Sep 2006

My feet are dead after the day today. We got up early today because we went to the Palace Versailles....wow soooo BIG!!! Amazing! We spent there all day...as the palace has a huge backyard too there was a lot to see. I think the Sunking had about 50 fountains in his backyard and also a little lake where you can take a ride on a little boat...wow!

In the palace you could do an audio-guided tour in most languages, also in German, that was good. If you ever go to Paris, go to Versailles it is a visit worth and also the waiting queus.

the keyboard is totally different here in france so excuse my mistakes in spelling....

15.09.2006

The trainride to Paris was uneventful. We went by Thalys, a highspeed train of the SCNF. The distance between Brussels and Paris we made in not even one and a half hour. As we arrived in Paris was the weather rainy and cloudy but not cold.

Our hostel is okay. The internet is expensive but what can ya do!
We are sharing our room with a couple other persons. The room is not as nice as the other ones we have stayed in so far but we will survive it for those five days. Breakfast is okay but a little bit too early. Sanitaires are not hygienic!

Not much more to say to that day.

16.09.2006

Again cloudy weather. Breakfast was okay but we bought some stuff afterwards at the grocery store; snacks and drinks.

This day was really busy. At first we went to the Cemetière Montparnasse, there we saw a couple huge graves. But this cemetry was huge so we didn't see everything. Then we went to the Notre Dame which was really cool. We went into the church and then on the very top of the southtower....it was for free this day. Normally it costs 5,50 Euro!!!! The only negative thing of it was that you had to walk up nearly 400 stairs....we have huge muscles now *lol* The view was not soo good as it was very cloudy and a little bit foggy.



After Notre Dame we got some lunch and went to the Sacre Coeur then. More stairs to get up....aaaahhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!!! But we survived are still alive, but not our feet. ha ha ha

This church is awesome! You have to go there! The view over Paris and the district Montmatre is awestruck!! At last event of the day we went to the Cemetière du Monmatre. But the closed 15 minutes after we had gotten there. Lucky us we found Heinrich Heines grave in 15 minutes.

Very exhausted we got back to our hostel and made some dinner. As the weather turned better during the afternoon we decided to go to the Eiffeltower. We got there after eight o clock and had to wait in line over an hour to get up there.
The view and the tower were great but the elevators sucked!!!!!! Because as we wanted to go down around 11 o clock the one elevator we were standing in queu for didn't really work and noone told us till everyone else, except the people in our queu, had gone down with the other elevator. Very nice!!!!! We were soooo pissed after that!!!! The more, it was freezing up there and we really had to go to the bathroom....1 hour wait....survive that....we did! Lucky us we made it back in time for the curfew our hostel has (2 am). Exhausted we got back and fell right away asleep as we layed down in our beds.

17.09.2006

more another day my time is almost up.

In a few hours we will be sitting on the train to Paris. We are a little bit tired but we can try to catch some sleep on the train.

14.09.2006

Yesterday was a more relaxing day. I got some postcards in the mail, then we went to the famous Vondelpaark again (we just love that park) and took a long walk and took some pictures. We have already 200 pictures!!!! Hm...what did we do next??? We took a look at the Nieuwekeerk and then took a look at the big Shopping Centre but there are only stores for rich people, except one store MANGO. So we just looked around.
We booked our trip to Paris yesterday too. There was such a long queue for international trains...you even got a number with which you had to wait till it was called. We were number 234! We just waited 20 minutes so pretty quick!
We got some food at the grocery store next to the shopping centre and enjoyed the beautiful hot weather...still no rain.
Before we went back to the hostel we saw such a weird man. He was an Indian magician and he could 'fly'. He was sitting with his left knee, only with his left knee, on a stick and the rest of the body was in the air. Really!!! We took a couple pictures to proof you later back home! So look forward to that.
In the evening we took a walk through the red light district and that was it for the day.
oh we tried some special lollipop....a green well you know what lollipop...but it was disgusting. that's probably why I don't take drugs they taste ugly!!!
that was it for now...more from paris.

12.09.2006

We are on the train to Amsterdam. Right now the train stopped in Den Haag, so onlz 2 more stations!
It seems as I caught the summer flu....not good, not good at all. I pump my body full with Vitamins and Pakimen 500mg. Let's hope that that will help.
If you look out the train you see no mountains no hills, but a lot of cows, sheeps and wind mills. I haven't seen any tulips yet, maybe later.
The first thing I gonna buy in Amsterdam will be a big package of tissues.

So now we are in Amsterdam, sitting at the Hard Rock Cafe. We had some dinner here, not cheap but my body needed something warm. And in the hostel they have a microvave for us to use but no pots where we could put in our stuff to heat up. That's why we went to a restaurant. I've also bought a shirt from the hard rock, one with the signing of bruce springsteen. looks cool. hey Roland, now I'm also a member of all access hard rock! woohoo!

Our hostel is nice, Internet costs 1,50 for an hour, so that's okay. our room is nice also the bathroom! We are sharing our room with two other people, Daniel from Barcelona and another guy from Lybia. The guy from lybia snores and so Monika doesn't sleep well. I don't hear it that much, must have been sleeping good the last night. probably because I'm sick!

Here in Amsterdam they have so many imported grocerys from the US, like Peanut butter, Moisture cake mix, salad dressings, even peanut butter m&ms and pringles vinegar & salt. I was so surprised.

We are sitting now in Vondelpark, resting after the walk into the city. Oh no, there comes some wierd guy....
He is talking to us and trys to get Monika's email adress....aaahh....good that i told him I've a boyfriend (not true but works). Now he tells us about a prince with a white horse and he is the prince with the horse...yeah right! In the Netherlands girls wait for the prince with a white horse...we gotta tell him that that is not so in Austria. We wait for the "froschkoenig". Okay, appears as he doesn't know that fairy tale but now he wants to be the frog...oh my gosh!
he is a real entertainer, but not as handsome as our frog should be...still we are having a blast with him.
Gotta go to bed soon, so we gotta say goodbye to him.

13.09.2006

Breakfast was good!! A big buffet!
Monika's morning hasn't started really good, at first she wasn't really able to sleep well as mister lybia was snoring all the time and second her matress sucks...so and then she cut her finger with her shaver! poor monika....but she is alive...she is strong! good girl!!! *lol* NOw she is laughing right now about what I wrote...
After that morning we made our way to the centre of Amsterdam. We visited the Westerkeerk (an old church), then we made a walk through the JORDAAN and another part of Amsterdam, after that we went to Madame Tussaud (more to that later), made a Canalboat tour and of course went to the Anne Frank huis (really depressing).

So to Madame Tussaud, some of you have been to NYC Madame Tussaud, remember my SCREAM there? Well, they had something similar there, just with The Pirates of the Carribean....Jack Sbarro was jumping at us a couple times and really scared us and the other visitors. BEsides that they had the similar wax puppets like in NYC.

The Canal boat tour (Grachtenfahrt) was really informative. They told you a lot about Amsterdam and the buildings. And the weather was perfect too, again 27 degrees Celcius....no rain! Perfect vacation weather. The tour last for over an hour, so was it's 9 bucks worth!

At the end of the day so a couple hours ago, we went to a grocery store got some food (also the famous dutch apple cake; very delicious) and then went to the Vondelpaark again. Really nice, and it is always so amazing at half past eight till dark into the night there are still a lot of people in the park. Where is that in Austria????? Oh I forgot to mention that we had to go to the grocery store because of the bag with the hamster, Monika desperatly wanted to get one...ha ha ha!
Back to the Vondelpaark...we sat down on a bench watching two girls unpacking there waterpipe and joints...starting to smoke...oh yeah we are in Amsterdam! Our food was delicous and while we were eating Monika tried to learn to read dutch numbers...a dutch person sitting next to us heard it and tried to teach her. It is really not easy to pronounce dutch. But we have learned something, okay MOnika hand me over the book...'Ik begrijp het niet'what means 'I don't understand'. Ali taught us that. He is half maroccain and half turkish. So we chatted with him for a long time. He told us that he has tried to learn German for two years but didn't like it. He doesn't like to speak dutch but loves the Netherlands because of the freedom he has here. We found out that in Amsterdam is not much snow in Winter, just for a couple days and then not much...so they also ride their bikes in winter. Wait for the pics, here are bikes everywhere, and when I say everywhere I mean everywhere.
We saw some college freshmen who had to survive some stupid games seniors asked them to do them...really funny. LUcky us that we are not freshmen here at University in Amsterdam. Always good when you meet some native Dutch, you find out a lot more about the country then.

Now we are back in the hostel, it's almost ten o'clock and we go to bed soon. Tomorrow is our last day here, Friday we are leaving for beautiful Paris.

We love Amsterdam!!!! Beautiful city, nice people. Come here when you get the chance.

bye

10.09.2006

so in the evening after I had written my blog yesterday Monika and me still stayed downstairs and played some UNO...was a lot of fun.
A handsome guy was sitting with his laptop on our table too! We found out later that he also sleeps in our room, but he has already left today. The same with the girl, she was from Austin, Texas. She is heading now to Germany. She is travelling alone and in Europe since July 17th..she will be staying till November and wants to see also Salzburg and Innsbruck! Yeah.
We went to bed around midnight.

11.09.2006

5th anniversary of Ground Zero!

In the morning around 10 o'clock we left for the ATOMIUM! It's really a visit worth. so huge, and you can go up to the top where you have a perfect view over Bruxelles! Took some pics I'll try to put online when I'm back. So far we have around 80 pictures.
After the Atomium we went to the European Parliament...it is soooooo huge! Big buildings made out of glass, and people speak all languages there, also German *lol* So we made that tour...we could take a walk into the building and the cool thing was you could watch the people, who work there, while the were walking from one meeting to another...like Big Brother! Then we were allowed to take a look at the big conference hall where the politicans discuss laws, etc. But after about 2 minutes we got kicked out because they forgot to tell the tourist guides that there was going on a "secret" meeting. As we would have understood it....ha ha. Well anyways the security was a little bit mad and the tourist guides were so sorry for us that we couldn't stay longer. But we were in there for 2 minutes, better than nothing, and it was for free!
After that we took the subway back to Bruxelles Centraal Station and walked back in the core of the town where we bought some belgium pralines...they were sooo yummy! 2 pieces cost me 1.35 Euro, but whatever hey when do I ever get the chance again. No, DAni I'm sorry. We wanted to take some chocolate with us home, but it is soo hot that it melts in a couple minutes! Sorry!!! I bought myself a Bruxelles shirt with the Manneqin Pins today. Looks good!
Oh and at the end before we went back to the hostel we bought a belgium waffle with strawberries, bananas and chocolate. Very yummy....if you ever get the chance to go to Bruxelles, eat WAFFLES!!!! Expensive, but yummy! Everywhere you go in Bruxelles you smell the waffles.
When I read my blog, I must say we are eating a lot here...ha ha...but I hadn't eaten breakfast today, I was still full from the day before.
We skipped Luxemburg, the girl from Austin and the boy from Birmingham told us, that in the core is not much to see, it is nice but it is better if you visit it by car, because on the outskirts is more to do!
That will be our last entry from really beautiful Bruxelles. Tomorrow we are leaving for Amsterdam.
Now I'm tired and I will go to bed soon. I guess I catched a cold, because I'm sneezing since the last couple ours and I have such a pressure on my eyes...f***!
Take care guys....love ya!