once you go travel towel...

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...you never go back!

I'm going to take a brief interlude here to write an ode to my travel towel - quite possibly the best invention ever!

Travel Towel so blue
How, oh how I adore you
You keep me bone dry
I barely have to try
One wipe and it's done
I can begin my day of fun
Travel Towel so blue
How, oh how I adore you

For those of you who have never experienced the joy that is a microfiber towel, I can't possibly put into words how very exciting this fabric is. One wipe and you're dry. It practically sucks the water off your body no matter how wet it is. Drying is a joke, it hangs for maybe a half hour in humid air and is good to go again. It doesn't smell funky (even if you do). Best of all? It's light and compact - barely taking up any room in my GIANT pack. I don't know how I will survive going back to "regular" towels again. I've heard stories of backpackers who have filled their homes with these things because they couldn't bear to go back to the terry cloth kind. We'll have to see what kind of person I am when I make it back home...

Tuesday - Okay, my first night train ever and I have some lessons learned and things never to forget. Lesson 1: traveling long distances at night is the best idea ever - saves you the cost of the hostel and you don't lose a day due to zonkyness thanks to weird travel vibes.
Lesson 2: The Rail guide book is not a bible - when it tells you there are reclining seats on all night trains, it is a big fat liar. Which takes us to lesson 3...
Lesson 3: ALWAYS book a couchette (sleeping bunk) on a night train - it saves you sitting with 5 other people in a compartment made for gnomes while trying to navigate around each other's legs politely to enable some form of "rest".
Getting to Amsterdam was an adventure, seriously. The train was an hour and a half late - meaning we left the station at 2:15am (once everyone was on board) rather than the 00:32 departure that had been scheduled. Not to knock the CZ, but that's where the train was coming from - apparently it kills trains as well as my electronics. I felt guilty getting on, had to wake someone up who was stretched across all three seats to be able to sit down. Crammed everything in the luggage rack, curled up with my travel pillow and tried to sleep. Alas, the next stop (about 10 minutes away) the car filled up and we were crammed in our seats like sardines. All boys too, what is with this Europe trip and the sausage fest I keep running into? Seriously... Well, after some polite navigating of legs we managed to sort of entwine ourselves into a moderately comfortable position and I dozed in small fits and starts. When we reached Köln our compartment emptied out and it was just myself an a hippie from Chile. I can call him a hippie because it was one of three English words he knew, he kept pointing to himself and saying "hippie" and then nodding at me - I am not sure if he knew what it meant. I was starting to get punchy and was grateful for the ability to stretch out along three seats myself and drift off a little bit. When we reached the Dutch border (still about 2 hours from Amsterdam) the police came on board and began inspecting everyone's passports. I found it curious because no where else has anyone ever been this anal - okay, maybe when I was working in the States, but besides that - not in the EU. They took about 8 minutes to study my passport, using a black light and a microscope before handing it back to me. The guy from Chile handed over his, they studied it for a good ten minutes and then asked if we were traveling together. When I said no, one nodded to the other and they promptly took him away. Bags and all, they lead him out of the compartment and he was gone... Part of me wanted to panic and the rest of me was just curious. Did that just happen? Seriously?
Thanks to German efficiency we managed to make up 45 minutes of the delay on our arrival in Amsterdam. I have decided that this city is more confusing than Prague in more ways than one. First of all there was more construction here than in Ottawa and Calgary combined. There are no detour signs, just blocks and blocks of construction that people seem to ignore on their quest to their destination. There are also no real road rules here. There are more stop lights than Prague (where the grand total of 10 were marked on the map), but people seem to travel instinctively rather than based on any sort of order. Crosswalks what? I found the hostel - which is on the edge of the Red Light District and right on Leather/Bondage street. 😊
With time to kill until check-in I wandered around the city and tried to get myself lost. Amsterdam is deceptively small, it's pretty hard to get lost. The dynamic of the city is amazing, just a bustle of people with narrow alleys and street ways that seem to pop out of no where. There are no street signs, names are on the sides of buildings and often obscured by one decor or another. Also - ORANGE everywhere! Euro 2008 anyone? I settled in a little café to eat and read for a bit before checking into the hostel and heading out on a guided tour of the Red Light District.
Now - slightly overrated, I'm not going to lie. It was a fun tour, history of prostitution and the like. We wandered the area at about 8pm and it was already in full swing. Fascinating to see the dynamics of people. The tour was run by New Europe Tours, a group based out of several major cities who are great. We would walk a few blocks and then stop to chat about what we'd seen or what we should be looking for. At one point a man (read: pimp) stuck his head out of a second floor window to yell at our guide, "my girls can't work if you're going to stand there screaming out useless information." After some back and forth banter she continued talking until we heard the window open again, she moved us out of the way as a spray of water spewed from the window - "now f*** off and don't come back unless you're buying!" Umm... Okay? Neat... Then it was back to the hostel to hang out for the night. I turned in early because I was exhausted from the night before and had spent most of the day walking around Amsterdam.

Wednesday - Slept in a wee bit and then headed out on the museum war path. My first mission was to reserve my seat on the train to Brussels Thursday morning. The Dutch rail system is more confusing than any other I have encountered to date. I stood in three different lines only to reach the counter and be told three different things. I've made the decision to just get on a train tomorrow without a reservation (it's not required) and see what happens. Stupid... First stop was the "Amsterdam Theatre Museum" - a touch disappointing as it was geared towards people who have no understanding or experience with theatre. "This is a director, this is an actor..." There was an incredible design display on the main floor, I may have taken some illegal pictures (I still am not sure if I was allowed to or not) because they were stunning. Second stop - FOAM (Fotografiemuseum Amsterdam): a modern art museum with one display concerning the Statsi exhibit I had missed in Berlin and another rotating exhibit of poverty in this city. Fun, but also mildly disappointing - it was smaller than I thought it would be. Third stop - Dutch Resistance Museum. I am a dope and this should have been my first stop - it had distinct echoes of the Canadian War Museum in Ottawa. It was an incredible set up and very informational - my favourite stop of the day by far. As I arrived late I only had an hour to make my way through the educational maze before closing - it made up for the so-so experiences of the rest of the day. Last stop - the flea market! I've been on the hunt for a purse since I arrived in Europe - it was a mistake not to bring one and I've regretted it since getting here. Managed to talk a guy into selling me a nice canvas one for 10€ - I later found the same one in a store for 50€... It's not perfect, but it makes me happy and it will do nicely for the rest of the trip. I've also had a hell of a time trying to find a sticker for Amsterdam/Netherlands for my cane. The goal is to put one sticker per stop on it and I've been stumped here - not sure what to do if I can't find anything. I don't really want to put a marijuana leaf on my cane, but those seem to be the only stickers I can track down. I wrapped up the day with an incredible meal at a Thai restaurant and some pool with a group of Brits back at the hostel.

Thursday - I'm just killing time before heading out the door to catch my train to Brussels. I've managed to make some solid plans over the next little while - Brussels until the 7th and then into Frankfurt until the 10th. Mainz is a 30 minute train ride from Frankfurt, and I have an 11am appointment on Monday with two professors in the IPP department about the doctorate program I've been looking at. For more info on my dream degree, please click here. (Don't worry - it's in English.) After Frankfurt I'm not sure - maybe Paris and Stuttgart? Maybe Bayeux and Paris? Looks like Paris will more than likely be a go, it's just a matter of what else is involved.
Looks like I can't seem to stay away from Germany. 😊 I am looking forward to landing somewhere I speak the language. Break out the rusty French, it's time for waffles and architecture!

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Comments

[Dad]

Sounds hectic
Glad you could experience some of the sights and sounds on this leg of your journey. Now try and post a few pics with that fancy camera of yours!!! The war museum sounds fantastic and I hope that you get to enjoy more museums along the way dad