So I've been pretty terrible at keeping this updated! But it's been a jam packed time!
I went to prague for the first rays of sunshine my skin has seen since leaving Australia. I went on a walking tour and a castle tour around this incredible city. Every corner you walked around was breathtaking so much so, that I didn't care that I literally got lost everytime I tried to go anywhere. The streets are a medieval mess! My tour guide was a melbourne Uni boy from Sandringham funnily enough - small world! Though the rest of the time I didnt meet any other Aussies. The castle took 600 years to build and was lit up by the generous funding of the Rolling Stones (one of the reasons my tour guide listed he liked the stones more than the Beatles). Its an incredible city and I highly recomend going there. It also has the biggest night club in europe, I believe which I managed to make my way to on the pub crawl. Where I made friends with some fun Brazillians who had just got engaged :)
The bus ride back was only a short 6 hours and I was happy to go back to my Berlin home. Our final fews weeks in Berlin were a crazy blur where we said good bye to Mon, celebrated the first of May (where we saw nearly all the police in Germany due to the fact that it was also a Nazi national holiday and various simultaneous protests), we went in a crazy, time warp labrynth which was literally indescribable because every single person experiences it differently and we visited potsdam, so beautiful! and sadly we said goodbye to all the friends we made in Berlin during a night of cocktails. Then we packed our bags and headed to Amsterdam.
This 9 hour bus ride, would for me border on one of the worst and most sleep deprived nights ever. The bus within one hour ran out of toilet paper, unlike other buses I had been on had no power points so my phone died and my tablet nearly did as well. The girl in front of me squished her chair right back on me (even when we were getting on and off the bus making it nearly impossible to do so) and then to top it all off, at one in the morning the bus drivers changed over and this particular driver thought that the time called for some heavy metal to be played till about three in the morning. Eventually we arrived in amsterdam and got to Cesca's shipping container at 7 in the morning.
In amsterdam we powered through the cultural and touristy attractions visiting the rijks museum (I got to see works from Vermeer and Rembrandt!), the Van Gogh museum (super awesome), we biked along canals, toured the historical parts of the city, shopped, toured the red light district (seeing the ladies in action, including a peep show) and met all of Cesca's lovely exchange friends. Though I must say, Amsterdam weather was horrible and I did not enjoy it one bit. Apparently it rains there almost two thirds of the year. I tried some of the famous herring and it was not bad at all! Then I woke one rainy morning and caught a lift to the train station and headed off to Norway!
I rushed excitedly off the plane to meet Oda and we headed back to her neck of the woods in Oslo! So awesome to see her again and for the first little bit when I was hanging out at the Nordhus crib it felt like I was just on a sleep over back in Brighton. They had such a lovely house and we headed out straight away to the city which was perched in an amazing bay/ harbour thing. A very rugged but handsome view as we came round the mountain on the tram. We went for beautiful forest walk, up to the highest point and viewed the ski jump, made it to the Munch museum (which was sadly closed), the university of Oslo, finally got to see some real handball :P and went to the incredible statue park. But best of all I was able to be part of Norway day! See everyone in their traditional dress, flag waving, marching bands and the partying! And I got to have ice cream three times in one day and drink champagne from breakfast right through the day! Then on Saturday night I got to watch the live broad cast of Eurovision. An eventful and fantastic six days. Sunday was a sad day where I headed back to Amsterdam, not sure when I get to see Oda again but convinced it will be soon!
Arriving back to amsterdam in lovely grey weather I met up with Cesca and her newly arrived bf Sam. WE went to a party and watch eurovision instead of being social and the next night we organised a dinner party. We headed off to a food market and I had roughly three dinners coz I couldnt decide which one I wanted to eat. The next day was very grey and we stayed in and played dutch monopoly for ten million hours then Alex and I left to see the Heavy who were aaammmaazziing. The next day I went for a crazy shop and we hung out for a bit then we jumped on a bus and headed to Frankfurt. Which of course entailed another nightmarish over night bus ride.
This time I was busting to pee but the door to the toilet seemed enternally locked and we arrived at 4:30 in the morning when check in wasnt till 4 in the afternoon. So we lazed around completely sleep deprived, dying for a shower and a nap. Eventually I went out and bought the biggest coffee I could find and wandered round but it was still so early nothing was open. We napped restlessly until we got in the rooms and I showered for a trillion hours. Bought some stuff that we had run out of and had an early night. The next day was dodge weather and rained and poured all day and I got lost trying to go for a shop and then went on a night tour of frankfurt with a bunch of rowdy americans. The next day we prepared ourselves and left for South America. I was so excited I thought I was going to vomit. And that is the end of the Europe leg of the trip. I'm very sad to leave Europe and everyone here though I know I'll be back again soon!
