TWO nights in Paris....not one!

Get into Paris around 8pm after long day of train travel from the snow, head to hotel and check in. Find some dinner at a local brasserie which wasn’t very good but oh well. Head back around midnight to hotel and doze off in a snow injury inspired sleep.

Up the next morning and walking to the Louvre (missed it last time around) got lost on the way (there’s a surprise) is about a 5k walk, found some overpriced breakfast and then hit the streets  again in search of all things fine art. Spend quite a few hours walking around looking, then head back up to ground level and hit the streets, walked another 5k to the Arc de Triumph which was commissioned for Napoleon for killing ppl and on the way down the Champs Elyss which is a huge shopping area. Getting hungry so need a snack but before that decided to high tail it over to another (cheaper) shopping area near the Moulin rouge, Damn it CLOSED!

Head back around a few stops, decided it’s too early for dinner but too late for lunch, need something to do, ahhhhha! The big carousel that overlooks the Eiffel Tower etc etc, went on that and was very composed considering my fear of heights (NOT), headed a few stops back near hotel for our last dinner in Paris. Found a local restaurant and had a bottle of champagne, 3 course meal each, dessert wine, coffee and some random other alcohol that the waiter gave us... met Peter from the Europe version of Nasa from Holland and spoke to him for a while.

Back to hotel for sleep, up at 7am the next morning, pack, breakfast, checkout and start to make our 24 hour journey home including a 5 hour stop over in Hong Kong with no available upgrades.  J

On the upside, 8 hour flight from Hong Kong back to Brisbane to arrive at midnight was almost empty, only 100 passengers so Darrell and I both had a set of three seats in the middle of the plane so we could lie down.  J Whooop Whoooop Back home now and sitting on the couch after only a few hours sleep, welcome to the world of jetlag. See you on the slip side and thanks for listening.

Chaos in Champonix!

Arrive Champonix, via train and one crazy chugging train up the mountain, V cold but not as cold as I had expected for snow areas. Check into our hotel which is like an oversized steroid wooden cabin, great views although a bit foggy on the night.

Need to find some snowboarding gear ASAP so can hit the slops, the lovely Jerome stayed open until 7.30pm to help us out even though he closes at 7pm. OK so we are ready to go for tomorrow but need to find snow area map and figure out where we are heading for tomorrow’s snowboarding mania. Head to centre of town and local tourist office, damn closed! So in search of food we go, found a restaurant that was massive inside full of pots, pans and random wall decoration, had a meal and then found the local pub / nightclub scene. Quite a few cocktails and an amuzed bar tender later (turns out she sounds English but is French...go figure) ok ok time for bed around midnight as we have a big day tomorrow.

Get up heading to city centre, get a map and find there is a local field very suitable for beginners just 10 blocks away, oh yeah we can walk that with our snowboards, boots and all gear no worries.....stop off for bread on way (aka breakfast).

Get to field, boot up, pay our fees and I’m off. What the, how slippery can snow really be? OMG what is going on, what’s that, I’m sliding down a hill.....don’t know what I’m doing.....Oh hello ground, I’d like you to meet my knees, Knee’s this is the ground! OVER AND OVER! For the record, when you see all those kids playing in snow, having a jolly good time and looking like it’s fluffy and soft, NEWS FLASH it’s not! So after some falling down, and I might also admit crying the 3^rd time I stacked it hard on my knee’s Darrell helped and showed me how to stop aka slide down sideways. So off we go up the rope thing to the top of the hill to start practise.

Long day of snowboarding and falling was behind us, a coffee later and we head back into town, check our gear into the lock up and buy some crisps from the local store, drink some vodka in our room and head to dinner before coming home and watching dirty dancing completely in French on the TV due to being so worn out. Lame much?

Next day hit the snow again started getting very cocky of myself, but shortly after re-introduced my already bruised knee’s to Mr Ground and put me straight back in my place! Although decided to go up to the top of the next hill, yay Darrell is going so well, I’m doing really well then HELLO BIG STACK! The kind that makes the other ppl stop and ask if you are alive. OHHHH HUGE stack for Darrell, punched himself in the ribs, this man has talent!  LOL

We take our injuries back, head to the bar and have a few cocktails, went to dinner and managed to squeeze in some laundry with the local guy. Leaving tomorrow for Paris for last two nights of trip.

Check out and begin to take the long journey to Paris on an overbooked train with no seats....awesome!

Lightening through Lyon!

Arrive Lyon safely via Easy Jet airlines, decided to fly rather then taking 14hours 50 mins by train. Head to hotel and get  very very lost in the local streets, it would appear that our prebooked hotel was full as we again arrived a few days earlier....bummer so instead book via booking.com a “two bedroom” and I use the term very loosely as it turns out the second bedroom was a sofa converted from couch in the middle of the loungeroom...

OK ok so let’s not get too out of control here, three days Lyon surely there is something to do......reading on the internet.....no not much to do.

Oooo there is a fresh food market that is indoors, lets go have a look. Wondered around this fresh market, bought some great cheeses, some bread and some wine ooo and two chocolates (just for me), had a wine taste at one of the stores and hit the streets. Getting dark but way to early for dinner yet, what to do, what to do?...

Ahhhh we can have a look through shops, hmmm boring! Ooo a pub in the middle of the shopping centre, for anyone who hasn’t tried red beer before, it is superb.

Must be dinner time...aha! OK so no direct plans so let’s go to the underground, chose a station, get off walk around and find somewhere to eat...mission accomplished, found a great little restaurant where we consumed some freakishly fantastic food, next to a slurping couple enjoying frogs legs.

Left restaurant and headed back to hotel, oh yes and was burst in on 3 times...what part of do not disturb has these ppl walking in on two naked ppl at 8 in the morning I’ll never understand, to say a bad review on tripadvisor is afoot is an understatement.

OK that’s it can’t take 3 days of it here, what to do? Ahhhh snow, only 4 hours train ride away to the French Alps, nothing better to do, I can’t snowboard, never seen snow....seemed like a great idea at the time. Pack our bags, leave early and head for train station.

Rushed around at train station with 30 mins to try and find some ski pants to buy...surprisingly mission accomplished!

On train, eating bread/cheese and the day before’s takings.  J

Roaming around Rome

Arrive Rome in a bit of a flutter, get to hotel....Oh they didn’t get my email and had only a room for the one night and that we would have to find some accommodation for the next day elsewhere, so we decided to stay for the night and sort out that muck the next day. Check into room...WOW what a great room, HUGE and new and GREAT! Much happier here then Napoli.

Hit the streets and to ancient beautiful Rome, OMG the fashion the beautiful women and clothing! OMG head to the Fontana Di Trevi (Trevi Fountain) get a hot chocolate on the way, which was also superb! Looked at the fountain and was very romantic, headed to the Pantheon, OMG WOW! Decided was time for some dinner so stalked the backstreets and came across a restaurant where we got some pasta, some buffalo mozzarella and ate and drank until our stomachs fell below our shirts....hit the streets and headed back to Hotel, instead stopped off at a restaurant, had a cocktail, hit the streets again and found a bar near our hotel, had a few wines and then hit the sack ready for the next day.

Out of bed and running, had breakfast, hoped someone had cancelled for the night, No luck there, checked in to another hotel around the corner for one night, left our bags and hit the streets. Walked past the trevi again for good measure, headed down to see the Colonna Traiana, the Mercati Traianel, the Arco Di Tito and the Colosseo.....all the ancient sites, the colosseum line was huge so instead decided to head to lunch, ate some pizza, drank some wine with the colosseum in  the back ground. Headed back to hotel and played Poker and drank Vodka in our room until it was time to hit the streets again. Got ready for some drinks, went to a local bar, had some cocktail and met some Irish teachers, hit the streets, past the Trevi again (again for good measure) located a restaurant on the back streets and walked in....OMG it’s a 2 star Michelin restaurant, 3 courses later and we were happy, full and broke (LOL) walked back to the hotel and sank into a food coma around 11pm.

Next day get up for breakfast, changed hotels back to original hotel and decided to hit up the colosseum yet again, line was still huge so decided to suck it up and wait in line, it was Sunday so was hugely busy. Here for about 2 hours gawking at amazing architecture, hit the streets, heading to the Vatican....Oh wait the streets are closed and everyone is out and about....OH SUNDAY....OH VATICAN.....not very well played Cate and Darrell, so walked to the Campo De Fiori, had some lunch, headed to the Piazza Navona sat by the fountains and marvelled. Came back to hotel, walked around, had some drinks and got ready for the night, went for dinner which was okish, walked back to hotel. Got up this morning, from our knowledge the cooking course couldn’t fit us in as we were booked for tomorrow but we now leave for France again tomorrow. Valentines day, had some breakfast and received a phone call, two ppl had cancelled cooking class so we can go, hauled ass across town only 1 hour late to course and started to prepare.....Tiramisu, Gnocchi, Something Meat wrapped with cheese and artichoke stuff with matching wines.OMG SO FANTASTIC!!! Back here in Hotel finding accommodation for Lyon tomorrow as they can’t take us ahead of schedule either...this is getting hard. Decided to blog as have 3 cities to do and haven’t done so in days and didn’t want to forget, lost my jacket somewhere along the way....DAMN IT!

Oh and also went to Vatican City on way back to Hotel from the cooking class, Amazing work of art.

Xx

Ciao Bella

Nipping through Napoli (Naples)

Arrive Naples (Napoli) get on a bus, OMG so many angry locals it wasn’t funny....also was a 10 min trip turned into approx 40 mins due to rallying and demonstrators and police blocking city

Get off bus for fear of being beaten to death, went for walk to find hotel....hmmmm not my best choice yet! LOL

Get into room and laugh at contents, furniture and general upkeep and decided to hit the streets for some dinner and wine and to laugh the night away

Found a restaurant and ordered some pizza and wine, after all this is where pizza is from, also decided to sit at window and people watch. First impression, all the cars and scooters here are damaged, every single one! And also every second car is a Smart car....still damaged though.

Went for small walk and headed back to hotel, went to sleep...well sort out... bed was like concrete so sleep wasn’t an option.

Get up next morning, skip the free breakfast as from the stat of the hotel it might contain hideous diseases.... so went for walk to find some pizza for breakfast. Walked quite a bit to an area where the pizza is suppose to be the best in the city....THIS IS THE FUNNY PART

I was seriously craving a coffee (as I typically do these days every hour on the hour) so we went to a pizza place that has HUGE reviews. Went downstairs, ordered some water and two coffees whilst we researched the menu and considered what to order (although pizza Napoli was high on the menu) so we ordered the two (Dua) Cappuccinos and waited for approx 20 minutes, all the time wondering where our coffee’s were and also why the waiter hadn’t come back to take our order..... So arriving on our table were two of the same pizzas......HUGE PIZZAS......for two people......TWO WHOLE PIZZAS!!!!! So EPIC FAIL on language breakdown!

Left the restaurant feeling like Fat White Westerners and hit the streets, walked around, considered going to a museum or a church but decided that we hated Naples so much that we were going to leave two days ahead of schedule....so back to the hotel we skipped to pack and tell the angry (working 2 days straight) guy at reception that we wanted to leave. Had to pay for that night anyway but we were happy to do so and headed to the rail station to head to Rome, emailed ahead to Rome hotel to try and make sure we had a room for the night and ahead to the cooking class to move that ahead as well.

 Ciao

Vino in Venice

Arrive in Venice on train, LOL! I went to shop when we left Germany to find cheese, bread, meat etc all the makings of a good train trip, bought some wine and rushed back to station to meet Darrell.

6 hour train ride, tried to open wine, OH what’s that, Cate bought some wine with a cork top....IDIOT! So tried to break into bottle, Darrell was hitting it with hit shoe in true Australian style while an older local man walked past our carriage and laughed at what we were doing. Finally broke into bottle by pushing the cork into the bottle only to find that the wine contained inside was the most hideous poison of a wine known to both man or alien, apparently even 3 euro 50 wine in Germany is el cheapo el crappo wine....who’d of thought....BUHAHAHAHAAHAH

Walked to hotel is an enormous amount of fog down the cobbled stone alleyways, was pretty cool but the vibrations up your arm towing your 20kg luggage was quickly wearing thin....found our hotel not too hard to find which was a huge surprise. Room is traditional Venice style, blue walls with gold trimming, Very Cool.

Went for walk to find dinner, v cool waiter who laughed that we weren’t cold reasonable good dinner, although I got soup and don’t know why......but we weren’t’ that cold here being that it was a good 10 degrees hotter then what we had come from, at 13 degrees it was balmy!!!

Next day, boat trip to Munaro Island where they make glass, watched a glass making show which was super cool and they are super fast, then he blew one up and broke it, so had to find some new pants (if you know what I meant....JOKES) walked around the island and stopped to have a coffee......Darrell’s first espresso.

Caught water taxi back to main island which sounded like it was about to blow up...walked in direction we assumed was heading back to the city, found a restaurant, turned out to be a 1 star Michelin restaurant much to our surprise but they specialise in seafood so we opted for some pasta and bread and some casa (house) wine. Quite tipsy at this point and tired we made our way back to our hotel for a cat nap.

Got back up, went for walk, checked things out and headed to dinner, went for drink at place where the bartender looked like Mr Filtch from Harry Potter.....which I found particularly humorous...

Walked some more, found a place to eat where Darrell dared me to lick the brick wall as the salt had some out of the bricks which I did....LOL, however the food was pretty crap which we weren’t happy about but you win some you lose some I guess.

Got lost for approx 2 hours after we left restaurant looking for our hotel, was quite funny as it was around midnight, no taxi, no idea just a map and walking past a random drunk Italian person....

Next morning, breakfast, left Venice and headed for Napoli for some Pizza.

Ciao Bella!!!

munchin in Munich

Munchin in Munchen

Arrive Munich, went to Hostel but they didn’t have room for us that night as we had arrived a day early, some form of sports show was on in town so heaps of the hotels were full. Walked along the street, asked a few hotels that were full until we found one on the same street that wasn’t. Paid more then we should have but at this point just needed somewhere to stay for the night. Hit the streets in search of something to do, went for a walk to the main city centre, looked at shops, went to brauhouse and had some beer which I then swiftly changed to wine, decided to go for another walk and look around the place, hours passed so went in search of some dinner, went to another brauhouse where the waiter was an angry jerk, worst possibly place to eat, meals were ready in seconds and were crap and I found some plate in my sauce which I almost lost a tooth on...never mind, we had some beer and headed back to the hotel tired from the days going ons... also watched some movies on TV which were in German, quite funny after a few beers and wine.

Next morning we got out of bed, had some breakfast, went for a stroll to watch the glockenspiel, found a cafe in the sun, had a coffee and felt the warmth whilst we waited for the clock to strike 11am. Watched the glockenspiel and decided to eat one of the traditional doughnuts, which again was AWESOME. Found the central gourmet food, fruit and veg markets bought some grapes, went for a walk headed towards the best science and technology museum in the world. Spent about 3 or so hours here, they had a great aviation section so Darrell was in his prime.

After this we went in search of this great hot chocolate place I had read about approx 5k walk from the meseum, didn’t have any cash so had to go for another 2k walk and do a loop. Chocolate was good, then went to a restaurant for late lunch (6.30pm) that I had also read about, had a litre of beer each and ordered probably the best meal we have had yet to date in Germany! Pork hock, potato, bread, Darrell had beef goulash, bread dumpling and a small side salad! OMG So yummy! The waiter was a fat, happy German guy, he was so great, we loved him and he laughed as we tried to pronounce stuff in German. We seriously overate! Went to find some red bull and head back to the hotel to go to the bar for happy hour, I ordered 2 cocktails and Darrell a beer, played a game of pool and headed to room to sort out some laundry, not something great holidays are made of but a necessary part of our trip as we were both running out of clean clothes at this point.

This morning as I type this we woke up, packed, bought some breakfast and some food for the 6.5hour train ride to Venice...on to Italy and traditional pasta...I cannot wait!

Frankfurt in a flurry

Frankfurt in a flurry......

Arrive frankfurt via train, got a little lost finding the hotel, assumed it was further out of the city then it actually was and therefore got lost, Darrell found a flower shop to ask where to go so bought me a tulip and also bought her a tulip too. We then got back on the train went back to the beginning and went one station out of city to find our hotel. Man this room was huge, checked in one day early and the room was massive and cheap...YAY

Checked out the local map, getting late in the afternoon but too early for dinner so went for a walk approx 10 minutes and found a shopping district called Zeil in the middle of town, so many shops and so damn cheap, probably the best dressed people I have seen so far, so I bought some boots, some skivvy and some stuff from Italy...yay shopping, then we went for walk to a SUPER good restaurant where we ate for dinner, it was called Munter Ernst. Ordered our first traditional meal, wrust and some potato, WOW!!! And some beer and some wine! YAY oh and they had to sit us with some locals at their table as their was no room, three gay guys and a lady... ended up making huge conversation for hours and wine and beer on end, I was feeling so ILL! One of the guys bought me a bunch of flowers from a lady selling them in the restaurant that came off the street. Feeling sick so decided to head back to the hotel after they had to kick us out of the restaurant. Got lost headed back to the hotel ended up on side of road somewhere and decided to get a cab being that I was sick and also couldn’t be bothered with public transport anymore.

Next day we got out of bed, had a bretzel for breakfast with butter and chives, WOW fantastic! Then we went on train, tried to find these flea markets, got lost, went for 10 k walk finally found them. The most eclectic bunch of items I have ever seen, random old torn couches, an oven, a random range of old tv remotes, you name it and they had it here, every now and then the wind would blow and half the tables would fall over, needless to say we stayed away from the scissor tables....also in the market was a crepe guy, being that Lisa had told me all about the nutella crepe I thought it my duty to give it a go, I have never felt so sick in my life! I got half way through and had to throw it out, Darrell happily ate his cheese crepe....how these ppl get through a whole sugary nutella filled crepe is beyond me. Went for another walk after the 1k long markets found a coffee shop, ordered a coffee which was terrible as it was an American shop. We were invited to go to an area at 3pm by the German locals but we ended up finding this really cool little food market gourmet veg, fruit, wrust and some apfelvine (wine made from apples) sat down had some food, headed back to the hotel with the full intention of having a small nap and ended up sleeping for 2 hours. Got out of bed, went for walk and to find some dinner, ended up walking around, couldn’t find anything we wanted so went to go back to the Munter Ernst but they were closed, cannot remember where we ate that night...

Next morning we got out of bed, grabbed some breakfast, butter bretzel and headed onto the train to Munich 3.5 hours on the DB Bahn.

Berlin on a budget....

Landed Berlin via train 8.50pm local time, first impression (besides wow it’s freezing at -5) was this place is crap, im going to be beaten and all my stuff is going to get stolen....may have had something to do with the 8 hours on a train, lack of sleep and food.

Found our hotel (more like a hostel which I would at a stretch give 1 star) although breakfast included which was surprisingly good, but I get ahead of myself. Checked in, put luggage in room and hit the streets in search for food and from the look of the surroundings ALOT of alcohol to get us through. No traditional wurst to be found anywhere, so we stumbled into something close to the hotel (hostel) which turned out to be an Indian restaurant that served what appeared to be 12 year old boys and girls gross (german for big) amounts of alcohol, not that we were complaining as the 1 litre of wine only $10AUS, ordered some Indian food which was terrible....not doing very well so far are we!  J

Went to bed about midnight, woke the next day to the awesome breakfast buffet, (Which had nutella, Lisa was right and I seriously underestimated the European obsession with Nutella) selection of keeser (cheese), meats, bread and kaffee (coffee) also some cereal and fruit if you wanted it.

Hit the streets for the day, visited Brandenburg Gate (wow if you have never seen this it is shockingly amazing, patched bullet holes from the cold war are still seen here), from here we walked to CheckPoint Charlie and to the museum where we spent about 3 hours and I can honestly say some of the most horrific images, writing and yet tales of escape I have ever seen. Humans it would seem in times of need can all become inventors, some of the ways these people escaped over, under and around the Berlin wall is just amazing.

Had some lunch in a local cafe, some kind of cabbage wrap thingy which I had no idea about, needed some salt but other then that was pretty good, Darrell had some salad, some veg and some pasta stuff, Kaffee to go and we were off and running (well perhaps a brisk walk shall we say) on to the Dali Museum, now if you know me and my favourite artist then you will know how much this meant to me, I missed Dali in Brisbane, Missed Dali in London, Missed Dali in Paris so this was 10 years in the making and well worth the wait!

Now onto trying to find some shops, apparently my lack of wardrobe in the way of 3 ‘winter’ shirts was going to be an issue, went to what appeared to be a David Jones type store where I refused to pay that sort of money for a skivvy...lol yes and without vouchers! (that was for you Jamie) bought some CurryWurst, OMG absolute genius, sausage served with a tomato sauce with curry powder on top and some Brot (bread) should you ask for it. Found a brau house (beer house) drank about 1 litre each of some local beers (ps they class Fosters as the Australian beer on the menu....pretty scary stuff), getting late, and hungry so decided to get back on the train and head home, Darrell bought me some beautiful red roses from the train station, soo pretty! searched for close to one hour looking for some traditional German food, asked a shopkeeper who basically told us that all food around Berlin is now international and good luck finding something......so we decided to go to one of the many Italian restaurants surrounding our area, found a good one where they make their own bases but they were too busy and didn’t offer a table or anything to us, so we picked up our skirt tales and heading back onto the street, at this stage too hungry and too thirsty to care, we walked straight into the next establishment, also an Italian restaurant.....

Here’s where the real fun begins!

The restaurant was practically empty besides 3 single people sitting at different tables and another couple, we decided this is where singles and dead end relationships come to die. Ordered some bruchetta as an entree and a litre of wine which took approx 15 minutes to come, not to sure why as we were the only ones ordering drink..... also ordered 2 pasta dish, I went for safe option of Bolognese Darrell ordered a pasta with mushrooms and chicken these came out a few minutes in....1/2 way through wine and I thought mine was bad, the extra bread tasting like acid and Darrell’s pasta was to date the worst thing I have ever tasted, we drank, laughed and made fun of the meal and it was the best fun ever! Crap food, great fun! We went back to the hotel and went to the bar, ordered a beer and wine and sat there to drink before heading to bed.

Woke up this morning and decided that we weren’t’ going to spend another day in Berlin as we had seen much of the inner city, so decided to head to Frankfurt a day early, here we are on another DB train travelling at 234km / hr to Frankfurt, a short 4 hour trip away.

Auf Verderzan

From Paris to Berlin.....

Bonjour,

We arrived paris after a 13 hour flight via cathay Pacific, managed to get some sleep due to scoring an extra seat (3 seats total) on the outside of the plane. Therefore 3 pillows, 3 blankets etc etc. OOOOooo attempt 2 at watching Eat Pray Love, OMG the middle of the movie I must thank for allowing me to get some extra sleep....total snore!

Arrived at 6am Paris time took about 1 hour to find our hotel and 2 trains later, and they let us check in early (thank you Le Hotel Du Printemps!!) so put the bags away and decided to get the hell out of the hotel before we fell asleep! Went for a stroll, made our way to Montmatre walked past Moulin Rouge and many many many strip clubs, sex clubs, lingerie and sex toy shops, decided to stop for a bottle of wine where the staff were amazed that we only wanted wine and no food.....almost as if we are a pair of Australian drunks...what are they trying to say?  ; P

From here we walked around for multiple hours, tried some pastry, some coffee, some more pastry, some wine, and found multiple awesome shoe and boot shops for CHEAP, I was in heaven but guess what?.... (sophie will appreciate this) godzilla foot strikes again and no shoes that fit me, so beautiful boots, amazing style and only $30 AUD but no sizes for Cate.

From here we continued to work, went to a bar, drank some more, reached 5pm Paris time (been awake for more then 2 days at this point) decided to get only 2 hours sleep and then get up to go to dinner so our body clocks would match.......13 hours later we woke the next day.

Woke to a traditional breakfast in hotel, croissant, bread, coffee, butter and jams MERCI! walked outside, -4 degrees!!!! WHOA nothing had prepared me for this and guess what! SNOW!!! falling randomly around Paris, rugged up we hit the streets and purchased yet another coffee, bought some soup and found our way to the Louve where aparently they close on Tuesday....who would have known. So we trecked to Notre Dam, walked to Eiffel tower went only to the 2nd floor as the top was closed due to ice and snow, PS, you all know how much I enjoy heights right.....WELL level 2 was far enough for me, almost went into a coma! walked around for around 20km, drank, ate, drank ate and so forth. LOL darrell almost got scammed by an old lady who was walking and 'found a gold ring' OH it doesn't fit her, oh how nice she gives to us for GOOD LUCK, then swifty asks for some money for a cafe....buhahahah us aussies werent born yesterday love. Went to dinner last night, woke this morning, breakfast again, walking again, shopping for darrell bought some pants, belt and pull over, god I want to go shopping in Paris.

From what I have seen so far I can honestly say what is the big deal with parisian fashion? The most I have seen in these temps below zero is matching scarf and beanie, not something that I would write home about.

Rushed via train to another train Thalys and had to pay an extra 170 euro as our tickets didn't go through brussells (spelling is off as I'm too lazy) thank you flight centre for that surprise! Currently going at over 300 km on a train 3 hours to cologne then another 5 hours through to Berlin after we chnage trains to the ICE, bought on board some beer, some cheese, bread and olives, so basically yes we are eating and drinking yet again! On the upside free internet on the train, hence allowing me to up date this blog.

Heading into Germany and Darrell's turn to speak some language as I have been trying my French out for the last few days, time for some wrust, some brot, some bier and time to kick back in Germany.

au revoir