try to meet up. It's tough though to plan something like that when you nothing about the city and there are no cell phones or, phones at all really.
It's raining today for the first time since I've been here, but I'm gonn try and check out Eze and Monacco before boarding up to head to Florence tonight. Can't wait to meet up with Rob and David and later Danny, have fun in Lmont and Mamurdaneck,
Charlie
Pre-trip Jitters: Part Deux
Well, Rob and I are headed off to Europe tomorrow to meet up with Charlie. We're taking a plane to Rome and then a train to Florence, where we'll be spending two days. After that, it's Venice for a day, then we finally meet up with Danny in Vienna. We'll all keep you posted on how things are, and look forwarding to hearing from you all too. Later.
David
David
Saturday, July 7, 2007
I just arrived at my Hostel in Nice and it seems to be pretty awesome. Free internet access is certainly a plus. I can't remember exactly where I left off, so I repeat something I've already said I apologize.
We went to Vence to see the Matisse Chapel, among other things, and were very dismayed when we found to be apparently closed. However, nosiness and a good old aggressive American spirit helped us for once and we learned that the Chapel was, in fact opening in two hours. We decided to act like the French and... eat. My dad claimed to remember going to an amazing hotel for the best meal he has ever had in Vence so we set off to find the Relais et Chateau (sp?) he thought he remembered. After countless loops around a small part of town, we ended up finding a Relais et Chateau hotel, but we weren't sure if it was the correct one. Needless to say, my parents debated over whether in fact this was the one and ultimately they agreed that mother was correct and it was not the one they were thinking of. For those of you who are unaware of what a Relais et Chateau is (like i was about a day and a half ago) it's a designation given to small, unique inns. It's a way for non-chain hotels to compete with bigger ones. All of the Relais et Chateaus are pretty incredible and all very special. Although the one we went to wasn't the one my parents were thinking of, it was still pretty incredible and the four of us had a nice, quiet lunch.
We returned to the Matisse Chapel after lunch and it was really breath taking in an extremely simple way. It was very cool to see the Chapel after looking at Matisse's studies in the Matisse Museum. (For anyone going to Nice, I highly suggest going to the museum and then the chapel). I'm going to try and go to mass tomorrow at the Chapel to see the robes and the rest of the stuff Matisse designed in action. It's pretty inspiring though to see one man's vision outlined and then actually produced. He really used simplicity brilliantly.
Next stop was St. Paul du Vence which was very nice but much like every other old town in southern France. My parents remember it differently but who knows. Still there was a lot of cool art throughout the streets and it was certainly worth going.
I'm gonna gloss over some stuff that isn't super interesting unless you were there because this is starting to get long and there's a lot left. We walked this trail to a good view of Nice. Went to dinner at a very local seeming restaurant that only let us in because dad spoke French (so we thought). Afterwards we went to this unbelievable gelatto shop with, if I remember correctly, 96 flavors. They had flavors ranging from cactus and corona beer to simple chocolate. All ice cream, of course. If I'm in the area I might get a beer flavored one (now that my parents are gone) just because I'm unbelievably curious.
My dad and I then ventured once again to the casinos, this time hoping to try some roulette or blackjack. We once again had some issues since we weren't allowed into the gaming room with shorts on. We were quite determined to make back some money so we got a cab back to the hotel and changed. On our second try, we got in. My dad had them checking his ID while i walked in quickly, so they wouldn't notice my sneakers weren't shoes. We got 25 euros converted in chips and then we learned that the minimum for blackjack was 20 euros a hand. We tried our luck at roulette which was just 5 euros and won once but then lost twice. With 20 euros left, we played a hand of blackjack... and lost. Tears. We were very distraut, but decided to try the other casino where the minimum might be less. Here it was 10 euros. Well... we'll skip to the good part where I was walking out with 85 euros more than when I came in. Ba da boom! How do you like 'dem apples? It was one am though so we went to sleep.
Today mom, dad and lily left and I went down to get my train ticket to go to Florence but was upset to find that, like yesterday, the Italian reservation system was completely shut down... great. Hopefully I'll be able to get a ticket later today or tomorrow. Oh yeah, in hindsight... don't forget your map. Things take longer when you get lost, in case you didn't know.
I have now made the long trek with my huge backpack to my hostel which is somewhat removed. The people here seem very nice. They live in Nice afterall. HAH! Jk LOL. Being alone is strange... liberating, but lonely. Very weird. I'll let you all know what I think of it more later. It is a bit of rush though. Anyway, there's an advertisement for a Chinese speaker and something about a free night here if you help them out so I'm gonna go and inquire about that. I'll let you know how it goes.
You can't imagine how gratifying it is to have some comments and it's great to hear from you so keep them coming. Even if you have nothing to say... the occassional "Sounds like you're having fun!" is much appreciated. At least this way we know people are reading.
Keep it real,
Charlie
We went to Vence to see the Matisse Chapel, among other things, and were very dismayed when we found to be apparently closed. However, nosiness and a good old aggressive American spirit helped us for once and we learned that the Chapel was, in fact opening in two hours. We decided to act like the French and... eat. My dad claimed to remember going to an amazing hotel for the best meal he has ever had in Vence so we set off to find the Relais et Chateau (sp?) he thought he remembered. After countless loops around a small part of town, we ended up finding a Relais et Chateau hotel, but we weren't sure if it was the correct one. Needless to say, my parents debated over whether in fact this was the one and ultimately they agreed that mother was correct and it was not the one they were thinking of. For those of you who are unaware of what a Relais et Chateau is (like i was about a day and a half ago) it's a designation given to small, unique inns. It's a way for non-chain hotels to compete with bigger ones. All of the Relais et Chateaus are pretty incredible and all very special. Although the one we went to wasn't the one my parents were thinking of, it was still pretty incredible and the four of us had a nice, quiet lunch.
We returned to the Matisse Chapel after lunch and it was really breath taking in an extremely simple way. It was very cool to see the Chapel after looking at Matisse's studies in the Matisse Museum. (For anyone going to Nice, I highly suggest going to the museum and then the chapel). I'm going to try and go to mass tomorrow at the Chapel to see the robes and the rest of the stuff Matisse designed in action. It's pretty inspiring though to see one man's vision outlined and then actually produced. He really used simplicity brilliantly.
Next stop was St. Paul du Vence which was very nice but much like every other old town in southern France. My parents remember it differently but who knows. Still there was a lot of cool art throughout the streets and it was certainly worth going.
I'm gonna gloss over some stuff that isn't super interesting unless you were there because this is starting to get long and there's a lot left. We walked this trail to a good view of Nice. Went to dinner at a very local seeming restaurant that only let us in because dad spoke French (so we thought). Afterwards we went to this unbelievable gelatto shop with, if I remember correctly, 96 flavors. They had flavors ranging from cactus and corona beer to simple chocolate. All ice cream, of course. If I'm in the area I might get a beer flavored one (now that my parents are gone) just because I'm unbelievably curious.
My dad and I then ventured once again to the casinos, this time hoping to try some roulette or blackjack. We once again had some issues since we weren't allowed into the gaming room with shorts on. We were quite determined to make back some money so we got a cab back to the hotel and changed. On our second try, we got in. My dad had them checking his ID while i walked in quickly, so they wouldn't notice my sneakers weren't shoes. We got 25 euros converted in chips and then we learned that the minimum for blackjack was 20 euros a hand. We tried our luck at roulette which was just 5 euros and won once but then lost twice. With 20 euros left, we played a hand of blackjack... and lost. Tears. We were very distraut, but decided to try the other casino where the minimum might be less. Here it was 10 euros. Well... we'll skip to the good part where I was walking out with 85 euros more than when I came in. Ba da boom! How do you like 'dem apples? It was one am though so we went to sleep.
Today mom, dad and lily left and I went down to get my train ticket to go to Florence but was upset to find that, like yesterday, the Italian reservation system was completely shut down... great. Hopefully I'll be able to get a ticket later today or tomorrow. Oh yeah, in hindsight... don't forget your map. Things take longer when you get lost, in case you didn't know.
I have now made the long trek with my huge backpack to my hostel which is somewhat removed. The people here seem very nice. They live in Nice afterall. HAH! Jk LOL. Being alone is strange... liberating, but lonely. Very weird. I'll let you all know what I think of it more later. It is a bit of rush though. Anyway, there's an advertisement for a Chinese speaker and something about a free night here if you help them out so I'm gonna go and inquire about that. I'll let you know how it goes.
You can't imagine how gratifying it is to have some comments and it's great to hear from you so keep them coming. Even if you have nothing to say... the occassional "Sounds like you're having fun!" is much appreciated. At least this way we know people are reading.
Keep it real,
Charlie
Friday, July 6, 2007
Corsica to Nice
To start, Jon, my entire family is extremely sad to hear that you're moving. We're all wondering about the specifics-when you are actually moving and how much time you'll be spending home (real home) versus LA. And yes, Lily did accomplish the impossible by doing a 93 second keg stand.
Okay let's rewind a little to our last day in Corsica. We woke up and went off on an interesting and unpredictable journey to a "river". We started driving in the direction we were told to go in and again had issues reading the signs. We found ourselves going farther and farther into this strange forest. The cars became less frequent and the roads became increasingly narrow. Eventually we found what appeared to be a parking lot and parked, hoping that our car would not roll off the edge of the cliff we were next to. It didn't and we searched for an entrance to the rumored river. We finally found it and the sight was amazing and very French.
There was a small river in the middle of huge slabs of granite. Locals had brought tables, bread, cheese and the local Corsican beer, Pietra, and were having picnics. We dove into the river which was far too shallow to be diving into. And enjoyed a couple of hours like the French do.
Our next stop was a Corsican vineyard, where we tasted a variety of red wines. The lady who worked at the vineyard was one the first cliche, obnoxious french people we've met. We left relatively quickly but not without stealing a couple of the labels they use on their bottles. Take that obnoxious French woman!
We returned to our hotel to change into our riding clothes becuase our next stop was a horse ranch. We rode on beaches and through some water seeing some pretty amazing parts of the Corsican country side. We trotted a little and one of the kids in our group fell of the pony he was riding (he was too little for a horse). His mom, who was riding behind laughed histerically. The leader was unphased. In America the mom would have sued the ranch for a billion dollars.
The next morning we woke up, all packed and ready for our trip to Nice. When we got to the airport, we noticed that the only person working there was a cleaning woman. Unlike JFK where there were a million people working and 20 million trying to board planes, Corsica had literally no one. About 15 minutes later two employees entered from seperate doors, walked behind the counters and started checking us in. Quite funny.
Nice is nice. It's much like Miami. There is a big promenade along the sea and all the buildings are ornate but detiorating. They are also bright, pastelly colors and, will- this is for you, my mom dad enthusiastically run from building to building taking pictures.
We walked through the famous flower market and had lunch while I convinced my dad to come to a casino with me. We lost 20 euros in 20 minutes. Slots completely suck. They're boring, take no skill and you will lose. A technician at the casino told us that time was against us becuase the machines inevitably take money. So once you're up, you should leave.
I forgot to mention that during lunch we sat next to an English deaf man and woman. It was interesting watching them communicate with each other and with the waiter. The waiter was writing notes to them and miming for them. I was impressed by how much he cared for them.
Okay, we're on our way to vence. I'll post more later. My parents head home tomorrow so things will inevitably become more interesting then,
Charlie
Okay let's rewind a little to our last day in Corsica. We woke up and went off on an interesting and unpredictable journey to a "river". We started driving in the direction we were told to go in and again had issues reading the signs. We found ourselves going farther and farther into this strange forest. The cars became less frequent and the roads became increasingly narrow. Eventually we found what appeared to be a parking lot and parked, hoping that our car would not roll off the edge of the cliff we were next to. It didn't and we searched for an entrance to the rumored river. We finally found it and the sight was amazing and very French.
There was a small river in the middle of huge slabs of granite. Locals had brought tables, bread, cheese and the local Corsican beer, Pietra, and were having picnics. We dove into the river which was far too shallow to be diving into. And enjoyed a couple of hours like the French do.
Our next stop was a Corsican vineyard, where we tasted a variety of red wines. The lady who worked at the vineyard was one the first cliche, obnoxious french people we've met. We left relatively quickly but not without stealing a couple of the labels they use on their bottles. Take that obnoxious French woman!
We returned to our hotel to change into our riding clothes becuase our next stop was a horse ranch. We rode on beaches and through some water seeing some pretty amazing parts of the Corsican country side. We trotted a little and one of the kids in our group fell of the pony he was riding (he was too little for a horse). His mom, who was riding behind laughed histerically. The leader was unphased. In America the mom would have sued the ranch for a billion dollars.
The next morning we woke up, all packed and ready for our trip to Nice. When we got to the airport, we noticed that the only person working there was a cleaning woman. Unlike JFK where there were a million people working and 20 million trying to board planes, Corsica had literally no one. About 15 minutes later two employees entered from seperate doors, walked behind the counters and started checking us in. Quite funny.
Nice is nice. It's much like Miami. There is a big promenade along the sea and all the buildings are ornate but detiorating. They are also bright, pastelly colors and, will- this is for you, my mom dad enthusiastically run from building to building taking pictures.
We walked through the famous flower market and had lunch while I convinced my dad to come to a casino with me. We lost 20 euros in 20 minutes. Slots completely suck. They're boring, take no skill and you will lose. A technician at the casino told us that time was against us becuase the machines inevitably take money. So once you're up, you should leave.
I forgot to mention that during lunch we sat next to an English deaf man and woman. It was interesting watching them communicate with each other and with the waiter. The waiter was writing notes to them and miming for them. I was impressed by how much he cared for them.
Okay, we're on our way to vence. I'll post more later. My parents head home tomorrow so things will inevitably become more interesting then,
Charlie
Wednesday, July 4, 2007
Travelling
So we left Sagone on Monday after spending a night at our friends house all alone. Just like the abonymous comment, we took advantage of our opportunity and invited all the locals for a massive party and the same way it was discovered that Toby is a badass drinker, we found Lily to be one too. She was funneling beers with stunning quickness. She even beat the local chugging champ.
We left Monday, piling into a car and plannaing on driving to Pinarello with pit stops in Filitosa and Sartene. I don't know if it's Corsica, France, Europe or just foreign countries, but we had some difficulty following the road signs. Roudabouts, points, as called by the French, are quite annoying, and more than once we found ourselves circling around trying to figure out where to exit. As we got closer to our first stop, Filitosa, we found ourselves deeper and deeper into... Nowhere. After a lot longer than it should have been, we arrived in this minute town, Filitosa. My dad was really excited to see these five thousand year old rock sculptures. We got out and started walking through the outside museum that displayed the structures. At first, althoug hesitant to admit it, I seiously doubted the authenticity of the structures. They were about three feet tall and had exceptionally subtle and simple carvings that could, perhaps be considered to look like faces. We continued on, however, and we were increasingly impressed by the structures we encountered. The rocks had all been manipulated into small shelters and carved into statues. We also suspected that many of the rocks had been carved and used before being destroyed by the elements. It was quite impressive when put into the truly ancient context.
We continued on to Sartene and eventually found a miniscule, ancient town that reminded me much of Sienna in Italy only without the big square in the center. We quickly piled back into the car to proceed to our final destination.
After more driving and difficulty with signs we arrived in Pinarello and put our stuff down in our hotel. We ate dinner at this fancy seafood restaurant where I ordered a lobster. The waiters show you specifically which lobster or poisson (fish) you have ordered. When they came with the petite lobster that was going to be for me a woman next to us said, in accented English, "lucky boy." We realized the petite lobster I had ordered was going to cost 120 euros. Needless to say we hailed our waiter and quickly changed my order.
Which brings us to yesterday. We woke up relatively early and headed down to Bonifacio which is said to be the location described in the Odyssey as the town of the cannibalistic Laestrygonians... If anyone remembers that part. We took an unbelievable boat trip out of the port of Bonifacio and got to see the grottos and sharp granite cliffs from the sea. The cliffs are literally verticle and you can see all of the layers of granite on top of each other like we learned about in Earth Science. We were dropped off at this cool little island where we picniced (sp?). On the way back we passed these amazing homes that literally blended into the environment. We left drenched, salty and comfortable due to waves and splashes on the boat. We hung out, had dinner and went to bed early.
It's been quite an experience travelling with my parents who are French speakers. Everytime my dad speaks, he is asked if he is British because, as he says, Americans don't learn foreign languages and only the British have such an awful accent. I'm reading this awesome book that is very fitting about a man living in Paris and becoming re-obsessed with the piano. It's called "The Piano Shop on the Left Bank" and I highly recommend it.
I also finished Harry Potter and have an idea that maybe horribly far fetched but I'm going to say it anyway. Ce n'est pa in French mean "it is not" or "this is not". When said quickly, like a Frenchman, it sounds surprisingly like Snape. Therefore, I believe Snape, who has never been what he seems (starting with the first book when you think he is trying to steal the stone) will be good at the beginning of book 7 and will ultimately be ambiguous in his allegiance. I'll leave you on that note as la corse beckons... Off to Nice tomorrow,
Charlie
We left Monday, piling into a car and plannaing on driving to Pinarello with pit stops in Filitosa and Sartene. I don't know if it's Corsica, France, Europe or just foreign countries, but we had some difficulty following the road signs. Roudabouts, points, as called by the French, are quite annoying, and more than once we found ourselves circling around trying to figure out where to exit. As we got closer to our first stop, Filitosa, we found ourselves deeper and deeper into... Nowhere. After a lot longer than it should have been, we arrived in this minute town, Filitosa. My dad was really excited to see these five thousand year old rock sculptures. We got out and started walking through the outside museum that displayed the structures. At first, althoug hesitant to admit it, I seiously doubted the authenticity of the structures. They were about three feet tall and had exceptionally subtle and simple carvings that could, perhaps be considered to look like faces. We continued on, however, and we were increasingly impressed by the structures we encountered. The rocks had all been manipulated into small shelters and carved into statues. We also suspected that many of the rocks had been carved and used before being destroyed by the elements. It was quite impressive when put into the truly ancient context.
We continued on to Sartene and eventually found a miniscule, ancient town that reminded me much of Sienna in Italy only without the big square in the center. We quickly piled back into the car to proceed to our final destination.
After more driving and difficulty with signs we arrived in Pinarello and put our stuff down in our hotel. We ate dinner at this fancy seafood restaurant where I ordered a lobster. The waiters show you specifically which lobster or poisson (fish) you have ordered. When they came with the petite lobster that was going to be for me a woman next to us said, in accented English, "lucky boy." We realized the petite lobster I had ordered was going to cost 120 euros. Needless to say we hailed our waiter and quickly changed my order.
Which brings us to yesterday. We woke up relatively early and headed down to Bonifacio which is said to be the location described in the Odyssey as the town of the cannibalistic Laestrygonians... If anyone remembers that part. We took an unbelievable boat trip out of the port of Bonifacio and got to see the grottos and sharp granite cliffs from the sea. The cliffs are literally verticle and you can see all of the layers of granite on top of each other like we learned about in Earth Science. We were dropped off at this cool little island where we picniced (sp?). On the way back we passed these amazing homes that literally blended into the environment. We left drenched, salty and comfortable due to waves and splashes on the boat. We hung out, had dinner and went to bed early.
It's been quite an experience travelling with my parents who are French speakers. Everytime my dad speaks, he is asked if he is British because, as he says, Americans don't learn foreign languages and only the British have such an awful accent. I'm reading this awesome book that is very fitting about a man living in Paris and becoming re-obsessed with the piano. It's called "The Piano Shop on the Left Bank" and I highly recommend it.
I also finished Harry Potter and have an idea that maybe horribly far fetched but I'm going to say it anyway. Ce n'est pa in French mean "it is not" or "this is not". When said quickly, like a Frenchman, it sounds surprisingly like Snape. Therefore, I believe Snape, who has never been what he seems (starting with the first book when you think he is trying to steal the stone) will be good at the beginning of book 7 and will ultimately be ambiguous in his allegiance. I'll leave you on that note as la corse beckons... Off to Nice tomorrow,
Charlie
Tuesday, July 3, 2007
Killarney
I see now people are actually reading this blog. sweet.
Traveling alone, to those that have not tried it, is simply dank. I don't want to stop, I don't want to go home, much less run out of money. When I travelled before it was with my parents, and towards the ends of those trips I would often get anxious to be back home in my room. I thought it was homesickness but now I realize I just wanted privacy, and to get away from mom and dad. A few days before I left for Ireland I started to get a bit nervous; would I get lonely? Homesick?
No. There is space around me every where I go, because I don't know anyone. But all I have to do is reach out, smile at someone, ask them how long they've been travelling, and the friendship between travellers buds. I've realized I have a skill at getting people to trust me, and subspequently drop me off places. After I wrote that last post in Kilkenny, I went to St. Patrick's Cathedral, a amazing structure, very picture-worthy (today I looked back on all my pictures so far and realized they're all of stone- abbeys, churches, castles, ruins, that's all I've captured). Anyway, I was dying to get out to this huge ruin called Kells priory, about 10 or 15 km outside of Kilkenny. I could have walked or hitched, but that wouldn't have gotten me back before dark. So I went up to the first guy I saw in the cathedral, and started chit-chatting about the difference between the nave and the chancel. It was Ricardo, with his wife Claudia, from Rome. Soon enough I convinced them we should all go to Kells. After a lot of direction-asking, we arrived at the ruin in the middle a fields. No admission fees here, just sheep. The place was huge and awesome. The Italians said "thank you! If you hadn't come up to us we would have never seen this amazing place!" They ended up giving me their adress and number in Rome and told me to visit and stay with them.
I've lined in with a sort of routine. In the morning, get breakfast, and consult the Bus Eirann schedules. Catch the numerous buses to my destination, then drop my pack off at a hostel, and get lunch. Then explore, and repeat. Breakfast and lunch are capped at 10 EURO, dinner at 20.
Anyway, back to the travelling. From Kilkenny I went to Cashel, where the famous Rock of Cashel, a castle/cathedral on a tall outcrop reigns the countryside. I went to the Rock, and then wanted to go to Athassel Priory, about 15km out of town. I could have walked it, but then I heard some people asking for directions to the same place. I took my chances, and ended up getting a ride to Athassel (near a town named Golden) from Erica and her husband whose name I forget. Both young New Yorkers who've actually heard of a place called Westchester. This priory was not as big as Kells, but just as remote. We had the whole place to ourselves. After the now compulsory picture of me and the newest person(s) who have helped me out, we set out. At Golden, they were going the other way, so I walked back to Cashel. On the way back I also checked out Hore Abbey. That was one day, yesterday.
This morning I got the full Irish breakfast (bacon, egg, toast, tea, and tomato), and took a bus to Cork, and another to Killarney, and dropped off my pack at Neptune's hostel, which has free internet, and thus affords this post. The west of Ireland is different. The countryside is rockyer, the mountains steeper. The bushes are thick with ferns. There are other ways but I cant describe them. I guess I'm just nearer to the sea than I've been so far.
Killarney is the base from which many many tourists explore the famed Ring of Kerry, a route of spectacular scenery around the Iveragh Peninsula. Without a car, I daren't attempt it. Instead I will do some hiking in the closer area, where lakes and mountains abound. This afternoon I did a river walk. A persisten downpour refreshed me from hours of airtight busriding, and also soaked my shoes. I think I'm going to have to dry them with a hairdryer, which is always a good opening for a girl (I forgot they're not bitties here, just lasses).
Tomorow, after the hiking, I will go south a bit down the road to Kenmare, where there's more hiking and less tourists, and north a bit up the road to Dingle, where the same applies. All this is in County Kerry, on the southwest coast of Ireland, so my cup-shaped semi-circle around the island is starting to take form.
I'm getting organized in my baggage. The brunt of the shit goes in the pack, which is eagerly gotten rid of at the hostel or the bus. Then I have the backpack from school. In it is my guidebook, map, raincoat, pocketknife, bottle of water, and novel (Trinity by Leon Uris, about Ireland, coincidentally). In my left pocket is my wallet and two passports. In my right pocket is my camera. In my head is a Beatles song that's echoed for the whole trip: Get Back. It's got a great walking rhythm to it.
I look forward to writing my thoughts down. Sometimes I think of stuff I'll write in the blog, but I forget it. I also forget what day it is, and how long I've been here.
I'm gonna get dinner now.
Keep up with the comments, they're hilarious and make me smile.
Take it easy,
Danny
Traveling alone, to those that have not tried it, is simply dank. I don't want to stop, I don't want to go home, much less run out of money. When I travelled before it was with my parents, and towards the ends of those trips I would often get anxious to be back home in my room. I thought it was homesickness but now I realize I just wanted privacy, and to get away from mom and dad. A few days before I left for Ireland I started to get a bit nervous; would I get lonely? Homesick?
No. There is space around me every where I go, because I don't know anyone. But all I have to do is reach out, smile at someone, ask them how long they've been travelling, and the friendship between travellers buds. I've realized I have a skill at getting people to trust me, and subspequently drop me off places. After I wrote that last post in Kilkenny, I went to St. Patrick's Cathedral, a amazing structure, very picture-worthy (today I looked back on all my pictures so far and realized they're all of stone- abbeys, churches, castles, ruins, that's all I've captured). Anyway, I was dying to get out to this huge ruin called Kells priory, about 10 or 15 km outside of Kilkenny. I could have walked or hitched, but that wouldn't have gotten me back before dark. So I went up to the first guy I saw in the cathedral, and started chit-chatting about the difference between the nave and the chancel. It was Ricardo, with his wife Claudia, from Rome. Soon enough I convinced them we should all go to Kells. After a lot of direction-asking, we arrived at the ruin in the middle a fields. No admission fees here, just sheep. The place was huge and awesome. The Italians said "thank you! If you hadn't come up to us we would have never seen this amazing place!" They ended up giving me their adress and number in Rome and told me to visit and stay with them.
I've lined in with a sort of routine. In the morning, get breakfast, and consult the Bus Eirann schedules. Catch the numerous buses to my destination, then drop my pack off at a hostel, and get lunch. Then explore, and repeat. Breakfast and lunch are capped at 10 EURO, dinner at 20.
Anyway, back to the travelling. From Kilkenny I went to Cashel, where the famous Rock of Cashel, a castle/cathedral on a tall outcrop reigns the countryside. I went to the Rock, and then wanted to go to Athassel Priory, about 15km out of town. I could have walked it, but then I heard some people asking for directions to the same place. I took my chances, and ended up getting a ride to Athassel (near a town named Golden) from Erica and her husband whose name I forget. Both young New Yorkers who've actually heard of a place called Westchester. This priory was not as big as Kells, but just as remote. We had the whole place to ourselves. After the now compulsory picture of me and the newest person(s) who have helped me out, we set out. At Golden, they were going the other way, so I walked back to Cashel. On the way back I also checked out Hore Abbey. That was one day, yesterday.
This morning I got the full Irish breakfast (bacon, egg, toast, tea, and tomato), and took a bus to Cork, and another to Killarney, and dropped off my pack at Neptune's hostel, which has free internet, and thus affords this post. The west of Ireland is different. The countryside is rockyer, the mountains steeper. The bushes are thick with ferns. There are other ways but I cant describe them. I guess I'm just nearer to the sea than I've been so far.
Killarney is the base from which many many tourists explore the famed Ring of Kerry, a route of spectacular scenery around the Iveragh Peninsula. Without a car, I daren't attempt it. Instead I will do some hiking in the closer area, where lakes and mountains abound. This afternoon I did a river walk. A persisten downpour refreshed me from hours of airtight busriding, and also soaked my shoes. I think I'm going to have to dry them with a hairdryer, which is always a good opening for a girl (I forgot they're not bitties here, just lasses).
Tomorow, after the hiking, I will go south a bit down the road to Kenmare, where there's more hiking and less tourists, and north a bit up the road to Dingle, where the same applies. All this is in County Kerry, on the southwest coast of Ireland, so my cup-shaped semi-circle around the island is starting to take form.
I'm getting organized in my baggage. The brunt of the shit goes in the pack, which is eagerly gotten rid of at the hostel or the bus. Then I have the backpack from school. In it is my guidebook, map, raincoat, pocketknife, bottle of water, and novel (Trinity by Leon Uris, about Ireland, coincidentally). In my left pocket is my wallet and two passports. In my right pocket is my camera. In my head is a Beatles song that's echoed for the whole trip: Get Back. It's got a great walking rhythm to it.
I look forward to writing my thoughts down. Sometimes I think of stuff I'll write in the blog, but I forget it. I also forget what day it is, and how long I've been here.
I'm gonna get dinner now.
Keep up with the comments, they're hilarious and make me smile.
Take it easy,
Danny
Sunday, July 1, 2007
En Corse... Cont.
So I continue to hang out in Corsica doing almost nothing while Danny experiences wild adventures. I must admit that I am slightly jealous. Anyway, my dad was upset with my previous post because I didn't describe our physical surroundings at all so I'll do my best now. We are staying in this beautiful house with a swimming pool right on the Meditteranean Sea. We've been climbing along the rocks and swimming in the sea. Despite the water being quite deep, it is clear enough to see directly to the bottom. The town closest to us consists of about five buildings. There are a couple of restaurants, a clothing store, a hotel, a pharmacy, and a super market. Mountains surround everything and it really is rather stunning, in a simple and natural way.
Last night was the actual dinner party for my family friend and it was extremely entertaining to watch the upper echelons of french society slip into oblivion with the help of some wine. There was a dj playing some cheesy techno that all the adults danced to. To all my dancing buddies- I asked one of the young and cute girls to dance and we did but after a couple of spins she had to stop because she claimed to be too drunk. I'm not sure if I was being dodged or if the exclamation was genuine. I'd like to think it was the latter and she was giving me the eyes afterwards so I'm convinced she liked me. The French really do enjoy life and "carpe diem" (shout out- Astrid, if you're reading this). It's quite inspiring actually. Not much else to report, so keep on rocking and, if given the opportunity, go on an adventure... They tend to be worth it. I'm loving the comments,
Charlie
Last night was the actual dinner party for my family friend and it was extremely entertaining to watch the upper echelons of french society slip into oblivion with the help of some wine. There was a dj playing some cheesy techno that all the adults danced to. To all my dancing buddies- I asked one of the young and cute girls to dance and we did but after a couple of spins she had to stop because she claimed to be too drunk. I'm not sure if I was being dodged or if the exclamation was genuine. I'd like to think it was the latter and she was giving me the eyes afterwards so I'm convinced she liked me. The French really do enjoy life and "carpe diem" (shout out- Astrid, if you're reading this). It's quite inspiring actually. Not much else to report, so keep on rocking and, if given the opportunity, go on an adventure... They tend to be worth it. I'm loving the comments,
Charlie
Chronicles Pt. 2: Kilkenny
Good afternoon,
I am sitting in an internet cafe in Kilkenny City, County Kilkenny, somewhere in south-central Eire (pronounced eh-ra). It took me some good effort to get here. But let's regress.
I bounced out of Dublin Thursday on a bus called St. Kevin's Coaches that dropped me off at the parking lot of the Glendalough National Park, about an hour south of the capital. Glendalough is a 6th century monastery founded by St. Kevin. It is between two lakes, nestled in a deep valley. Conveniently, there is a youth hostel a two minute's walk down the road from this. That's where I stayed for two nights, chilling with a nice Donegal girl called Claire McGuire. She's now a teacher in Dublin. But still young and pretty cute. Claire and I explored the monastery, a ruined church and 33m round tower without a door. The area is covered in tombstones. Then she left and I spent the day hiking around the surrounding mountains, which afford spectacular views of the valley and the lakes. Dank.
Friday (I think it was Friday) I got up at eight and started hitchhiking to Rathdrum. It was raining but you couldn't feel it cause it was a light mist. Never seen anything like it. Anyway it took me about an hour to get a ride. I was competing with Kiera McCullough, a sweet New Zealand girl, also trying to get to Rathdrum, and also young and cute. Finally a nice Britsh couple picked me up and dropped me off in Rathdrum, a non-existent town where I got a bus to Arklow. Kiera also got a ride and made the bus so we chilled in Arklow and got lunch. Then we both went our separate ways; mine was to Waterford, where I would catch a third bus to Kilkenny. But we were running late, so Paul, the driver, who was from Kilkenny, called the station ahead and had them wait for me. I made the final bus to Kilkenny, only to wat towards Foulksrath Castle Hostel, a hostel in a 15th century Norman castle, about 15k outside of Kilkenny.
I walked a couple miles until a nice dude picked me up, except he didn't know where the castle was and dropped me off in totally the wrong place. I started out again towards the castle, and decided to cut some time by cutting through some farms. A couple of fields and barbed wire fences later I found myself on a back road surrounded by farms, without a clue as to how much further I had to go. Eventually, the nicest farmer in Ireland, Dick, saw me and offered to take to Foulksrath. I made it to the hostel at 4. What a day.
So that was yesterday. I chilled at the hostel, mooched some dinner off some Canadian chicks, then met Ollie, the hostel manager's son. He's 23, and by the evening 5 of his friends (they're all from Dublin) had joined us at the castle. So the six of them and Ben from New Hampshire and me were chilling playing pool and we decided to go for a night in town (Kilkenny). The eight of us got in a cab, got pulled over by a cop, and continued on to a club the name of which I forget. We stayed until it closed, about 2 am. The Dublin boys wanted food (you know how it is in the wee hours), so we went to Super Mac's, which was basically MacDonalds, except with a riot inside. I swear I saw more people on the Kilkenny streets at 3am then during the afternoon.
We then spent a while looking for a cab back to the hostel (in the rain) and finally made it. I got to bed around 4. I'm tired.
This morning I found three eggs in the communal fridge and decided to scramble them (who that is reading this hasn't had my dank scrambled eggs?). But when I cracked the first one I found out they were already hard-boiled. oops.
Anyway I smoothed talk my way into getting a ride into Kilkenny from a German family, checked into the Kilkenny Tourist Hostel, which does have room today, unlike yesterday, dropped off my pack, and have been wandering the town since noon. It's 2 now, or 14, as they call it.
Tomorow, it's another three buses to Cashel, in County Tipperary. I'm surprisingly on schedule.
Let's see, what else..
Kilkenny is a veritable city, with tons of shops, and tons of churches, and a castle.
The hostel manager has dreadlocks and crocks.
Hope you're all enjoying the summer!
Take it easy,
Danny
I am sitting in an internet cafe in Kilkenny City, County Kilkenny, somewhere in south-central Eire (pronounced eh-ra). It took me some good effort to get here. But let's regress.
I bounced out of Dublin Thursday on a bus called St. Kevin's Coaches that dropped me off at the parking lot of the Glendalough National Park, about an hour south of the capital. Glendalough is a 6th century monastery founded by St. Kevin. It is between two lakes, nestled in a deep valley. Conveniently, there is a youth hostel a two minute's walk down the road from this. That's where I stayed for two nights, chilling with a nice Donegal girl called Claire McGuire. She's now a teacher in Dublin. But still young and pretty cute. Claire and I explored the monastery, a ruined church and 33m round tower without a door. The area is covered in tombstones. Then she left and I spent the day hiking around the surrounding mountains, which afford spectacular views of the valley and the lakes. Dank.
Friday (I think it was Friday) I got up at eight and started hitchhiking to Rathdrum. It was raining but you couldn't feel it cause it was a light mist. Never seen anything like it. Anyway it took me about an hour to get a ride. I was competing with Kiera McCullough, a sweet New Zealand girl, also trying to get to Rathdrum, and also young and cute. Finally a nice Britsh couple picked me up and dropped me off in Rathdrum, a non-existent town where I got a bus to Arklow. Kiera also got a ride and made the bus so we chilled in Arklow and got lunch. Then we both went our separate ways; mine was to Waterford, where I would catch a third bus to Kilkenny. But we were running late, so Paul, the driver, who was from Kilkenny, called the station ahead and had them wait for me. I made the final bus to Kilkenny, only to wat towards Foulksrath Castle Hostel, a hostel in a 15th century Norman castle, about 15k outside of Kilkenny.
I walked a couple miles until a nice dude picked me up, except he didn't know where the castle was and dropped me off in totally the wrong place. I started out again towards the castle, and decided to cut some time by cutting through some farms. A couple of fields and barbed wire fences later I found myself on a back road surrounded by farms, without a clue as to how much further I had to go. Eventually, the nicest farmer in Ireland, Dick, saw me and offered to take to Foulksrath. I made it to the hostel at 4. What a day.
So that was yesterday. I chilled at the hostel, mooched some dinner off some Canadian chicks, then met Ollie, the hostel manager's son. He's 23, and by the evening 5 of his friends (they're all from Dublin) had joined us at the castle. So the six of them and Ben from New Hampshire and me were chilling playing pool and we decided to go for a night in town (Kilkenny). The eight of us got in a cab, got pulled over by a cop, and continued on to a club the name of which I forget. We stayed until it closed, about 2 am. The Dublin boys wanted food (you know how it is in the wee hours), so we went to Super Mac's, which was basically MacDonalds, except with a riot inside. I swear I saw more people on the Kilkenny streets at 3am then during the afternoon.
We then spent a while looking for a cab back to the hostel (in the rain) and finally made it. I got to bed around 4. I'm tired.
This morning I found three eggs in the communal fridge and decided to scramble them (who that is reading this hasn't had my dank scrambled eggs?). But when I cracked the first one I found out they were already hard-boiled. oops.
Anyway I smoothed talk my way into getting a ride into Kilkenny from a German family, checked into the Kilkenny Tourist Hostel, which does have room today, unlike yesterday, dropped off my pack, and have been wandering the town since noon. It's 2 now, or 14, as they call it.
Tomorow, it's another three buses to Cashel, in County Tipperary. I'm surprisingly on schedule.
Let's see, what else..
Kilkenny is a veritable city, with tons of shops, and tons of churches, and a castle.
The hostel manager has dreadlocks and crocks.
Hope you're all enjoying the summer!
Take it easy,
Danny
Saturday, June 30, 2007
en corse
I just deleted the post I had written so if you sense I'm in a bad mood that's why. My other disclaimer is that I'm using my dad's blackberry so that explains any formatting or spelling issues. Anyway, lily set a new record by throwing up in the airport, before we even got on the plane. To her defense, however, the airport was extremely crowding to the previous day's delays and we almost missed our flight. Once we did make it on the plane her nerves were replaced by motion sickness. Since she'll probably throw a fit if she hears that I announced this to the world, I'm going to move on.
We arrived in corsica yesterday morning and we've been hanging out rather leisurely, reading, swimming, going to the beach and playing ping pong and foosball. This morning waking up was tough due to jetlag but we're all adjusting well to the time change.
Chantal, the friend whose surprise birthday we're here for was sufficiently surprised, which was good.
Since we've been doing very little, there is naturally very little to write but things should start to pick up. I'll keep you informed as they do. Until then, whether you find yourself in france, corsica, ireland or larchmont keep it real. I obviously am excited to receive comments and hear how all of you are doing. Over and out,
Charlie.
We arrived in corsica yesterday morning and we've been hanging out rather leisurely, reading, swimming, going to the beach and playing ping pong and foosball. This morning waking up was tough due to jetlag but we're all adjusting well to the time change.
Chantal, the friend whose surprise birthday we're here for was sufficiently surprised, which was good.
Since we've been doing very little, there is naturally very little to write but things should start to pick up. I'll keep you informed as they do. Until then, whether you find yourself in france, corsica, ireland or larchmont keep it real. I obviously am excited to receive comments and hear how all of you are doing. Over and out,
Charlie.
Wednesday, June 27, 2007
Dublin, Day 1
Hi everyone!
I'm sitting in the lounge of the Abraham House on Lower Gardiner Street, a few minutes walk from the River Liffey. Dublin is dank.
My flight landed around 10 this morning. I waited for a while and thought I had forgotten my luggage until I realized I was looking at the wrong belt. whammy.
I dropped off my fat ass backpack in the baggage room here, and set out for the city by noon. Pleasures here abound for the architecture enhusiast. Like any old European city, Dublin is host to many very old structures that lie adjacent to modern office buildings and apartments. Being a fan of antiquity, my stops included Trinity Square, the oldest university in Ireland, Christ's Church, and St. Audeon's Chapel, among others. The streets are lively south of the river, and there is a surprising diversity to the people tht walk them. I heard many languages and accents.
My feet got tired, so I went to St. Stephen's Green, Dublin's "Central Park", and napped under a tree for three quarts of an hour.
The weather is ambiguous here. It stays within the range of 55-65, but I must have switched between my sunglasses and my raincoat at least ten times. So much for summer.
South of the Liffey, Dublin's thoroughfare is Grafton Street, a colorful pedestrian avenue packed with human "statues", musicians, and many many shops. Around it, a maze of more shops. And more tiny interconnecting alleys than one could ever explore in a day.
North of the river, the city's blood flows through O'Connell Street, which strongly resembles the Champs Elysees in its design, except without the cafes and their sidewalk tables.
In the afternoon I came back to the hostel to rest my feet and drop a duke. In the room (which has 20 beds, co-ed) I met two dudes from Vassar, two guys from Spain, one guy from Lille, and two chicks from NYC. Then I went out to have dinner with a friend of my step-grandmother's called Paul, whom I had never met but is very nice. After dinner, we went to a pub that advertised a jazz/funk band but ended up staging a karaoke night. We quickly finished our pints and moved on. Paul showed me a bar/restaurant inside a renovated church. That was cool.
Now I'm back and I'm exhausted. Desiree has kindly let me use her internet access on her laptop in exchange for my plug adapter. We're now best friends for it.
Tomorow, Glendalough.
Enjoy the high 90s lucky fuckers.
Danny
I'm sitting in the lounge of the Abraham House on Lower Gardiner Street, a few minutes walk from the River Liffey. Dublin is dank.
My flight landed around 10 this morning. I waited for a while and thought I had forgotten my luggage until I realized I was looking at the wrong belt. whammy.
I dropped off my fat ass backpack in the baggage room here, and set out for the city by noon. Pleasures here abound for the architecture enhusiast. Like any old European city, Dublin is host to many very old structures that lie adjacent to modern office buildings and apartments. Being a fan of antiquity, my stops included Trinity Square, the oldest university in Ireland, Christ's Church, and St. Audeon's Chapel, among others. The streets are lively south of the river, and there is a surprising diversity to the people tht walk them. I heard many languages and accents.
My feet got tired, so I went to St. Stephen's Green, Dublin's "Central Park", and napped under a tree for three quarts of an hour.
The weather is ambiguous here. It stays within the range of 55-65, but I must have switched between my sunglasses and my raincoat at least ten times. So much for summer.
South of the Liffey, Dublin's thoroughfare is Grafton Street, a colorful pedestrian avenue packed with human "statues", musicians, and many many shops. Around it, a maze of more shops. And more tiny interconnecting alleys than one could ever explore in a day.
North of the river, the city's blood flows through O'Connell Street, which strongly resembles the Champs Elysees in its design, except without the cafes and their sidewalk tables.
In the afternoon I came back to the hostel to rest my feet and drop a duke. In the room (which has 20 beds, co-ed) I met two dudes from Vassar, two guys from Spain, one guy from Lille, and two chicks from NYC. Then I went out to have dinner with a friend of my step-grandmother's called Paul, whom I had never met but is very nice. After dinner, we went to a pub that advertised a jazz/funk band but ended up staging a karaoke night. We quickly finished our pints and moved on. Paul showed me a bar/restaurant inside a renovated church. That was cool.
Now I'm back and I'm exhausted. Desiree has kindly let me use her internet access on her laptop in exchange for my plug adapter. We're now best friends for it.
Tomorow, Glendalough.
Enjoy the high 90s lucky fuckers.
Danny
Tuesday, June 26, 2007
Pre-trip Jitters
Well, Yer. Danny leaves us today for Ireland, the Emerald Isle. We're all rather emotional. We're excited, nervous, anxious and everything else you would think us to be. Our thoughts and prayers are with Jon whose absense on the trip will make it bittersweet. Check here for updates, stories, perhaps pictures, and much, much more!
Team Yer (Eur)
Team Yer (Eur)
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