Jarrod & Krystals Euro Trip

Gallery: Sailing Croatia

jarrodkrystal — Thu, 3 Jul 2008 19:35:00 GMT

Gallery: Venice

jarrodkrystal — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 19:11:00 GMT

St Johann in Tirol, Austrian Alps

jarrodkrystal — Sat, 28 Jun 2008 23:27:00 GMT

St Johann was absolutely amazing. It is a very small town in the Tirol region of the Austrian Alps, famous for skiing. We stayed in a 600 year old lodge which is now a small backpackers.

We arrived before lunch so had plenty of time that day to walk around. As it is in the Mountains there are alot of walking tracks, we did an easy one.. We also spent the afternoon at the local swimming pool which was huge. It had views up to all the mountains and forests surrounding, cant explain how beautiful it was. Jarrod also stepped on a bee and had to go to the first aid office at the pool which was quite funny cos the guy made me get it out anyway.

There was a group of about 8 of us staying at the lodge so we all had dinner together that night. We were told that the place had great food but noone liked it (we all had schnitzels).

The next day was one of the funnest of our trip so far. We went canyoning which is basiaclly working your way through a long, deep gorge. We were suited up with 10mm thick wetsuits as the water is straight from the alps. We had to absail, jump, climb and slide down through rocks etc. The best bit was a 20m absail down a small waterfall and a big 7 metre jump into a small rock pool which was freezing!!! The water is the purest in Europe to drink.

We also went to the top of the mountain that day by the ski lift. It was 1700m above the ground and the views were unreal. The higher mountains still had snow on them they were so tall. A few of the guys went paragliding from the top down to the bottom which took about 30 minutes.

Gallery: St Johann in Tirol

jarrodkrystal — Sat, 28 Jun 2008 19:06:00 GMT

Gallery: Munic

jarrodkrystal — Wed, 25 Jun 2008 19:14:00 GMT

Munich, Germany

jarrodkrystal — Wed, 25 Jun 2008 01:53:00 GMT

Munich, the Beer capital of the world. We arrived mid afternoon after a stop over in Salzberg where the sound of music was made. We choose not to stay there overnight for that reason.

First night we were there Germany were playing Turkey in the Eurocup semi final. Germany has the second highest population of turkish people outside Turkey and Munich has the most Turkish people in Germany so it didnt really matter who won cos it was going to be a big night either way. (Germany won..)

Next day there we went on a free bike tour of the city and saw the major sights including the Hofbrauhous which is the second largest beer hall in the world (the largest is also in Munich). We also rode through the English gardens which is one of the largest parklands in Europe and also has the largest beer garden in the world. There is a nice river that runs through the garden and all the nudists come out every day. It was a bit wet so there were none there on the day but our guide told us about a guy called Tripod who comes out and does a bit of a show every day for the tour. We were kind of glad he wasnt there, haha. On the same river there is also a surfing wave. It is where all the water is channeled into a small river and makes a wave. We watched the surfers for ages, it was really cool to see.

We had lunch in the gardens at the beer garden and had a drinking contest, where I came second behind the guide... Food was pretty average though, and expensive. We saw a lot of other things relating to Hitler during the tour as this was where he started his political campaign and the NAZI party. It was very interesting and we also saw where him and his politicians tried to take over the government and the spot where he was almost shot but his body guard dived and took the bullet. World would of been a much different place if that had got him...

Krystal got a bit excited when we walked up Maximillian Platz (street) which is ment to be the most expensive shopping street in the world. The whole street was lined with designer shops aswell as ferrari's, porsches etc.. You could spot the Aussies cos we were walking around having a stubbie.

The next day was really hot, we were planning on going to a town called Dachau which was a concentration camp, but we slept in. Instead we went to the Munich Beach, which is just a river with lots of rocks. It was a pretty nice spot though and very relaxing.

Vienna, Austria

jarrodkrystal — Sun, 22 Jun 2008 22:09:00 GMT

The bus trip through to Vienna was long...... The weather is starting to get really hot.... One of our stops along the way was at a service station and we couldnt help but laugh at some of the things they were selling. There was T-Shirts and cups etc with pictures of Kangaroosand they said "There are no Kangaroos in AUSTRIA". We guessed they were for the Japanese tourists.

By the time we arrived in the capital, we were pretty hot and bothered. To make things worse, the hostel stuffed up our booking and only booked for one person. We had one night in a dorm room then were ment to move to a private room the night after. So for the first night Krystal had to sleep on a very thin mattress on the floor, and we still had to pay!!! After a bit of backchat to the girl behind the counter we finally agreed to pay a reduced fee. The room was so hot and tiny so needless to say we didnt get much sleep. The wholeplace was booked out as Austria are the hosts of the Euro cup.

That night we ventured into the heart of the city, which is completely taken over by soccer. The whole centre is fenced off for "Fan Zone" where everyone goes to watch the games. It was a pretty good night cos there were so many people there. Spain won and there were alot of spanish people there. Beers were so expensive..... I miss Prague...

Next day we met up with the regular crew to explore the city. Because of the soccer, none of the city tours were running so we were left to our selves. We first went to the Schonbrunn palace which was home to the Hapsburg family. They were an austrian family which basically ruled most of Europe for approx 6 centries. We have heard this name in EVERY country we have been to so far as they have ruled everywhere. They are basically the reason Vienna is so beautiful and has some many recognised buildings. When we saw the palace, you could tell they had money... It was HUGE. Biggest palace in Austria and the most elaborate. The gardens them selves took an hour to view by a small tour car. It also had amazing views over the whole city.

We also looked around the muesum district etc however it was really hard to get around because of fan zone taking over everything. Unfortunately alot of things were closed off so we didnt really get to see much else.

That night we went on our pub crawl, 4 cities in a row for pub crawls now.... It was the usual crowd we catch up with in each place. We went along the Danue river as there are alot of bars and clubs and it is a fairly new area, but the pubs we went to were so dodgy. The first one was run by what looked like a vietnamese drug lord. The last night club was pretty good but apart from that it was pretty ordinary. To get home we had to catch 4 seperate buses, it took forever.

The next day was even hotter, but we did have our own private room with a fan (not air conditioning though). We decided to go to the pool, but of course we got there and it was closed because of the soccer. We then asked a local where the best place to go and we were told to go to the river, which was near where the pub crawl was. We thought it might be a bit yuk, but it ended up being so fun. The water was actually pretty nice but bit smelly... There were dogs everywhere and it was a good day.

We found a nice Indian restaurant for dinner that night and had a few drinks with friends as a few of them were heading off a different way the next day.

Vienna was a little bit disappointing, mainly because alot of things where either closed or surrounded by fences for the soccer. We were planning on going to the opera but ran out of time, you can get really cheap standing tickets. Maybe next time.

Gallery: Vienna

jarrodkrystal — Sun, 22 Jun 2008 18:38:00 GMT

Gallery: Prague

jarrodkrystal — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 18:38:00 GMT

Gallery: Berlin

jarrodkrystal — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 19:47:00 GMT

Prague - Czech Republic

jarrodkrystal — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 02:47:00 GMT

Another early morning getting onto the bus and heading for the capital of Czech, the country that consumes more alcohol per person than any other in the world. And the drinks are cheap too... woohoo

Along the way we had a couple of stops, firstly in Dresden) still in Germany). This was an optional night stop for our trip but we chose not to. 95 percent (cant find the percent key...) of Dresden was bombed by the allies during WWII so it is fairly new place.

We also had a hour or so stop off in a place called Terezin (Czech). This whole town was a Ghetto for Jewish people and was controlled by the Nazi´s. Just out of town there was also a Concentration camp. We did a tour of the camp, this was not a death camp, more a housing camp for people before they were sent to place like Auschwitz, however more than 5000 ppl died due to illness and of course execution. There were bullet marks all in the walls and also the platforms for the hangings. The tour was amazing, we had never seen anything like it before. You could see rooms that housed up to 600 people with only one toilet during the cold winters. You couldnt really imagine what it must of been like for them back then. This was one of the first camps to be closed at the end of the war. Krystal and some of the other girls had a sick feeling in there stomachs the whole time!

We finally arrived in Prague (Praha) later that afternoon. We were staying right in the centre of town, unlike most people from the bus who were out of town. We caught the train into town with another couple, luckily Peter was born in Czech and could speak the language cos we had no idea, there language is absolutely crazy and so hard to understand.

The centre of town was amazing. Every street is filled with gothic buildings from as far back as the 1400's and earlier. The old town square, where we were staying, had a HUGE screen TV and beer and food stands all round it for the Euro Cup. That night some of our friends came into town to meet us and watch the game, the centre was packed. We ate local sausages and chicken from the stalls and had a few beers.

The next day we all met at 'Muzeum station' for our walking tour of Prague. It was run by an English guy who was off in his own world for most of the time. We got to see heaps of the city, including the Astronomical clock. This was built in the 14th century. It only tells time by the hour but also has a zodiac ring which shows movement of the stars, sky and sun. It shows 3 times, including Arabic time aswell as Babylonian time (the only clock in the world to do so). It also has another dial which is a name calender and has all Czech names and their star sighs. Pretty impressive. The king of the time actually had the builders eyes gauged out so he could never build a better one.

We also spent a bit of time at the Prague castle which is the largest castle grounds in the world and sits up above the whole town. It is beautiful and parts of the buildings date back well over 1,000 years.

Later that night we went out to Plus Prague (were the other guys were staying) for an authentic meal, Krystal had Goulash which was grose as it had deer and the meat was terrible.

The next day we desperately needed to do washing, but couldnt find anywhere to do it... haha... We spent the day exploring the town and Krystal bought some Babushka dolls which are everywhere in Prague. We had a pretty easy day, in readiness for our Pub Crawl that night....

This pub crawl was more of a Cocktail bar crawl. The second bar we went to was Coyote Ugly bar and the girls did a show for us... Drinks were pretty pricey for czech standards. The next bar was an awesome underground bar, which we all loved. We finished the night at a night club on Level 6 of a building and had fantastic views over the city, not that we were interested in sightseeing at this stage. Finished up pretty late (with a Maccas stop on the way home), a few of the other guys had to catch the bus at 8am, luckily we stayed on for another 2 days and could sleep in til midday.

On the last day we took a day tour out to Kutna Hora, this is a small Bohemian town with some amazing churches and also has the Bone Church. You really needs to see this place... Everything in the church is made out of bones. There are bones to over 40,000 people in this church as a plague went through the town hundreds of years ago and they had no where to bury them. There are chandeliers and all the walls are just covered in bones, the artist who did it (if thats what you could call him) also made a replica of their coat of arms out of bones... It didnt quite feel right being in a smallish area with so many sculls and bones.

We also did a tour of an old church and Mint as Kutna Hora was a silver mining town and very rich back in the day.

There was also a carnival going on in the town which we got to have a look around for a while. Krystal got stuck into some local fairy floss (which was pretty good!). There was only the 2 of us and Brad on the tour for the whole day so it was good.

Prague has definately been our favourite place so far. We chose to stay an extra couple of nights than we have in other places and it was definately worth it.

Berlin, Germany

jarrodkrystal — Sun, 15 Jun 2008 23:02:00 GMT

Arrived in Berlin, Germany, after 10 hour bus ride which included crossing the Netherlands / Germany border. We got through without being stopped but aparently they regularly check people leaving Amsterdam (not sure why that would be...)

As we got in late, we just found a nice Italian restaurant and had a quiet night. Krystal wasnt feeling well and was up most of the night sick. After not much sleep, we finally got up, however Krystal was still feeling terrible. I decided to do the manly thing and leave her at the Hostel for the day and go exploring Berlin. Krystal basiaclly slept all day and was feeling better by that night.

I did a walking tour which went for about 4 hours and took in the main sights. Berlin has a huge amount of history (mainly bad recently) and alot of the city has obviously been hit hard by various wars, however there is still so much to see. Probably the highlights were what is left of the Berlin Wall (which Krystal thought was like the Great Wall of China) and hearing the stories of the communism days, aswell as the Jewish memorial which takes up 2 whole street blocks. Alot of the tour was also obviously around the Nazi's and saw alot of the things that Hitler changed in Berlin. Also saw the bunker where he killed himself. The tour guide told a story of 2 Aussie guys who pissed on Hitlers grave so they could go back and tell their mates. He said that was the funniest thing he had seen while doing his tours (I was quite proud to be an Aussie haha)

That night Krystal was feeling alot better, and is there anything better than a Pub Crawl to help you get better. Well there probably is, but we did a pub crawl anyway. We met up with all the guys we have been travelling with on the BusAbout tour and hit the town of Berlin. Went to about 4 pubs which were scattered around the city, so we had to do a bit of walking. It was OK cause we had Jager shots in between each pub. The first pub was an ex-East Berlin pub from Communism days and it hasnt been changed since (Krystal thought it just smelt... which it did). Also went to a big pub which had a beach area out the back. All pubs had really cheap drinks so it was a good night.

Next day, got her first glimpse of Berlin at day. Had a look around the main city and saw the TV Tower etc. Also did some shopping as the Europe summer hasnt been too hot yet.

That night we caught up with an American couple we met. Germany were also playing in the EuroCup so the town was pretty excited for them to win.

Our 3 nights in Berlin went really quick and unfortunately Krystal didnt get to see much. We will definately have to go back there, it is a really nice city and people are actually pretty cool. They maybe love David Hasselhof a bit too much (he claimed to be responsible for ending the split between East & West Germany....)

Gallery: Amsterdam

jarrodkrystal — Sun, 15 Jun 2008 19:28:00 GMT

Amsterdam - The Netherlands 11/6 - 15/6

jarrodkrystal — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 18:25:00 GMT

We caught our 1pm bus to Amsterdam, and were pretty excited. The bus took about 5 hours, and our tour guide who was ment to tell us all about Amsterdam and what to do, fell asleep the whole way there.

We arrived at our hotel (not Hostel this time!!!) at around 7, we got a bit lost on the way. We were on the trams with 4 Kiwi's and got talking the whole way there and missed our stop twice... We got back just in time to have a shower and get ready for our pub crawl. Most of the guys we had met on the bus were doing the same pub crawl (as Bus About sell the tickets)

The pub crawl was pretty mad. For 17Euro each, we went to 6 pubs and 1 night club, had free shots most of the night and got a free beer at each place we went too.

Next morning was a bit of a slow start (Jarrod especially), we had arranged to do a bike tour of Amsterdam at lunch time. Out of the 15 (approx) of us who did the pub crawl the night before, only 7 of us turned up for the bike tour, and I can tell you it was the best hang over cure ever.

Amsterdam is a beautiful city. It is a canal city like Brugges and Vienna. Amsterdam is a fairly new city and before it was built used to be under water. It was dammed off from the river system (the Amstel River) hence the name, Amster-Dam. Amsterdam is a completely flat city, so the bike ride was not streneous at all, basiaclly everyone rides in Amsterdam so there are bikes everywhere and they are more dangerous than cars.

The bikes are the old school californian bikes and were so fun to ride, they all had names and mine was "Vanilla Ice" (amesome, I was so happy with that) and Krystals was "Aggie Duck" (????). The tour guide was so funny, we has a bit of a dope head but really knew his stuff. He did get into a fight with a car because we had a large group of bikes, so our tour guide encouraged us to all give him the finger as he drove off. The car then came back and tried to run him over and spat at him. Was funny, but a bit sick also...

We saw all the sights of Amsterdam and also went through the red light district which was a bit of an eye opener. Girls just sitting behind glass doors along a seedy looking street. Quite an experience.

We had 4 older american ladies on our tour, one of them couldnt even ride a bike, it was so funny but really frustrating. We had to keep waiting. Then she ran into a parked car, fell off and got a big bump on her head. After our hour boat cruise (which was part of the tour) she got lost because she we had all had a beer. We had to wait for about 20 minutes while the tour guide went and found her, her friends said she was a bit drunk.. So funny...

That night we had organised to meet up with a few of guys and go to a Steak House for dinner. We also went for a walk around the red light district to see what it was like at night, very interesting. There was a lot more of "them" out, probably why there called "ladies of the night" I guess. Anyway, had a great night.

Next day we went to the Van Goch Muesum. This was really good. I am not a great art lover, but the tour was really interesting. We did an audio tour with headphones (so we looked like real tourists) but it was good. We also bought some art work, some copies of a couple of his famour ones and we also bought a really cool oil painting which was done by a local artist so it was a bit of a variation on the Van Goch.

Spent the rest of the time in Amsterdam just looking around the city. Apart from the seedy stuff which everyones knows about, it is actually a very beautiful and interesting city. It is only a few city (in European terms) but has had a very interesting past. Also the Netherlands Soccer team are kicking ass in the Euro Cup. We have all been following them and their supporters are always to loudest.

Holland...Holland...Holland. Oi....Oi....Oi

Gallery: Brugges

jarrodkrystal — Sat, 7 Jun 2008 22:17:00 GMT

The home of Chocolate and Beer!!

Bruges - Belgium 07/06 - 11/06

jarrodkrystal — Sat, 7 Jun 2008 05:46:00 GMT

We took the Busabout bus to Bruges from Paris at 8am in the morning and arrived at Bruges at about 1pm. Our hostel was about a 20 min walk from where the bus dropped us off so we were able to walk through the town and see what it was like.

Bruges was a beautiful little town, the building looked so old but where so nice. We found out later that the buildings had all been renovated and done up to look old.

Bruges was the home of the lots and lots of chocolate and beer so we were both happy. The first night we just walked around the town until we found somewhere nice to eat and then went home as it was raining and freezing cold. They also love there hot chips in Bruges, they have a Fries Museum we didnt go to it though!!!

We had to have a little retail therapy here too because the weather was so cold and Jarrod and I had only brought summer clothes, clothes were pretty expensive so we had to do a bit of bargain shopping.

There were 850 local beers in Belgium so Jarrod tried to sample as much as possible!! There was 1 nice one that we liked and it was called Jupiler. It was just like a Corona but a bit stronger. The locals drank a lot of this too. We had some samplers at our hostel to of cherry beer - a lot of girls drank this beer and also the dark like guiness beer - we stayed away from these.

We went to the chocolate Museum and to the Beer Museum. The chocolate museum was pretty good, they had massive chocolate scultures all throughout the museum but god knows how long they had been there for cause it did stink a little. We watched a short film on chocolate and where it came from which was really interesting, i didnt think there was so much history behind chocolate. The chocolate was nice but you cant beat Cadbury and Cadbury just isnt the same over here is a darker chocolate. After the chocolate Museum we went to the Beer Museum, it cost 4,50Euro to get in and u got a free beer at the end. The tour went for about1 hour and was spoken in 3 languages, French, English and Dutch. The Beer Museum was quite sad, we learnt that in the 1900s workers were put in rooms that were as hot as 80-90 degrees celsius and that little kids had to clean the big tanks which was almost in the same conditions but with harmful toxics. They rotated every 15 mins or so. They also used to get drunk all the time as they all had no money for food so they just drank at work as they saw that as there meal so then they could provide for their family. Also beer was serviced as water in hospitals to the poor as the water was too dirty and wine was serviced to the rich in hospitals. Enough about the sad stuff.... the beer at the end was nice but unfiltered so it was very cloudy and had a very bitter taste to it. I couldnt drink mine so Jarrod was happy with 2.

We really spent the rest of our time in Bruges just relaxing and eating. The weather wasnt all that good when we were there so that was all we could do. Bruges was a really nice town and would be absolutely pumping in their busy seasons, the canals were beautiful to walk along at night and the windmills were huge and amazing.

Apart from the Beer and Chocolate the highlight of Bruges was the Toy Shops. These shops were old school toy shops and had all those wooden toys that are so hard to buy these days. Jarrod and I spent ages in the shops.

Paris

jarrodkrystal — Wed, 4 Jun 2008 20:46:00 GMT

4th June, we arrived in Paris from Athens. It was a long flight as we flew with budget airline Easyjet..

Airport was really busy, and of course being in Paris no one wanted to speak English. We caught the train to our Hostel, the transport there is really easy to use...

Hostel (St Christophers) was really nice, it was only opened in January 2008. The staff were useless though... We basically just spent the rest of the afternoon looking around the outskirts of Paris as this was where we were staying, we werent game enough to go into the city just yet.

Next morning we took a "free" walking tour of Paris. This was amazing and covered all the major attractions like Eiffel tower, luovee, Notre Dame Cathederal, Sein River, Pont Neuf (bridge), Arc De Triomphe. The tour giude was really good and very funny, we learnt heaps about history of Paris. After the 3.5 hour tour (and paying a tip to the guide) we decidied to tour the town and look at everything in a bit more detail. We went with Nathan (Aussie) and Rob (American) to see the Arc de Triomphe and climb the Eiffel tower (700+ steps). Views were just amazing... That night we were pretty stuffed, but went for drinks with Nathan and Blake and Bec (also Aussies)

Next day Jarrod woke up a bit sick, we were going to get up early but slept in. We spent the day looking around Notre Dame Cathederal which was absolutely beautiful... It was huge and full of amazing stained glass windows. We left Nathan to explore the Luvee Museum (35,000 pieces of art including the Mona Lisa) while we had to go back to the hostel as Jarrod had a phone interview for a job in London...

That night we went to Moulin Rougee... This was pretty expensive for the show, however it has probably been the highlight of our trip so far. The show was amazing, couldnt really understand the singing but was still great. Aparently most of the girls in the show are Aussies...

After a few days in Paris, we were in love with the city. The city centre is amazing, there are no new buildings the whole city is just full of the historic buildings. It is pretty touristy but you cant go there without falling in love with it. We cant wait to go back.....

Next stop, Brugges in Belgium...

Gallery: Paris

jarrodkrystal — Wed, 4 Jun 2008 18:28:00 GMT

France

Greek Islands - Mykonos 29/05-31/05 Santorini 31/05-03/06

jarrodkrystal — Fri, 30 May 2008 20:25:00 GMT

On the 29/05 we caught the ferry to Mykonos, 1 of the Greek Islands. The Ferry cost about 54Euro each and took about 4 hours to get there. We had to be on the Ferry at 7am so we were up at about 5am (We said we would never be up this early again). The Ferry was huge so it was really comfy to travel in and you didn't feel any waves or anything - but ppl still smoked on it. PPl smoke everywhere and anywhere in Greece.

Mykonos was absolutely beautiful. From sea all you can see is an Island full of white houses, like little bungalows. They were all white, square shaped, with blue doors and window panes, just like you expect the greek islands to be. The water was bright blue too!!

We were booked to stay at a camping ground but a lovely Greek Lady won us with her Studio Villas on 1 part of the island (Platis Gialos). It was only 40 Euros a night and was about 100 metres from the beach -the best thing we did was stay here!

We basically sat at the beach all day everyday here. On the last day we hired a scooter to see the rest of the island which was really good but it was just so windy up on the hilss that it made it too hard to control it. We saw the sunset andwent to other parts of the island when we had this bike but where we were staying was the nicest by far!

The beaches on Mykonos were nice but Aussie beaches are just so so much nicer!!!

After a couple of days in Mykonos we caught the Ferry to Santorini, we were actually sad to leave Mykonos and our hosts Mina and Kosmos, but when we got to Santorini it was worth it.

Santorini was a lot bigger and more colourful. Houses were not just white and blue they were even pink and yellow!!! The town is set up on a hill over looking a volcano which broke off from mainland Santorini 100's of years ago. As the city is on the top of the Island you can just imagine how nice the view is and especially the sunset at about 7pm!

We had a pool at out Hotel so we spent a lot of time here sunbaking (and getting burnt) but the weather for the first few days was so nice and very hot again.

We hired a car here for 20Euros a day and drove around the island to all the different beaches. Kamari Beach was black sand, it was very weird and also extremely hot, JArrod and I both didn't really like it but it was so different to at home! We also went to the red beach which is red.....ha ha. It was a deep burgandy colour, you had to walk for about 10-15 mins to get to it as it was down a very steep, rocky hill. It was amazing to see because it was a beach that was cut into the side of teh mountain. You had to pay 5Euros to sit on it though!!!

We met a few really nice Canadians in Santorini, 1 couple at a bar that we were only having 1 drink at - well we stayed all night and Jarrod had to carry me home (5 min walk took about 20 minutes) We had a really good night. We also met another Canadian girl staying at out hotel so we went for tea with her the following night to a restaurant over looking the water and sunset. The food wasn't all that good but it was an experience!

After many hours of doing not a hell of alot, we were very sad to leave the greek islands. The week we were there was just amazing, we recomend anyone to go there. Everything is so beautiful and the people are so friendly....

Gallery: Greece

jarrodkrystal — Tue, 27 May 2008 18:35:00 GMT

Athens and the Greek Islands