Well Hello again Amsterdam

Tuesday May 31, 2011

Today was our last full day in Europe.  We awoke in Brugge and ate breakfast at the B&B, I think we may have been the only guests left, and then we spent a little more time walking around the city before we headed to the train to make our way to Amsterdam.

Let's start with where we went once we checked out of the B&B. We walked around and went searching for a few geocaches. The first one that we were trying to locate was a multiple clue cache. We found all of the places that the clues asked us to and we were within about 5 feet of the cache but we couldn't find it and we were not putting our hands in strange holes. It was frustrating to give up on it when we had spent the better part of an hour getting to the final clue but I guess that's something you have to learn to deal with if you are going to look for caches. The second one was much more basic and we were within about 10 feet of it and searching when another guy with a gps came over, we worked together and found it stuck to some metal box and signed the slip and now Jamie can cross The Netherlands, Denmark, Germany and Belgium off her list of countries where she's found caches!

After finding the caches we decided that we needed some more chocolate. Jamie wanted to get a few pieces to take to give to the flight attendants on her flight home and, well, I don't really need an excuse to buy more chocolate!  We went to two places, one was a branch of a place I'd been in Brussels and so I was able to get more of the chocolates that I new I really liked.  The other place was recommended by Rick Steves and it was a very cute family run shop.

We also knew that we needed to make one last stop for ice cream! This time splurging and getting three scoops on a waffle cone. The ice cream in Europe just can't be beat, I've just never tasted anything from the U.S. that tastes quite as amazing!

We were also on the hunt for one last postcard to send to our good friend who lives in Montana. We finally found one and some stamps so we just needed to drop it in the mail at the train station. With our bags loaded down we made our way to the station. We took a train to Antwerp and then transferred onto a train to Amsterdam. The trip took us about 3 1/2 hours and thankfully took us straight to the airport.

Once we got back to Amsterdam I was able to put my postcards into the mail, I had tried to mail them when we were first in Amsterdam before heading to Denmark but couldn't find a mailbox so I held onto them until we got back to Amsterdam.  After mailing my postcards and grabbing some food in the airport we caught the shuttle to our hotel. It was disappointing that the hotel didn't have free wifi but I think at that point we were both ready to be home.

The following morning we packed up one last time and caught the shuttle to the airport.  The lines at the baggage check were absolutely ridiculous and if it hadn't been for the bottle of wine in my backpack I could have skipped the line and headed through security to do a little last minute shopping and spent the 40 Euro that I had leftover. Unfortunately, Jamie's line was even longer and I didn't feel comfortable just leaving her. She was trying to fly standby on a pass but somehow she didn't get listed for the flight. I finally had to go and rush through security and catch my flight while Jamie had to head back to the hotel to spend another night in Amsterdam hoping to get on a flight to the States in the morning.

It's good to be home but I really miss traveling.  I like wearing something other than what's in my backpack but I really do love seeing new things. Hopefully I'll get to take a group of students to Europe one of these summers and do even more sight seeing.  Next on my list of places I most want to visit is Greece and the Mediterranean, I think a nice 3 week cruise would be the perfect way to see the area. Time to start saving!

Suzie :-)

Mussels in Brussels and a little peeing boy

Saturday, May 28, 2011

We awoke in Cologne this morning, ate some breakfast at the hotel (grabbing some snacks for later) and headed to the train station. We caught an 11:43 am train from Cologne to Brussels, it was time to say goodbye to Germany and head to our final country, Belgium. We arrived at the Brussels south station and took the metro up to our hostel where we dropped our bags and headed out again. Since we only had one day in Brussels we wanted to make it good. Our first stop was the Royal Museums of art which contains both "ancient" and modern art. Let me just say that Brussels is difficult to navigate! With all of the street signa in two languages it is difficult to figure out where you are and what direction you need to head.  Well, after a few wrong turns we were finally headed in the right direction. Unfortunately when we got there we found that the modern museum was closed and we could only go into the ancient portion yet we had to pay the same price. So, we decided that it wasn't quite worth it. We back tracked going through the sculpture garden and found a street market going on so we browsed the stalls as we worked our way towards the old town.

It was about this time that we figured out that a jazz festival was going on this weekend. The jazz festival made things a bit more difficult because there was a huge stage set up in the Grand Place which made it very difficult to get a picture of the square. Our first stop in the square was the city museum where we went up to the fourth floor to check out little Manekin Pis's costumes.

Mannekin Pis is a little statue of a boy peeing. There are lots of stories about why Brussels has a statue of a boy peeing but no one knows for sure where he came from. What I do know is that he is quite popular and people all over the world send him clothes to wear. He has over seven hundred outfits that date back to about the 1600's. His clothes are pretty cute and so is he, he is really quite a tiny statue and you could easily miss him if you didn't know better. We went to see him and take pictures later in the evening along with about 100 Asian tourists :)

After looking at his costumes we were ready to tackle some hardcore chocolate shopping! The Godiva shop in the Grand Place was closed so we went to Neuhaus, Leonidas, Galler, and two other chocolate shops. I bought a lot of chocolate!

We were getting hungry for some real food so we sat at one of the restaurants in the square. Jamie ordered mussels and frites while I got a little pizza. Oh, and we both got a beer sampler with tiny cups of 5 Belgian beers. The fries were okay and the mussels were not as bad as I thought they would be. The cheese on my pizza was really good, but again, it was just okay. Of the beer that we tasted only one was something that I would order again. It was a cherry lambic. In Belgium they used to preserve fruit by putting it in beer and then in the winter they would have fruit and flavored beer.

After eating a little we walked over to find the little peeing boy and take some pictures with him and then we really just wandered around taking in the sights. We were getting hungry again and found a creperie with both savory and sweet crepes. We had w chicken, pesto and cheese and then a lemon and sugar crepe. They were both delicious but I think I liked the savory one more.

While we were eating outside there was a guy begging. He was going from table to table and was very persistent. The first time he only stopped at our table for a few seconds but then he came around again and proceeded to speak to us in french and when we didn't respond he started yelling and getting beligerant and finally the waiter came out and got him to leave. I felt bad for the guy but Belgium has pretty sweet social service programs and so I'm pretty sure that he just wanted money for drugs or alcohol. Very sad.

So, after that little incident we decided that we should go and walk by the royal palace and at least see it since we were there. Thankfully we were near a subway stop and so we just took the train a few stops and walked through the park to the palace. It's very nice but not as large or grand as I expected.

From the palace we went to check out a hole in the wall place we had heard good things about. It was literally a whole in the wall and then through the courtyard to a little pub that was nice and relaxed. There we tried the lambic without fruit and then with peach. On it's own it is very sour and tart but bot in a bad way if you like things that are sour!

It was getting late so we headed back to the hostel and checked in. We had a private room with our own bathroom which was very nice. Not a bad place to stay unless someone starts hacking up a lung in the hall at 1 am. Otherwise it was nice.

Suzie :-)

Introduction to Brugge

Sunday, May 29, 2011

Woohoo, we made it to Brugge! Brugge was at the top of my must visit list when we first started talking about European travel. I'm not quite sure what drew me to the city, it may have been a travel or food show, but I'm so glad that we made it here.

We left Brussels at 9:30 and got to Brugge around 10:30. Right off the bat I was in awe as we walked along the old moat to get to our b&b which happened to face a canal and our room happened to overlook that canal. We dropped our bags off at the hotel and got the keys and then headed out to explore the town. We started with some breakfast in the big Market square. We had quiche and coffee, a little pricey but you pay for the central location and the sounds of the bells right there. After breakfast we decided to try the Rick Steves self-guided walking tour and perhaps a museum. We started in the market square where the big bell tower is and then headed to Burg square where the city hall sits and where the Basilica of the Holy Blood is.

The Basilica is said to posess the actual blood of Jesus Christ. The story is that a crusader brought the blood back in 1150. They display the blood daily and for a donation you can touch the container. We came back to see it but did not touch it.

The Burg square is also home to the "carwash" a modern statue that is supposed to be a play on water and lace but just looks ridiculously out of place. Another newer building in the square is the Plaza Hotel. The cool thing about this new building is that it was built on top of some old ruins and you can walk right down into the basement and see the artifacts that they dug up along with the original walls. Very cool.

The Burg Square also had one of the best statue men I've ever seen, he was so good that when he moved it gave Jamie a bit of a scare!

From the Burg we walked across a canal to the fish market where on Sunday they have some souvenier vendors out. There were a few artists selling original work and it was beautiful and would have made a great gift if I'd had money and room to bring them back.

From here we walked to an area called the canal postcard view for good reason, it was the most beautiful little spot rivelling Amsterdams canals. Of course we took pictures. Then we saw the Groeninge Museum which we had wanted to go to but it is undergoing renovations so we decided to skip it and continue our walk to the Church of Our Lady where they have the sculpture "Madonna and Child" by Michaelangelo. It is very rare to see his work outside of Italy. It was really the most beautiful sculpture I've seen, there was a certain refinement in the work. The church was really quite beautiful. From here we paused our walk and got some money from an atm and went back to the fish market so that Jamie could buy a painting. We came back to where we left off to finish our walking tour. We made sure to buy our brewery tour tickets and then we had a street waffle and soda. The place place where we got our waffle was amazing. It was a woman and her son and they also sold ice cream. The little boy was maybe 8 or 9 and he was manning the mixer making up some waffle dough, it was more cookie dough coonsistency than batter. While we waited for our waffles to cook we watched him weigh out portions of dough, it was a great scene to see.

After the waffles we had an hour to kill before the tour so we headed to the Minnewater and the place wherr the Benedictine nuns live. The Minnewater is lake like and there are lots of swans and ducks. This is also where the horses pulling the carriages come for a drink and snack. The Begijnhof is where religious women live, not quite nuns but similar. We got to the little chapel and they were singing vespers and it was beautiful. I wish we could have sat and listened all afternoon.

Instead though we had to get to our tour of de Halve Maan Brewery for our tour. The tour was given by a very dry humoured woman who clearly loved beer and new quite a bit about it. During the tour they took us to the old brewery and through all of the stages that beer goes through before anyone can drink it. The tour was educational and fairly entertaining but the best part may have been the view from the rooftop. You could see the entire town from up there, it was great. Of course after the tour we had to sample the beer and it was pretty good. I have to say that over here beer is so much more than a means for getting drunk. The beer here has depth and flavor that I've never tasted anywhere else. It is so vastly superior to any beer I've tasted in the US.

After our drinks we walked back up past the market square and made our way to a highly recommended place. Unfortunately, being Sunday evening it was closed. After much careful consideration and consulting maps and guidebooks we found an Irish Pub that was open and serving food. It felt a bit wrong to be at an Irish Pub in Belgium but the food was good (bangers and mash) and they had the Ireland v. Scotland football game on. We stayed for the entire game and really got into it. Great choice.

It was definitely time to go back to the b&b at that point and get some rest for our big bike ride in the morning.

Suzie :-)

Two Castles and a Change of Plans

Friday, May 20, 2011

This morning we arrived in Munich a few hours late thanks to an animal on the tracks somewhere around Hamburg that led to our train needing a new engine. Unfortunately I was not able to sleep well at all. I felt like this train in particular was quite jerky and loud and for some reason my earplugs were really uncomfortable. Nonetheless we made it to Munich.

Once in Munich we checked into the hostel and stowed our bags and then headed back to the train station to talk to someone at the Euraid about future train travel. While the guy was very helpful and spoke perfect American English he had a way of making feel stupid and inept. Apparently we've been using our pass wrong and we are lucky that it didn't get torn in half. He sorted us out and gave us some advice about our future travel days. The most interesting thing that he pointed out was that we could save about $45 by going to Schwangau today to see the castles of King Ludwig rather than wait until tomorrow when we would need to buy a train ticket or use another day on our pass. I called the castle tour office and they were able to accomodate us today so we hopped on the next train to Fussen!

The train was about 2 hours followed hy a 15 minute bus ride and a short hike up to the first castle, Hohenschwangou. This is the summer castle of King Ludwigs father and he grew up here. It was beaitiful and the views were stunning. They wouldn't let us take pictures inside but if you google it you'll find lota of images.

After touring the first castle we ate our picnic lunch of bread, cheese and an apple before heading up to the main attraction, Neuschwanstein Castle.  This is the castle that inspired Sleeping Beauties castle, it really is a fairy tale castle. King Ludwig used the operas of Wagner as inspiration for all of the wall paintings in the castle.

King Ludwig seemed to be a little more interested in building the perfect castle than ruling a kingdom so he was forced to step down because he was not mentally able to he king, aka he was crazy King Ludwig! Shortky after stepping down he eithe killed himself or was murdered, no one knows exactly what happened. Because of these events Ludwig only spent about half a year living in his castle and never quite got all of the work done. To this day it is still unfinished. What is finished is incredibly oppulent and simply stunning. Every window has an amazing view as well, it really is breathtaking.

After visiting the castle we hiked up to Mary's Bridge, which is quite an engineering achievement of the 19th century. From the bridge we had a spectacular view of the castle and the valley that lies below. There is also a waterfall off the other side of the bridge. It would be great to come back and do some hikinh around the village as there are lots of trails and paths to follow.

After getting our pictures we headed down to the village to grab a bite to eat, schnitzel sandwich, and catch the bus to the train station.  We made it back to Munich without much excitement.

After getting the key to our room and taking our bags up we set out to get a bite to eat. We wanted to go to the Augustiner Beer Garden but ended up at there downtown restaraunt instead. We sat outside and people watched while we ate our pretzels and then headed back to the hostel for some much needed sleep!

Suzie :-)

The Importance of Ice Cream and German History

Thursday, May 19, 2011

Last night we decided that we could afford to sleep in today since we had a noon check out and only a few sites planned for the day. We got up around 10 and checked out of the hostel just before noon. We were pretty hungry so we headed to the Cafe at the Opera House which is famous for its desserts. The menu was a little out of our price range so we decided just to get dessert and we could buy a pretzel from a street vendor later.

We ate some amazing ice cream, we had raspberry and lavender poppyseed with fresh raspberries, sauce and whipped cream. It was incredible. We did stop and get a prrtzel before going to the German History museum.

First of all, the German history museum is huge. Second, German history is pretty much Western European history since Germany didn't become a country until the mid-1800s.  I focused on the areas covering the Protestant reformation, the life of Karl Marx and the conditions leading up to WWII. It was so interesting, a little tough to follow at times but well worth the time.

After spending 3 hours at the German hostoey museum we walked across the street to the Guggenheim. Jamie has a goal to visit all of the Guggenheims. The German Guggenheim is much smaller than the one in New York and is not as intereting looking. The exhibit was okay but we only spent about 45 minutes there.

After the Guggenheim we headed back towards the hostel. We stopped at a traditional German restaurant and ate some really good, filling and inexpensive schnitzel.

From there we headed back to the hostel to get our packs and then to the main train station where I bought an Appel Manchen, these are the East Berlin stop and walk signs at street lights, they are really cute. I got the green walk guy on a magnet.

We finally boarded the train at 9:15 and settled down to sleep.  It's our last overnight train and I'm pretty thankful for that!

Suzie :-)

Hello Berlin!

Tuesday, May 17, 2011

This morning we arrived in Berlin at 6am and we promptly made our reservation for the overnight train to Munich for Thursday. This time we remembered to request the bottom bunk since we've been on the top bunk on our previous night trains and it makes it difficult to get up and use the bathroom or really do anything!

After making our reservation we headed to our hostel to put our bags up. The hostel is in a great little neighborhood and seems to be fairly quiet. It has free wifi and we have a private room which is awesome.  We mapped out our strategy for the day and headed out for breakfast.

We were both really hungry so we went to a sit down place to get something other than bread and coffee. The meal was amazing and after being in Denmark it seemed so cheap! We took our time since it was raining and we were meeting a walking tour just outside of the restaurant.

The walking tour we did was fantastic, the guide was so knowledgable and went at a good pace. Our guide, David, was very friendly and was even able to give us some great restaurant suggestions in our neighborhood. On the tour we hit Museum Island, Unter Din Linden, the book burning memorial, an amazing chocolate shop, the wall, checkpoint Charlie, the bunker where Hitler killed himself, Brandonburg gate and we could just make out the Reichstag.  The walk gave us a good sense of the things that we wanted to go back to and the things that may not be for us.

After the walk we took the subway down to Potsdamer Platz which is where the 4 sections pf Berlin came together, now it's full of new skyscrapers and a mall. From there we walked to the Gameldegalerie, the cities fine art gallery. We ate in the cafeteria before heading in.

The museum has some worls by Rembrandt, Rafael, Vemeer and many other artists, particularpy Dutch and German. It was a beautiful museum with a good free audioguide.

After the gallery we came back to the hostel and officially checked into our room. After relaxing for a bit we headed to il due forni for what we were told would be authentic Italian pizza made by punks. They didn't lie, it was amazing!  Best pizza I've ever eaten!

Finally we went to bed exhausted but ready to do it all again the next day.

Suzie :-)

Crown jewels, a famous mermaid and an amusement park!

Monday, May 16, 2011

This morning we got up early and packed our bags up and checked out of the hostel at 9:30. We then walked to the train station to stow our bags in a locker, mail some postcards and grab yogurt and a banana from the handy 7-11, oh, and I had to have my cocan-cola light!

We left the station and headed to Rosenborg Castle which was built by Christian the IV. In the basement of the castle is the treasury where they display all of the gifts given to the king.  They also keep the crown jewels here. The crown worn by Christian the IV is stunning as is the 100+ karat amethyst! I was basically drooling over the beauty of them. The way they have the cases lit up they truly sparkle and I was mesmerized.

In the main part of the castle it is preserved in a way that illustrates a few of the time periods when the royals lived here. It was really well done and very beautiful. I was surprised by how small the castle is but it makes sense in a cold climate to have small rooms, less to heat!

After touring the castle we ate cheese and bread outside in the garden before continuing our tour to see the Little Mermaid statue. On our way up there we walked through a lovely park that is surrounded by a star shaped moat/canal. We got a little turned around in the park but it was lovely and gave us a great view of the Episcopal church, St. Albans, which was really quaint!

After leaving St. Albans we finally found the little Mermaid sitting in the harbor. We got some great pics, there really isn't anything else to do there, and then headed down to the Stroget, a famous street for shopping. The Stroget was beautiful down by the harbor where there is a canal and boats docked and colorful row houses and outdoor cafes with blankets on the seats. As you walk inland the street becomes sort of a cobblestone mall with highend stores, not nearly as cool.

We continued our walk to a coffee shop by Tivoli and the train station. We saw a danish in the display case and decided to try it as we were in Denmark! It was the best danish I've ever had!

After our snack we went across the street to Tivoli which is an amusement park. Unfortunately it was raining and very expensive so we didn't go on any rides, we walked around and watched the kids and strolled through the shops and finally grabbed some dinner before going back to the train station.

We took a train to Malmo, Sweden and then a sleeper train down to Germany. At first I was confused as to why we went to Sweden first and if you look at a map you'll see why that's confusing. However they drove the train onto a ferry boat to get us across! We looked out the window and saw cars parked next to us, pretty darn cool!



Suzie :-)

Take the midnight train going anywhere

Saturday to Sunday, May 14-15, 2011

Well, not exactly anywhere, ideally this midnight train gets us from Amsterdam to Copenhagen. We left the central train station in Amsterdam on an overnight train at 7:01 pm. We had made a reservation for a four person couchette when we first arrived in Amsterdam. Our "room" was already arranged into bunks so we got into our upper bunk and settled in. We were on the top bunk while another couple was on the bottom bunk. The main problem was that we couldn't sit up straight so it was easier just to lay down. Apparently I was really tired because I fell asleep right away at abou 8 pm and woke up only once to use the restroom before 8 am. The rocking of the train really lulled me to sleep. We were also fortunate that our car was really nice and quiet.

When I finally woke up this morning I ate my bread and cheese and fruit that we bought yesterday afternoon. Dutch Gouda is an awesome mild cheese, I seriously could have eaten the entire kg round that we bought.

We should be arriving in Copenhagen soon and we'll hit the ground running with a few museums and sights.

Suzie :-)