Katie K Meets London Town

I know, I know. I have ONE more city to post about. Don’t you worry- it’s coming! 

<3

It’s funny how heavily we relied on Google Maps while we were backpacking…and more often than not, the directions were terrible and we ended up just stumbling onto the street we were looking for anyway! Paris was no exception to this. We hopped off the bus in Paris and started looking for our hotel, Hotel La Fayette.

Other than the hotel we stayed in on New Year’s Eve, we had primarily been staying in hostels. We were excited for something different. Hotel La Fayette was in an old house on Rue de Lafayette. Our room had a sink and a bed, haha. The toilet and shower were located in two different places outside of the room. Overall, the hotel was fine…it was just different. The employees were pretty friendly and appreciated my attempt to tell them my name in Francais.

Hotel La Fayette did not have wi-fi either which wouldn’t normally be a problem while backpacking but Cori and I had developed a habit of spending our first day in each city mapping out where we wanted to go, how we were going to get there and researching what else there was to check out in our area. Hotel La Fayette did not stop us. It did not take long for us to figure out that every single McDonalds in Paris had publicly accessible wi-fi. We spent our first night creating an agenda and after that we roamed the streets in search of Gare du Nord to purchase our train tickets to the airport. After that, we found an internet café where we could print our boarding passes for the planes. Checking in for our RyanAir flights took about three times as long as it should have because this particular international keyboard was horrendous. Everything was misplaced and I blame the French alphabet.

Our second day in Paris was January 3^rd—the very same day a beautiful miracle came to life way back in1990; Katie Rose was born. That’s right!

We had decided to check out Notre Dame. I had read online that the line moved quickly and it was free to enter.  Unfortunately, the line did not move quickly and when we got to the front, we were expected to pay. What the heck! Turns out we waited for about an hour and a half in …fairly cold weather just to find out that we were indeed in the wrong line. We rolled our eyes at our own stupidity and moved to the front of the Notre Dame, got into the correct line and were standing inside the cathedral in under five minutes’ time.

Notre Dame was gorgeous. There really is no other way to describe it.  The stained glass and the gothic architecture is literally mind blowing. I’ve said this umpteen times before but I am always amazed at the history a place like Notre Dame has seen.

The highlight of the city was this: the Eiffel Tower. (We tried to ride to the top on my birthday but it was too windy. Cori and I were being blown around on ground level, so I can only imagine what it would have been like at the top of the Tower. I have videos of us traveling in the elevator to the top and I have some great photos, as well. I will post them soon!)

Anywho- after waiting in the wrong line for the cathedral, we were freezing and went to a café to grab a cup of coffee to warm up. Later on, we ate authentic crepes for my birthday; one Nutella and coconut, one banana and nutella. They were P-H-E-N-O-M-E-N-A-L.

Our last full day in Paris was spent, again, walking around. We went to find the Arc de Triomph, like any tourist would. This brought us to a very high-end shopping area. As we were walking down the streets, we suddenly heard a man yell something indecipherable and the next thing we know two cops stop right next to us, jump out of their car and chase after two young men. It quickly became obvious that they had stolen something from a street vendor but gosh, my heart definitely skipped a beat.

We got back to the hotel around 9:00PM. We needed to get to sleep…we had a 6AM train to catch.

Off to Dublin we go!

Now that our trip has come to an end, Prague seems like it was forever and a day ago.

After seeing Shaynah off in Berlin, Cori and I were excited to check out yet another new city: Praha.

-By the time we arrived it was dark out and hard to figure out where we were (much less where we were going). After walking around aimlessly for over an hour, we sauntered into the Hilton and called a cab. Fortunately our hostel was just a Couple of blocks away.

-PLUS Prague: People Like US.

After an eventful bus ride from Amsterdam- the three legs of this traveling tripod were good and ready to find our hostel and freshen up. After hopping off the metro, a sweet German couple saw us looking at a map on the street. Even though we weren’t lost we welcomed their directions. Unfortunately once they realized we spoke English the elderly man looked at us, and then turned in one big circle looking for someone on the street who could help while saying, “English? English?”…nobody was around. The couple gestured directions to the best of their ability and went on their way.

Upon arrival, the hostess informed us that they upgraded us to a private room for free- nice! The hostel, Paula’s Comfy Corner, was unique…not like any other hostel I’ve ever stayed at. Apparently a woman, presumably Paula, owns this condo, doesn’t live there and rents cheap rooms to travelers. An awesome idea because it is set up like an apartment and it’s very comforting- a sufficient home away from home indeed.

We did lots of exploring in Berlin- taking a little bit of a different path each time we travelled into town. We ate at a couple great little bakeries just does the street from the hostel, we wandered up and down Friedrichstraße while admiring the Christmas decorations and I tried to practice my Deutsch…which is easy to avoid because most everyone speaks English anyway.

We went to a great Christmas Market! We walked through the rows of stalls making sure to try all of the free samples and absorb lots of the German culture. We sat in a tent and ordered some delicious cherry Glühbier and enjoyed each others company. Before the night ended, Shaynah was sure to get her very first, authentic German sausage (we have pictures to prove it).

Really, if I gave you details of everything we did in Berlin, you would be reading for days so I’m going to shorten it up a bit with some bullet points. Some sites we saw: Berlin wall, Potsdam Plaza, WWII memorials, the Holocaust Gate, Tiergarten and lots more.

Berlin is where we spent Christmas! We found the American Church of Berlin and enjoyed a very peaceful candlelight service on Christmas Eve. The hostel had arranged a dinner for their guests but the three of us were the only ones to attend. We brought a bottle of wine to share while we feasted on fish, potatoes, tomato and mozzarella and some amazing desserts. We exchanged stories and laughed with each other for nearly three hours and then it was off to bed.

On Christmas day I woke up to pastries and hot chocolate, courtesy of Shaynah. She snuck out while Cori and I were still sleeping. All in all we had a very relaxing day. We walked around, grabbed a drink at an Australian bar and watched Happy New Year at the local theater with a bucket of popcorn.

Boxing day was a sad day. Shaynah’s journey in Europe came to an end. We went to the bakery to grab a bite to eat before seeing her off. Man, I hope she made it home OK-…Shaynah?

Cori and I spent our last full day in Berlin at the zoo! The most popular zoo in all of Europe and it was do much fun. I felt like a little kid at Christmas! Well, I guess I kind of was. Regardless, it was a great way to end our visit in Deutschland. Off to Prague!

Amsterdam was fun but I was a little disappointed. I guess on some level I knew most tourists go there because it is legal to smoke, buy and sell pot. I suppose I just thought the city would have more to offer than that; they would have something for people who weren’t into that sort of thing. I wasn’t totally wrong…like I said, Amsterdam was beautiful and we did make a lot of memories there- but we were happy to move on.

After our many hours of card playing we were excited to finally get on the bus to venture into a new and exciting city.

This bus ride was funny. 

Shaynah, Cori and I jumped on the bus and snagged the back row. Like any conditioned bus traveler, we knew the back row would be the only row full of seats. Five full seats for three very tired travelers. Win!

Shortly after we sprawled out and got completely comfortable, the bus stopped to pick up more passengers. I was already sleeping against the window so I didn’t mind much anyway. The bus was completely full now and the three of us were now side by side.

About an hour later, a list was passed around and we were to check off our names (and go back to sleep). Around two in the morning the bus had stopped completely. Apparently there was one extra passenger on board and they didn’t know why. 

Long story short: a boy who pretended not to speak (but understand) English, had no proof of identity, let alone a passport, and was sitting right next to us in our beloved back row was in fact a stowaway. He was taken off the bus and into a police car.

I’m going back to sleep….

…for an hour.

They woke us up at the border of the Deutschland to check our passports. The employee looked at me and said, “haha, you tired?”. …Thanks- I usually look fantastic after three 45 minute naps on an uncomfortable bus at 3am. :)

I’m going back to sleep…

…for almost two hours-until the bus stopped at a gas station for a 15 minute break and to refuel. I had no choice but to wake up and get off because there was no bathroom on the bus and I drank a lot of water prior to boarding. Whoops!

Then, then I finally rested until we arrived at the Berlin bus station at 9.
I was probably the most excited about Berlin. I had been taking German, learning about their history and culture since the sixth grade without ever having stepped foot in the country. Here we are! Here we go!

Ok ok, I’m a bit behind in my blogging…but I took some notes so this entry should sound as if I’m still in Amsterdam.
What oh what to say about Amsterdam. Shaynah and I hopped on the ferry in Newcastle and I can honestly say I felt like I was on the Titanic. The Kingsway was gorgeous and I was happy to be on the water. I only wish we had seen more of it. After finding our room, we put our stuff down and explored the deck. We didn’t want to explore everything right away because well…what would we have to do later?
We retracted to our room, laid down and fell asleep. We woke up around 10:30pm only to decide we were too tired to do anything other than go back to sleep. We slept straight through the night until the ship docked. We took a bus into the city center where we set off to look for Bob’s Youth Hostel. Oh, Bob’s…

We were greeted with heavy metal music and the sweet smell of marijuana in the ever so delightful common room air. Shaynah and I quickly dropped our stuff off and headed out to check out the rest of the town in hopes that it was a bit more charming than our hostel. We found a cute restaurant which was relatively inexpensive (win!) so we decided to eat lunch there. It was run by two older men who didn’t speak English and I’m not so sure they even spoke Dutch. I ordered a tuna melt on a bagel with a chocolate milkshake and Shaynah ordered an avocado and tomato sandwich with a banana milkshake; seemed like relatively safe choices and we had high hopes because we had heard that the food in Amsterdam was delicious… … …

Anyway- after “lunch” we continued to explore only to stumble, and I mean literally stumble, into the red light district. Haha, it caught us off guard but we still felt like we had to walk though. Oh, you don’t know what the red light district is? Google it.

Amsterdam is organized in one big circle which is constantly intersected by canals. I know by the tone of this blog it might sound as if I didn’t enjoy Amsterdam. That’s not entirely true! While it definitely was not my favorite city, I still thought the landscape was beautiful and it had a lot of really neat buildings and places to check out.

One of my favorite expeditions was when Shaynah and I explored a different area in hopes of finding a café called De Balie. We brought books, ordered a couple of coffees and just relaxed and read for the afternoon. De Balie was highly recommended by the many tourist blogs I had read and who doesn’t love tourists? No one. So, why wouldn’t I trust their blog? There is no good answer to that question….

Shaynah and I left on the 21st to meet Cori at the airport! We were super excited to see her- it had been a long time! She quickly noticed the exuberant amount of “coffee shops” and shortly after that we brought her through the RLD (it’s a right of passage, isn’t it?) We settled on waffles for dinner- mine had chocolate, whipped cream and strawberries on top. I would go back to Dumpsterdam just for those!

The next day we took a tour of the House of Bols. It was a museum about the man who started the Bols liquor line. At the end of the tour we got a free drink and a taste of two (of the 36) different Bols liqueurs. It was a lot of fun and I would highly recommend it!
When we left, we thought we would check out a Christmas market just across the street. We were stopped by a blockade of policemen and a very large vehicle which was shooting water at people. My guess was that there had been some kind of protest but none of us dared to get close enough to figure it out. We left confused. Later we saw a sign depicting the very same water gun-car (?) and underneath it said “DNA Spray”. I still don’t quite understand but if you know something that I don’t please, please message me and fill me in!

What else, what else. Later that night we checked out the Amsterdam Library which was huge! A lady was also practicing the piano which made our journey throughout the six stories (ba doom-pshh) even more pleasant.

On our last day we went to the Anne Frank House. I’m always fascinated by places like that- it has seen so much history. There really are no words to describe the feeling you get while walking through the halls of her hideout knowing what happened. What’s even crazier is the fact that her story didn’t take place all that long ago.

After that we continued to walk around- Shaynah got some world famous French Fries and we found a man who sold SMURF ICECREAM (!!!) so naturally, I had to eat some. We saw tons of pretty Christmas lights and decorations, street performers, and more. The transportation of choice in Amsterdam is by bike. I’ve blogged about bikers before so if you’re a true follower, you know exactly how I feel about them.

We made our way to the bus station where we still had many hours to kill. Our bus wasn’t leaving for nearly five hours so we did what anybody would have done: we sat in Burger King, I charge my phone and we played cards…Rummy to be exact.

More on this ridiculous place later.

Our trip in Edinburgh was short and sweet but we definitely experienced the city. Our night bus from Cardiff arrived at 8am. We anticipated being able to actually rest on the 9 hour bus ride but we were surely mistaken. We found our hostel (Art Roch) in no time at all but we did find out we couldn’t check in until 3pm. Thankfully they had a complimentary baggage room so we didn’t have to drag out 50 pound bags around the city all day.
The sites in Edinburgh were literally breathtaking. We saw Edinburgh Castle, we hiked up Arthur’s Seat, we saw Occupy Edinburgh, we meandered through a museum called The People’s Story, we ate at a little hole in the wall and more. Scotland is really unique. There are men in kilts everywhere and obviously the form of busking in Scotland is playing the bagpipes- really cool!
I was just 50 miles east of Kippen, Scotland- would have been kind of neat to check that out. Again, the weather was kind of crazy! It rained and snowed- the streets were always wet.

We hopped on the bus this morning and arrived in Newcastle at about 1:45. Now we are at the port waiting to board the ferry- Shaynah likes to call it our honeymoon cruise- and we will arrive in Amsterdam at about 10am tomorrow!

Dear Cardiff,
You are a spitfire. Seriously. Your streets don’t sleep, your weather is insane and you are gorgeous; restless, crazy and good looking…just like any teenager I’ve ever met.
Cardiff was a ton of fun. Shaynah and I started our journey by getting off at the wrong bus stop which meant we were not at the right meeting point for our Couchsurfing host (a blessing in disguise?) Anyway we quickly discovered that we were on the doorsteps of Cardiff University’s Student Union. The people inside we’re very helpful and directed us to a nearby hostel.
We spent both nights at Bunk House Hostel which is right in the middle of City Center.
The first night was very low key as we were pretty tired from the days adventures. We got a drink at the bar downstairs (my first Hot Toddy- YUM!), and hit the sheets. After sleeping through the free breakfast - bummer- we walked around Cardiff. We discovered Bute Park and Cardiff Castle, the Stadium, Cardiff Bay, Cardiff Market and lots more. We invited ourselves to a local schools’ holiday concert, and while walking through the streets of shops and stalls I found a pair of gloves for £5! Shortly after that a woman invited us into a random building to watch a 20 minute nativity show. We were happy to watch and even happier to be in the accompaniment of primarily homeless men, haha.
We continued to meander only to stumble into a movie theater where we spontaneously decided to see My Week With Marilyn. The movie theater was really neat- four stories high and the theater itself was gigantic.
For our last day in Cardiff we decided to purchase student tickets to see Cardiff Castle. SO AMAZING. It’s absolutely incredible to walk around a place that has seen so much history. We saw the castle falcon, the apartment, the war tunnels, and the keep. We killed about three hours and then it was time to catch our bus.
Megabus is great but they do a terrible job of advertising their bus stops. I won’t go into detail but I will say that we ran onto out bus.
I really liked Cardiff. The weather was a bit strange though. One minute it would be pouring, then it would be hailing the next.
Three cities down, many more to go!