bbedelstein
Bonnie Edelstein Joined: January 26th 2007
Logged in: January 14th 2009
Logged in: January 14th 2009
Originally from Vancouver, Canada, I spent 2007 living in Hamburg, Germany and travelling through Europe.
I am constantly amazed at the diversity of cultures the world holds, espescially in such a small geographical space as Europe. My travels there have given me the motivation and confidence to see more of the world after I finish my degree! Check back in 2009 and hopefully I will continue blogging...
Travel Blog Posts
Altstadt Skyline across the Elbe
When I first arrived in Dresden, even though I was exhausted and sick, I got a good vibe from the city. Something about it just seemed right somehow. Although nothing special - no crazy parties, no falling in love with German men, no big adventures in the Altstadt - ended up happening, and in fact it was incredibly cold and I was very sick the whole time, my opinion of Dresden just escalated the longer I stayed there. I felt really comfortable: the streets made sense to me, like they did in Dublin, the East Germans were fabulously friendly, and I just felt like I belonged. I loved it so much that I asked at the hostel for information on finding a room in a student flat in Dresden; I found out that to live in ... read more
Prost!
Yes, it´s true, I made it down to Oktoberfest. I felt like it was my patriotic duty as an International traveller to experience this giant beer festival, so as long as I´ve known that I was staying in Germany through the fall I´ve been planning to go with an Australian girl named Brooke I met in Edinburgh. We met at the train station on thursday night and headed to the campsite with her friend Corinne, another supercool Australian girl who looked so much like Mo I almost called her by the wrong name more than once. Thalkirchen (luckily) had free spots left- it was a first come first served deal- but it was fiiiilllled with drunken Australians on "van tour" or organized bus tours or with the 100 club. These are all things I learned about ... read more
Me and The Caldera
Santorini started off great. On the ridiculously long ferry ride over (7.5 hours), some Torontonians I met at Pagration Hostel in Athens got on the ferry from Paros to Ios! They were awesome, and we had great conversation the whole way, plus they shared their wine... which is a great way to make friends! Haha. I was sad when they had to get off the ferry one and a half hours before me, but it just gave me some time to relax and watch the moon set behind the ferry. On Santorini, I managed to book myself a palace! It was called Pension George and I had my own room with my own bathroom, terrace, fridge, and television! Plus, the pension had a pool! Lovely. My first day there I took my time getting ready and ... read more
Wall Patterened to prevent Earthquake destruction
On my second day in Athens, I got up early to take the three-hour bus to Delphi with Charly and Prem. Those two didn't get along so well, which I mostly just found amusing, but we all had a great time anyways. It was phenomenal to see the ancient Greek "centre of the universe", and I realized that I find sculpture so much more beautiful and inspiring when it's in the place it was originally designed for. Maybe that's the contemporary art student in me, or maybe there really is something to the idea that art has a purpose, and that purpose is in the location. Hm. Delphi is situated on the side of a huge mountain which overlooks a very deep valley and an isthmus on the coast. The hills surrounding it are quite ... read more
Traffic Jam!
Third Trip: Spain, Italy & France How can I describe Venice? Well, the Italian leg of my trip got off to a very bad start as I waited at the bus stop for over an hour for a Shuttle Bus which never came... turns out it only runs starting in May but that wasn't really well advertised, so I had to take a ridiculously expensive taxi to the campsite to meet Zoe and her brother Jackson and stepmom Maureen. It made me really upset, but in the end it is only money and I know I shouldn't let it ruin anything major. We spent two days in Venice, which is dying as a city for two reasons: it has more tourists than locals, and the sea and shifting muds are causing it to sink into ... read more
My family outside La Sagrada Familia
Third Trip: Spain, Italy & France So here I am in Madrid trying to recover from the fact that my parents had to go back to Canada today. I didn´t get out of bed all morning and then didn´t feel like following my plans so I just went to the botanical gardens and enjoyed the sights and smells.... and thought about Barcelona. We stayed in a large apartment in Barceloneta, which is the old "port" district... but now it´s mostly delicious seafood restaurants and loads of beaches that reminded me of South Beach in Florida. The weather was perfect the whole time we were there, and my parents declared that this always happens for them on holidays! I was a bit frustrated at first, because getting used to their travel style took some time. We ... read more
I Have Lived 
I Want to See 
I Have Travelled to 
