We actually got up early today, and so did the rest of the family; the house was a flurry of activity.
We were sent off with hugs, promises of future hosting, and a big bag of breakfast pastries. Finn got us onto the right bus using his entire family's transit passes, then sat and fussed about not getting to the station in time. We raced off and ran for Platform 1 at the Berlin Hauptbahnhof... to find that it hadn't arrived yet.
When it did, we sat down in comfy seats, waved to Finn as he chased the train down the platform, and had just enough time to make another American friend before a Korean family chased us out of their reserved seats. We moved-- and it happened again. I'd lost faith in the reservation system after the Great Amsterdam Train Debacle and these trains hadn't required them, so we ended up camping on the floor again until Leipzig. The rest of the ride was nothing special and we arrived in Nuremberg a little after 4.
Kim was waiting and took us out to her car (first car ride in Europe!), where we miraculously loaded our backpacks into her tiny sedan trunk and drove to another parking lot. And then, sightseeing.
Nuremberg is very brown.
Apart from a few oxidized copper roofs (once brown), every building is some shade of khaki, chocolate, fawn, chestnut, mustard, rust, or just plain brown.
We wandered into an old Gothic church, which was not nearly as old as it looked-- it had been destroyed during the second world war but completely reconstructed from copies and measurements. Lots of northern European-style icons and pained-looking saints in a dark and dusty cathedral.
Then we wandered out into the main square which was completely full of tents and craft shops and the occasional pen of sheep.
It was quite hot out, warmer than any other city we've visited so far. So of course the second sightseeing destination featured a lot of walking uphill, to the old castle complex which I'd never heard of before. It was built on a rock outcropping and the way up is VERY steep. But it does have the best view of Nuremberg.
We came back down, spun the ring at the golden fountain that guarantees you'll come back to Nuremberg, poked around the commercial district for German chocolate, and then got slushes at the American Restaurant That Shall Not Be Named.
Noting the lack of public toilets all over Europe, we ducked into a department store for their bathroom and got our first look at "modern" Bavarian festival wear. Apparently the national costume of dirndls and lederhosen has made a comeback in the last five years (presumably as pride in national heritage is decriminalizing with a new generation). The lederhosen are beautifully embroidered, though they look very warm to wear, and the dirndls are delightfully tawdry and over-color-coordinated. The little aprons are purely decorative, the outfits come in every color and pattern combination imaginable, and the tiny peasant blouses underneath are actually half shirts and cropped above the stomach. You can get nicer ones at specializing stores, Kim told us, but they're quite expensive.
From there, we wandered back to the car, from which commenced an exhilerating introduction to the Autobahn: a half hour of white-knuckled handhold gripping as we rocketed down the freeway, covered by deceivingly nonchalant chatter with our speed demon driver. It was a little fun; it was also mostly alarming. 180 km/h is the fastest I've ever been in a motor vehicle-- how are there no Germans in NASCAR?
We dropped off at Vim's workplace first to meet him, a collections of warehouses and garages that house enormous, movie-villain-esque, tree-moving machines. Humongous scoopers and diggers, big enough to move a redwood. (Their company moves trees.)
He is tall and Dutch and speaks great Englsh (with a fondness for the word "stupid"). After we smiled and shook hands, Kim loaded up again and we arrived at Vim's lovely family house 3 minutes later, and were shown our accommodations.
It's a camper.
The bathroom isn't hooked up but we are free to come in and use theirs, and there's a double bed plus a couch/ lounge area for Aaron.
We were also graciously offered the use of their pool by Wim's mother. Andie and Aaron accepted and swam with Kim, while I just stuck my legs in and took pictures of the chickens running around us.
Later, we went to their little village beer festival, if village is the right name; Kim used another term, because people don't like the teensy-unimportant connotation of "village", even if that's how big it is.
It was a complete kitschy carnival, with rides and food stands and booths, but not swarming in children-- and everyone fully committed to getting drunk. Everything was very authentically Bavarian, with every other person in either lederhosen or dirndls; my doner kebab even had sauerkraut in it. (It's not supposed to-- it's Turkish.)
Kim and Wim dressed up, too. (Wim's participation came after some amount of begging by Kim, though he's too tall to wear the accompanying suspenders and he kept called the matching shoes "stupid"; Kim's dress set was brown and blue and very pretty. She told us that the apron tying is a code: knot it on your left hip if you're single, the right if you're taken, and in the back if you're widowed.
We were given enormous tankards of beer (or Radler, a lemonade shandy) and expected to finish them. The beer tent has live music on a stage at one end, which enthusiastically played German songs, American karaoke numbers, and the sporadic Bavarian drinking song, which everyone else seemed to know by heart.
The front was full of younger youth all standing on their picnic table benches and singing along-- Kim said they were 15-year-olds and had a curfew, so they had to party early.
We ate, walked around, the boys played shooting games, we declined the spinning whirly thing, and then stood around at the bar and had another drink: the "girly" one called a spritz, sparkling wine mixed with bitters. (Tastes more like orange Fanta with vodka in it.)
Drinks downed, we went back to the tent with a few more Kim's friends and were swept up into a precariously-balancing mosh pit that was now standing on the picnic benches. Andie and I knew most of the English pop songs, we smiled and clapped through the rest, and Aaron went to go hang out with some friends Wim introduced him to. We met up later, when everyone else decided to have white wine (Andie and I were trying to turn down things at this point) and discovered that he was quite popular. People had been buying him more drinks for the last hour and he'd been obliviously accepting them and teling stories.
I passed him my water bottle, but I think the damage is done. Tomorrow will be interesting.
When it became clear that we three were exhausted and begging off more drinks because our early train tomorrow, Wim called their designated driver to come take us home.
We showered and fell into bed, but not before I accidentally broke their sink tap. It's the strangest thing I've ever tried to turn on.
Saturday, July 20, 2013
Friday, July 19, 2013
Schwan lake
We were out of ideas for what to do today, but decided on "the lake" over brunch. (I still don't know the name of it.)
We stopped at the Berlin Hbf to get our train tickets settled, since I'd only booked them through Berlin; Andie wanted a human to help us with the rest. We stood in a line for a half hour, then created another half hour delay ourselves as we subjected the poor, patient man at the help desk to our travel whims. We knew what days we wanted to go and where, but he had to find the schedules and click through every reservation individually-- and then I got confused about the plan between my 5-day ticket and Andie and Aaron's 6-day, and we had to shuffle things again. (I thanked him for his patience during one computer wait, and he answered that this would be a bad job for someone who wasn't.)
So now, we have reservations (required) for each train throughout Italy, the correct number of Eurail Flexipass days in which to use them, and extra tickets for one short Italian leg (me) and a sleeper train back to Paris (Andie and Aaron). It's done.
Finn was at the end of his patience with us after this hour of scheduling drama but we still needed lunch supplies, so he ushered us to the train station supermarket for food (since the train station is practically a mall). We loaded up a few bags of picnic fare, then took another hour of multiple trains, buses, and walking to arrive at a large park that surrounded a lake. Finn wanted a paddleboat rental, so we sprung for one, and then pushed off. Out on the lake for a picnic.
We had bread and pretzels and yogurt (WITH spoons, Finn remembered plastic spoons) and paprika-flavored chips (they taste like barbeque, but less sweet) and cookies and gummies and sodas, plus Finn's personal Leberkase supplies and Aaron had an enormous chunk of cheese. Finn also brought a beer, but no bottle opener, which led to an experimental 10 minutes of trying to whack the cap off against various boat surfaces. The boys sat in the back of the four-seater paddleboat actually paddling, while Andie's and my seats didn't have pedals... so we had a lovely time. We just sat and ate.
We got all the way out to the center of one arm of the lake and then drifted closer to shore while eating. We finally moved when we got close to a family of swans: two adults and about 5 cygnets. The boat turned and we left them alone-- or thought we had, before one adult separated and started swimming after the boat.
The boys paddled a little harder. The swan did, too.
We didn't know what to do about this, except try to get away from it; swans are big birds that can pack quite a punch, and though we weren't sure how we'd made it angry, everyone was silently remembering that tv show "When [insert animals] Attack". The evil swan chased the boat for 5 minutes solid, gaining the whole time as Finn and Aaron became increasingly more frantic and paddled faster-- sitting in the back of the boat, they'd be the first targets. Amid their hilariously panicked calls to either abandon ship or fight it off with a pocket knife (and they were funny, Andie and I couldn't stop laughing), I tossed a piece of pretzel over the side. The swan immediately stopped and went for the bread.
It had been trained to follow tourists until they fed it. The attack subsided.
We (read: Aaron and Finn) ended up paddling around the stretch of the river for a full two hours, then booking it back to the dock when we realized time was almost up before we'd have to pay for the three hour mark. We got a little turned around coming home (a few false starts and one wrong bus) and met Rolf and Rena at an Indian restaurant around 8. It took forever to get our food, which turned out to all things Andie recognized and gave her approval for-- I'm told it was good. Then we went over to an ice cream shop across the street which displayed pictures of the biggest, most decadent and exotic sundaes I've ever seen. We stuck with small cones.
After thanking the parents for dinner, w split off to go to another supermarket for marshmallows and last-minute chocolate gifts; then came home, lay around for a while, and made rice krispie treats. We've finished all of our laundry, now to fold and pack it away in the morning-- when we leave.
We stopped at the Berlin Hbf to get our train tickets settled, since I'd only booked them through Berlin; Andie wanted a human to help us with the rest. We stood in a line for a half hour, then created another half hour delay ourselves as we subjected the poor, patient man at the help desk to our travel whims. We knew what days we wanted to go and where, but he had to find the schedules and click through every reservation individually-- and then I got confused about the plan between my 5-day ticket and Andie and Aaron's 6-day, and we had to shuffle things again. (I thanked him for his patience during one computer wait, and he answered that this would be a bad job for someone who wasn't.)
So now, we have reservations (required) for each train throughout Italy, the correct number of Eurail Flexipass days in which to use them, and extra tickets for one short Italian leg (me) and a sleeper train back to Paris (Andie and Aaron). It's done.
Finn was at the end of his patience with us after this hour of scheduling drama but we still needed lunch supplies, so he ushered us to the train station supermarket for food (since the train station is practically a mall). We loaded up a few bags of picnic fare, then took another hour of multiple trains, buses, and walking to arrive at a large park that surrounded a lake. Finn wanted a paddleboat rental, so we sprung for one, and then pushed off. Out on the lake for a picnic.
We had bread and pretzels and yogurt (WITH spoons, Finn remembered plastic spoons) and paprika-flavored chips (they taste like barbeque, but less sweet) and cookies and gummies and sodas, plus Finn's personal Leberkase supplies and Aaron had an enormous chunk of cheese. Finn also brought a beer, but no bottle opener, which led to an experimental 10 minutes of trying to whack the cap off against various boat surfaces. The boys sat in the back of the four-seater paddleboat actually paddling, while Andie's and my seats didn't have pedals... so we had a lovely time. We just sat and ate.
We got all the way out to the center of one arm of the lake and then drifted closer to shore while eating. We finally moved when we got close to a family of swans: two adults and about 5 cygnets. The boat turned and we left them alone-- or thought we had, before one adult separated and started swimming after the boat.
The boys paddled a little harder. The swan did, too.
We didn't know what to do about this, except try to get away from it; swans are big birds that can pack quite a punch, and though we weren't sure how we'd made it angry, everyone was silently remembering that tv show "When [insert animals] Attack". The evil swan chased the boat for 5 minutes solid, gaining the whole time as Finn and Aaron became increasingly more frantic and paddled faster-- sitting in the back of the boat, they'd be the first targets. Amid their hilariously panicked calls to either abandon ship or fight it off with a pocket knife (and they were funny, Andie and I couldn't stop laughing), I tossed a piece of pretzel over the side. The swan immediately stopped and went for the bread.
It had been trained to follow tourists until they fed it. The attack subsided.
We (read: Aaron and Finn) ended up paddling around the stretch of the river for a full two hours, then booking it back to the dock when we realized time was almost up before we'd have to pay for the three hour mark. We got a little turned around coming home (a few false starts and one wrong bus) and met Rolf and Rena at an Indian restaurant around 8. It took forever to get our food, which turned out to all things Andie recognized and gave her approval for-- I'm told it was good. Then we went over to an ice cream shop across the street which displayed pictures of the biggest, most decadent and exotic sundaes I've ever seen. We stuck with small cones.
After thanking the parents for dinner, w split off to go to another supermarket for marshmallows and last-minute chocolate gifts; then came home, lay around for a while, and made rice krispie treats. We've finished all of our laundry, now to fold and pack it away in the morning-- when we leave.
Thursday, July 18, 2013
The circuit
In some strange twist, I have become our early riser.
Today, it was 10:00. (That's a new record.)
We went biking again today, with more confidence and poise than Tuesday's adventure. Lovis is packing today to leave early tomorrow morning, so Jack and Liam managed to find Finn's house on rented bikes and tag along with us for most of the day.
(And by "day", I mean after 1 PM. That's when we always seem to leave; today we waved off Rena and Anne who went to go get Anne's wisdom teeth out in the morning, and were still there when they got back.)
We rode to some large government buildings/ memorials/ churches, mostly to photograph them, because Finn didn't really know anything about them. He could find just about everything, almost like he was going off of a list, but there was no tour guide spiel.
(We threatened to fire him as a guide. He threatened not to take us back home.)
So, lots of biking, lots of pictures, all day long. Not much else to tell.
When we wound up our sightseeing, he took us by a supermarket for food and then out to the old East Berlin airport. The airspace is now public, with acres and acres of flat land and runways. We saw kites, kitesurfers, rollerbladers, runners, countless bikers, and the occasional nudist hiding in the tall grass. (No, seriously.) I don't think I've ever seen such a huge horizon of public park space; between the fields and our bikes, Andie said she felt like we were in one of those farm-kid-makes-it-big movies, like October Sky-- maybe we live in Iowa and work at a diner called the Chuckle Hut.
We finally found some trees without people under them (clothed or otherwise) and shared a picnic lunch. When people got bored, they took turns riding Finn's racing bike and flinging around a frisbee with various degrees of skill. Jack and Liam went off to their own evening plans and we went home ourselves.
The first hour of any return is usually eaten by technology. In the time you would normally sit and rest for a while, we each find an electronic device and vegetate. We only move later, when someone finally looks up and asks what we're doing for dinner-- or in this case, that they feel like cookies. Andie decided that we should make cookies, and inspired everyone to walk down to the supermarket to find premade cookie dough (which we all sort of knew was a fruitless endeavor, but it was something to do). Instead, we found a large and interesting selection of ice cream, and we left with Magnum bars to eat on the walk home (and raspberry bars for Anne and her swollen face). Cookies abandoned, we decided to watch a movie. Warm Bodies has its moments, but perhaps less of the intended effect when you watch it with all the twitches and sluggishness of streaming online.
We went to bed earlier than we have all week, only slightly after midnight. Maybe this will start retraining us back into a normal circadian rhythm.
Today, it was 10:00. (That's a new record.)
We went biking again today, with more confidence and poise than Tuesday's adventure. Lovis is packing today to leave early tomorrow morning, so Jack and Liam managed to find Finn's house on rented bikes and tag along with us for most of the day.
(And by "day", I mean after 1 PM. That's when we always seem to leave; today we waved off Rena and Anne who went to go get Anne's wisdom teeth out in the morning, and were still there when they got back.)
We rode to some large government buildings/ memorials/ churches, mostly to photograph them, because Finn didn't really know anything about them. He could find just about everything, almost like he was going off of a list, but there was no tour guide spiel.
(We threatened to fire him as a guide. He threatened not to take us back home.)
So, lots of biking, lots of pictures, all day long. Not much else to tell.
When we wound up our sightseeing, he took us by a supermarket for food and then out to the old East Berlin airport. The airspace is now public, with acres and acres of flat land and runways. We saw kites, kitesurfers, rollerbladers, runners, countless bikers, and the occasional nudist hiding in the tall grass. (No, seriously.) I don't think I've ever seen such a huge horizon of public park space; between the fields and our bikes, Andie said she felt like we were in one of those farm-kid-makes-it-big movies, like October Sky-- maybe we live in Iowa and work at a diner called the Chuckle Hut.
We finally found some trees without people under them (clothed or otherwise) and shared a picnic lunch. When people got bored, they took turns riding Finn's racing bike and flinging around a frisbee with various degrees of skill. Jack and Liam went off to their own evening plans and we went home ourselves.
The first hour of any return is usually eaten by technology. In the time you would normally sit and rest for a while, we each find an electronic device and vegetate. We only move later, when someone finally looks up and asks what we're doing for dinner-- or in this case, that they feel like cookies. Andie decided that we should make cookies, and inspired everyone to walk down to the supermarket to find premade cookie dough (which we all sort of knew was a fruitless endeavor, but it was something to do). Instead, we found a large and interesting selection of ice cream, and we left with Magnum bars to eat on the walk home (and raspberry bars for Anne and her swollen face). Cookies abandoned, we decided to watch a movie. Warm Bodies has its moments, but perhaps less of the intended effect when you watch it with all the twitches and sluggishness of streaming online.
We went to bed earlier than we have all week, only slightly after midnight. Maybe this will start retraining us back into a normal circadian rhythm.
Wednesday, July 17, 2013
Antiquities
We left late again because we woke up late, and Andie and I refused to leave unless Aaron took a shower.
We also had to wait another half hour because Finn's friend Milan, was going to join us-- a fellow foreign exchange kid from his same year at Norcross. We took the train out to the Egyptian museum, after a few false starts (a large museum complex = lots of chances for wrong museums/entrances).
I always forget that it was Europeans that first started the Egyptian excavations (and subsequent artifact abuse from their seeming expendability, like using ground mummy as a medicinal). The Neues Museum left me awed and annoyed, by turns.
I was bugged by the slightly condescending feel of the exhibit halls, which also felt unfinished and out of order. European archaeology has more of a base in history under the umbrella of "antiquities", and I felt a lot of the explanations were lacking in people details; it's more of a things-to-put-on-a-shelf heritage rather than in-depth studies of the artifacts themselves. (Though to be fair, the contexts in which most of them were removed was well before "archaeology" was ever codified, and without solid excavation notes or consistent methodology, their details are probably tapped out.) The Egyptian artifacts are grouped thematically, not by period, which also makes me scatterbrained trying to put together items that were dynasties apart.
I also don't think the Amarna Period deserved its own exhibit upstairs. I mean, you kind of have to build something around the Nefertiti bust, which resides here-- it's an absolutely spectacular piece-- but it gives a disproportionate amount of attention to a mere 28 year era, among the 3200 that ancient Egypt survived. Egyptian culture, particularly that surrounding the pharaoh, tried to appear monolithic and unchanging for the sake of ruling legitimacy, but that wasn't the case overall. Things did change-- and I saw no mention at all of the intermediate periods, or even an acknowledgment of Old, Middle, and New Kingdoms. Add to this the neutral-to-complimentary wording in a hall dedicated to Heinrich Schliemann and hisbutchering work on Troy, and I was slightly put out.
(Schliemann's Trojan excavations-- though that may be too generous a term-- are one of archaeology's greatest embarrassments, since he tore through countless valuable layers of the city to reach the bottom, and then misidentified most of them. He did dig it out, but now his finds are all suspect because he didn't use the correct methodology, and those parts of the site are spoiled for future study.)
But there are so MANY artifacts, and such large and grand pieces that the inconsistencies are all forgiven. (Well... mostly.) This museum has a few Roman and German history halls, and started with a Cypriot collection. But everything else on three floors is Egyptian, including the bust of Nefertiti (no photography allowed).
In short, I don't think it's curated well, but the collection is VERY impressive.
I lollygagged through most of the museum and completely lost the other kids, but I really shot myself in the foot when I wandered out an exit and couldn't get back in or signal the group where I'd gone. They eventually figured it out and came outside, but not before we were all starved and running for the first food stand we saw. (Döner kebab, loaded up with vegetables and tzatziki in huge, toasted pita pockets.)
Finn insisted on taking us to Alexanderplatz, another Berlin mall, just to prove that German malls did get bigger than the tiny underground one we were at yesterday. (He made sure we knew this, he said it three times.) We found our other tour group half-- the Brits and friend-- outside the mall and walked over to the Berlin Wall Memorial together.
The memorial is a section of the removed wall with accompanying excavation sections, informational plaques, and mini-exhibit effect as you walk along where the wall used to be. It focuses mostly on the building period and the escapes that were staged from the East to the West during that time and later through tunnels. You can tell which is the East; all of the remaining houses that were close to the wall had their windows bricked up on that side, since jumping from them had been a popular escape tactic.
Everyone was tired out after walking and couldn't decide what to do next, so we split up. Finn and Milan and us three headed off to the East Gallery, which is the artist-decorated sections of remaining wall. It's a huge, graffitied expanse of colors and styles (pictures to come), where every artist gets a section about the size of a billboard. When we walked around the back, that side is decorated with photos of other famous dividing walls: Gaza, the Korean DMZ, Israel, and others.
We went home after that, but would not admit defeat to an early bedtime, so we played German board games for a few hours after that; Finn has this one that's a version of Trouble, but the playing piece colors are all hidden (all black, as witch characters). It makes for a very mixed-up, aggravating, ill-thought-out drinking game.
"This is why we burn witches." -- Finn
Aaron and Milan and Finn then left to hang out at a friend's house and we went to bed.
We also had to wait another half hour because Finn's friend Milan, was going to join us-- a fellow foreign exchange kid from his same year at Norcross. We took the train out to the Egyptian museum, after a few false starts (a large museum complex = lots of chances for wrong museums/entrances).
I always forget that it was Europeans that first started the Egyptian excavations (and subsequent artifact abuse from their seeming expendability, like using ground mummy as a medicinal). The Neues Museum left me awed and annoyed, by turns.
I was bugged by the slightly condescending feel of the exhibit halls, which also felt unfinished and out of order. European archaeology has more of a base in history under the umbrella of "antiquities", and I felt a lot of the explanations were lacking in people details; it's more of a things-to-put-on-a-shelf heritage rather than in-depth studies of the artifacts themselves. (Though to be fair, the contexts in which most of them were removed was well before "archaeology" was ever codified, and without solid excavation notes or consistent methodology, their details are probably tapped out.) The Egyptian artifacts are grouped thematically, not by period, which also makes me scatterbrained trying to put together items that were dynasties apart.
I also don't think the Amarna Period deserved its own exhibit upstairs. I mean, you kind of have to build something around the Nefertiti bust, which resides here-- it's an absolutely spectacular piece-- but it gives a disproportionate amount of attention to a mere 28 year era, among the 3200 that ancient Egypt survived. Egyptian culture, particularly that surrounding the pharaoh, tried to appear monolithic and unchanging for the sake of ruling legitimacy, but that wasn't the case overall. Things did change-- and I saw no mention at all of the intermediate periods, or even an acknowledgment of Old, Middle, and New Kingdoms. Add to this the neutral-to-complimentary wording in a hall dedicated to Heinrich Schliemann and his
(Schliemann's Trojan excavations-- though that may be too generous a term-- are one of archaeology's greatest embarrassments, since he tore through countless valuable layers of the city to reach the bottom, and then misidentified most of them. He did dig it out, but now his finds are all suspect because he didn't use the correct methodology, and those parts of the site are spoiled for future study.)
But there are so MANY artifacts, and such large and grand pieces that the inconsistencies are all forgiven. (Well... mostly.) This museum has a few Roman and German history halls, and started with a Cypriot collection. But everything else on three floors is Egyptian, including the bust of Nefertiti (no photography allowed).
In short, I don't think it's curated well, but the collection is VERY impressive.
I lollygagged through most of the museum and completely lost the other kids, but I really shot myself in the foot when I wandered out an exit and couldn't get back in or signal the group where I'd gone. They eventually figured it out and came outside, but not before we were all starved and running for the first food stand we saw. (Döner kebab, loaded up with vegetables and tzatziki in huge, toasted pita pockets.)
Finn insisted on taking us to Alexanderplatz, another Berlin mall, just to prove that German malls did get bigger than the tiny underground one we were at yesterday. (He made sure we knew this, he said it three times.) We found our other tour group half-- the Brits and friend-- outside the mall and walked over to the Berlin Wall Memorial together.
The memorial is a section of the removed wall with accompanying excavation sections, informational plaques, and mini-exhibit effect as you walk along where the wall used to be. It focuses mostly on the building period and the escapes that were staged from the East to the West during that time and later through tunnels. You can tell which is the East; all of the remaining houses that were close to the wall had their windows bricked up on that side, since jumping from them had been a popular escape tactic.
Everyone was tired out after walking and couldn't decide what to do next, so we split up. Finn and Milan and us three headed off to the East Gallery, which is the artist-decorated sections of remaining wall. It's a huge, graffitied expanse of colors and styles (pictures to come), where every artist gets a section about the size of a billboard. When we walked around the back, that side is decorated with photos of other famous dividing walls: Gaza, the Korean DMZ, Israel, and others.
We went home after that, but would not admit defeat to an early bedtime, so we played German board games for a few hours after that; Finn has this one that's a version of Trouble, but the playing piece colors are all hidden (all black, as witch characters). It makes for a very mixed-up, aggravating, ill-thought-out drinking game.
"This is why we burn witches." -- Finn
Aaron and Milan and Finn then left to hang out at a friend's house and we went to bed.
Tuesday, July 16, 2013
Berlin by bike
We accidentally slept in until 10:30 today. This has been a problem the whole trip thus far; it gets light so early that I can't gauge the time at all. 6 AM outside looks like 9, which looks like 11.
So we struggled out of bed and Finn ran to the neighborhood bakery for a huge selection of pastries that we couldn't possibly finish. Not that we weren't encouraged to try, since Finn kept pushing the donuts and his mother kept handing us cherries and peanut butter. Sightseeing was also discussed: apparently we were going to bike Berlin today. I helped clean up the kitchen and went to change into biking-appropriate clothes.
We left the house much later than planned because we had to assign and adjust the bikes; Finn's parents and sister graciously planned for us to borrow theirs, so seats had to be lowered and tires checked, and a demonstration was required of me to prove I wouldn't tumble off.
Then we went. And it was terrifying.
Berlin has a stunning array of accessible bike lanes and paths, and bicycles are at the top of the traffic food chain; both cars and pedestrians actively try to get out of their way. You can go for surprisingly long distances at high speeds without having to dodge a single thing or stop... which is extremely disconcerting, to those of us who a) have been taught a fear of getting close to multi-ton cars and b) have no idea what they're doing on a bicycle. The last time I rode a bike was a good eight years ago, with no practice since. The experience reminded me most of kayaking lessons, where most of your forward momentum is provided by sheer panic. Finn led, and led quickly; Andie and I had to chase the boys the whole way, with occasional stops for us to catch up with them.
I had a tough time.
5 minutes in: "Are we anywhere close?"
15 minutes: "I'm bleeding."
25 minutes: "You're sure this isn't part of the Tour de France?"
Arrival: "...And how long until we need to get back on these things?"
Anxiety aside, I didn't fall off and I didn't run into anything (minus one close encounter with a tree), but I cut my leg on a pedal and I don't balance well. The other cyclists whizz around you in the bike lane, confident in their road superiority--which doesn't help if you're already wobbly. Those poor passersby pedestrians never knew how close they came to being collision targets this morning.
For a better illustration of the Carrie-bike relationship, I direct you here.
We were racing to get to the Reichstag, the parliament house, because they book visiting hours by reservation. We arrived at 12:45 for a 12:30 appointment, but somehow still got in. After a security check and metal detector scan, you're let into the building and elevators up to the upper dome. It's a giant glass structure striped by walking ramps up to the top level, all narrated by a very dry audioguide who has no idea what direction you're looking as it tries to tell you about the skyline features of Berlin.
The more interesting story is that the observation dome sits directly over the parliament chamber and is ingeniously engineered with alternative energy devices. A large mirrored funnel in the center reflects light into the chamber, the open top circulates the warm stale air out, and there's a rain-catching well under the opening that channels rainwater to heat or cool the building. The huge shade shape is... well, a sunshade, cutting the cooling costs of the building.
We poked around and admired the view from the roof of the Reichstag and compared notes about the tour; Andie was impressed with the language used, calling the Nazi regime the "National Socialist reign of tyranny" and the Holocaust Memorial in honor of the "murdered Jews". Strong, condemning terms.
Finn took pity on me when we left and just walked the bikes over the Brandenburg Gate, which is just around the corner. We took pictures and chatted with three recently acquired members of our group: two British boys and a girl, a friend of Finn's. As usual, I didn't catch names. (I did later: it's Lovis, with friends from her foreign exchange trip in England, Jack and Liam.)
From there, we went to the Holocaust Memorial. It's an entire city block of concrete stelae, just huge rectangles set up in a perfect grid that create a blind-corner, labyrinth effect among the tallest ones. Each square inch of concrete is supposed to represent so many deaths.
We appreciated the composition for a while, then wandered in. I started an extremely irreverent but geographically genius game of tag, with everyone running around corners into each other, lying in wait, or accindentally jumping out at perfect strangers. (At least we weren't the tourists climbing on the columns.)
When everyone got tired and wandered out, Finn took us to the nearest mall for lunch (~3 PM). He and Andie got Leberkäse, which are large ham loaf sandwiches, very authentically German with a small bun and lots of brown mustard. I was too hungry and jumped for the imitation Chinese place that smelled the best. (It didn't taste that way.) We walked around the mall and ran into another of Finn's friends (a lovely, dark, slim girl, though I never caught her name), and then all decided to go out to the park.
The park in question is the Tiergarten, the second-largest park in Berlin. It's mostly trees and bike paths, interspersed with open fields, fountains, ponds, and memorials. Finn, Andie, and I biked slightly ahead and somehow managed to completely lose Aaron and the rest; we stopped at a pond just past the German composers memorial and waited, laying out and talking while Finn tried calling them. They never found us. Instead, we were summoned to the next planned sightseeing stop: the Siegessäule, the Berlin Victory Column.
This thing is a memorial to the Franco-Prussian War, or so we gathered from talking to several Germans who really had no idea about it. There are bronze bas reliefs all the way around the pedestal (some of them still damaged from WWII shelling), a small museum in the bottom level (that runs out of things to tell you and starts in on other large world monuments), mosiacs in the middle terrace, and enough stairs to put a lighthouse to shame. They spiral up and up, with a small landing every few flights that taunts you with a single chair. The top is heavily fenced in and extends barely three feet out, so everyone was climbing over each other to rotate around and get photos of Berlin from every possible angle.
We walked back down, parted from the group, and Finn led us back to his house at a somewhat slower, if no less wobbly, pace.
He said we were going to a friend's house for a barbeque, so we stopped in at supermarket for raw meat (apparently that was the polite-guest thing to do). We then showed up at a complete stranger's apartment (Finn had never actually been there, either) and were ushered through to a decent-sized patio with a table set and small grill-- and next to no light. Someone got out tea lights later, but we spent most of the evening squinting at our plates. The brother of the apartment owner was visiting and had worked as a chef for a few years, so the food was excellent. We mostly sat at our end of the table and tried to make small talk until Lovis and the Brits showed up; then we had a whole English-speaking side of the table, which Aaron took to with a will. The night eventually devolved into the Germans talking among themselves and Aaron and the boys showing each other things on their phones. I was so tired. We finally left after 1 AM, right as I was on verge of throwing plates at anyone who would've asked us to stay longer, and went straight to bed.
So we struggled out of bed and Finn ran to the neighborhood bakery for a huge selection of pastries that we couldn't possibly finish. Not that we weren't encouraged to try, since Finn kept pushing the donuts and his mother kept handing us cherries and peanut butter. Sightseeing was also discussed: apparently we were going to bike Berlin today. I helped clean up the kitchen and went to change into biking-appropriate clothes.
We left the house much later than planned because we had to assign and adjust the bikes; Finn's parents and sister graciously planned for us to borrow theirs, so seats had to be lowered and tires checked, and a demonstration was required of me to prove I wouldn't tumble off.
Then we went. And it was terrifying.
Berlin has a stunning array of accessible bike lanes and paths, and bicycles are at the top of the traffic food chain; both cars and pedestrians actively try to get out of their way. You can go for surprisingly long distances at high speeds without having to dodge a single thing or stop... which is extremely disconcerting, to those of us who a) have been taught a fear of getting close to multi-ton cars and b) have no idea what they're doing on a bicycle. The last time I rode a bike was a good eight years ago, with no practice since. The experience reminded me most of kayaking lessons, where most of your forward momentum is provided by sheer panic. Finn led, and led quickly; Andie and I had to chase the boys the whole way, with occasional stops for us to catch up with them.
I had a tough time.
5 minutes in: "Are we anywhere close?"
15 minutes: "I'm bleeding."
25 minutes: "You're sure this isn't part of the Tour de France?"
Arrival: "...And how long until we need to get back on these things?"
Anxiety aside, I didn't fall off and I didn't run into anything (minus one close encounter with a tree), but I cut my leg on a pedal and I don't balance well. The other cyclists whizz around you in the bike lane, confident in their road superiority--which doesn't help if you're already wobbly. Those poor passersby pedestrians never knew how close they came to being collision targets this morning.
For a better illustration of the Carrie-bike relationship, I direct you here.
We were racing to get to the Reichstag, the parliament house, because they book visiting hours by reservation. We arrived at 12:45 for a 12:30 appointment, but somehow still got in. After a security check and metal detector scan, you're let into the building and elevators up to the upper dome. It's a giant glass structure striped by walking ramps up to the top level, all narrated by a very dry audioguide who has no idea what direction you're looking as it tries to tell you about the skyline features of Berlin.
The more interesting story is that the observation dome sits directly over the parliament chamber and is ingeniously engineered with alternative energy devices. A large mirrored funnel in the center reflects light into the chamber, the open top circulates the warm stale air out, and there's a rain-catching well under the opening that channels rainwater to heat or cool the building. The huge shade shape is... well, a sunshade, cutting the cooling costs of the building.
We poked around and admired the view from the roof of the Reichstag and compared notes about the tour; Andie was impressed with the language used, calling the Nazi regime the "National Socialist reign of tyranny" and the Holocaust Memorial in honor of the "murdered Jews". Strong, condemning terms.
Finn took pity on me when we left and just walked the bikes over the Brandenburg Gate, which is just around the corner. We took pictures and chatted with three recently acquired members of our group: two British boys and a girl, a friend of Finn's. As usual, I didn't catch names. (I did later: it's Lovis, with friends from her foreign exchange trip in England, Jack and Liam.)
From there, we went to the Holocaust Memorial. It's an entire city block of concrete stelae, just huge rectangles set up in a perfect grid that create a blind-corner, labyrinth effect among the tallest ones. Each square inch of concrete is supposed to represent so many deaths.
We appreciated the composition for a while, then wandered in. I started an extremely irreverent but geographically genius game of tag, with everyone running around corners into each other, lying in wait, or accindentally jumping out at perfect strangers. (At least we weren't the tourists climbing on the columns.)
When everyone got tired and wandered out, Finn took us to the nearest mall for lunch (~3 PM). He and Andie got Leberkäse, which are large ham loaf sandwiches, very authentically German with a small bun and lots of brown mustard. I was too hungry and jumped for the imitation Chinese place that smelled the best. (It didn't taste that way.) We walked around the mall and ran into another of Finn's friends (a lovely, dark, slim girl, though I never caught her name), and then all decided to go out to the park.
The park in question is the Tiergarten, the second-largest park in Berlin. It's mostly trees and bike paths, interspersed with open fields, fountains, ponds, and memorials. Finn, Andie, and I biked slightly ahead and somehow managed to completely lose Aaron and the rest; we stopped at a pond just past the German composers memorial and waited, laying out and talking while Finn tried calling them. They never found us. Instead, we were summoned to the next planned sightseeing stop: the Siegessäule, the Berlin Victory Column.
This thing is a memorial to the Franco-Prussian War, or so we gathered from talking to several Germans who really had no idea about it. There are bronze bas reliefs all the way around the pedestal (some of them still damaged from WWII shelling), a small museum in the bottom level (that runs out of things to tell you and starts in on other large world monuments), mosiacs in the middle terrace, and enough stairs to put a lighthouse to shame. They spiral up and up, with a small landing every few flights that taunts you with a single chair. The top is heavily fenced in and extends barely three feet out, so everyone was climbing over each other to rotate around and get photos of Berlin from every possible angle.
We walked back down, parted from the group, and Finn led us back to his house at a somewhat slower, if no less wobbly, pace.
He said we were going to a friend's house for a barbeque, so we stopped in at supermarket for raw meat (apparently that was the polite-guest thing to do). We then showed up at a complete stranger's apartment (Finn had never actually been there, either) and were ushered through to a decent-sized patio with a table set and small grill-- and next to no light. Someone got out tea lights later, but we spent most of the evening squinting at our plates. The brother of the apartment owner was visiting and had worked as a chef for a few years, so the food was excellent. We mostly sat at our end of the table and tried to make small talk until Lovis and the Brits showed up; then we had a whole English-speaking side of the table, which Aaron took to with a will. The night eventually devolved into the Germans talking among themselves and Aaron and the boys showing each other things on their phones. I was so tired. We finally left after 1 AM, right as I was on verge of throwing plates at anyone who would've asked us to stay longer, and went straight to bed.
Monday, July 15, 2013
Guten tag, böser zug
We left for the Sloterdijk (slow-ter-dayk, maybe?) station bright and early, which gave us a full 45 minutes at the platform to sit and do nothing. The train arrived at the exact time specified online, which allows for about 4 minutes to load everyone before it takes off again. You have to be ready.
We got on and were quite gratified about its improvement over the Megabus; not only did the seats recline, but there was legroom, tray tables, and luggage racks to spare. We had a nice ride-- tickets checked, everything fine. The trouble started when I looked at our integrated Eurail schedule and discovered that we needed the passes for the next leg, starting at Bad Bentheim... and which hadn't been activated. You need someone official-looking to stamp them and put in the start/ end travel dates. The usher on the train said we had to do it at a ticket office for free or on the train itself for €50. The ticket window it was.
We pulled into Bad Bentheim already backpacked up, and then jogged/ bounced/ jazz-ran for the ticket window inside. We threw them at the surprised window person, who stamped them all in 3 minutes flat for us to jog back... while the train sat and waited patiently for another 15 minutes afterward.
The next interruption came when were told that there was a delay in the schedule due to a slow train in front of us, and we would be 20 minutes late. The conductor did apologize, but everyone got a little anxious and started looking at their itineraries. We ended up missing our connection (which we had reserved seats on) at Hanover by 15 minutes-- they couldn't hold it for us. German timeliness would not allow it.
We had to wait another 45 for the next train to Berlin, which everyone and their mother tried to get on, resulting in another delay while they politely asked people to get off the overcrowded train and wait for the next one. (We were having none of it, with people to meet and dinner reservations-- but that's what the rest of the Amsterdam backpackers were probably thinking, too.) It eventually left, and we crouched and sat and camped out on our claimed section of floor all the way to Berlin. Four hours.
So, the math:
20 minute delay to Hanover
45 waiting for the next Berlin connection
+ ~30 expectantly looking at other people to get off our train
3 tired backpackers with bruised coccyges arriving at 6:00 instead of 4:12 and very happy to be there.
Finn was there, smiley as always, and he herded us down the escalators and out to the nearest tram. We bumped our way on, backpacks preceding us, and spent the ride talking like the loud Americans we'd been trying to avoid looking like the whole week previous. We didn't care.
We followed Finn to his house, up stairs, and to his family's apartment. It's small in the common spaces but with large bedrooms, so the three of us fit well into Finn's room; we would be staying there, and Finn would camp out in the living room. There are plants everywhere and little balconies to put them on, with a surprising amount of greenery for the limited space. Our yard at home was severely put to shame by a square 10 feet of potted plants, plus ivy growing up the front of the building.
His father, Rolf, got home first and we all said hello and chatted. His English is great. He said Andie looked the same as she did the last visit, 4 years ago, and made her laugh. His mother, Rena, got home next. She's currently taking an English correspondence class and is trying really hard, so what she doesn't know how to say, we act out or ask Finn or just giggle over. (Giggles are my first language, I can understand her fine.)
They took us out for dinner at a walkable nearby restaurant, where we puzzled over the menu together (all the English ones had been given to an enormous table of South Korean tourists behind us). I tried the schnitzel.
Schnitzel is a large piece of meat. (Most of German cuisine involves large pieces of meat, we're learning.) Specifically, it's a slice of pork that has been breaded and fried. This comes with a large side of fries and a light beer you've never tried, either. It's a whale of a calorie count, but I did my best.
They walked us back to the house, all the while pitching activity ideas for our stay and admiring the gardens, and we turned in early.
We got on and were quite gratified about its improvement over the Megabus; not only did the seats recline, but there was legroom, tray tables, and luggage racks to spare. We had a nice ride-- tickets checked, everything fine. The trouble started when I looked at our integrated Eurail schedule and discovered that we needed the passes for the next leg, starting at Bad Bentheim... and which hadn't been activated. You need someone official-looking to stamp them and put in the start/ end travel dates. The usher on the train said we had to do it at a ticket office for free or on the train itself for €50. The ticket window it was.
We pulled into Bad Bentheim already backpacked up, and then jogged/ bounced/ jazz-ran for the ticket window inside. We threw them at the surprised window person, who stamped them all in 3 minutes flat for us to jog back... while the train sat and waited patiently for another 15 minutes afterward.
The next interruption came when were told that there was a delay in the schedule due to a slow train in front of us, and we would be 20 minutes late. The conductor did apologize, but everyone got a little anxious and started looking at their itineraries. We ended up missing our connection (which we had reserved seats on) at Hanover by 15 minutes-- they couldn't hold it for us. German timeliness would not allow it.
We had to wait another 45 for the next train to Berlin, which everyone and their mother tried to get on, resulting in another delay while they politely asked people to get off the overcrowded train and wait for the next one. (We were having none of it, with people to meet and dinner reservations-- but that's what the rest of the Amsterdam backpackers were probably thinking, too.) It eventually left, and we crouched and sat and camped out on our claimed section of floor all the way to Berlin. Four hours.
So, the math:
20 minute delay to Hanover
45 waiting for the next Berlin connection
+ ~30 expectantly looking at other people to get off our train
3 tired backpackers with bruised coccyges arriving at 6:00 instead of 4:12 and very happy to be there.
Finn was there, smiley as always, and he herded us down the escalators and out to the nearest tram. We bumped our way on, backpacks preceding us, and spent the ride talking like the loud Americans we'd been trying to avoid looking like the whole week previous. We didn't care.
We followed Finn to his house, up stairs, and to his family's apartment. It's small in the common spaces but with large bedrooms, so the three of us fit well into Finn's room; we would be staying there, and Finn would camp out in the living room. There are plants everywhere and little balconies to put them on, with a surprising amount of greenery for the limited space. Our yard at home was severely put to shame by a square 10 feet of potted plants, plus ivy growing up the front of the building.
His father, Rolf, got home first and we all said hello and chatted. His English is great. He said Andie looked the same as she did the last visit, 4 years ago, and made her laugh. His mother, Rena, got home next. She's currently taking an English correspondence class and is trying really hard, so what she doesn't know how to say, we act out or ask Finn or just giggle over. (Giggles are my first language, I can understand her fine.)
They took us out for dinner at a walkable nearby restaurant, where we puzzled over the menu together (all the English ones had been given to an enormous table of South Korean tourists behind us). I tried the schnitzel.
Schnitzel is a large piece of meat. (Most of German cuisine involves large pieces of meat, we're learning.) Specifically, it's a slice of pork that has been breaded and fried. This comes with a large side of fries and a light beer you've never tried, either. It's a whale of a calorie count, but I did my best.
They walked us back to the house, all the while pitching activity ideas for our stay and admiring the gardens, and we turned in early.
Sunday, July 14, 2013
Amsterdam à la afternoon
Plans got off to a late start today.
We knew there were two other backpacks and accompanying people in our room yesterday, who never appeared... until 4 AM. They came in and tried to be quiet, but I woke up anyway, and didn't get back to sleep for hours; one of them snored like a foghorn. It was like he was going to swallow his own sinuses, the sound was barely human. At one point, I saw Andie get up, walk across the room, and listen to make sure it wasn't Aaron making that noise-- because then, we could have done something about it. (Probably stuffed an entire pillow up his nose.) But there's nothing for it with strangers. I went for earplugs.
Our phones aren't holding charges when we try to plug them in, so everyone's alarms weren't working. We trusted the sun to wake us up at a reliably early hour like it had in Paris, but that tactic plus the interrupted night didn't work at all: we finally got up after 1 PM. Whoops.
And in a panic, too, realizing that we'd lost half a day of the one we had left to sightsee. We'd seen something about a morning walking tour, but that was right out; the best we could do was maybe pay for an afternoon one or try to walk it ourselves. As we jumped out of bed and started running for our clothes, the snoring boys woke up and were frustratingly pleasant, becoming much harder to hate when they were nice and funny and Finnish. (They're both high school graduates like Aaron, and work at "Finland's equivalent of McDonald's".)
We finally got out the door and eating things, and decided to hit the Van Gogh museum and then try for a canal cruise boat tour we'd seen at the front desk. We got turned around a few times in the maze of streets and took one detour to the Bloemgarden: the Flower Street.
The museum is next to a few others, making a huge complex of green space, sculpture gardens, and lawns that looked like they'd drawn half the city's population. We made it over to the museum, bought tickets, and proceeded to lose each other over 4 floors of Van Gogh pieces. The exhibit was very well done; it's called "Van Gogh at Work", meaning the evolution of his styles, and that's how it progresses. All of his works are ordered chronologically, interspersed with pieces by his contemporaries that he copied/ admired/ felt influenced by, a few of the actual model items from his still life's, and generous explanations about the thought processes and communications behind the pieces. I was impressed.
The dock for the canal cruise was completely across town and on some obscure road that we didn't locate for half an hour-- though shockingly enough, me and my map reading pulled it out in the end and found the place right before the 5:30 boat left. We jumped on, plugged the free headphones into the the audio tour machine, and trundled along in a wide yet surprisingly nimble tour boat for an hour, listening to a perky "native Amsterdam" couple tell us about their city. The captain really knew how to milk the photo ops, between Anne Frank's house and the "Seven Canals" view. We even saw the original location of the Dutch East India Company.
We got off and headed to a supermarket to get dinner things, ate, and then Andie managed to download a walking tour onto her phone. We visited all the buildings the canal tour hadn't covered and headed back to the hostel, feeling satisfied with our Amsterdam endeavors.
There were two more people in the room tonight, a brother and sister from England (another girl!). They and the Fins invited Aaron to come hang out with them in the lobby for cards and drinks, so Andie and I went to bed early.
And in a panic, too, realizing that we'd lost half a day of the one we had left to sightsee. We'd seen something about a morning walking tour, but that was right out; the best we could do was maybe pay for an afternoon one or try to walk it ourselves. As we jumped out of bed and started running for our clothes, the snoring boys woke up and were frustratingly pleasant, becoming much harder to hate when they were nice and funny and Finnish. (They're both high school graduates like Aaron, and work at "Finland's equivalent of McDonald's".)
We finally got out the door and eating things, and decided to hit the Van Gogh museum and then try for a canal cruise boat tour we'd seen at the front desk. We got turned around a few times in the maze of streets and took one detour to the Bloemgarden: the Flower Street.
The museum is next to a few others, making a huge complex of green space, sculpture gardens, and lawns that looked like they'd drawn half the city's population. We made it over to the museum, bought tickets, and proceeded to lose each other over 4 floors of Van Gogh pieces. The exhibit was very well done; it's called "Van Gogh at Work", meaning the evolution of his styles, and that's how it progresses. All of his works are ordered chronologically, interspersed with pieces by his contemporaries that he copied/ admired/ felt influenced by, a few of the actual model items from his still life's, and generous explanations about the thought processes and communications behind the pieces. I was impressed.
The dock for the canal cruise was completely across town and on some obscure road that we didn't locate for half an hour-- though shockingly enough, me and my map reading pulled it out in the end and found the place right before the 5:30 boat left. We jumped on, plugged the free headphones into the the audio tour machine, and trundled along in a wide yet surprisingly nimble tour boat for an hour, listening to a perky "native Amsterdam" couple tell us about their city. The captain really knew how to milk the photo ops, between Anne Frank's house and the "Seven Canals" view. We even saw the original location of the Dutch East India Company.
We got off and headed to a supermarket to get dinner things, ate, and then Andie managed to download a walking tour onto her phone. We visited all the buildings the canal tour hadn't covered and headed back to the hostel, feeling satisfied with our Amsterdam endeavors.
There were two more people in the room tonight, a brother and sister from England (another girl!). They and the Fins invited Aaron to come hang out with them in the lobby for cards and drinks, so Andie and I went to bed early.
Saturday, July 13, 2013
Going Dutch
Today we left Paris for Amsterdam.
We checked out from Aloha before 9:30 and headed for the Porte Maillot metro station, the main coach park. After some wandering, we found the station and the bus itself, driven by a nice British man named Mark who check us off the list and stowed our backpacks
The ride was fairly uneventful. It was fairly cramped, too, but we all got out when the bus stopped for gas and we were allowed to stretch when we stopped in Brussels (the other stop on the line). Andie didn't think Belgium or the countryside was deserving of photography, she didn't take a single picture until we got to Amsterdam itself. I saw one windmill and lots of fields and cows. Maybe it was for the best.
The bus let us out directly at the Amsterdam tram station, which was easy enough. You buy your tickets at a small window on the tram itself-- we got on in the back and sent Andie up for them, then discovered that they're valid for time periods, not specific rides. Encouraged, we also used them for the intercity trains (and found out later that they're not valid for that, and we rode all the way to our hostel illegally).
The schedule at Amsterdam Centraal took some figuring-- which with us, means frustrated wandering. My directions specified one train by final destination, but which wasn't on the platform or due anytime soon. It took us a full circuit of the station and up and down 5 platforms to decide on another with overlapping routes. The trains themselves are double decker with their own wifi, so Andie was able to corroborate everything I'd been saying for the last half hour and only then decide it was good idea.
Our hostel is directly across from the Sloterdijk train station (which we still can't pronounce), and surrounded on all sides by nothing but an office park. It's not the location that recommends this place; it's the accommodations, previously being a large hotel before converting the rooms for higher occupancy. There are 8 floors. The rooms are Scandinavian-looking and spacious with bathrooms, televisions, and door keys. We're in a 7-person room with evidence of two other people's stuff (though still no sign of them), but still with plenty of room and a separate sink, toilet, and shower. Marvelous.
(The staff at the front desk mentioned the Paris train wreck when we checked in and provided further details. Apparently it was pretty bad.)
We went back into town and wandered the main drag for a while, looking for a suitable dinner stop, when Andie spotted an authentic Malaysian restaurant. She navigated the Malay/Dutch/English menu and ordered for us, which turned out really well. She was very excited the whole meal and spouting stories; she's also promised to recreate tea tarik for us at home.
We accidentally wandered into the Red Light district on the way back and scuttled out just as quickly. This is Europe's recreational playground, where the entertainment starts with organized pub crawls and devolves from there. It was a zoo of people on the street, a lot of them drinking (or sporting sponsored bar crawl t-shirts) or high, with sensory assaults to match-- we found a side alley and got out of there. Andie put it best: "It's a shame that such a lovely city is wasted on drunks."
We made it back to the train station and the hostel, showered and watched Dutch television, and went to bed without ever seeing the other roommates.
We checked out from Aloha before 9:30 and headed for the Porte Maillot metro station, the main coach park. After some wandering, we found the station and the bus itself, driven by a nice British man named Mark who check us off the list and stowed our backpacks
The ride was fairly uneventful. It was fairly cramped, too, but we all got out when the bus stopped for gas and we were allowed to stretch when we stopped in Brussels (the other stop on the line). Andie didn't think Belgium or the countryside was deserving of photography, she didn't take a single picture until we got to Amsterdam itself. I saw one windmill and lots of fields and cows. Maybe it was for the best.
The bus let us out directly at the Amsterdam tram station, which was easy enough. You buy your tickets at a small window on the tram itself-- we got on in the back and sent Andie up for them, then discovered that they're valid for time periods, not specific rides. Encouraged, we also used them for the intercity trains (and found out later that they're not valid for that, and we rode all the way to our hostel illegally).
The schedule at Amsterdam Centraal took some figuring-- which with us, means frustrated wandering. My directions specified one train by final destination, but which wasn't on the platform or due anytime soon. It took us a full circuit of the station and up and down 5 platforms to decide on another with overlapping routes. The trains themselves are double decker with their own wifi, so Andie was able to corroborate everything I'd been saying for the last half hour and only then decide it was good idea.
Our hostel is directly across from the Sloterdijk train station (which we still can't pronounce), and surrounded on all sides by nothing but an office park. It's not the location that recommends this place; it's the accommodations, previously being a large hotel before converting the rooms for higher occupancy. There are 8 floors. The rooms are Scandinavian-looking and spacious with bathrooms, televisions, and door keys. We're in a 7-person room with evidence of two other people's stuff (though still no sign of them), but still with plenty of room and a separate sink, toilet, and shower. Marvelous.
(The staff at the front desk mentioned the Paris train wreck when we checked in and provided further details. Apparently it was pretty bad.)
We went back into town and wandered the main drag for a while, looking for a suitable dinner stop, when Andie spotted an authentic Malaysian restaurant. She navigated the Malay/Dutch/English menu and ordered for us, which turned out really well. She was very excited the whole meal and spouting stories; she's also promised to recreate tea tarik for us at home.
 |
| I don't know what this is. It was Andie's only photo from Amsterdam. |
We made it back to the train station and the hostel, showered and watched Dutch television, and went to bed without ever seeing the other roommates.
Friday, July 12, 2013
Golden opportunities
For our last sightseeing day in Paris, we decided to do everything else I was interested in. (Andie and Aaron are coming back and flying out of Paris, while I go on to Spain. They'll have more chances.)
So, Versailles.
We left around 10 (waaaaay too late), got there, and waited for 30 minutes in the ticket station line that most of the other "smart" tourists went for, as well. The teller explained that the crowds were worse in the morning and we should go to the gardens first, then try the house after 2:00. Sure enough, the free garden entrance around the side had no line.
The grounds are fantastic.
The fountains are enormous, the whole thing is a giant, symmetrical maze of incredibly manicured lawns and bushes, and there are LOADS of statues. The first fountain you come to down the stairs is being renovated, the Latona fountain (lizards and frogs one)-- so that was disappointing. Farther on, past the Apollo fountain, is the imitation Grand Canal, after Venice's (at one time, there was a village of gondoliers there, just to punt the courtiers around). Hidden behind the tall lines of trees are tons of hidden little copses and groves, fountains, and structures meant to be outdoor "rooms" off to the sides. There's something unexpected to see any direction you walk. (If you'd like to explore with us, click around here.)
We ate our picnic lunch on the edge of the Grand Canal with all the other tourists while watching the clueless rowboat renters ram into each other. I realized I wasn't wearing sunscreen as we walked back; with the full sun out and getting warmer, this wouldn't be pretty. Worries aside, I led a detour off to the side to see the Neptune and Dragon fountains, which were swarming with alarmingly large carp/sturgeon (our fish identification skills are a little lacking). Here are all of the fountains.
We got back to the front of the Chateau by the time the ticket seller had suggested, but still had to stand in a snakey line for 45 minutes in the sun. I feared for my arms.
We finally made it inside and accidentally started in the unimpressive downstairs apartments. After a wasted 15 minutes of empty rooms, we figured out the main entrance and picked up free audioguides. Aaron declined a sweaty earpiece so I gave him our guidebook, but then my audioguide died 10 minutes in, and I had to remember Rick Steve's descriptions and guess at the rest of the rooms
(Here are virtual tours of several rooms, the official website, and a video. About sums it up.)
Opulence is an understatement at Versailles. Gold leaf is everywhere, original and neoclassic-imitation marbles are everywhere, and every ceiling is painted with stunning masterpieces. Mostly, I stared at the ceilings.
The palace was built/expanded from a hunting lodge by Louis XIV, who grew up in poorly during his regency period and never forgot it-- this palace was meant to be a celebration of all things happy and excessive. It's no wonder his descendents were so out of touch; how do you learn fiscal responsibility in a place that cost half of modern France's GNP to build? Every renovation only made it grander: a two-story chapel, opera house, extra wings, plus rooms and stables to house 5,000+ courtiers. It's pretty hard to scale back at that point.
I lost Andie and Aaron again while shuffling around Korean tour groups, but finally ran into them at the end.
We wandered back down to the train station and went to, but a desk person came out and shooed us toward the next train while we were still trying to figure out the ticket kiosks. All the rest of the exiting tourists were hustled after us (and not a single one with a ticket), which was odd, but we didn't question our luck. Everything was fine and we were halfway back to Paris when the train suddenly stopped, a garbled French announcement was made, and all the locals immediately got off... leaving the cars full of foreigners stuck and very confused. We got off ourselves after a few minutes and overheard an Australian family nearby asking a local about the announcement. Turns out there had been an accident with a train in front of us and it had backed up the whole line. The announcement also mentioned that they didn't know when it would be cleared. We jumped on the nearest tram and took a half-hour detour back.
Rick Steves' last restaurant recommendation had been a success, so we trusted him again and got off at the Latin Quarter to go to Cave la Bourgogne. We found it quickly and even got a hugely helpful waiter who took down the written menu off the wall to translate it for us, though even with his help with the daily specials, we accidentally ordered two of the plates we'd already tried on Monday (though prepared differently enough--and I submit, better-- that no one minded). We also splurged on a bottle of Côte du Rhone and desserts: tiramisu and creme brulee. GREAT meal.
We rolled ourselves back out to the metro for one last look at the Eiffel Tower, this time lit up; Andie took us to the marble plaza at the Esplenade du Trocadero for the best view-- if you don't mind the barrage of three different panpipe groups and an army of strolling vendors waving glowing Eiffel Tower paperweights at you. Great pictures.
We went back to the hostel and I bathed my sunburns in an icy shower while Andie and Aaron sat in the lobby with the rest of the American kids, swapping travel stories until very late. I joined them with the laptop and tried to blog.
When we did make it back to the room after midnight, I walked in to find a random guy in pajamas asleep on my bed, on top of my sheets and everything. The two other roommates had left that morning and I hadn't expected others so soon, so I'd left a few items at the foot of one of their empty beds; the new kid had apparently been confused about occupancy and chosen to sleep in mine. (I admit some fault in letting my personal effects infringe on the common space. Though why he went for the bed with the clearly USED sheets and pillowcase rather than the naked mattress with a book and a phone charger on it-- that, I can't understand.) I asked the front desk if he'd paid for any sheets that I could make his bunk with and sleep there myself, but he hadn't, and they have a blanket policy (pardon the pun) of not issuing more than one sheet set per guest. They couldn't help me-- if it was a problem, go wake him up. But sleeping there now looked less appealing, and I ended up camping out on his bottom bunk in my sleeping back liner (which was actually more comfortable than my assigned bed).
Will be more careful in the future.
So, Versailles.
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| Front gates! |
We left around 10 (waaaaay too late), got there, and waited for 30 minutes in the ticket station line that most of the other "smart" tourists went for, as well. The teller explained that the crowds were worse in the morning and we should go to the gardens first, then try the house after 2:00. Sure enough, the free garden entrance around the side had no line.
The grounds are fantastic.
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| Louis XIV, the Sun King and builder of Versailles |
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| The Apollo fountain, with the Helios/Apollo sun chariot rising out of the water |
The fountains are enormous, the whole thing is a giant, symmetrical maze of incredibly manicured lawns and bushes, and there are LOADS of statues. The first fountain you come to down the stairs is being renovated, the Latona fountain (lizards and frogs one)-- so that was disappointing. Farther on, past the Apollo fountain, is the imitation Grand Canal, after Venice's (at one time, there was a village of gondoliers there, just to punt the courtiers around). Hidden behind the tall lines of trees are tons of hidden little copses and groves, fountains, and structures meant to be outdoor "rooms" off to the sides. There's something unexpected to see any direction you walk. (If you'd like to explore with us, click around here.)
We ate our picnic lunch on the edge of the Grand Canal with all the other tourists while watching the clueless rowboat renters ram into each other. I realized I wasn't wearing sunscreen as we walked back; with the full sun out and getting warmer, this wouldn't be pretty. Worries aside, I led a detour off to the side to see the Neptune and Dragon fountains, which were swarming with alarmingly large carp/sturgeon (our fish identification skills are a little lacking). Here are all of the fountains.
We got back to the front of the Chateau by the time the ticket seller had suggested, but still had to stand in a snakey line for 45 minutes in the sun. I feared for my arms.
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| And we're in! |
(Here are virtual tours of several rooms, the official website, and a video. About sums it up.)
Opulence is an understatement at Versailles. Gold leaf is everywhere, original and neoclassic-imitation marbles are everywhere, and every ceiling is painted with stunning masterpieces. Mostly, I stared at the ceilings.
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| Ceilings. |
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| More ceilings. |
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| You know what this needs? Just a tad more gold leaf. You know, right there. |
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| Hall of historical battle paintings |
We wandered back down to the train station and went to, but a desk person came out and shooed us toward the next train while we were still trying to figure out the ticket kiosks. All the rest of the exiting tourists were hustled after us (and not a single one with a ticket), which was odd, but we didn't question our luck. Everything was fine and we were halfway back to Paris when the train suddenly stopped, a garbled French announcement was made, and all the locals immediately got off... leaving the cars full of foreigners stuck and very confused. We got off ourselves after a few minutes and overheard an Australian family nearby asking a local about the announcement. Turns out there had been an accident with a train in front of us and it had backed up the whole line. The announcement also mentioned that they didn't know when it would be cleared. We jumped on the nearest tram and took a half-hour detour back.
Rick Steves' last restaurant recommendation had been a success, so we trusted him again and got off at the Latin Quarter to go to Cave la Bourgogne. We found it quickly and even got a hugely helpful waiter who took down the written menu off the wall to translate it for us, though even with his help with the daily specials, we accidentally ordered two of the plates we'd already tried on Monday (though prepared differently enough--and I submit, better-- that no one minded). We also splurged on a bottle of Côte du Rhone and desserts: tiramisu and creme brulee. GREAT meal.
We rolled ourselves back out to the metro for one last look at the Eiffel Tower, this time lit up; Andie took us to the marble plaza at the Esplenade du Trocadero for the best view-- if you don't mind the barrage of three different panpipe groups and an army of strolling vendors waving glowing Eiffel Tower paperweights at you. Great pictures.
 |
| Ooh la la. |
When we did make it back to the room after midnight, I walked in to find a random guy in pajamas asleep on my bed, on top of my sheets and everything. The two other roommates had left that morning and I hadn't expected others so soon, so I'd left a few items at the foot of one of their empty beds; the new kid had apparently been confused about occupancy and chosen to sleep in mine. (I admit some fault in letting my personal effects infringe on the common space. Though why he went for the bed with the clearly USED sheets and pillowcase rather than the naked mattress with a book and a phone charger on it-- that, I can't understand.) I asked the front desk if he'd paid for any sheets that I could make his bunk with and sleep there myself, but he hadn't, and they have a blanket policy (pardon the pun) of not issuing more than one sheet set per guest. They couldn't help me-- if it was a problem, go wake him up. But sleeping there now looked less appealing, and I ended up camping out on his bottom bunk in my sleeping back liner (which was actually more comfortable than my assigned bed).
Will be more careful in the future.
Thursday, July 11, 2013
Paris by foot, part 2
So...
The line for the Louvre wasn't too long, we were lucky.
(For your own perusing, try this link for panoramic views of the Apollo Galleries and some rooms of Napoleon III; here are the Egyptian antiquities; this is the statue of Nike of Samothrace that greets you coming into the main entrance; and this is a search for themed tours of specific works, viewed below the search engine.)
Once inside, people were streaming straight for the Mona Lisa gallery. If you happened to be swept along, you couldn't get through the hordes of tourists-turned-paparazzi holding up their cameras at it. I stayed in the back of the room and just looked at everything else.
And there was a lot to look at.
(I'm still out of camera batteries, so these are a few of Andie's favorites.)
We only realized that we hadn't agreed upon a separation plan when it happened: Aaron charged ahead, I shuffled, and Andie bounced back and forth between us until we disappeared from view. I figured I'd meet up with them at the end of the galleries and regroup, but no one else had the same idea. Andie thought to head for the Mona Lisa with everyone else and try to pick us out, but that became impossible in such a seething mass of people, so she just wandered the upstairs galleries (Italian and French painters) looking at the tourists until she saw me an hour later. Aaron went for where he thought I'd go first, and bee-lined for the ancient Etruscan art. He looked for us through the whole Islamic art section and half the ancient Greek, and we finally caught him coming down the stairs toward an exit. Finally.
Andie insisted that we go finish the Greco-Roman marble statue collection, so we saw most of that, including the Venus de Milo. Andie then went and escorted Aaron back to the Mona Lisa, since he'd completely skipped it and hadn't been looking at most of the paintings in that wing. I waited in the lobby and propped my feet up.
The line for the Louvre wasn't too long, we were lucky.
(For your own perusing, try this link for panoramic views of the Apollo Galleries and some rooms of Napoleon III; here are the Egyptian antiquities; this is the statue of Nike of Samothrace that greets you coming into the main entrance; and this is a search for themed tours of specific works, viewed below the search engine.)
Once inside, people were streaming straight for the Mona Lisa gallery. If you happened to be swept along, you couldn't get through the hordes of tourists-turned-paparazzi holding up their cameras at it. I stayed in the back of the room and just looked at everything else.
And there was a lot to look at.
(I'm still out of camera batteries, so these are a few of Andie's favorites.)
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| Welcome to the Louvre. |
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| Nike of Samothrace, goddess of victory over crown control. |
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| Cupid and Psyche (and bearded tourist) |
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| The Venus de Milo... |
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| ...and her adoring fans. |
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| The original Diana the Huntress, copied everywhere in France |
We only realized that we hadn't agreed upon a separation plan when it happened: Aaron charged ahead, I shuffled, and Andie bounced back and forth between us until we disappeared from view. I figured I'd meet up with them at the end of the galleries and regroup, but no one else had the same idea. Andie thought to head for the Mona Lisa with everyone else and try to pick us out, but that became impossible in such a seething mass of people, so she just wandered the upstairs galleries (Italian and French painters) looking at the tourists until she saw me an hour later. Aaron went for where he thought I'd go first, and bee-lined for the ancient Etruscan art. He looked for us through the whole Islamic art section and half the ancient Greek, and we finally caught him coming down the stairs toward an exit. Finally.
Andie insisted that we go finish the Greco-Roman marble statue collection, so we saw most of that, including the Venus de Milo. Andie then went and escorted Aaron back to the Mona Lisa, since he'd completely skipped it and hadn't been looking at most of the paintings in that wing. I waited in the lobby and propped my feet up.
When Andie and Aaron reappeared, we all commiserated over our achey feet and Andie suggested we go rest on the steps of Sacre-Couer, the other cathedral she wanted to see. What she didn't mention was that Sacre-Couer is across the city in Montmartre, the hills there rival San Fransisco, and we were going to walk more on cobblestones. Uphill.
Things got rapidly worse when we got off at the Abbesses stop and went for the stairs, ignoring the crowd of locals around the elevators and the sign that said "Caution: 90 stairs ahead".
90 is more than you think it is, particularly when you're climbing an underground, spiral, subway staircase and every time you turn a corner, THERE'S MORE STAIRS.
See here.
We rested at the top, but kept picking our way up more steep hills. I nearly mutinied and turned around, but we'd already picked up pastries and quiche and sodas along the way for dinner. We sat on the steps and ate-- and quiche is good even cold, if it's Parisian quiche.
Things got rapidly worse when we got off at the Abbesses stop and went for the stairs, ignoring the crowd of locals around the elevators and the sign that said "Caution: 90 stairs ahead".
90 is more than you think it is, particularly when you're climbing an underground, spiral, subway staircase and every time you turn a corner, THERE'S MORE STAIRS.
See here.
We rested at the top, but kept picking our way up more steep hills. I nearly mutinied and turned around, but we'd already picked up pastries and quiche and sodas along the way for dinner. We sat on the steps and ate-- and quiche is good even cold, if it's Parisian quiche.
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| The Basilica of the Sacred Heart of Paris, or Basilique du Sacré-Cœur |
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| It's a lovely structure, all white at the top of the hill. |
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| Andie eating chocolate croissant. (This is her chewing face, she actually loves them.) |
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| Quiche Lorraine. REAL Quiche Lorraine. |
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| The view from the highest point in Paris (without standing up at the church's dome) |
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| Everyone else trying to do the same thing. |
Our Rick Steves Paris book recommended a walking tour around Montmartre... which sounded like a great idea until we were halfway into it, nowhere near a metro stop, not really interested in where Toulouse-Latrec lived, and VERY tired and cranky.
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| Don't remember. |
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| Don't know. |
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| Don't care. |
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| Eh. |
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| Tiny little artist cafe |
We staggered back to the metro lines and our hostel, vowing never to do this again.
Paris by foot
Andie
was mildly ill this morning, so I had time to catch up on my writing.
(She's fine-- she woke up dehydrated, but her after-breakfast rest
turned into an hour-long nap, so she recovered quickly.)
We had some contention over identifying bridges, but Pont des Arts is unmistakeable: its wire grating is completely covered in
padlocks, so many that it glitters gold in the sun.
We headed over toward Notre Dame and ordered hot sandwiches for lunch from a yelling French lady nearby-- somehow her questions seemed easier to understand when loud. We sat and ate chicken kebab and fries ("Voulez-vous un frite?") in the green space next to the cathedral, shooing the pigeons.
When we finished and walked back toward the front of the cathedral, my camera batteries promptly died in the line. We'll be trusting Andie's photography until I can find some more.
Subsequent invasions and building projects recycled the stone from Roman buildings and walls-- there are medieval structures using blocks with rough Latin inscriptions.
We hit
the Louvre for the rest of the afternoon-- will need another whole update to sum up the day.
We
decided the first thing to do was go to Notre Dame. Or at least
somewhere over there on the island, because we had to wander back and
forth around all the bookstalls, statues, and old bridges; and once,
Andie forgot where we were going and took us halfway to the Louvre
before we asked which way the cathedral was.
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| Napoleon built this one. |
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| The Seine itself is green and murky and far down, but there's always a breeze when you're near it. |
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| Couples write their names on one, lock it to the bridge, and throw the key in the river. |
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| The bike lock was my favorite. |
We headed over toward Notre Dame and ordered hot sandwiches for lunch from a yelling French lady nearby-- somehow her questions seemed easier to understand when loud. We sat and ate chicken kebab and fries ("Voulez-vous un frite?") in the green space next to the cathedral, shooing the pigeons.
When we finished and walked back toward the front of the cathedral, my camera batteries promptly died in the line. We'll be trusting Andie's photography until I can find some more.
Besides the lovely
windows, Notre Dame also has smaller naves, mini-chapels, modern glass confessional booths (recording booths, they look like), statues, and art from all eras, it looks like. Rick Steves was very helpful.
.JPG)
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| This is Mary, in front of the central window. |
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| The light was bad in this picture, but there are two gargoyles (correct term: "grotesques") on the top of this corner pillar; the one on the right has his chin on his fist-- the "bored gargoyle" |
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| This is Kilometre Zero, the dead center of Paris. People have pitched coins onto the stone decal. |
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| On the way in... |
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| The center aisle |
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| Altar, with choir area behind and marble Pietà at the foot of the cross |
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| Trademark rose windows |
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| Joan of Arc statue |
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| The backside of the divider between the altar and the back naves is decorated with painted relifs from the life of Christ. |
.JPG)
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| These were part of a mainiature exhibit in the back showing how the cathedral was constructed. The exercise wheel is attached to a rope and pulley, for hoisting up stone blocks by running. |
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| Third saint from the left (the headless one) is St. Denis, one of Paris's patron saints. He was the first bishop in the area when Christianity was still spreading and was martyred by the Romans as an example to other believers. Legend says that when they beheaded him, him stood back up, picked up his own head, walked with it to the nearest public fountain, washed it off, and continued walking for another few blocks before he finally collapsed and died. This greatly helped the reputation of Christianity in the region and Notre Dame is actually built on top of the previous site of the Temple of Jupiter. |
And
leaving, we found the Archaeology Museum, which is underground
underneath Notre Dame and houses the original Roman/medieval/later
buildings of Paris. I ran for it.
You walk downstairs into the exhibit, and suddenly, into actual ruins.
The original Roman settlement was called Lutetia and centered on the west bank of the Seine, spreading to the Ile, but invaders gradually forced the Romans to fortify the island and vacate the left bank buildings.
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| Digital reconstruction of Roman-era Ile de la Cité |
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| Interactive screens in the back, allowing you to look at Notre Dame from any angle during its different construction phases. |
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| I think this is medieval-- they mentioned some corner was evidence of the building's use as a foundling hospital. |
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| This was blurry due to schoolchildren running around my knees, but it's the reconstruction of the old harbor. The Seine has moved about 50 m since Roman Lutetia. |
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| And every few minutes, they dim the lights and project a reconstructed harbor scene on the back wall, complete with the sound of waves and seagulls. |
Subsequent invasions and building projects recycled the stone from Roman buildings and walls-- there are medieval structures using blocks with rough Latin inscriptions.
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| Roman Lutetia |
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| Medieval Paris |
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| 17th century Paris |
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| 16th century Paris |
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| 15th century Paris |
I was enthralled. The siblings, less so.
(Andie raced through, and Aaron found an empty chair and took a nap.)
(Andie raced through, and Aaron found an empty chair and took a nap.)
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| Archaeology is simply scintillating. |
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