¨The best part of Budapest were the graveyards¨, Tom said, goulashly

Well you may be wondering what the delay was in writing about old Hungary. The thing is that we didn´t go there as planned. We were scheduled to take a night train on Wednesday evening, thus spending Thursday afternoon in Budapest with a Friday return. We arrived to Munich airport nearly an hour and a half ahead of departure, plenty of time to go visit the Wombat Hostel (I think the 3rd stay here, confirmed it has my favorite hostel in Europe) and get back for the long ride. Well...we had a mechanical failure which delayed our arrival from the airport to the train station by about an hour. Very unGermanlike.

Well when we got there, we said, it would be better to just go the next day, and go back to the Wombat. That next day Dad and I went to Aying, and more specifically, the Ayinger brewery. We got inside and heard the next tour would be that evening...in German. Just getting inside was good enough, and I took Dad on a highlight tour (read: prior blog photos) of the town. We ended up having a great lunch at local biergarten further entrenching my puzzlement at the general idea that German food leaves much to be desired. My best meals of this trip (maybe even last one as well!) have been in Germany.

Back at the train station, we find we can´t book our train because we are too close to departure. Our only hope is to talk to the conductor and see if tickets are available. The price is more but this is a one time shot at Hungary. We get on and the guy says it is 40 euros. Awesome! I dont even need to burn a rail day at that rate. Turns out he thought we needed the beds and had train tickets. Add 100 Euros. Well thank god for those Eastern European sleeze bags, because he charged us 100 in total if we didnt get a receipt (take a guess where that money went).

The Great Train Robbery...Attempt

We were told by the same guy that we need to lock our door because there may be theives on board. That is always comforting to hear. Throughout the night I swear I was hearing things and around 5 am Dad and I both heard someone trying the door. There was zero question about it(the handle was moving). We think at that point we were in Slovenia which is puzzling given that the path to Budapest should be a direct one through Austria. What is even more puzzling is that the train was moving, where were those people going to go after they stole whatever they were going to get?


In Budapest the next morning we arranged a tour of the city. I usually HATE, with a capital H, the idea of tours. A tour is a completely impersonal way to see a city. You never walk with locals and just hit one tourist spot after another... with other tourists. This one was very different. Judy gave us a lot of cool tidbits, got us to the best lookouts and places we would not have found. I am not deluding myself into saying we saw Budapest, but we did see the highlights. Ironically, as Dad and I started to make some less than complimentary comments about the city we thought it would be a good idea to switch to Spanish. Everyone on our tour spoke Spanish. Throughout the streets...Spanish. In the cafe, I even ordered my food in Spanish. What the heck is going on there?!?! Anyway if you are going to go to these (tourist) places you might as well be with natives as you transport yourself. In other words, soaking up the local color. The train bit gave us reason to bypass that line of thought as well as having only the day in the city.

The main train station has a certain Tampa Theatre quality to it. So nice and old that you hate to tear it town but it will not suffice for the future, when Budapest starts growing in earnest. It recently was remodeled/renovated and it looks great...until you get to the edges where the nations relative poverty shows.

We got a great tour by a girl named Judy and went to both Buda and Pest. The city is magnificent, and we saw it in less that prime conditions. It is like seeing a supermodel just woke up, hung over, with a black eye and vomit all over her. When you say, dang she still looks good, that says something.

At Hero Square we saw a group of Icelandic tourists just checking the place out...huh? Then we went to the Agriculture museum. This was built a bit over 100 years ago and features something kind of neat. Every building, in this fortress was representative of a different style of architecture. Gothic, Baroque, Neoclassical, Renaissance etc. Crazy!

The Not So Blue Danube

From that area we headed over the chain bridge across the Danube to the ¨mustsee¨ Castle District, which gives you a great view of Pest. The Danube is very impressive as it carves through the two sides of the Hungarian capital. I have no hesistation recommending it to anyone in Central Europe as a day trip (at the minimum, 3-4 days would be ideal).

We got back on the train and headed back to Munich where got to the hostel and found out some stuff about Ireland. My plan was to hang out in Limerick (if only for the blog possibilities) but apparently that city is pretty dangerous. The Irish guy at the hostel was held hostage there. Nice. So he gave us some advice and I settled on a rough schedule for ol Ireland

Day One: Sleep in Dublin
Day Two: Dublin tour, Guinness brewery, Temple Bar etc.
Day Three: Pick up Em and head to Galway
Day Four: Meet some relatives
Day Five: head back to Dublin
Day Six: Head to London


Dad and I did some checking and took a rainy train trip to Bertesgarten. This is was Hitler´s infamous retreat. A long ride back put us in Munich around 8ish and we were at the Hofbrauhaus by 9ish. It was too crowded so we headed to that bar where Fabio, Merina and I had that Celebrator on tap. The food there was fantastic! Pork Schnitzel, bacon, cheese, onion, spatezel other stuff, beer. We got stuffed. For desert, I had a ¨radler¨ at the Hofbrauhaus. A Radler is near heresy but it is popular so I try everything once. It is lemonade and lager mixed. Acceptable but I´ll stick to the real stuff from now on.

Dad went to the airport and I took our day pass to the World Cup stadium, got some lunch at the Hofbrauhaus, and wrote the blog. I am off to Vienna tonight at 11:44 and expect a semi long day tomorrow of goofing around.

If I am not exhausted I will blog tomorrow night (6ish EDT) otherwise wait until Tuesday ;)



Dad and I at a Bad Hersfeld restaurant...I have a French Fry in my ear...it was funny at the time.

--Joey

At a schlöss for words in Füssen

I am on a German keyboard so bear with the z and y being flipped. This is also a pretty long blog...sorry.

I picked Dad up at the airport around 12ish after his flight got delayed. He came out ready to roam, which I was anything but ready to do when I arrived. We checked into the Wombat, and headed off to get a Bayern pass to get to Fussen and the Fussen bus to Neuschwanstein. Much like Aying had changed to an unbelievable degree, Füssen´s transformation was even more dramatic. For one, you can see the castle far away (at night it was like a freakishly glowing orb...it sort of looked green?), and apparently there are huge mountains (the beginnings of the Alps?) nearby...who knew?

Unfortunately the castle tours were closed, but it was well worth the walk up. In fact, we got inside the castle gate and sat down when we were told they were locking up. From there we went across the Mary Bridge that was (almost to completely) invisible last time. Vertigo sufferers need not visit.

Since it was getting dark we headed back to the bus stop to find we missed the last bus until 10ish. Never missing an opportunity to walk in Bavaria, we trekked back about 2 and a half miles to the train station. Unfortunately, the next train was 10ish (Sundays are different) so Dad and I enjoyed some traditional Mexican food, I guess their twist on it would be GerMex or MexGerm, either way TexMex sounds and is a lot better.

We called that the end of a long day and went to sleep.

Picture Perfect

I have now seen all five (Fantoft Stavekirke needs an asterisk) of Dad´s enlarged photos. We went to the airport to get the rental car.Apparently because Automatics are rare, they reserve them for the fancier cars, so we got a Mercedes E Class with GPS :-D

Rothenberg was surprisingly far even at 80mph or more on the autobahn. We were one time passed aggresively while doing 90+. The town has become pretty touristy (a lot like Venice and Toledo) but with that, it has also been spruced up so it has never looked better. Dad´s photo looks black and white compared to the new ones(I´ll post both when I get home for comparison).

Once we arrived in Bad Hersfeld, we found the MapQuest maps to be deceiving, but fortunately the car had GPS and equally fortunately I was able to use it. The town is small but has a very busy central shopping district. Dad and I headed to a restaurant then went back to the hotel (which has a view of a park[left]) and collapsed.




Awe de Cologne

With every cathedral, every monument it gets tougher and tougher to get your attention. The Köln cathedral does that... big time. It is the 2nd tallest Gothic cathedral in the world, and until the Washington monument 4 years later, it was the largest building in the world. Construction began in the mid 13th century and was completed more than 600 years later. Inside it is equally amazing and it further cements Gothic architecture as my favorite (and most impressive) style.

Afterwards, I went out in search of some music for the road trip back to München today. For those interested and for those not, the best of the Crooners, Buckshot and Andre Rieu performs Strauß.

Back at the train station I found a route back to Bad Hersfeld that arrived around 00:30. Sounded good to me. Dad said he would pick me up...maybe. I had two changes, one in Frankfurt(Main) with the other one in Fulda. The problem was that I got off the train at Frankfurt(Mann) or Mannheim. I should have realized something was afoot, when I arrived much earlier than expected (nearly an hour) but that would mean that the airport in Frankfurt is almost an hour and a half from Frankfurt Hauptbahnhof. It took 30 minutes after my connection, to get to Frankfurt from Mannheim, which effectively steamrolled my hopes of getting back with my itinerary.

At the station I met a guy from Dearborn named Lonzell. He was working with a Haliburton subsidiary in Afghanistan and was trying to get back home before he has to go back. He traveled with cash only, and he got stuck in a small town and had to use it for the hotel. His company didn´t wire him the money so he has to wait until Friday. He needed 15 euros to reserve a room so I gave it to him. If he was a conartist, he has a convincing story.

I checked on a ride back to Bad Hersfeld, and a guy with a mustache that wentfrom sideburn to sideburn tells me that it is not possible. The last stop is in Fulda and the next one afterwards is 5am. I asked if it was safe to stay there, and he responded with, a lot safer than here! He also told me they have a mission (red cross...sort of) off of track one. So I called Dad and we agreed it would be best for me to just wait there until I could get a ride back.

Quick recap

Euro Trip 1: Slept in Gardermoen Airport, Norway
Euro Trip 2: Slept in Lyon Airport, France
Euro Trip 3: Slept in Torino Train Station, Italy
Euro Trip 4: Slept in Frankfurt Hauptbahnhof, Germany

Once inside the mission, I scouted out a place to sleep. It was supervised but I still wanted my pack and cds close to me. The people there (after I arrived, I was first) were a mix of the poor and travelers, though mostly the latter. I met an Italian girl named Daria who is studying in Dresden and had a 5am connection. Turned out her train, also stopped at Bad Hersfeld so we hung out for a while. We both got about 2 hours of sleep which became 7 once I got back to the hotel where I had a big breakfast.

We leave in an hour or so for Munich. Hungary for some Budapest?

Bad Hersfeld for Mom

Henry for Emily

--Joey

Aying Day Trip

This will be a quick blog. I thought I would post some photos from Aying. As you may expect it looks a little different in April than it did in February.

When I got there the brewery was closed (I still have a chance on Tuesday if I want to ride the rail to Munich before going to Koln...definitely a possibility).


The hotel, where the photo of the beer from Aying took place, was being used for a wedding. How sweet is that! You know you wont be stuck with some crappy lite beer.

Across the way is a beer garden, where I had some Bavarian roast chicken and Kartoffsalat (kind of like Potatoes Au Gratin with some Lederhosen) and a liter of the Ayinger Hefeweizen. Who says food in Germany stinks? It has been rockin for me!



The town which was nice during the winter, really comes alive in the spring. There were a total of 3 people outside other than me when I was there last. Now there were several people, mostly locals, or close_enough_to_be_locals enjoying the weather, drinking beer and doing outdoors stuff.

I decided to walk to the post office, where I took that desolate picture, and found that it was technically in a town called PeiB or Peiss. There are also mountains in the background :oP

Once it started to become night I headed back and it started to rain a little, reminding me of walking through the snow flurries. This time the coat was mostly unnecessary, whereas that was the coldest day of my trip.

Night night...















One last photo illustrating the difference between then and now


















--Joey

Fahrting around Germany

Ich haben ankomst en München (how was that Dad or aunt, zia, tia, whatever Laura?)

It was a heck of a trip here though. The last I wrote I was in Brussels trying to make it to the city center to soak (drink) up the local (yeast) culture(s). For those keeping score at home.

Beers of the trip:

Bavarian Beer (Netherlands) - I had this on the train...skip it. Yechk
Leffe Blond and Bruin - Both rocked and I think they are available back home
Bellevue Kriek Lambic - Like cherry syrup in a Budweiser...no thanks
Mort Subite Gueze Lambic - Ooohh it has that wonderful sour lambic taste with a grapey bready flavor...I gueze you would describe it

I believe the thumbs up ones are available back home but I haven't tried them before now.

Okay so Brussels...you can keep it.. no it is fine but kind of industrial for my tastes. I walked back through a sketchy neighborhood to get back to the central station (gare midi) and eventually back to Bruges. This was the first time I had really gone out at night. The town lights up right nice :)

I headed to the main plaza market place and ate at Quik (this is a belgian mcd) because everything was closed, or 30 euros. I hit the sack shortly there after because I knew I might have a semilong day. I had a 30 hour day.

Lesson 56, always check the airport you are flying to especially when using airlines like Ryan Air. The Brussels airport is far from town so I took the metro, changed lines, and took a bus there. This took about one and a half hours, so I was still 2.5 hours ahead of time (good thing I got to Brussels so early). Small catch, the Charleroi airport is even further from the Gare Midi than the main airport was. So naturally I was hoping a bus went there directly or something. Nope. How do they recommend to get back? The 45 minute, direct train to Gare Noord with a final stop at Gare Midi (why not tell me this in the first place)

So I jump on that line, and get off where pick up another train which takes at least 1.5 hours (I reset my phone so my sense of time left something to be desired). When I got there I had to wait for a bus for 20 minutes during which time an old lady fell. I stood by and watched the others help her up...I looked for pickpockets. I've become a cynical person over here :-P

I got to the airport too late, but fortunately, the flight was delayed so they would let me check in late. Sweet! One catch, they have no record of me booking a flight. I said, that would be okay, if there are still seats left, just recharge me the amount and I will be off. 180 Euros which is 6x the cost I paid online. Without a booking number there was nothing they could do (they will refund my money if I find it)

Train it is. I thought going through A'dam or Paris would be the best option. My hunch was right, my timing was wrong. Since it was a Friday, they had nothing available on high speed trains. The slow trains made me miss the night train connections so after all the smoke cleared I was left with two options

1.) Go to Koln, change, and head to Munich
2.) Go to Paris, change, and head to Munich

For number 1, the time differential was 4 minutes, even given German punctuality that was cutting it close. So the guy recommended number two, only I would have to change train stations, but I would have an hour. Fine. So I get to Charles Of All the Gall airport on time (more or less) and all the ticket machines are broken or are only in French. Yechk. The only option was a long line of people, where there was one person helping all of them.

Joey: The nation of France, I would like to introduce you to customer service. Customer service, the nation of France.

Customer Service: Nice to meet you ::extends hand::
France: Hrmpf

Did you just see that? France didn't even shake hands...unbelievable.

The train was not direct and took almost an hour to get to Gare du Nord. I had to get to Gare du Est. The subway door won't let you out without your ticket, so I have to dig through my pocket, pick it up and then wait for the train. I arrived 30 minutes too late. Would any of that have helped? Maybe not but I would have had a change had they been German. Ironically, I met a nice guy on the train to the airport, super helpful etc. So I think the deal is that the older French are the problem, maybe the younger ones are not such p.i.t.as


The schedule is for one last train to get to Strasbourg in 4 minutes. I asked if I could jump on that with my Munich reservation. Non! Figures. So at the ticket window the lady seeing that I was panicking (I can't find a place to stay on such short notice and the station was looking unsafe) so she said get on the train. Again I met a young couple that was friendly and helpful. The ticket stamper was so typically French I just wanted to bite his face. I think he was going to give me a fine but the laziness factor set in and he just muttered c'est la vie and walked away.

My biggest concern was the train would be 3-4 hours only, and leave me no where to go once I got to Strasbourg. Luckily I was on a slower train and only waited one hour before my Munich connection.

Now I am off to Ayinger, once I can get a shower.

The last photo I took in Bruges (too bad it got so washed out, I may have to tweak this later)






Tschuss,

Joey

BTW, w/r/t the title Gute Fahrt was translated, Have a nice trip, however, my Norsk instinct tells me that Fahrt does not mean travel or visiting or anything like that but more like "Go(o)d Speed"

An Okily Dokily day in Flanders

After a long day on Tuesday, I didn't wake up until about noon on Wednesday. Time was limited so I toured Bruges some, posted the blog from yesterday, and called home. I didn't want to waste the money it takes to go to Brussels (about 23 euros) but it did seem like a good time to visit the coastal town of Oostende.

As soon as the sun started to set in Bruges, I knew that I had around 2 hours to make it there. Oostende is not in my guidebook (I am surprised Belgium was) and it looks like it is about to gear up for summer tourists. There, I saw a cool cathedral...but that was nothing. There was the biggest claw machine I ever encountered! I took a video for Em.

I walked about as far as I could in order to return by the last train (10:30). Back in Bruges the outskirts of town were not lit up which surprised me a little. Once "inside" (somewhat literally, there is an entrance and a wall) Bruges rivals Salamanca for a small town at night...only not many people are outside (mostly tourists).

Having done my fair share of walking I headed back to the hostel and ultimately to bed. The one guy I saw earlier was there but covered with his blanket so I didn't notice him at first (I left the light on and everything) so I was noisier than I should have been. When I realized, I felt kinda bad, turned off the light, and took the key downstairs (this is one of those, one key for the room hostels). Around 3am los barachos came in being loud etc. What is it with the Spanish (to be fair they were Mexicans but at that hour who cares) and hostels? ;)

I got a relatively early jump on today and thought it would be a good idea to visit Brussels for two reasons:

1.) There is stuff to see and I have covered Bruges reasonably well
2.)I need to take a flight tomorrow to Salzburg and I want it to go as smoothly as possible

The train took about an hour although I expected it to be longer because I thought there would be more stops on the way here. I also thought there would be more of an "entering a major city" feeling. The train station itself felt a little sketchy so I am going to try to get back by dark (they also had monitors warning about pickpockets, so I don't think I am just being paranoid)

From there I headed, via metro, to the Atomium, the Eiffel Tower of Brussels, in recently restored (were talking last couple of weeks) condition. I was worried that it would be difficult to spot once I left the metro station, as you can see to the left, that was not a problem,

Inside it has a certain Spaceship Earth feel to it appropriate for its Nuclear Age construction timeframe (1958 for the French Expo) . Apparently, sometimes Belgian kids have sleep overs here. Pretty cool!

Afterwards, I began a long walk back to the center of town. It will continue after the blog is posted.

Bruges, without my mug ruining it



--Joey

If it´s Tuesday this must be Belgium


I landed in Amsterdam (or as the cool kids say: a´dam) about 5 minutes early and made my way to the Centraal Station. My plan was to drop off my backpack and walk around (possibly going to the Keukenhof, their ultra famous garden...it was featured in the inflight magazine). That paragraph took me ten minutes to type because all the keys on the Belgian keyboard are messed up. To show you what I mean, I will rewrite the paragraph above:

I lqnded in Q,sterdq, 9or qs the cool kids sqyMqùdq,0 qnd ,qde ,y zqy to the centrqql stqtion: ?y plqn zqs to drop off ,y bqckpqck qnd zqlk qround 9possibly going to the Keukenhof; their ultrq fq,ous gqrden:::it zqs feqtured in the inflight ,qgqwinbe:

At centraal, all the lockers were taken and given that I had three hours of train riding to get to Bruges (call Guinness to see if there is a record for the number of ways to pronounce this town...even from IT´s OWN RESIDENTS! (I think the accepted version is brew-::loogeysound::-geh with brew-juh being 2nd but 1st with tourists)) I made my way south to Antwerp. An uneventful train switch later and I was going toward Ghent and Bruges. The afternoon was still young when I got to Ghent so I jumped off the train.

I think I got lucky, while Ghent is a very cool middle age city, but Bruges appears to be far better for walking around. When you get off the train in Ghent, it seems like a nondescript Eurotown. Only the tops of two cathedrals hint to you that you should get off and poke around. There were lockers but I didn´t plan on spending more than an hour (it was more like 3) so I brought it all with me.

Along the way I met this guy to the right and figured Em would want a photo. The center of town has four interesting landmarks and I only know the name for two :-P It was this let me just check it out first bit that made me miss the Mystic Lamb but did get to see inside Mariakirken (top photo), so I may go back on the way to Brussels.

Apparently, from what I read later, these paintings (the mystic lamb) have a good deal of bizarre history associated with them. Their origin is suspect (one of the artists may have been invented), they were nearly destroyed during the 1700s, in the 1800s the nude portions were covered in paint, and then it was stolen during the 30s, held for ransom, only to reappear at a train station a while later. You can't make that stuff up.

Back at the station I picked up the train to Bruges and spent an hour finding the hostel. The travel guide says that the town was peaking in the 15th century and had a 400 year recession preventing modernization. Lucky us, because this feels like Venice only more "real." Since arriving at the hostel (the photo at the left is the view out the window) I have pretty much just collapsed and written this (54 minutes and counting). Not a bad day all in all :)

Below is a photo from Ghent in what can only be described as a rousing endorsement of Flemish cuisine :-P



--Joey

Deja vu

I am going back to Europe until May 6th. Dad has a meeting in Bad Hersfeld, Germany so he wanted an expert tour guide of Munich :-P

My itinerary hasn't been flushed out but here is a rough idea:

April 17 - Leave Tampa
18 - Arrive in Amsterdam Leave for Ghent
19 - Ghent
20 - Ghent
21 - Brussels -> Munich (Ryanair)

22 - Munich
23 - Munich/Fussen
24 - Munich -> Bad Hersfeld (driving)
25 - Bad Hersfeld <-> Cologne (Koln)
26 - Bad Hersfeld area
27 - Bad Hersfeld -> Munich
28 - Munich -> Salzburg
29 - Vienna
30 - Vienna
01 - Vienna <-> Budapest
02 - Vienna <-> Budapest
03 - Vienna -> Bratislava -> London Stansted (Ryanair)
04 - London
05 - London
06 - London
07 - London -> Tampa
08 - Die of exhaustion
09 - ?

--Joey

Stay tuned...shortly.

--Joey