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Showing posts from 2013

Three seasons of France

France... It´s just so... How do you say?... French?! Beautiful Dole We entered the country a total of four times during our journey, mainly in transit. We hadn't planned on spending much time there. We were extremely happy that we made time for it. Stories of French people disliking English speaking people had filled us with anxiety prior to our trip. Whenever we had to utter the words, 'parlez-vouz anglais' we would wince in anticipation of the disapproving looks that would surely follow. With great relief, we found the French to be EXTREMELY helpful and tolerant. One night at a campsite the owners could see us struggling away to get the flimsy tent pegs into the rock hard ground and lent us their hammer AND strong pegs. Another night we were struggling to find a campsite and out of desperation asked the guy at the petrol station who spent the next twenty minutes googling campsites for us (in between serving customers). Seriously...

Prost!

"Brad, wait up!" And just as Brad glanced back to see what I was on about, the train doors closed before our eyes. Me on the platform, Brad on the train. I shared a giggle and a roll of the eyes with a fellow commuter, before I suddenly realised. I was alone. In East Berlin. No money. No train ticket. No ID. No map. No keys to the apartment. No phone. No Deutsch! NO CONTINGENCY PLAN!! The Brandenburg Gate, Berlin It is a strange feeling to be left alone after spending 24/7 with one person for almost 5 months. How, after 5 months of travel, had we never discussed what to do in this situation??  I vaguely remembered discussing what to do if we were separated. As I sat there pretending to act natural I thought to myself,  "Now, did we agree to meet where we last saw each other? or back at our accommodation?"  Holocaust memorial, Berlin The situation wasn't helped by the fact that I couldn't see ...

Autumn has sprung!

October saw our last few weeks of sleeping in the tent. The temperature dropped a few degrees and suddenly we went from saying, "Wow, I can't believe the sun is still up at 9:30pm" to "its getting dark, it must be 4pm". The best part about all of this? We were now driving down colourful autumn tree lined streets. Just your average day driving around Germany... Potsdam. Having left sunny San Sebastian only days before, 9 degree Zurich was certainly a shock to the system. The lady did stifle a laugh when we explained that we were camping... she openly giggled when we told her we were camping in a tent. Although it was the most expensive place we had visited (60 AUD per night for camping and 8 AUD for a coffee), Zurich was one of our favourites. We found an enjoyable and inexpensive way to keep ourselves occupied. People watching. And not just your average everyday people watching, but rich-banker-business-fashionista-Ferrari driving-people w...