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Published: September 24th 2010
People keep asking me the same thing: to sum up the past 6 weeks in some kind of fun way, in an ordered and logical style, with lots of pictures. Luckily for all these people and anyone else, I've finally done it in the tried and true alphabetical order.
A is for the Acropolis in Athens which is over two and a half thousand years old. My mind failed to truly comprehend the majesty of the Acropolis and I had to sit down to contemplate it. Of course, I chose the wrong place to sit and a fierce, uniformed woman chastised me through the medium of whistle blowing. I must have been in some kind of a sacred spot. Embarrassing, sure, but it got worse. Soon after, in the interest of creating a spectacularly acrobatic photo for a Gisbornian friend of mine, I tried some aerobics in front of the Erechtius and not only got the same whistle treatment, but was also forced to delete any photographic evidence of it under very vigilant supervision. A magnificent place, but don't even think about having fun there.
B is for Budget. Due to the indeterminate length of these travels, we knew
we'd have to break some kind of record for maintaining finances, especially considering we had very little to begin with. The budget has been tighter than my Primark clothes after one wash. But as Bob Dylan once inspirationally sang: "When you ain't got nothin', you got nothin' to lose." He also sang that "Eeeverybody must get stoned", so I don't know how literally I'm meant to take his lyrics.
C is for Caricature. There is a beautiful bridge in Prague called Charles Bridge, where cartoonists make a living drawing caricatures of willing tourists. I always thought with my facial features that I would be a caricaturist's dream. Karina was game for a laugh as well, so we did it and Karina told the artist to 'Show no mercy'. What a mistake. I thought the finished product was great, but Karina was livid and spent the next hour explaining exactly how a caricature should be drawn, what should be exaggerated, which features should be embellished etc etc. Judge for yourself, the picture is below.
D is for Dangle, which is what Michael Jackson (RIP) did to his baby out the window of a hotel in Berlin. You'd think a
free walking tour of Berlin would be all about Adolf Hitler, the Nazis and holocaust gloom, but there you go, they really do cover everything.
E is for Early Arrivals. There are two good things about taking overnight trains - one, that you don't have to worry about accommodation for that night, two, that you generally arrive at a city before everyone else has even woken up and have free reign of the place.
F is for Finland, more specifically Helsinki - where my good mate Chris was waiting to take us on his world famous free walking tour and pub tour. A highlight for all was Senate Square which was filled with big plastic bears, each painted by an artist from each country in the world. Some painters had gone to great lengths to be clever, humorous or just artistic. Australia's contribution was eyebrow raising, or maybe 'one eyebrow raising'.
G is for Greece, yes Greece is the word. It was my Mum who recommended Greece, and how glad I am she drilled it in. We arrived in Thessaloniki which besides the great name (Tess-a-lon-EEK-ee) had nothing interesting to offer us at all. But, things really
Pest and Buda
More commonly known as Budapestimproved in Athens, and got even better on the island of Santorini. The Greek alphabet blew my mind, (see the background of the photo below with the guards) and I now understand why people say 'It's all Greek to me.' I sometimes say this when people offer me salad, in reference to Greek Salad. As this joke doesn't make much sense, I've never really got a good response from it.
H is for Heidelberg. If you asked me what 'Heidelberg' was a few weeks ago I might have guessed it was some kind of a Norwegian iceberg and certainly not a picturesque little German town where the bunsen burner was invented. Caroline, a friend we were staying with in nearby Mannheim, took us there on a day trip to explore. It had all the makings of a typical European town (river with multiple bridges - check, castle on the hill - check, cobblestones - check) but Heidelberg really seemed to pull it off.
I is for Inception, the Leonardo DiCaprio film we watched in Belgrade for the price of 2 Euros each. Cheapest cinema in the world? Not only is the film excellent and well worth watching, but
I just about fell out of my chair in surprise (in fairness, the cinema was a bit dilapidated and the chair was only half attached) when I saw Kraig, a theatre actor and family friend, as an extra in a scene with Leo himself.
J is for Jam packed lunches. Unfortunately for us, when I say that our lunches were jam packed, I don't mean that we had lunchboxes overflowing with food. I mean there was an over abundance of jam between a few slices of thin bread. Usually cheap and disgusting jam. Some countries have the most horrid jam you could imagine, but it definitely provides one of the most inexpensive lunches when you're on the road.
K is for Kidneys. Karina was convinced, on more than one occasion, that we would wake up in an ice cold bath with our kidneys missing. This has caused her to lose sleep more than once. It usually happens when the accommodation seems too cheap, and unusually, when the staff seem too nice. Worse still, on an overnight train from Budapest to Zagreb, a heavy set man in a trenchcoat crept into our train cabin and sat in the corner,
breathing heavily as we pretended to sleep. I must admit, I was pretty scared on this one, but when I eventually woke up, I found my body fairly intact.
L is for London and Leicester, where I began this trip. A 5 day bonanza of seeing familiar faces and old haunts. Special thanks to: Grandma and Alan for demonstrating a real English Sunday Roast and for expertise in the zip mending department, Auntie E and the Maddicks for kindness and extra hot chillies (!), the Taylors for babysitting tips and a much needed haircut, Uncle Chris and the Cousins for a guided tour of Windsor and an introduction to West London curry, Chiara and Dan for taking in an unexpected guest with such gracious hospitality, my old colleague Michal who drove into central London so we could revisit the hotel, and Dulal for being such a kind chauffeur to the airport when my time was done. 5 days. Seems kinda incredible now.
M is for Moose. What is a moose anyway? Why do all the little touristy shops sell moose memorabilia? Where are they? Do they exist, or are they just a tourist myth like the Loch Ness
Monster and pet kangaroos. There are street signs warning of moose crossings all over Scandinavia, and yet, I still haven't seen one crossing any street, or indeed doing anything at all. Something very mysterious is going on here.
N is for Nautical Luxury. Before Karina's Mum and Hasse took us on a Baltic Cruise, the highest form of Nautical Luxury I'd experienced was when a whale shark expedition provided light snacks at lunchtime. But, for the first time in a month, we lived the high life and sailed from Stockholm to Helsinki on a 7 storey luxury liner, fully equipped with private sleeping cabins, a disco, bars, casinos, shops, and a glorious buffet dinner which was positively attacked by yours truly. A special thank you to Valerie and Hasse for giving such us such a stylish entrance to Finland.
O is for Orebic, the town in coastal Croatia where we spent a few days swimming, camping, and taking cycling adventures in the hope of finding archaeological ruins in the nearby mountains. There were a handful of people from around the world who thought it was Camping in Europe's best kept secret, so don't tell anyone I told you.
P is for Pest. Not many people would know that Hungary's capital, Budapest, is divided into two cities called Buda and Pest. Fewer people would know that Pest is actually pronounced Pesh. Fewer still would know that we visited and were suitably gobsmacked by the city (especially when lit up at night) and bamboozled by the language. Something for everyone there, and some incredible statues. Also, the goulash is pretty, pretty, pretty good if you're Hungary.
Q is for Quad bike. We hired a four wheeled motorbike in Santorini, to get from A-Z (hehe) and it was one of the best ideas so far. Letting Karina drive, whose experience on the road has never exceeded passenger status, was perhaps not the best idea in terms of speed or safety, but there you go. Santorini is a paradise... cheap, very friendly locals, and you can take a photo in any direction and it comes out looking like a postcard.
R is for Russian Visa. It pains me to even think about the effort it took me (and James back in Australia) to acquire a visa for Russia. There should be a saying like "Well, at least you don't
The road is long
with many a winding turn... Greece have to get a visa to Russia" in terms of its frustrating difficulty. You have to get an official invitation from a hotel (which you have to request when booking) which was hard enough in itself, but then send it off with about every document you could think of including your passport, and then you can only hope it gets approved. Mine did, but there's a rigmarole I could have done without. (nb. If I ever invented a complicated sandwich, I would call it a Rigma Roll.)
S is for Split, a fantastically named city in Croatia where we met with Perth friends Charlie, Matt and Ljubo. Quite a lovely place, we arrived there at dawn and enjoyed the first serious sunshine of the trip. It was Ljubo's birthday, so we went out for dinner and drinks, but we had a 2am train for Serbia so we had to split.
T is for Teardrop Tattoo. Once, when we were boarding a train in Germany, we noticed a man who was covered in tattoos. Even on his bald scalp were racing stripes and dragons. They were pretty poorly inked, so I naturally assumed they were from prison. He also
Munich
Looks like a hard rain is gonna fall had an inky tear on his cheek, which Karina informed me meant he had killed someone. I later checked up on this fact, it seems pretty true. Anyway, as luck would have it, this murdering brute was sitting in our reserved seats and as the train was full, someone had to kick him out. Me. I don't have much experience with murderers, but I did have a fair bit with kicking people out of my reserved seats, and I think I handled it pretty well, and avoided becoming a second teardrop on his cheek. This might not sound so scary in just one paragraph, but it actually was, and I'd like to see you do it.
U is for Urinal Humour, which shouldn't exist really, but World Cup Football Fever had really hit Prague in every conceivable manner, as the picture below testifies.
V is for Vrsac. We visited some family of friends in a small town called Vrsac in Serbia, right on the Romanian border. Vrsac (VRR-shuts) was pretty far off the beaten track, if any of the 4 previous Australians to visit read this, the new tally is 5. The family we stayed with were completely
'self-sufficient' and fed us healthy and fresh food from the fruits of their garden. Waffles in the morning were incredible.
W is for Wave. In Munich, the river Eisbach passes under a bridge and creates a natural wave due to the high flow of water. Surfers have literally jumped at the opportunity (from the bank of the river) and surf back and forth along the narrow stretch while tourists stand on the bridge and take photos.
X, I guess, has to be for
X-ray or Xylophone and unfortunately I haven't encountered either so far. Although my shoulder did dislocate while diving into the Adriatic Sea in Dubrovnik, which is kinda close to x ray worthy. Dealing with a dislocated shoulder under water is a pretty harrowing experience. Incidentally, so is being:
Yelled at in German. Someone once told me it was the scariest language to be yelled at in, and I think it's true (having experienced my fair share). We took a wrong turn while searching for toilets in a mall as it was closing, and got shouted at by a security guard. It wasn't actually that frightening, but not many things begin with the letter Y
but it's better than Yummy, which I was going to use.
Z is for Zig Zag, which is roughly the shape of the Eurail train trip we took from Uppsala to Athens. Big, sweeping slashes from left to right and back again all through the centre of Europe. Doesn't make much sense to zig zag around, but when you have unlimited train travel, it doesn't really matter how you get from A to Z as long as you get there. And we finally did, and I finally have. Thanks. More photos on the next page.
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Dani
non-member comment
Bunsen
If you'd posted this just four days earlier, I would have known that the Bunsen burner was in fact not invented in France, but Germany. This may have made all the difference to the scoreboard at Paddy Maguire's quiz on Monday. I hope you sleep well tonight, Oliver. Travel Safe.