Eire

Eire, Ireland in English, has been my home for almost 5 days now. I love this country. The weather has been abnormally sunny and warm and I have yet to experience the famous Irish rain. The people are friendly and the country side is beautiful (just like it is in the movies!).

Liz and her dad picked me up from the airport. Seeing the familiar face made me realize how close to Canada I really am now. It was a little strange seeing Liz, my friend from Japan in her home country. They drove me to their home in Dublin on the north side of the Liffey in an area called Glasnevin. Here I was welcomed by lizs mom, and two sisters, Emma and Mary. They told me to make myself at home, and I really do feel comfortable and at home here. I have my own room and ensuite bathroom in their old townhouse.

I acclimatized myself with Glasnevin during the day on Friday and enjoyed a play in town with Liz and her siblings on Friday night. Liz and her twin Michael ran a 10 mile race on Sat morn so we just went to the pub for a short while on Friday night. Here I met Liz's boyfriend Lada. Saturday after the race, Liz and I took public transport into town and walked around. I was actually a little shocked being in an English speaking country. It felt and still feel weird to understand people talking in the streets or on the buses and to know they understand me too. Our first night out I was almost nervous having to order food in English. Like, peoples expectations of me as a native English speaker are higher then peoples expectations of my Japanese and I don't like the pressure. I wish I could explain this better, but Liz says she felt the same way and that it didn't last long. Saturday night Liz and I met up with her friends and sisters and another Irish friend of mine in town. good times.

Yesterday we travelled south of Dublin to Glendalough. It is a beautiful scenic area with rivers and lakes and Irish hills. Really, this country is unbelievable. I know I will have to come back again, rent a car and experience it properly. I also had my first Rugby match experience last night. The Rugby World Cup is in France and Liz and her family are hardcore Irish Football and Rugby fans so I celebrated the Ireland/Namibia match Carolan (Liz's last name)style. Donned in Irish Jerseys the Carolan troupe (sisters, brother and Sig. others) went to a bar 2 hours before the game to save seats in a prime location. They gave me a crash course in Rugby rules and gave me a play by play as the game progressed. Even I could tell that it was a pretty weak showing by the Irish team, but they still managed to beat Namibia with an appallingly low score of 37 to 17. It was a sombre walk home to say the least but an exciting 'authentic' Irish sporting experience for me! Hopefully next Saturdays match will be better. Go Ireland!

Tears and Rain

Rain..that's what my last two days in Budapest were filled with. The temperature actually reached a low of 14degrees, not cool! During my last couple days I explored the Buda side of the Danube, walked up a forested hill to the Citadel making sure to take all the wrong turns as to walk along every possible path, saw Budapest Castle, sampled Hungarian beer and enjoyed the company of my fellow travelers.

On my last day most of our hostel opted for a relaxing afternoon in The Loft snuggled up to warm, freshly dried laundry and umpteen episodes of Scrubs. This was a nice end to my travels in Asia in Europe. We followed the lazy afternoon with a group outing to a local bar. The hostel owner had friends visiting and it was their last night so everyone in the hostel all celebrated together at a really small, dark, kind of dingy Hungarian Pub on the Buda side. We just ordered cheap Hungarian wine ($4 for a litre) and sat around and enjoyed each others company. It felt really homey, like we'd all known each other for ages.

Last Thursday I left Budapest as the sun came out and temperature rose to mid 20's and headed for The Emerald Isle.

Don't worry mom, my title is misleading cause there were NO tears, just rain. But Tears and Rain is a James Blunt song title.

A River Runs Through It

I made it to Budapest!
My train departed Prague at 11o2 and arrived in sunny Budapest at 8am. I was lucky and only had to share my 6 person cabin with two others, a young Spanish guy and an old Czech guy. Both friendly, although the older guy wanted to go to sleep right away and we wanted to chit chat so he kind of through a hissy fit which resulted in us standing in between cars for a little. The funny thing was that our wagon attendant, who was super nice, offered to open an empty cabin for the old guy to have a place for himself but the old guy refused.
My hostel is called The Loft and is exactly what the name implies. It is really comfy and clean and more like a shared apartment then a typical hostel. I really like it and have met some nice girls from Quebec here.
Today I spent the day walking around with the Spanish guy from the train who is staying at a hostel nearby. The weather is warmer here then in Prague, which I am very appreciative of. We wandered thoroughly around the Pest side of the river. Including an island park which was beautifully green which made me feel more like I was in the tropics rather then Europe.
I am having a little break then heading out for dinner. It is really nice having 'backpacker' company again, our budgets are similar, we want to explore the city the same way, shared interest in travelling etc.

Dad and Car- it was great talking to you both the other day! Cant wait to see Roxy!

Good King Wenceslas looked out on the Feast of Stephen...

As you may or may not have known, King Wenceslas was a real Czech king back in the day.
Today I saw his statue and read may book in Wenceslas Square.

It was my last day in Prague and I took it really easy. My morning was filled with stories of Stalin and Vaclav Havel in the Communism Museum. In school we learned bits and pieces about The USSR and communism in Soviet times but not much about Czechoslovakia. I was fascinated with the info and artifacts such as school books, images of agriculture propaganda and secret police phones.

Yesterday I joined a 3.5 hour walking tour of Prague. Everyday locals lead an English tour around the old town, lesser town, Jewish town and Prague Castle. They tell interesting stories, answer any and all questions and work strictly off the tips people pay. Since I don't like walking around with my guide book reading about all the buildings, this tour provided an easy to understand background/history on the important sites and Czech in general. Yesterday afternoon I grabbed a piece of picnic table at a Folk Festival near the Old Town Square and sampled local food and beer while watching people from around Eastern Europe dance and sing away.

Tonight I leave Prague on an overnight train bound for my last stop before Ireland and the UK, Budapest. Lets hope its an easy journey!

I made it to Prague!

I am now in Prague. But getting here was a little adventure.

Yesterday evening Elwira took me to the bus station where I waited for my bus to depart at 5pm. So far so good... We drove through central Vienna for one last glance at the beautiful city on the way to the highway. I got a great look at Austrian countryside as we headed towards Czech. Fields of sunflowers, corn, wheat, lots and lots of grass and farms. The border crossing was a joke really, it looked more like a highway toll station then an international border. We had our passports briefly checked and we were officially in Czech Rep.. Almost immediately after the border we had a little stop where I met some of my fellow travellers, a group of 4 60'ish year old women New Zealander friends travelling around Europe together. Very friendly and chit chatty. Everyone got back on the bus and we left. WE drove about 35 mins through little towns, fields a beautiful sunset and then we noticed our bus driver making a U-turn. The Kiwi women and I speculated that there must be an accident ahead and we were finding another route. After 30 minutes we asked some young guys on the bus to ask the driver is Czech what the deal was. They did and it turns out the bus driver left a passenger at the rest stop. We had only driven 35 minutes (yes, i was actually keeping an eye on the time) but it took over an hour to return to the get the lost guy. We ended up 2.5 hours behind schedule somehow and arrived after 11pm.

Its not that dramatic except a bunch of us were thinking the metro was going to be closed and for me, as a single female traveller, arriving by 9 was reasonable but travelling around 12am not so much. Thankfully the guys showed me how to use the tram, where to get on and for how long and helped me locate a ticket purchasing machine (at night this can prove to be quite a task). I made it too the hostel by 12.15am after getting off at the wrong stop, walking the deserted streets a little afraid of my own shadow and being stared at by drunken Czech guys. Not a bad night!

Now for a day of sightseeing...

Cream coloured ponies and crisp APPLE STRUDEL...

door bells and sleigh bells and SCHNITZEL with noodles....

Today was my last day in Vienna. Elwira and I met early and went to Kaisergruft or the Imperial Vault as they call it in English, but I would more accurately describe it as the imperial crypt. They give you a map as you walk in and a family tree of the Hapsburg's so you can track what coffins you are looking at. The coffins are really ornate and almost works of art themselves. Usually the Emperor or Empress is in the center of a big room in a giant coffin surrounded by his or her children in more modest homes. I found out that their bodies were kind of mummified, their organs were taking out and are housed in containers in the catacombs of St. Stephens Cathedral (which I already saw) and their hearts are buried somewhere else. I tagged along a little to an English tour and heard some stories about the families, Sisi, Napoleons wife (a Hapsburg) and Napoleons son.

As the lyrics of My Favorite Things suggest apple strudel and schnitzel are considered Austrian delicacies. During my stay here I have made an effort to taste both, along with fresh horseradish (its actually dry and really liked shaved radish), sauerkraut, wiener schnitzel and apfelstrudel. YUMMY!

Now its Bye Bye to Elwira and off to Prague!

The hills are alive, with the sound of music...

..or they were yesterday as I serenaded Elwira on our walk up through the wine region to the top of the mountain on our way to Kahlenberg.

I have just spent three and a half great days in Vienna, with my friend Elwira as my personal tour guide. When I arrived on Sunday she immediately took me to my apt. (actually her friends empty apt.) which she arranged for me to have to myself for the week. It was such a pleasant surprise to have a place to myself and it was such as welcomed relief from communal, hostel living. In the three days I have been to the oldest brewery in Vienna (Salm Braeu), visited the Summer palace (Schönbrunn) and winter palace (Hofburg) of the Hapsburg's, seen the bodies of dead Austrians that were buried under Stephendom Cathedral in the main square during the plagues in the 17th C, and enjoyed a mini tour of the wine region in Vienna.

The wine region tour was called Heurigen Express. During this tour we took a hop on, hop off choo choo train from Grinzing up the mountain a little where we decided to hop off and walk to the top. Well, after 5 minutes Elwira was struggling (not me of course..hehe) and to lessen the physical stress I started my rendition of the Sound of Music Soundtrack. For those of you who know and love the movie as much as I do, you will appreciate that I started with The Sound of music, moved on to the group song of How do you solve a problem like Maria, followed by I have confidence and so on. I only made it to the end of the first half of the movie (So Long, Farewell sung by the children..in my best voices) before Elwira was laughing so hard and begging me to stop because together we were a scary sight, but it worked and we made it to the top in good spirits. At the top the view was spectacular. Wineries in the foreground, the Danube to the left, mountains to the right, and the city of Vienna at dusk in the background. Not bad!

The weather was less then perfect today so we took it a little easier starting with Seegrotte, or the biggest underground lake in Europe. It is an old mine that was flooded after some accidental explosions thus ending its typical use. The neat thing about this place is that during WWII the Nazis had control of it and actually pumped all the water out and used the empty mine as a location for the production of airplane parts. OH and 20 minutes of the 1993 flick The Three Musketeers with Kiefer Sutherland, Charlie Sheen and Chris O'Donnel was filmed there. Other then the mine it was a relaxing day of 'just taking Austria in' for me. Now its an early night in my apt. Excellent!

I'm leavin on the midnight train to Georgia...

Now just replace Georgia with Vienna, and midnight with 7am. Tomorrow morn bright and early im leaving Krakow and heading to see Elwira in Vienna. She is going to meet me on the platform when my train arrives around 1:30pm. I am very excited to see her and I am looking forward to our 4 days of events!

Will keep you posted....

"he's leavin, on the midnight train to Georgia. Said he's goin back to find the simpler place and time...I'd rather live in his world, then live without him in mine....all aboard all aboard..i've got to go...i've got to go..."

I had a seat on the hot tamale train!!

OK, that's just a cheesy shout out to ballroom dancing guru and judge of So You Think You Can Dance, Mary Murphy..I love mind numbing reality TV.

But really, today I had an amazing Polish experience...no ...not Auschwitz, although I did go there too....you'll never guess so I'll just have to tell you! I rode on the Pope John Paul II train! No, dont rewind, you read it right! There is actually a train called The Pope Train (in Polish of Course). It runs from Krakow's main station to Wadowice, John Paul II's hometown. Its faster then the normal local train and has built in entertainment in the form of TV screens with movies playing of various Pope'ish events. I felt a little wrong reading my book and not giving my full attention to the local hero, but others fell asleep so I figured I wasn't the most disrespectful. I rode the train to Kalwaria (where the Pope was just before he died) where I met Gabi and Elwira's mom. They drove me to Auschwitz and waited around for me for 4 hours then took be back to Kalwaria for dinner.

I will write later about Auschwitz and Birkenau. It doesn't really go hand in hand with my Pope Train experience.. so fun!