Day 47 - Prague

So today was a travel day on the bus, but we made it to Prague by like 2.30pm, so it was a pretty short day.

We checked into my amazingly cheap and awesome hostel. Probably one of the best I've stayed in so far. Then I met up with a few girls I met in Berlin and we caught the tram into town.

We sat down and had some traditional Czech food. The girls had really meaty pork dishes, but I had cheese and spinach pancakes. They were so good. And soooooo cheap. The beer was ridiculously cheap.

After that we wandered around and looked in heaps of jewelery shops, then decided to get a bottle of Absinthe and get drunk at the hostel (because the Czech Republic is one of VERY few places left that are allowed to make Absinthe the traditional way.

So bascailly we played lots of card and drinking games in my room, and got wasted, but not awfully, considering between us we drank the whole bottle...

It was a pretty fun day actually. Lots of fun and good food.

Things that made me happy today; Cheap Czech beer and alcohol.

Things that made me sad today; Not seeing the green fairy.

Day 46 - The Zooooooo

So today I got INCREDIBLY homesick, and I did not feel like doing anything. I think the history of Berlin really got to me... I got online and talked to mum and dad and Paul for a few hours. But I knew I had to make a decision and go out and see SOMETHING.

So I went to the Zoo!! Berlin has the biggest zoo in Europe, and my god was it big.

I caught the metro there, which was a bit tough, because originally I thought I had to catch the tram, but it was the metro, but I did sort myself out. It was really quite cool, not particularly 'culturally' enlightening or historical, but I had a good day, and it pulled me out of my little sad slump.

After the zoo I got home and came back to the hostel and hung out in my room for a while. Then a guy from my room and I went to get a kebab. BEST kebab wrap! Oh my god so delicious!

I chatted to some guys from Bruges after I had dinner, then I went and packed my bag and showered ready for the next day when I was leaving on the bus for Prague.

It wasn't the most signi8figant of days, but I did have fun.

Things that made me happy today; Kids getting super excited about the animals (especially the kangaroos)

Things that made me sad today; Getting so horribly homesick, and also getting exhausted walking around the zoo.

Day 45 - HALF WAY!!!

So today marks the halfway point in my trip, YAY!

I got up pretty early this morning and met the girls from yesterday (4 girls from Perth) and we decided to go on the walking, but as it turns out, it started at 10am, not 10.30 like we all thought... so we all took our umbrellas (as it was SOOOOO rainy) and decided to go to checkpoint charlie.

Well, that didn't work either because there was some political rally, and they blocked all the streets off... Sooooo we went to the Jewish memorial.

This WAS open! So we went under the memorial, and read all about the history of the Holocaust. There was a lot of information just on people who both survived and died, and families that were wiped out. It was pretty intense I have to say, but it is meant as a memorial, not exactly a museum, so you can search a database for names and things like that, and there are stories just on average people to attempt to create a memorial to every person. It's really quite moving to see such a big memorial to just average people and families.

After this we DID make it back to the hostel in time for the later walking tour (I got currywurst on the way, google it, it's amazing!) And then we started the walking tour.

It was REALLY informative, I highly recommend the Berlin walking tour. The guy we had was English, but had lived here for 7 and a half years, and he knew his stuff. He took us to heaps of amazing places, told us about a LOT of history, I feel FAR more knowledgeable about German history than ever before. He even took us to the area (now a car park) above the former bunker of where Hitler died and was buried, and the remains of the Berlin wall. The whole tour was a bit... Sombre I guess you could say? It was very informative about the history but at the same time, it kind of made me feel really bad about humanity in general.

I have to explain myself a bit futher, I really do like Berlin, it's a really pretty big open city, but... It's not a place where I feel comfortable being happy and having a good time. There's so much history and reminders of what has previously happened here, in terms of the second world war and the cold war the holocaust... It's not a place where I feel like I want to go out and have a good time, I feel more like I should respect the history this place has, and think a lot about that instead... It's very hard to explain, but I hope I made some sense there. I am glad I've made the decision to not go to a concentration camp... I'm not quite sure how I would handle it.

Anyway, on the way home from the 4 and a half hour walking tour, I got some fish and chips, was really good, but you know, just fish and chips. And then I came back to my room because I'm exhausted and cold!

All in all, I can't say it was a 'good' day, but it was a VERY interesting, informative and thought provoking day.

I'm not going to sum up with things that made me happy or sad... It doesn't seem very appropriate here. This isn't really a place I want to make jokes about.

Day 44 - Travel day

So today was super boring, this will be a short one. I just jumped on the bus super early, met a bunch of girls at one of the stops, then we got to Berlin, which is really cool, but it was raining so hard we just stayed in and ordered pizza from the hostel kitchen, was really good.

After that I showered and chatted with a couple of girls in my room for a while, then went to sleep.

Was a reeeeeeally dull day. Nothing else to report, honestly!

Day 43 - Last day!

So once again I got up pretty late, I didn’t do too much for the start of the day, chatted to Paul for ages. (I really missed home today)

Then I decided to go to a market. It was a decent walk, and it started raining on me but I bought an umbrella at the market. I also bought some nailpolish, some perfume and other random things, but MOST important is the Dutch pancakes I had. With powdered sugar… delicious.

After this went to ANOTHER market (I walked HEAPS this day) then I went back to the hostel, and I met up with a girl I met previously on busabout Rachel, and her, her friend and myself went to a coffeeshop, we met a couple of guys on the way there which joined us. I had to order everything for Rachel because she had never smoked before lol but I did my job because we both got pretty high. We had frites for dinner, and bought some more food at the supermarket (which got stolen) in preparation for the bus ride. We then all had a few drinks, and I went upstairs (pretty high still) to pack my bag. FINALLY got one over the fucking group of English people that keep waking me up, because I got in after they were all in bed and woke them ALL up by turning the light on. Pay back is a bitch.

Overall, pretty average day again.

Things that made me happy today; Giving the poms their payback.

Things that made me sad today; Missing home.

Day 42 - Boring

I didn’t get up to TOO much today, pretty boring day. I chatted to home for a while (until pretty late in the day) then I decided to go to the Van Gogh museum. TOTAL rip off. It was 14 euro, for like 4 levels of JUST paintings, NOTHING else, and only about a third of them are Van Gogh, the rest are people that influence him, or that he was influenced by him… Pretty lame.

So it started raining HARD on my way there AND home. I got pretty soaked. Which wasn’t too fun. I then sent the postcards, and then on the way home I bought dinner, which was like a pre-packaged tiki masala curry, and some FRESH MILK! Yum!

I then did some more washing….

Later that night I hung out in the smoking room for a little while and chatted to some people, they were all pretty nice, but didn’t really catch any of their names.

I then cooked dinner, and had a chat to a Canadian girl, but after all of that, I just went to bed.

Really a pretty dull day to be honest with you.

Things that made me happy today; Fresh milk.

Things that made me sad today; the Van Gogh museum.

Day 41 - Riding a bike really IS like riding a bike!

So today I got up super early (after a shit sleep because some fucking group of people walked in at 2am and turned ALL the lights on…) and I went on a bike tour! Oh! First I stopped off at a café and had an AWESOME coffee (first good one in ages, very satisfying)

Now, I’m not going to lie, I was kind of shitting myself about this bike tour, here’s why;

Bikes are EVERYWHERE, literally everywhere. They control the road, not cars. But on the other hand, cars don’t seem to like bikes very much, they don’t really get along, so a car will totally try to get take control. And pedestrians?? Well, if you’re a pedestrian I’m pretty sure you have no rights, and you will CONSTANTLY feel like you’re walking in the wrong place AT ALL TIMES.

Regardless of all this I sucked it up and hey presto, I discovered I can still ride a bike quite well. The tour was really good. This city is basically completely flat, so it wasn’t a real strain on your body, but it was still a 25km ride, and my butt and legs are quite tender right now.

So firstly, we stopped at a windmill. Exciting! Then we got rained on, not so exciting. And then we went tooooo……

A traditional cheese farm!! Dad you would have LOVED it. All the cheese is made by hand, and they showed you how (but I already knew, thanks to my Dad, the survivalist) And we got to taste all the cheeses they made. They sliced it right off the wheel, except the lady thought I seemed like a good sport, so she decided to grate it into my hand (to show the group how a cheese grater works…?) Not so easy to eat I’ll let you know, but this is me we’re talking about, I ate every little grated piece of that delicious stuff.

Then after this, at the same farm, we learnt how to make clogs! Well, they showed us how the machine works. They guy seemed pretty interested in me, and kept calling me ‘lady in red’ and asking me to touch his freshly lathed clog… Weirded me out…

THEN they took us to the obvious part of the farm, the room where you buy shit. The cheese!!! Ooohhhh so many cheeses. It was really cheap too. But it was made very clear to us, that these could NOT be taken back to Australia or New Zealand, as if I didn’t know?? I think they were just rubbing salt in the wound. So I then had the very difficult task of deciding if I could eat a whole wheel of cheese in a month and a half? I decided I most definitely could!! Buuuuuut it would just be too hard to carry around.

After this we biked back to the bike shop and I walked back to the hostel and had some food, left over’s from last night’s feast (I use that term loosely)

I then decided to do some washing and I died my hair. It was pretty difficult, but I did ok. I feel much better for having it fresh.

Then I met a girl called Holly in my room, she invited me along with her and her friend Fiona to go to the sex museum. So we first went to a coffee shop. There were lots of black people around, and we sat down to this one guy who was decked out in Armani and all these designer brands (I only know because he had bags and stuff next to him LOL) And he turned to Fiona and I and was like “he, do you girls like hip-hop music?” We were both like “Oh….. na, not really.” And he sort of went “oh.. ok” and turned away. Anyway, not long after this, heaps of people came into the shop, asking for his autograph and one guy was like “dude, I’ll be DJing your music across the road” I’m pretty sure he was kind of a big deal, like famous?? But I had NO idea who he was, and we totally shut him down by telling him we didn’t like hip hop?? LOL. I thought it was funny afterwards.

We then missioned to the sex museum, I’ve already been, but it was SOOOOOOO much funnier while I was stoned. Then we got frites. I had curry and onion sauce, SOOOO good. And then we walked down “skinny lane’ in the red light district. It’s a really skinny lane, but all the ‘best looking’ girls (I use that term loosely, they all look like giant fake barbie dolls) That was funny, but I have to say, it feels weird walking around there, because they all just look at you, for example, I wanted to turn around to the girls and have a laugh, but they can ALL see you, so it makes you feel really awkward.

After this we REALLY wanted to find dutch pancakes, but we had no luck and were told they are a morning thing, so we just settled for waffles..

After this we TRIED so hard to get back to the hostel, but we were all pretty stoned, and EVERYTHING here looks the same! So easy to get lost! So we just caught a taxi.

It ended up being a really cool day, I did LOTS.

Things that made me happy today; Learning that I might be a LITTLE bit more fit than I give myself credit for.

Things that made me sad today; Australia’s quarantine…..