Amsterdam

I was on my last full week in Paris and I had to decide how to spend my last weekend. My choices were endless but had narrowed it down to two cities: Berlin and Amsterdam. The decision was based on a soccer game. The Netherlands won and they were in the World Cup final. 10 minutes after the game ended, I had bought a plane ticket, booked a hostel and was brushing up on my Dutch!

After a major speed bump with the airline company (they didn't book my ticket so on friday afternoon I didn't have a way to get there, they gave me 15 euro off my next flight, and i found a train for 20 euro cheaper so it all worked out).

Amsterdam was one of the most beautiful cities I have visited in the world. It was also the hardest to find my way around. I got lost more in two days than I have in two months in Paris. Every street looks the same, the canals are all the same, the houses look the same and there are not many major monuments etc to tell where you are. Although it seemed like I always found my way back to the Red Light District (my hostel was right in the heart so I had to).

Saturday I walked around for a couple of hours, went to the Heineken Experience. It was the original brewery and they have a tour and a tasting room. I then went on a pub crawl! It was my first ever organized pub crawl. I met some really cool guys and we had a blast. A free drink at every bar and the organizers carried bottles of vodka and gave it out very generously.

Sunday I woke up early to go on a bike tour. In Amsterdam, there are 2 bikes for every person! The government gets about 10 000 bikes out of the canals every year. The tour lasted 2.5 hours and we saw the entire city.

I met up with one the guys from the pub crawl the night (Matt) before and we set off to Mueseumpleine to watch the World Cup Final (Netherlands vs. Spain). Museuempleine is a giant park with a lot of museums surrounding it (Van Gogh etc.). Matt and I had both bought orange shirts so we could get drowned in the sea of orange! They estimated over 100,000 people were in the park, and over 350,000 had come to the city to watch the game. It was like the Olympics all over again but more intense!

Unfortunately the Netherlands lost 1-0 so the city was disappointed and not really up for a big party. Matt and I made our way back to our respective hostels (he was staying at the Marriott!). No partying for me Saturday.

I woke up Monday morning, had a big breakfast and trained back to Paris. A short stop in Brussels and a few hours of travel later and that was it, weekend over!

There were so many things to see in Amsterdam, museums, shops, restaurants, windmills, people, prostitutes etc. Of all the cities I have visited Amsterdam has the most culture and one of the most interesting. I already want to go back! It was nice to be able to speak English again, I was shocked at the fact that almost everyone spoke perfect English!

I didn't really know what to expect out of the city and I had hesitations about going but it definitely met all expectations. I was worried about my hostel being in the Red Light District but it was very safe and not at all what I expected. My first red light experience was during the day when the "less appealing" sights of the city are tapping on their windows. This worried me... I later found out that it is expensive to rent out the rooms so the not attractive prostitutes can't afford prime time rates at night so they use them during the day.

I only have two more days in Paris, today I have to stay with the kids all day, and tomorrow I am meeting a friend Tamara for Bastille Day in Paris. Very sad to be leaving this amazing city and I will miss it. Although I do miss Vancouver and all my friends and family!

I am going to try and write another post when I am home as a debrief, or possibly in the airport...

"The Manny"

Mind the Gap

I figured it was time to find my roots and introduce myself to her majesty. Last weekend I made the trek through 20 minutes are darkness, usually referred to as the "Chunnel". Spending a weekend in London was one of the most fulfilling experiences to date!

After two hours by train I arrived at St Pancras/King's Cross Station. It was a short trip on the tube before I reached my hostel, right next to London Bridge. I didn't realize it was London Bridge. I think I expected "Tower Bridge" to be London Bridge. London Bridge is just a cement bridge with nothing special. The one next to it, Tower Bridge is actually amazing and has is what I imagined!

Walking along the Thames past Shakespear's Globe theatre, The Tate Modern Museum, The London Eye and ending at the Westminster Abbey, and Big Ben! This was probably the best bang for your buck as far as walking goes.

There is so many famous things in London it was very difficult to try and see them all! I met my friend Nancy and her boyfriend in Leicester Square for lunch, I ended up being 35 minutes late because I got lost and couldn't find the restuarant. (It had moved and changed to a gay bar, that proved to be interesting when I started asking for directions!)

I then met up with a guy I had met in Barcelona, he was in London on his way back to Ireland so we walked around for a couple hours. I then had to leave to go and watch the Musical I had bought a ticket for.

Les Miserables was fantastic. It was my first "real" musical, and what a better place and show to see than Les Mis at the Queen's theatre in London. It did cost me 60 Pounds, ($100 Canadian) but it was totally worth it! And Nick Jonas played Marius.

I finished the night with a beer from the hostel bar and proceeded to bed as I had been up since 6 that morning.

Sunday morning started early because I wanted to see the changing of the guards. A sight worth seeing especially because the first song the band struck up was the YMCA, I expected God Save the Queen from the royal band infront of buckingham palace but apparently they prefer the Village People!

I met up with Nancy again for lunch, this time was Fish and Chips. had to get my fill of cliche british things!

Walks through Hyde Park, Trafalager Square, Piccadely Circus, The British Museum and then on the London Tower to visit the Crown jewels.

After all of that extremely touristy stuff it was time to find out what London was all about. I met two 20 somethings from Washington DC. They were staying at the same room in the hostel and they invited me to dinner. We went to St George's Pub for traditional sunday roast. Roast beef, baked potato, vegtables and yorkshire pudding. Topped off with a beer and all was good.

That night I met a guy from Burnaby at the hostel. What a small world. It never fails to amaze me the fact that I meet people accros the world from the same city!

Another very plain breakfast from the hostel in the morning and I was back to Frog land in Paris! London blew me away, I really enjoyed my weekend and would consider spending a lot more time in England!

Next weekend... Amsterdam.

"The Manny"

Barcelona

For the sake of brevity, I will neglect to talk about the trips there and back; neither of which were entertaining or eventful. I boarded, slept and got off the plane.

Barcelona was amazing. It is a beautiful city, I visited it once before in grade 9, we were there two days and did a lot of the major sites. Saturday was not too busy. Went to our hostel, checked in, then went for a walk with Chris' sister. Chris and Jenna stayed behind to nap. With only a couple days I couldn't waste valuable time sleeping!

We walked along the boardwalk and along the beach. What a beautiful city. We then went out for dinner and I was not overly impressed. Overall the food wasn't amazing, Sunday lunch was good but it was a meat plate. Pork, beef, glorified hot dog, an egg, and fries. It was good but too much protein.

Sunday we did an open air bus tour of the city. You could get on and off whenever you wanted. We basically did the entire route and saw all the major venues in Barcelona. Walking down La Rambla was amazing. It is one of the most lively streets I have ever been on. So many street vendors, entertainers, artists etc.

After lunch Sunday we were walking back to the bus and I decided I was going to buy some cheap sun glasses. I am kinda picky with shades, I am not an aviator guy, I don't like really sporty somewhere in the middle. I found a pair at the last guy on the row. These guys have a blanket with the glasses on them and pick up and move if business isn't good. I was bartering with him, he wanted 20 euros, I said 10. Things were going in my favor when he started to pack up real quick and so I threw the glasses down. He then said 10 is great so I picked them up and he started to walk the other way. I tried to follow him for a 20 seconds when I realized why he was "running". The police where coming, and I can only imagine they get into a lot of trouble if they are caught selling things on the street. By this time, I had followed this guy for a while trying to get money to pay him but at that point he was 5 steps ahead of me and the police officer on his motorcycle was right beside me. The officer realized what was going on, said something?? and waved in the opposite direction. I still had the glasses in my hand and he was "telling" me to go.

So I did, I got the sun glasses that I wanted and I paid the right price, NONE!
This was a great laugh for Chris, Jenna and Kelsy (Chris' sister). They thought it was hilarious I followed the guy and try to pay him. Not to mention it was questionable the fact that I was "caught" by the cops and he told me to go the other way.

Sunday night we stayed at the hostel again. It was much more lively this time around and there was a group of people going to a Karaoke bar, it was a blast. The hostel is a chain in Barcelona and so all of the chains go to this place so there was a lot of english speakers there. We elected not to go to the club around 2 am because I had to get a bus back to the airport around 930 and I didn't want to be late. I would have loved to stay out until the sun rises as this is a very common occurrence but I haven't had the time or dedication.

Met some awesome people at the hostel: some brothers from Washington DC, guy from Toronto and an Irish guy. The Irish guy is also in London this weekend so we may meet up and have a beer.

I was told today that Etienne is going on a "trip" for a week starting Saturday so it will be just Antoine and I. My job couldn't get any easier!

Off to London Saturday morning via train. Staying in a notorious party hostel next to Tower Bridge.

Au Revoir for now. Pictures will come soon.

"The Manny"

Chris and Jenna in Paris

It all started with a phone call last weekend. Chris Grimes-Goard was calling from the Canadian embassy in Barcelona. He had his passport stolen and needed references, I happily obliged and got a call later from the embassy. I understood the terrible situation, especially because it was 2 am in Vancouver and everyone was asleep except for me being 9 hours ahead. Chris and Jenna Vaughn are backpacking around Spain and Morocco. The leg to Morocco was canceled and they decided to visit Paris instead.

They stayed in a crumby hotel for two nights and then were going to stay with me for two nights. We had a great time going around Paris for five days. Some early mornings for me to trek into town, do touristy stuff and then rush back to "work". They then booked their return overnight train back to Barcelona as Chris' sister was meeting them there. They offered for me to tag along so I took them up on the offer immediately.

They left for the train Friday night and I was going to fly out Saturday morning because I couldn't leave the kids alone Friday afternoon. I went in for a shower after dinner and Mika yells upstairs and says my friends are back. This worried me... Their confirmation number didn't work, and the company wouldn't give them tickets. They had arrived very early for the train, went into the office to get tickets and they said no. They booked through "RENFE" the Spanish train company, and they don't share information with the French company SNCF so they didn't exist according to France so they returned to my house after hours of travel to and from the train station and arguing with the people. They haven't gotten a refund/return/credit yet but are going to try in Barcelona soon.

Plan B was to try and get the same flight as me in the morning. They were listed as 250 Euros! Ouch. I only paid 110 Euros for the same flight 4 days earlier. They didn't want to book and go Saturday morning and try and buy the tickets the day of. So we woke up at 5:45 in the morning to get the airport early to buy tickets for them or at least get on a standby list. Roadblock number 2 for them, the airline doesn't sell tickets for flights the day of. Crap!

We found a computer with internet, went on the website of the airline, booked tickets for them on the same flight as me for the 250 Euros and went back to the desk and they took the confirmation number. How stupid is that!

Oh yeah, i forgot to mention the fact that Chris' credit card was stolen, Jenna's was maxed out so the only person that had a card was me! I also don't have a big limit so I tried my parents card. That didn't work because it had been locked because I had booked my flight on it and visa thought it had been stolen. With time ticking down on the internet we payed for, I put a bunch of money on my credit card, then tried to charge the flight, and it worked! Apparently the bank of Ryan came through and allowed them to leave the country!

We all made it to Barcelona! Another three days of my visiting with Jenna and Chris in foreign countries, the Barcelona post is to come.

These two have faced some of the worst traveling problems I have ever heard of, although they will make great stories some day once they can laugh at them.

"The Manny"

Father's Day

I know it is nearing the end of Father's Day in Vancouver but I didn't think it was too late to say that I miss my dad.

I can't remember the last time I wasn't at home to give him a big hug and put a bow on a new garden hose, a shovel, some plants, a card and probably some socks. None of which are overly inspiring gifts but yet my dad loves them every year.

So this one is for you Dad!

Happy Fathers Day.

"The Manny"

Sundays

One of the biggest challenges I think I have faced so far is having only 5 days that are available to do things. It is extremely common in Paris for almost everything to be closed on Sundays and often Mondays.

Sundays I can sort of understand. Everyone needs a break and a lot of people would be working 7 days a week if it wasn't for sundays. I would also attribute this to the large religious contingent in Europe. Churches are impossible to miss and you would be very hard pressed to walk for more than 10 minutes and not come across some sort of religious building.

This "day of rest" brings havoc to the traveler. For a person who is not use to taking a full day off, or the worst case scenario, for someone who only has a few days in a city and one happens to be Sunday; they are in trouble. I was very hard pressed to find something interesting to do today.

I have seen a lot of museums, seen a lot of art, wandered a lot of neighbourhoods and streets.
Today, I set out for a park, and an art exhibit called "Le reve americain." for you anglophones, that is "THE AMERICAN DREAM". All the pieces were done by an american artist Duane Hanson. They were life size humans created out of bronze, plaster, etc and painted and designed to depict real life working class individuals.

Unfortunately you weren't able to take pictures because the art was so realistic(click here to see pictures i found online), I felt like I was in the USA because it was scary how true to the stereotypes the art was. It is meant to be realist art but this freaked me out. Some of them I thought were real people when I was looking through the window.

Not much else to say, the park was very interesting. It was called La Villette, their specialty is an open air movie showing most nights, the museum of music and kids play area. Some very interesting sculptures and pathways, more of an amusement park than a lets have a pic nik but it was interesting nonetheless.

"The Manny"

The Catacombs

I have never been more grossed out and fascinated in my life.

Me and 6 million dead bodies all underground at the same time was a lot to handle. The skulls, leg bones and arm bones were all stacked on top of each other, in perfect lines and often in designs.
I can't explain how strange and eerie it was. But totally worthwhile. It took 40 minutes to walk through all the tunnels, there is only one way in and one way out so that adds to the creepiness.
I then had some free time because it was my day off so I decided to find the building that Jacqueline described to me. Her instructions were: you can see the eiffel tower, it has weird ceilings inside and it looks like there are sticks as a fence but they are not sticks. She showed me a picture of the ceilings and the view of the eiffel tower from the building. After about 30 minutes I realized what it was... The Musee de quai Branly... The African/Asian/Indian Art museum. A very interesting building but nothing that interests me on the inside so I just took pictures of the outside.

And that was my day off!

Ryan "The Manny"