July 2011
37 posts
1 tag
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Nice, St Raphael, France, Frankfurt, Germany,...
10/7/11
I woke up with an exploding head, whereupon Betty and Sam had to fill me in on the parts of the night I’d missed. Betty was going to take us out to our parents via the SNCF.
The train was majorly delayed at Cannes as police hunted through the train for drugs. I didn’t get to see any major Law & Order France moments though.
After checking out Betty’s parents...
Nice, France - Day 16 Eurotrip
9/7/11
Betty met us at the station then grabbed us breakfast, which was of course coffee, baguettes and pain au chocolat.
I then went down to the pebbly beach to make use of the sunshine. Plenty of English accents were to be heard round the cafes near the shore.
“Ah, well it’s a might hot innit?”
“Where on earth can ye get an ‘alf decent meat pie?”
Ida...
Bordeaux, France - Eurotrip day 15
8/7/11
We got up early for our Medoc wine tour, which was a bit of a multi stop trip. First up was the Chateau D’Arsac. The Chateau had had rather a chequered history, but the culmination was that a rich investor had rebuilt the chateau, restarted the wine business then set about populating the spot with his ever expanding collection of modern art.
Key to the guy’s strategy was...
Bordeaux, France - Eurotrip day 14
7/7/11
For some reason Sam demanded kebabs for breakfast, so we found some in the city centre and tasted chilli sauce for just the second time in two weeks.
Apparently the longest shopping strip in Europe.
“KEBABS?”
We then booked a wine tour for the next day and set about exploring the city. More cathedrals were visited. They all start to blend into one, truth be told, even...
2 tags
Angers, Bordeax, France - Eurotrip day 13
6/7/11
We woke up late and hungry in Algers, accidentally ordering a meat platter when we thought we were getting some sort of Quiche. Improving French, as I mentioned.
Angers was still a pretty nice looking town - all cobblestone avenues and white walls. Like this old house where they at least kept the facades as they joined with the newer buildings.
After leaving some chocolates for...
5 tags
Blois, Chambord, Algers, France - Eurotrip day 12
5/7/11
We got on the early train that morning from Paris to meet Lucille at the Pont de Blois.
Blois is a little 18th century style village a couple of hours south of Paris. The look of the town seems quite painstakingly preserved, right down to the bridge itself over the Loire River.
The view of the village from in front of the Chateau. You had to descend a steep stone staircase to get...
4 tags
Paris, France - Eurotrip Days 10, 11
3/7/11 - 4/7/11
We woke at Thomas’ around midday feeling seedy as hell. We had a go at trying to clean up some of the mayhem and I snapped a couple of shots of the scenery out the window in Sentier, around the centre of Paris.
The sloped rooflines carry into the penthouse apartments.
After finally dropping our bags off into a crusty looking double bed apartment in Montmartre, we...
Paris, France - Eurotrip day 9
2/7/11
One of the first rules of waking up is that you must sleep first, so I’d describe opening my eyes at Orly airport Paris as more of a jarring blink. We’d left mercifully left Erik’s place at around 4-30am after he had made a heroic attempt at staying awake, kneading his face with closed fists and blinking more and more slowly as we waited for Sam to get back from...
3 tags
Berlin, Germany, Eurotrip day 8
1/7/11
Sam didn’t get back to Erik’s til around midday, by which time I was almost ready to move again. We got back on the bikes and met Betty and Ida near the Reichstag building, but quickly decided that we’d be better off nursing our hangovers back at the Tiergarten nearby.
After all it was a damn nice day. We then decided to go get a beer at Der Visionaire.
...
Berlin, Germany - Eurotrip day 7
30/6/11
We were pretty glad to get out of Singer109 and find a touch of privacy, so we packed the stuff up and shipped off to Erik’s near Frankfurter Alles.
Erik had a million albums to review so we again found Tom near Alexanderplatz.
Every day at the station they set up one of the cars as a clothing store. And what are the outfits like? Well, I think personally the logo says all...
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Berlin, Germany - Eurotrip days 5 and 6
28/6/11 - 29/6/11
Realising we hadn’t eaten for around 14 hours, Sam and I headed to Moritzplatz in search of Kreuzberg, but more importantly some freaking Vietnamese style pulled pork rolls, which were everywhere and awesome. Had the first of many rather crap coffees, but that pig’s slow simmering sacrifice had made me too happy to care.
We finally found Tom again then made the...
Berlin, Germany - Eurotrip day 4
27/6/11
We arrived in Berlin around 10am and jumped straight on the Bus and Train in order to track down Tom. This was made slightly difficult by Tom’s lack of mobile communications. I had set off on the trip determined not to be without my beloved mobile data and purchased a T-mobile sim from an internet cafe, only to burn through 25 precious Euros worth of data in one day due to an auto...
3 tags
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Vienna Austria - Euro Holiday Blog day 3
26/6/11
Managed to sleep in til about midday local time. That would have been 8pm in Sydney. Heard loud knocking at the door and decided to answer in my underpants. This straggly haired guy is standing wearing a quizzical expression and a cyan blue shirt, followed closely by a strong waft of last night’s booze.
“Where Isaac?” he demands, “This room Isaac’s,”...
9 tags
Vienna Austria - Euro Holiday Blog day 2
25/6/11
Finally passed through Frankfurt airport and got my flight to Vienna around midday the next day. Arrived at Spittelau station smelling like 28 hours of recycled air and microwaved food… probably perfect material for their local Biofuel plant.
Spittlelau Biofuel plant
Dumped most of my shit in the generously unoccupied dorm room of Mr Isaac Sheer, who regrettably won’t be...
Euro holiday blog - Day 1
24/6/11 - Australia
Left the house at midday for a long series of flights to Vienna. None of this was helped by a two hour delay for takeoff, and a hitherto unmentioned midnight stopover between Beijing and Shanghai airport. People were starting to panic about missing connecting flights in the middle of the night, making booking arrangements, etc. I just tried to sit back in my kiddie chair and...
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And I can't even update facebook
Because I’m in China!
