Prague: City of Beer

Did you know that the Czech’s are more punctual than the Germans? We took 2 buses in German both of which were late by a minimum of 20 minutes (45 minutes for one them!!). However, we got to our Berlin bus station 2 minutes late only to find out that our bus for Prague had already left…

So what do two travelers do that need to get to another country? They buy overly expensive, last-minute bus tickets that luckily only had 3 free seats left (apparently some people were missing this bus).

Fortunately we made it onto this bus, and even got two seats next to each other (although we did ask a girl to move, and she kept on giving me a look the whole time on the bus ride… Which I don’t understand. She could have told me “no”, but then it’s either she sits next to me, a stranger, or another stranger… So I don’t see the problem. On a crowded bus I am happy to offer my seat to a couple/ friends as for me it doesn’t matter whom I sit next to).  

Anyways, we made it to Prague, 30 minutes after our original bus. At one point on the road we actually passed our bus on the road! Ughh… 120 euros down the drain.

This was our first city where we would be staying in a hostel. We had booked the Postal Hostel, which if you are going to Prague we really recommend you stay at. The people running the hostel were really helpful in suggesting good/ cheap restaurants and bars, and the hostel itself is clean and very comfortable. However, if you are lazy/ would prefer to be closer to the downtown and bars this isn’t exactly your hostel.

Our hostel room.

Just got so comfortable in the hostel that I almost left in my flippy floppies. Dennis wasn't impressed.

Through our hostel we found our first “Free Walking Tour”. As I understand it is a certain company that organizes several tours around different European cities, some of which are completely free (tips are appreciated though. Considering how awesome every tour guide is and how much walking they do on a daily basis while keeping a smile on their face (rain or shine), they really do deserve a generous tip).

Prague is beautiful in the way that it has it's modern buildings integrated into it's history.

Many people all over Europe like to rub statues. In this case apparently if you rubbed his feet you'd get good luck. As you can see the feet are gold meaning lots of people had rubbed those feet.

.... and people would run other places too.

But I am a rebel.

You would find many fun things on the streets of Prague. 

The prices in Prague were really low for us (we would convert to the dollar). Alcohol especially. So in other words, we ate a lot of food. Street desserts (some rolled up pastry with sugar) and I went around to restaurants trying different “gulash” (an eastern European dish).

Gulash. Which was delicious! 

A pig roast that was served at the market.Unfortunately very overprices for Prague price standards, but it was amazing! If possible and you are in Prague either just pay for the roast, or find a cheaper one that is outside of the city centre area.

Beer, everywhere really good beer.

Prague (like many European cities) is divided by a river, the Vltava. Of course we checked out both sides. The side away from the “city center”, or across the Charles Bridge has a huge castle. However, we didn’t explore much of the castle itself as it seemed like a tourist trap. It was a really expensive ticket here, and another here, for different accesses to the castle.

On the other side of the column was a chick all dressed up and with a guy taking photos of her. So I got on the other side to take my own "modelling" photos.

On our last night in Prague we decided to go hard (keep in mind we needed to wake up in the morning to catch a 8:30 bus to Vienna. Oh and this time we didn’t want to be late).

We decided to go for a pub crawl. It was only 20 euros per person, you hit up 5 bars (ending at the largest club in Prague, that is 5 stories high with different “themes” at each level. I’m looking at you country-lover… you are more than welcome to stay on that floor), and you get one hour of free shots – We took great advantage of that I must say… Free shots were of vodka, absinthe, or a cup of beer.

Right away we met an Irish couple that we really liked and so we stuck around with them drinking shots, trying to scream over the music to talk, and of course, drinking more shots.

Once last call was called it was a scramble to get the last couple of shots and off to the next bar. On our way there we met a second couple, this time travelling Australians. We hung out with this crowd for the rest of the night, drinking, talking, and dancing. Apparently they “lost” me in one of the bars (boyfriend wasn’t too happy about this), but when girl chats happen in the line for the bathroom what can you do! You must offer great drunken advice to young 18-year-olds and then happily hug and say how you will always stay best friends. It happens.

Cool crew of travellers!

On the way home I was miserable about having to get up in a couple of hours and knowing I'd be incredibly hung-over, and being extremely cold. Dennis is having the time of his life.. I am not impressed.

Charles bridge at night.

While walking home we happened to look overhead to find a flock of bats. Pretty creepy, but at the same time really cool to witness something like this.

The morning after wasn’t so fun… The fact that we had a really nice bus helped! But hung-over and car-sick me wasn’t having it. I pretty much passed out almost right away, or just had to keep my head looking forward… God knows what would happen if I moved my head slightly in either direction.

Most comfortable bus ever! Tv's, hot chocolate, tea, and snacks. Oh and the cheapest bus we took the whole trip!

Overall Prague is a beautiful city, and spoiler alert: it was definitely my favourite cities we visited (After Paris and Moscow of course). The food was amazing, the sights were beautiful, and the people were very welcoming.  

Berlin: trying to escape paying for the bathrooms.

Yes that's right. You may not have had to pay for the bathrooms in France but starting in Germany you better have cash on you if you need to pee. However, if you are eating in the restaurant you shouldn't have to pay but they will still ask for money, sometimes really aggressively. So pee and then run before they catch you for your 50-75 cents.

Welcome to Berlin where the tour we took went something like this “please look over to your right, where now stands a new hotel we are building, now if you look over to your left you will see this other new building that we just finished building”. Now I understand Berlin went through some terrible destruction during WWII but I didn’t realize this until I actually went to Berlin and saw that there isn’t that much physical history left. However, the places that we did see were incredibly eye opening. Also I got to see and stay with the wonderful Karo, another au pair friend. She was totally understanding when we got into Berlin in the morning and just wanted to take a nap, gave us a tour of the main points of Berlin, and packed us lunch on a daily basis!

I hadn't noticed this until now but apparently I took a great photo of two strangers when trying to photograph the Reichstag building.

Escaping the wall. 

One of the days we explored Berlin all by ourselves. First we took a cruise on the Spree to see the shore-side buildings. Personally I wouldn’t recommend this cruise to people who are like me and want to see historical Berlin. This cruise was cool to see modern buildings that Berlin has. [If you think about why that is: attacking bridges to stop supply runs and population transport is a strategically method of thinking by the Allies, so with history it makes sense why we saw mostly modern buildings along the shore].

We then went to explore the German History Museum, and walked around Museum Island. We ran into a not-so-lovely lady at the cash who for some ridiculous reason did not understand that summer vacation is a thing, and a student card cannot be validated until September (you know when school actually starts and you use the student card).  So unfortunately we did not see any of the Museums on the island. However, if you are in Berlin for a long period of time definitely check them out.

One of the museums on the Island.

At one point we went to a market that is very popular in Berlin called Hackescher Markt which we really enjoyed! We stopped by a comedy show (that was in German but who cares, actions are universal], and listened to some great music.

                                               

A market is more fun with beer.

So while in Berlin we were suggested we try “CurryWurst”, a sausage with curry powder and fries. It sounds simple but remember this is a German sausage and it was delicious! We also wanted to try some schnitzel, but we weren’t looking to pay 30 euros for the real veal meat. Instead we looked up a place on Trip Advisor that was apparently the best. So we ended up taking the train 20 minutes out of central Berlin to end up in a pretty sketchy area (the reviews on Trip Advisor did warn us about this to be fair), and came to a small place under the bridge. The place was decorated with black writings on the wall in all different languages. We ordered two pieces of the regular schnitzel (which came out to about 12 euros for both), and were incredibly pleased with the portions and quality of the food. The place is called Scheers Schnitzel, if you are in Berlin definitely check it out, it is worth the hike out.

I don't know how to flip photos in blogger... But this was the schnitzel we got! comes with a side salad. Just looking at this photo makes me want to go back to the place.

On our last night in Berlin we went out with Karo and her friends for some Happy Hour drinks. Luckily for us the bartender was kind enough to extend the Happy Hour prices well past the hour. After enjoying some large drinks we made our way home to start packing for our bus ride to Prague the next day.

Berlin where the monuments that do stand are breathtaking but you can see what war has done to them. 

Dortmund: Travelling Like Hobbits

Dortmund was an unplanned stop on our eurotrip. It was more of a 12 hour layover, which was made much easier because I got to see a friend that I met at the beginning of my au pair year!

I am sure I would have enjoyed Dortmund much more if I wasn’t sleep deprived, it didn’t rain 50% of the time, and the bathrooms were free (even though I didn’t pay for them, but it was incredibly frustrating to be told I have to pay after eating at the restaurant).

If it wasn't for this park we visited in Dortmund and my friend coming by, I feel like Dennis and I would just have slept in a McDonalds. 

It was funny as most of these barrels had drifted to the little island across this pond. So it is virtually impossible to grab the barrels without swimming across. So we had to wait for the only barrel available that was [at this moment] occupied.

Let the hobbit adventure begin! 

Barreling is harder than it looks. It also feels like you might drown at any moment. Not suitable for small children, or people who cannot swim. 

Like I mentioned, this park was really cool. It had the barrel riding (pictured above), these swinging things, cinema, a nice walking path, and... 

Flamingos. 

Advice for future travellers do not take two over night buses back to back unless you are a smaller than average height, function when sleep deprived, or are a robot who can just shut off for a couple of hours.

La vie Parisienne

Staying only three days in Paris meant Dennis and I had to put on those running shoes to make sure we saw all the main points and my favourite non-touristic places. I am actually pretty impressed because we did almost everything that I wanted to do with him including going to a last minute theatre show! I mean there isn’t much I can say about Paris, I’ve literally lived here for a year. I love this city so much. I’ve said everything I can about it in all my previous blogposts.

I do plan on coming back to Paris, the city where I grew and changed as a person… oh and tried to learn some French.

The one last time we can get drunk by the Seine. The true Parisienne experience that Dennis just had to try.

The "eyebrow"

Trying to perfect the "eyebrow" but unfortunately not being up to par with the master (aka me... seriously did you even look at the perfection in the top photo?). 

Of course lots of french food was eaten. Including snails and lots of Bourgogne red wine. 

The build up to the "proposal"...

The unfortunate circumstances that occurred. 

Consolidation.

And then just more cheesy photos being taken by the Eiffel tower. Which are inevitable when you go to Paris with your significant other. 

Next stop: Dortmund.

Getting started: Fontainebleau

How the last day of school went, is exactly how my last week went.

The kids were excited to get out of school; I was excited to be finishing work, have my boyfriend come, and start our eurotrip. 

However the kids were saying goodbye to their friends who they might not see all summer; I had to say goodbye to the most wonderful family I could have chosen to aupair for.

In the car on the way back Connie says to her little sister “We’ll miss you Anastasia”. So many feels!

During the week I was also meeting with people for goodbye’s before either they or I would part ways.

But saying goodbye to some could be saying hello to others. My boyfriend was finally coming into Paris that night.

So my lovely Russian pal and I headed over to Paris to pick him up at the Gare du Nord train station. 

The next morning felt like any other morning just with an extra person to love. The girls were very excited to meet “mon amoureaux” and even more excited to receive maple syrup. 

We have some maple syrup fanatics.

Then it was time to head out and explore Fontainebleau.

Now on the way there something scary and embarrassing that happened that I don’t like to talk about (do not ask Dennis, his version is untruthful!). But lets just say suburban French people are the loveliest when it comes to a crisis!

The next day my host family invited us over to go canoeing.

Little did we know this trip would be a near death experience (exaggeration may apply).

After our first little “rafty” journey of going down some rocks we cracked our canoe. Inevitably we slowly started sinking as we continued our journey along the river. Little did I know (and was continued to be told the contrary to stop a panicky situation) was that our canoe wasn’t sinking that slowly. Turns out when we docked our canoe was so heavy with water that Dennis, who was in the back, was less than an inch away from the water.

After this courageous trip we all went to a restaurant situated in the forest. This was my most favourite restaurant I have been in. The food was really spectacular! We chatted a lot with the family of some fond memories, as well as, our future plans. This unfortunately was our last big meal before Dennis and I officially headed off to our next stop, Paris.

I miss the girls already, leaving the empty room was so depressing , saying goodbye to the girls was even worse. But I was promised letters and drawings in the mail, so there is always that to look forward to!