Day 40 - HAPPY FATHERS DAY and HAPPY BIRTHDAY MUM

So I didn’t really do so much today. I woke up pretty late and showered, and I chatted to Mum and Dad for father’s day and Mum’s birthday, but then I couldn’t decide what to do for the rest of my day, so I walked into town, and decided I was going to buy, write and send a BUNCH of postcards. (17 to be exact, NOT the cheapest of exercises…)

So I got a hotdog on the way up into the city.

I got a bit lost walking around to find some good postcards. But I did find some VERY good ones.

I saw some street performers and some rowers along the canals.

I bought stamps, then I went back to my hostel and asked everyone for their address’ and wrote them all out.

After this I met up with James and Kate, who were leaving the next day, so I chatted to them for a little while then said my good byes. They have invited me to go hang out with them in Manchester when I get back to London, which I think I will definitely do.

It was about dinner time by this time (I know, postcards are VERY time consuming?) So I decided, on my VERY limited budget, that I was going to go and buy, and make dinner. Now, I thought it would be fun to get a little baked before I did this, (which it was) picking all the most delicious and cheapest morsels of food I could find (which took me about 45 minutes) and I took them ALL to the register, and the lady told me they didn’t take credit cards (see mine doesn’t have a chip in it, it’s only swipe, which is very out-dated over here) So I had to go on a mission to get some money out, which is ALSO very difficult over here and there seem to be NO ATM’s. But I did find one (across the road from the shop after I walked like 4 blocks in the other direction and decided to turn around…) And then I got to go and do ALL my shopping again, but not high, which wasn’t as fun, and didn’t take up as much time.

I settled on Pumpkin soup, bread with cheese (laughing cow cheese is EVERYWHERE here, and I’ve become a little addicted to it) some waffles (that come with caramel in them) some spread which is a mixture of; Nutella (they’re obsessed with Nutella in Europe) White chocolate spread, and something I THOUGHT was caramel, but turned out to be a spread made out of like sweet dry biscuits, kind of tasted like an Anzac biscuit spread? It’s actually really good, but I’m still annoyed it wasn’t caramel. OH! And I found fresh milk! Fresh cold milk, (I actually found this yesterday when I was shopping for the BBQ with Amelia, James and Kate, and I got REALLY excited about it, and they all laughed at me) so I bought some chocolate milk, but it’s like the consistency of custard? So it didn’t really satisfy the craving for real milk, but I’m going to go buy some more fresh unflavoured milk. Hopefully it’s not thick like the chocolate one…

After I made up my little dinner, I basically went to bed? And that was pretty much my day, not very exciting, but hey. Not every day can be right?

Things that made me happy today; Stoner food shopping

Things that made me sad today; The cost of a stamp to Australia

Day 40 - Is this your first time on this planet?

This morning I woke up SUPER late after our late night out the night before (didn't go to bed until 5.30am lol) So I woke up at 11.30 and didn't really know what to do? But I ran into Amelia coming out of the shower (it's really quite amazing how we would just bump into each other everytime we sort of needed to?)

So both feeling a little worse for wear, we went to find some food. We didn't want to walk far, so we ended up at this little cafe, and I had an omelette, but mostly lots of water and coke and hot chocolate lol.

After this we headed back to the hostel and ran into Kate and James. We all organised the night before to head to a BBQ thing in the park being held by the hostel, we thought it was later in the night but it started at 4? So Kate and James headed over, and Amelia and I said we would catch up with them there a bit later. So we went and got ready, and when we came down, Kate and James both said they couldn't find it? So we all decided to do our own BBQ.

They have these INGENIOUS things over here! Portable BBQ's, Ive never seen such a thing. Its bascailly just a metal tray, with coals and firelighters. So we bought food, and one of these BBQ's and headed to the park.

WELL, let me tell you, the park was literally like a festival/camping grounds. There were just people EVERYWHERE, cooking food, getting high, tripping on whatever drugs, I have no idea. but the place was fucking fun! Some guy eating a chicken wing walked up to us and asked us; "Is this your first time on this planet?" Amelia was like "no actually, second" LOL

So i cooked the BBQ. I struggled a little... Dad would not have been proud. James and Kate were like "just light the firelighters" I was all "well... ok" but only one side of the coles light... and it didn't seem to get hot until like 3 hours later, when we already half cooked our burgers, and were full! Kind of annoying, but I tried every Bear Grylls trick I know to light it! I had cardboard, and everything trying to light the other coals... lol, just didn't work though.

But we did end up cooking some stuff enough to eat lol, and it wasn't so bad.

I also opened a bottle of wine without a cork screw (which I HAVE to remember to buy) Dad would have been VERY proud lol.

So we hung out in the park ALL afternoon. James and I walked to find a coffee shop, then we all had a bit of a smoke in the park. And then headed home and went to bed.

It was actually one of the coolest days I've had in Europe.

Things that made me happy today; Cheap food and booze all day, and the awesomeness of the park.

Things that made me sad today; Burning myself trying to light the stupid portable BBQ. Wishing that a park like this existed in Melbourne.

Day 39 - Food stoned

So today Amelia and I got up pretty much the exact same time, and had showers, and went to get food. We ended up wandering around the whole city, and had a hotdog with all different toppings.

I got a new sim card, and had a lot of trouble buying credit. And then my card stopped working! So I had BARELY any cash. And I also discovered that in my daze last night getting changed I had a 50 euro note in my bra, that must have flung out in the bathroom, and I lost L So that was SHIT. And I discovered that my card wasn’t working because I had no money on it, because my accommodation was so expensive. Anyway. It was a big kerfuffle that freaked me out a little, but I’m ok.

We wandered around going into different souvenir stores, and finding postcards and all kinds of random drug paraphernalia. All quite cool stuff actually.

Then we went to the sex museum, that was SOOOOOOO funny! Ameila and I were just pissing ourselves the whole time. It made me feel like a 12 year old.

After this we went to a Mexican restaurant, the food was ok, but the fact that we were sitting there looking through playing cards with naked men was even funnier.

We then walked around for ages, just getting back to the hostel.

We had met a few people earlier that day (Kate and James) they were going out for Kate’s birthday. So we met up with them and Steph. And we all decided to go to the red light district and have a look.

We had a beer in a pub first, and then James, Kate, Amelia and I decided to catch a tram, but the others didn’t want to?? So, that was the last time we saw them.

We wandered to the red light district. It’s not what I expected. It’s just skanky fake girls in small underwear standing in windows? They aren’t naked, and they don’t really act overtly sexual or anything?? It wasn’t so shocking.

We ended up getting pretty hammered in a pub near the red light district, and sort of did our own bar hop. Which was pretty fun, Amelia James and Kate were really funny people drunk.

After this we decided to go home, once again, a mission as we got lost, this place is so hard to navigate! But I KNOW for a fact the map has things marked in the wrong place! I think it’s to mess with the stoned tourists. But I’m onto them.

So we got food on the way home, more frites. VERY delicious.

Then we sat in the park across from our hostel and had a small smoke again, and got all giggly.

All in all a really fun day, we did SOOOOOOO much walking.

Things that made me happy today; Once again, it’s VERY obvious.

Things that make me sad today; getting VERY stressed over money.

Day 38 - Amsterdam

So, today I got up early with Rebecca and we went to get a Belguim waffle. OH MY LORD! Sooooooo good!!! It was a warm waffle with bananas, vanilla ice cream and REAL melted chocolate, that went hard over the ice cream, SOOOOOO amazing. We were in heaven, I can’t believe we didn’t die by getting hit by a car we were too distracted lol.

After this we waited around for the busabout bus to arrive, which it eventually did,a nd we were on the way to Amsterdam.

Didn’t take us too long before we arrived at the hostel. I checked in and discovered (which I only just counted today) 69 stairs to my room, no elevator…. So that’s been fun.

As soon as I came back down from my room I ran into Amelia, and a friend she had made names Steph. Rebecca was staying at another hostel, so she lkeft and I hung out with Amelia.

The three of us decided to get into the spirit of things, being in Amsterdam, and go get something t5o smoke.

DISCLAIMER; Look, I know a lot of people from work, and my parents and their friends are reading this. So I’m just going to remind you all, that in this country, it’s COMPLETELY legal. I’m not doing anything wrong, so I AM going to write about my adventures in this blog. If you don’t like it, or disagree with it, that’s cool. You don’t have to read J

ANYWAY back to the story. We missioned to a coffee shop, and found a cool little one. It’s SOOOOOO weird to see everything just so open? Like, there’s menu’s explaining what type of high you will get with certain types of weed. You can buy pre-rolled joints too? It’s just very bizarre to get to choose?

Anyway we picked something that would be a bit uplifting and make up giggle, and had a smoke.

Nothing much happened until we decided to leave. THEN we got SUPER giggly and all felt like complete tourists. Lol.

We wandered around and got some food. We got Frites (fries) with all different sauces, I had curry sauce, was so good. Then we got some pizza and pasta, I only got bruschetta though, and it wasn’t so good…

We basically just wandered around for ages, trying to find somewhere quiet to have a drink and chill out. But we never really did because we got so lost. NONE of us knew where we were, it was quite funny. But we found our way back, and Amelia and I tried to find another coffee shop, which took us ages, but we did. And then we hung out in the smoking room at our hostel for a few ours, met a really weird guy…. But eventually ended up in bed.

Was a pretty cool start to the Amsterdam experience.

Things that made me happy today; I think that’s kind of obvious

Things that made me sad today; Not very much to be honest, even getting lost was an adventure.

Day 37 - Eating myself to death

This morning (after an awful sleep with an old snoring lady in my dorm) Rebecca, myself and another girl we met called Carla got up early and went to the market in the main square. It was so amazing because they offer just free fruit to try, so you just wander around and eat all this amazing fruit. Rebecca and I had these soft donoughts with custard in them, SO good. The receptionist once again told us to go back at like 12, just before the market closes because it’s the best time to get good deals on food.

So after this, we walked around and I tried DESPERATELY to find a charm from here for my bracelet. It was a complete waste of time, I totally gave up UNTIL, I just happened to walk into a shop, and found one!! A tiny windmill, pretty cool, but I didn’t think I was going to find anything.

After this we headed back to the market, and got some roasted chicken and salads. The chicken was good, but there was too much, and the salads were pretty average, but the fruit I got was soooooo good.

We then went to go for a ride on the boats that do tours on the canals. Just before that though, we got some chocolate (because were in Belgium of course) I have to say, I prefer Swiss chocolate MUCH more. The boat tour cost us like $5.80, and it was half an hour, SOOOOO worth it, you see a lot, including a dog that EVERYDAY hangs out of a window to sleep, pretty cute LOL and the smallest window in the city? Lol random.

After the tour, I had to go find some underwear, so Carla took me to H&M, and on the way we got a hot chocolate, BUT this hot chocolate is like a cup of hot milk, and then they put a chocolate lollipop type thing, and you mix it up until it’s a hot chocolate, its amazing.

After H&M I headed back to the hostel, and Rebecca, Carla and I had some dinner at the hostel’s restaurant, and we got a beer tasting included, there was a dark beer, similar to a stout, wasn’t a HUGE fan, then a pale wheat beer, that was really good, and a cherry beer, which didn’t taste anything like beer, but was good. I then ordered a raspberry beer, and that was delicious! Dinner wasn’t spectacular, we went kind of late, and they had sold out o a lot of stuff, so I just had a veggie burger.

After this the other two girls decided to go out, but I was so tired I just went and had a shower and slept.

REALLY good day, I had so much good food. I think I gained all the weight back that I’ve lost so far!

Things that made me happy today; Pretty sure that’s obvious.

Things that made me sad today; Not getting waffles again!

Day 36 - In Bruges

So today I woke up early, and headed off to Bruges. It only took about 5 hours to get there, so a reasonably quick bus ride. However our guide was ill, so we only had a bus dri8ver, and no one really knew how to get to the hostel. But someone thought they did, and we got there eventually (with my bladder about to burst!)

I hung out with Rebecca, and we chilled out for a while because we couldn’t check into the hostel right away because we got there so early, once we checked in I decided to have a nap because I was so tired from getting no sleep in Paris.

When we got up I did some washing (to get rid of the bed bugs..) but the thing is you have to dry it on a really high heat, and I melted all of my lace underwear :S I did salvage like two pairs though… But I re-packed my whole bag with all my summer clothes at the bottom, and my bag is VERY small and half empty again after re-packing it, so that made me feel better,

After this Rebecca and I decided to go for a walk and then we had some dinner. We went to Chinese, it was really good, but I wanted to go there for the vegetables, and there were hardly any L so that sucked, but still really good food.

After dinner we headed back to the hostel, and we were going to go get Waffles, but the shop that the receptionist at the hostel told us about was closed, so we bascailly just headed to bed.

Cool day, Bruges is really pretty.

Things that made me happy today; The calmness of Bruges (everyone is really relaxed and it’s so safe)

Things that made me sad today; Missing out on waffles