Living the Dream My travel journal to help keep friends and family up to date with where I am in the world.

In Madrid at the present and it´s damn hot. Took a bus tour of the city today and saw all the main sites while yesterday we went to the Bernabau which is the stadium Real Madrid play at. We did the stadium tour and museum while we were there.

Previously we had ended our Contiki tour in Berlin after a walking tour of the city which details how most of the things worth seeing actually don´t exist anymore, such as Hitlers bunker (now just a carpark and kids playground).

Off to Barcelona tomorrow for a fews days and that will be followed by Nice. Time has come to take in the beaches!

Since I am just over half way through I thought try and come up with a list of things I will and won´t miss from travelling around Europe. No doubt I will be able to add to this list later on.

What I will miss
- Some amazing scenic views (e.g the Jungfrau in Switzerland and the Rhine in Germany)
- endless partying (in any capital or big city)
- some grand cities (St Petersburg and Prague top the list so far)
- losing track of time and day (time just flows)
- Russian and Danish women (easily the hottest around so far)
- experiancing the World Cup in Germany (the biggest party in the world)
- watching Australia play at the World Cup for the first time in my life time
- meeting people from so many different places in the world
- being able to say "last week I was in Moscow, yesterday I was in Berlin, today I´m in Madrid and next week I´ll be in Rome"
- german beer (i could drink it all day and you don´t get hangovers)

What I wont miss
- taking photos of buildings and statues (I´m pretty much over going to big cities. I will only do Rome and Paris after Barcelona before getting to the UK)
- Russian food (its crap and you get stuff all of it)
- crap breakfasts everywhere
- wheat beer
- Polish roads (lucky the bus has top class shock absorbers and suspension)
- living out of a bag (self explanatory)
- fizzy water (I always confirm "No Gas?" before buying)
- nearly getting run over by germans on bikes or russians in cars
- shrinking clothes (you have to use the dryer when constantly on the move and nowhere to hang them)
- hangovers all too regularly and getting sick due to pushing the body to far
- crinkled clothes (who irons on holiday?)
- sharing rooms with upto ten other people many of whom snore and are awake different hours to you.