Oktoberfest, Munich

Now, I don’t know if you have all been keeping up with the weather reports over here, but we are in a very cold Europe right now. So we decided that since we would be camping, yes that’s right it was cheaper and we thought it was a good idea in March, that we would splash out on thermals. Thank god we did!! On Friday afternoon, we left our warm cosy hostel and headed for our campsite. Got tent number 47 and a wrist band that had not only our tent number on it, but also the address of the campsite just incase security found you in an alley somewhere over the weekend. Sitting on the ground we decided our next necessity was to buy a pool lilo from our tour operators - mine was green and Lizzie’s was pink. Our first night we showered and layered up with our thermals (long johns & 2 singlets each), trackie pants, t-shirts, jumpers and jackets. Oh and 2 layers of socks. Did we sleep? NO!! Had to get up at 6:30am on Saturday morning to get ready to make it to the festival to try and get into the Hoftbrau Hall. We got there at 8am and met a mob of people out the front…we stood there for 2 hours and when we finally got close to the front, we were told no one was coming through the front doors and if you wanted chance to get in get to the back doors. So us and about 400 other people sprinted around the building (I think I even pushed people!) and made it kind of close to a door and got in. This was at 10.30am. We had lost our tour group right at the beginning (bloody waste of money they were) and had to find our own table…this was a mission as everybody was saving seats for people who hadn’t even made it into the hall yet. Finally found some nice guys who squished over. Now I hear you asking why all the fuss for this hall?? Well, this is the hall in which the Mayor Taps the first keg to signal that the festival has started….this doesn’t happen until noon. When this happened thought, it was totally amazing. The crowd of 10 000 people cheering and shouting was crazy! Now all we had to do was wait for a Fraulein (not beer wenches or they don’t come to your table as the table next to us found out) to serve us. This. Was. Painful! We didn’t get our first beers until 1.15pm. Yes, that’s right, we had waited a total of 5 hours to get a beer. Nuts. Absolutely nuts. Tasted good but!! Best fun ever! We had steins and sang and all was well in the world. That is until we had to return to the cold, crappy campsite, better sleep this time thanks to the Hoftbrau!

Day 2 of Oktoberfest had us heading in quite late, around 10, watched the parade with these giant horses bringing in barrels of beer, and lots of traditionally dressed Germans playing music marching through the festival grounds. I quite liked it. We then decided to head into the Lowenbrau beer hall around 1pm and found a table fairly fast considering the beer had already been serving since 12. Made some new friends again and drank until about 7pm. Now I hear you all asking about how many steins we had. We I think I had over the 2 afternoons 6 and Liz the non beer drinker got down 3!!! I am so proud of her, as should all of you!!! What an effort by the girl who has only ever finished half a stein her entire life!!! Now I now, I probably should have had more, but people, these things are massive…they are more daunting than you realise. But with all these steins also came our drunken purchasing of merchandise and here we went a bit crazy…but hey, we now have 3 Oktoberfest half steins, 2 crazy hats, a shirt, a jumper and of course a gingerbread heart!! Campsite sucked again, and no sleep for me as my lilo was completely deflated and Liz didn’t even offer to share hers…drunken bum!!! Got up at 6am on Monday to get back to the nice warm hostel to catch our bus to the next destination.

Oktoberfest rocked!!!

Munich, Germany

Before hitting up the Oktoberfest we had few days to actually look around and see Munich. We did this by going on a walking tour which was fantastic. Our guide, a tall black German/Canadian in lederhosen, took us to all the major parts of the city but also gave us lots of information about Munich which we actually remember!! I wont’ bore you with it now…so watch out for when I speak to you all next! He took us to this great Beer Garden in the middle of the city, which we returned to 3 more times. Not only was it a beer garden but there was a fresh food market as well, so you went and got all your goodies (stuffed peppers, olives, bread and cheese) and got your beer and sat in the sun all afternoon. Perfect. Here, Liz started AND finished her first ever half stein of beer…pretty impressed I was! The next day we went to the Deutsches Museum which is just massive. It’s 6 floors of science and technology from way back to the present day. There was lots of interactive things you could do in each section, we only visited a few Musical Instruments, Chemistry, Photo & Film, Textiles, Printing, Technical Toys and this took us 3 hours. There are 61 sections….some of it was a little hard to really learn off as it was all in German, but still cool to look at. I can just imagine every school teacher incorporating this museum into their curriculum, it’s got everything!

Salzburg, Austria

Not really too much to Salzburg, except of course THE SOUND OF MUSIC TOUR!! I have now, re-enacted a few scenes from the movie when visiting some of the places they shot it. And I was not the only one!! There are millions of us flocking to Salzburg just to ride on the very cooly painted bus and hear all about the wonders the is The Sound of Music. I was a little disappointed though as you don’t get to go to the top of the hill and sing the opening line as the mountain is a 3 or 4 hour walk up the mountain to do this and well, they don’t really have time for that! But I do have to say it was a definite highlight. Another highlight whilst on this tour was the Apple Strudel….mmmm delicious!

We also just walked around the Old Town which is super cute, it’s this tiny street and there are just shops everywhere and all them have this great signs hanging from the outside of each shop…very old fashion but adorable! Here in Salzburg we went to the Augustina beer hall and had Pork Knuckle, Potato and beer. Was soooo good! The knuckle we got given was supposed to feed just one person but Liz and I had a hard time finishing it off together!! And all the beer is served straight out of the barrels…was really good….had a few half pints in preparation for Oktoberfest!

Let the Beer Drinking Festivities begin!!!

So we have made it Munich, the beer capital of the world and home of the world famous Oktoberfest!! Liz has done some training and drank her very FIRST WHOLE half stein yesterday in preparation for the weekend. I'm so proud of her :)

We are camping for the weekend but a slight problem is that in the space of 5 days, Germany has decided to drop quite a few degrees....actually alot. We have had to go out and buy thermals so that we do not get frosbite over the next 3 nights. This I am not looking forward to but I am very excited about the rest of it as you all know it's been a life long dream to come here and drink gallons of beer in a giant tent hahaha

Stay tuned for the ending of this beautiful tale.......

Vienna, Austria

Vienna has done everything possible to make us dislike it but we have been determined to have a great time!

Issues:

Number 1.Our first night in our dorm room was full of stinky, snoring men so it was safe to say we really didn’t sleep that well.

Number 2.Got up in the morning to explore and went to get some money out of my Travel Card account and was not able to. Little worried. But that’s ok because we have our calling card and we’ll just ring and fix it all up. Calling card doesn’t work. Fine. Spend 5 euros to call the card people to find out they have blocked my card to do an identity check on me. It is blocked because they did not receive the form and correct papers back by the due date….they sent the paper work to my London address. Where I am not since I’m travelling, with my Travel Card. FOOLS!! To clear this up I have to send them a fax of my passport, drivers license and a document with my UK address on it….right. Called Katie (Liz’s sister) on skype to see if she could help as all our paperwork is at her house. Turns out we were nicely organised as we had copies of all 3 things in a bag at her place. FEW! Still haven’t found out if I’m cleared or not yet. THANKS KATIE!!!

Number 3: Liz has broken out in giant red itchy bumps….she has picked up bed bugs. At 8.30pm at night trying to find a chemist to get calamine lotion and antihistamines was a feat. And we failed. Poor Lizzie went to bed so itchy. Up early the next morning though to get treatments. Poor Lizzie is still suffering... we are shaking our fists at whichever hostel did this to her!

But after all this, we have still managed to really enjoy Vienna. There is lots to do here and we have done everything we wanted to. We walked around the Ring Road which encircles the main part of the city and houses all the important buildings. The Hofburg Palace, State Opera, Parliament, Museum Quarter and lots more. We then walked a bit out of town to look at the Hundertwasserhaus which is this great apartment block which this particular artist/architect designed. It’s all different colours and everything is uneven and just great. Really different. After this we went back to the Opera to line up for nearly 2 hours to get standing tickets for 4 euro each!! The Opera we saw was called Ariadne Auf Naxos and was all in German and even though we had translation screens in front of us, it was a little hard to read that and watch. But we can now say we’ve been to the Opera. Feet were bloody sore after that!



Our next day took us to Praterstern which is a big fun fair park with heaps of rides and games and junk food. A permanent Ekka if you will. It was really quiet and not many rides were open so it was a little eerie but we had a look around and then walked back into the city. On our way there, we stopped for coffee and some on Vienna’s Sacher Torte. Best chocolate cake. Visited St Stephen’s Cathedral in the centre of the city and then headed out to a Heurige (wine tavern) called 10er Marie to test out all this wine people keep going on about. And I have to say it is worth going on about!! Liz had this white wine which had only been made that day. We think. But it came out in mugs and looked like cloudy apple juice but tasted so good! I had some red wine which I really liked. And it was so cheap. A Mug (250mls) cost us 2 euro 20 cents! Cheap drunks we were! Plus there was a festival in the streets just outside this tavern so there was heaps of great music so we had a great night.

Saturday was another wandering and exploring day ready for our big Sunday of going to Mass!! That’s right, you heard me, Mass! We got up super early to get a decent standing spot to hear the Vienna Boys Choir sing in the Chapel attached to the Hofburg Palace. We froze and our feet were a little sore by the end of it but it was well worth it. The Choir was one of the most beautiful sounds I have ever heard. We only got to see them for 1 song as they were in a different room for most of the service but it was enough just to hear them. As the day has been bloody cold here, we warmed up with some delicious coffees and then lazed around reading and relaxing at the hostel.

Tomorrow, Salzburg….The hills are alive with the sound of music. I AM SO EXCITED!!!

Bled, Slovenia

We headed off to Bled next, which is about and hour and 20 minutes from the capital. Got a bus, and again, had to find a map and walk with our backpacks…slightly more painful this time as there were hills!. I swear I was going to collapse just as Liz spotted the hostel! Dropped our stuff and went for a look. Bled has a famous lake and it is absolutely beautiful. It’s huge and blue and clear. You could even see the fish if the water was shallow. It was quite hot, so we decided to go back to the hostel to check in and grab our togs so we could go swimming in the lake! Diving in the water was a bit cold but it was so gorgeous to swim in. Just being able to look around you and see the castle, mountains…oh it was wonderful! Over the next 3 days, we went swimming in the Lake every day even when the sun was hiding.

We hired a little wooden boat and rowed to the little Island in the middle of the Lake which has a church on it. We decided not to explore as we have seen so many churches, plus we only had the boat for an hour and we wanted to keep rowing. I was not very good at it but Liz was great. Some action shots will accompany this blog!! We walked all around the Lake also, which is 4km, we did it in a very leisurely stroll so as not to exert ourselves. We also tried their famous Cream Cake. This is pretty much a better version of vanilla slice, but with a thick layer of cream on the top…mmmm I also tested out their 2 Slovenian brews here, both coming in 500ml bottles which I found amusing. One called Union was so so but I really liked the other which I think was called Lasko.

On our last day we decided to walk to the Vintgar Gorge which was about a 45 minute walk from our hostel. When we reached the area we could already hear the water rushing and when we saw the first river we were amazed. The water was crystal clear. So lovely. The Gorge walk took about an hour to the end and back. And as we had gotten up a bit early to do it, we didn’t come across anyone else which made us feel like we were in our world. In some parts the water was this beautiful green colour. If it wasn’t so cold in the Gorge you would have jumped in!
We really enjoyed Slovenia, everything was so cheap, the people were really friendly and the views at Bled were just beautiful. Definitely a place I would recommend to everyone!!

Ljubljana, Slovenia

So after our trip to Budapest we were supposed to hop on a bus back to Prague. But since Prague really didn’t impress us that much we decided to take a side journey to Slovenia as a few people from our tour recommended it. So we stayed an extra night in Budapest to organise ourselves and booked train tickets to Ljubljana, the capital of Slovenia. We were under the impression that we had the one train all the way there which was about an 8 hour trip. So we got on this super nice train only to be told that in 3 hours we would have to get off and get on a bus. Right. Following everyone else we hopped on this un air-conditioned bus that just drove for an hour and half through the countryside. I only knew we were still in Hungary because every now and then I would see the Hungarian flag out the front of houses. Finally we stop and got our bags and were moved to a different train. This one was not so fancy, had no air con and we couldn’t really tell if we were getting on the right one. We did however see the ticket man so we figured we were ok. We hoped! We got to be in a carriage just like the ones Harry Potter takes to Hogwarts…this I found a little exciting, except there was no lady coming around with a sweet cart, wee bit disappointed there!! 4ish hours later we arrived in Ljubljana. HOORAY!!

It’s night time, and we have no map and no clue as to how to get to our hostel. Hmmmm Lucky, Lizzie found a random map in a display so we kind of made a mud map off of that. Now the only problem was that we had to carry our backpacks. Yes! This is the first time we’ve really had to carry them further than down the stairs of a hostel and onto a bus. It was awful! I swear, if we ever ACTAULLY backpack, I am buying one of those expensive women ones and only taking 10 items of clothing!! Found the hostel so all was good.

Our day in Ljubljana had us just looking around. There was not too much to see there except a few buildings, a castle on a hill and a canal. But it was pretty and the people were really nice. We actually slept most of it as we were so buggered from the Trek.

Photos from meeting Krystyna and Chris in Krakow

Eastern Trekker Tour 29th-4th September

On the morning of the start of our tour we were up nice and early to have breakfast and meet our fellow trekkers. There are 32 of us and there was no way we were going to remember all of their names! Our first stop was the Bone Church in Kutna Hora. This was freaky. The whole inside of the church is filled with human bones, some are made into chandileirs, into huge caves and just generally hanging around. Liz absolutely loved it, me, meh bit creepy. But the reason being that the gravyard attached to the church was overfilled so they decided to do something with all the bones and this is what they came up with!

After this, we continued on to Olomouc where we checked into our hotel and had a teeny rest before meeting up with the group again to go on a walking tour led by our tour leader. Not too much really went on this town and plus I was way to hungry to pay attention. It is a fairly small town with a square. Oh the founder of Genetics studied here. We then went to dinner but as some of us had to go to the ATM we got left behind but were eventually found and as we were starving we were of course THE last ones to get our dinner. I swear I was going to eat the table cloth! But I had Goulash and all was well in the world again. Visited a plane that landed in the city and they never bothered to move it so now it's a bar. Smelt bad so we didn't stay.

Day 2 had us back on the bus and off to Auswitz . Bit nervous about going here. Was definately an interesting experience. There really just isn't many words to describe how it makes you feel in there.

Back on the bus to Kracow we stayed in a dodgy hostel but it was mostly clean so it was ok. First night we went to dinner and had Perogi which Liz had been raving about as her Dad and Babcia used to make it. It is a kind of dough with meat,vegetable or fruit filling, kind of like ravioli but without sauce on top. It was delicious!!! Had the local beer, not bad, and then went to a club which had us having a shot of Polish Wodka. Oh my god. Never again! I swear it burnt all of my taste buds going down. Next day was a bike tour around Kracow. This city is so beautiful, there is a huge river running through it and the day was so sunny and gorgeous it made us fall in love wtih it. In the afternoon we met up with Liz's relatives. Her Dad has been speaking with his cousin Krystyna for a while now and her nephew Chris spoke pretty good English so he came to translate between Liz and Krystyna. It was a great experience and they have convinced us to return at the end of the year and visit them again. Krystyna lives a little way out of Kracow so it will be lovely to visit her home and hopefully try some of her cooking as the Polish have some delicious dishes! That night we went to a salsa bar and I had a go. It was so much fun!! Who is up for joining Salsa dancing with me when I get home????? :)

Day 4 took us to Zakopane which was only 3 hours away. The afternoon was our own to go exploring so after a quick look through the village we decided to climb up one of the mountains. We are pretty unfit but we were surprised that it didnt' take us that long to climb it, plus we chose the smaller of the two, as one mountain climb on the opposite side of the village took 2 hours to get up and 2 hours to get down...yeah not for us right now. The views at the top were absolutely beautiful and would look even more amazing during winter. The mountain are part of the Tatry Ranges and I think our mountain was 1130m high. Dinner that night was out to a grill place that had shish kebabs the size of me. Liz and I chose to share this meal and we were glad of it as it was huge but so delicious.

Day 5 took us to Budapest and on the way we had lunch in a church yard in the middle of Slovakia and then headed into Hungary. Our night was organised by our tour leader, first off was dinner at a restaurant and then on to a 'booze cruise' which was meant to be all you can drink whilst on the boat....yeah, the beer was hot and the wine ran out before everyone even hopped on...RIPPED OFF!! Was a little cranky at our tour guide for leading us on to this as we all had to pay the equivalent of 16 euros each for the pleasure. Not happy Jan! But the night picked up as we went to a cool bar and started throwing back the drinks which were very cheap and tasty. Then moved onto a night club which was underground and smokey but playing trashy but cool music which seemed to suit our tour. Lots of dancing and drinking and Liz hoovering the streets of Budapest as they were dirty...picture to come later haha

Day 6, bad hangover but we were all up to go on our bike ride of Budapest. We were a little slow but glad that the Pest side was flat. Not so happy about the Buda side where we had to ride up a massive hill to see a castle. Some walked but most of us rode all the way. View was definately worth it. You could see all of the River Danube and the Pest side. Ride back down was much more pleasant and then it was off to Burger King for us!

Day 7 had the bus leaving for Split and us staying behind as this was were we hopped off. It was sad to say goodbye to the group who we'd just kind of gotten to know, but some are living in London so we may catch up with them again. Another guy hopped off as well, so we hung out with him until we left Budapest. We went to the Thermal Baths which were fantastic and so relaxing. One of the baths was 38 degrees and just wonderful, we didn't want to hop out but it was recommended to only stay in there for 20 mins.

Budapest was really great and so cheap that it is definately a place worth visiting. We also really loved Poland and so I am sure we will be returning there again soon. The tour was definately an experience and we are now looking forward to enjoying getting back to doing our own thing.