Having stayed up the entire night previously, I was a bit tired on my train to Utrecht, or rather my train past Utrecht, since I fell asleep before we got there, and woke up a few stations past my destination. After that extra hour and half of travel, I had to wander for Internet in the streets at 9am to download directions to where my former flatmate from San Diego lived.
I finally made it to Stefan’s house (aka Papi Wittens lair) at about 10am, and was greeted at the door by one of Steffy’s housemates that was unaware of my impending visit. She was trusting enough to let me in the house anyways, and I almost immediately proceeded to fall asleep until Stefan would return later in the evening from a big road trip with his girlfriend Gina. The next day my sleep cycle was still out of whack, but I managed to meet Steffy’s roommates and learn a great card game that has a very forgettable name. I was also treated to a meal of dutch mussels which tasted great but unfortunately for some reason led to an upset stomach. Read More →
I was set to meet Matt Hager (my roommate from University) and our couchsurfing host in the main train station, but my efforts were frustrated by ticket machines that don’t accept cash or American credit and debit cards. Our host Sanne took Matt and I to meet some of her friends for dinner at a little restaurant called Skek, where we say in a secret little upstairs cubby with really low ceilings. It was a pretty legit little spot the Dutch girls had carved out for us.
We did a short walking tour through the city, meandered through the red light distract (which made me really uncomfortable the first time), and eventually made it back to Sanne’s apartment. Read More →
After a full day on busses from Edinburgh, I made it to Manchester where I was going to meet up with Jake Cook, another I-House Alum. I was met by Kat, Jake’s girlfriend, a couple blocks away from their apartment, and she showed me the way in. I took a massive nap after having a big night out while Kat prepped us a delicious pasta bake.
After waking up, Jake had us on a mission for another night out on the town. We had some drinks and met up with a bunch of Jake’s work friends before heading to a club. We got VIP treatment at the club because Jake’s girlfriend works there, and we had a good night out. On the way home though, near disaster struck.
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I flew into Edinburgh airport at night got a bus to a big train station where Elliot McDonald met me for the train ride back to his hometown of Kirkcaldy. Elliot had been my flatmate in San Diego for almost a half-year, and it was great to be see him in his native environment.
We got in kind of late so we just cooked up some food and chatted for a bit before heading out to pick up Elliot’s girlfriend Joanne from the local nightclub, Kitty’s. We got there just after closing and despite Kirkcaldy being such a small town, the club had a decent flood of people in the streets, to the point that police were directing traffic around the club.
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Anna Murray and I (with some well-timed help from Liz, Anna’s mom) took the hi-speed train to Cork, Ireland, and Cormac picked us up in his car right outside the station. We immediately got a little tour of Cork by car and foot. We walked around the University College Cork campus where Cormac goes to school, and saw some crazy old stones which had carvings in them that were supposed to be one of the oldest written languages in the world (called Ogham).
After that we went to a little barbecue at one of Cormy’s friend’s houses that had great food and some crazy accents. There was one girl in particular at the party who I often didn’t understand. We stayed pretty late and had some great food as well, and got back to Cormac’s house just in time to wake up his mom by accident when fumbling with the keys and the door. Nice.
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I lucked out with a ride to Duesseldorf from Lenny, Oki’s boyfriend, who was headed there anyways, and attempted to meet up with a couchsurfing host who I had already contacted in the city. After about an hour of waiting around and attempting to get in touch at the central traion station, I decided to phone up Reinhold (My former Cologne host) again, who was only about 50 miles away in Bruehl. Reinhold agreed to host me another night, and I was glad.
I ran to catch a well-timed rain to meet Reinhold. We caught some dinner at his favorite local pub, and watched the film. We got up early in the morning and took the train into town where I met another mitfahr straight to the airport. The mitfahr was supposed to go Brussels, but the driver took a liking to me and agreed to go pretty far out of his way to spare me the train costs.
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My mitfahr to Goettingen was just me and one other guy in a really nice rented Opel car. We definitely capitalized on the lack of speed limits on the Autobahn and got to Goettingen in record time. I asked him to drop me off at the train station, as I hadn’t yet contacted the Schlegels to know where they were. It was still early in the day, so I managed to cover a HUGE amount of ground on foot for the first few hours.
Eventually I managed to regain contact with the girls and met up with them in downtown Goettingen, which is mainly two little intersecting high streets. The whole city is based around the University, and isn’t very big, so it has an incredibly cosy feel.
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I got a mitfahr to Aachen with a girl who had lived in California for a year, so we spoke English for most of the ride. She agreed to drop me off at the train station in Aachen, since there wasn’t really much to do in the city itself. I hopped a train back to Cologne, where I had stayed about a week earlier. I couldn’t get into the hostel I had stayed in before, but they helped me get setup at a place accross town.
I introduced myself to my roommates in the hostel, and again found a german who had spent time living in the U.S.A.
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Over the next few days, in no particular order (I guess my notes aren’t detailed enough), I managed to see the church of Notre Dame (which was seriously lacking in Hunchbacks), Montmartre, and some other touristy sites. I also managed to meet up with Jazz and Zaq, a British/French friend who had lived with me in the International House at UCSD, and her boyfriend who is also from San Diego.
I also managed to get aboard the Bateaux Mouches with the entire UCLA study abroad group, with some help from Kim’s very generous professor.
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My morning mitfahr to Paris was a bit sketch. The guy driving spoke German with a strong French accent, which was definitely something I hadn’t heard before, and that led to some trouble getting our meeting point straight. I got lucky that it was like a little service that a few French guys had decided to run, and there was more than one mitfahr from Cologne to Paris that morning from the train station. Despite betting ditched by the first driver, there was a second ride available to get me to Paris.
My arrival in Paris was rainy, for the first time in what seemed like weeks. I had been dropped off in an area the opposite side of Paris from where I needed to be, so I made my way to the metro to begin the now-familiar exercise of learning a new metro system. After my experiences in Frankfurt, the Paris metro was very easy to manage, despite knowing little to no French.
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