Holland, Nederland:
Best trip ever. I loved this trip. Just making a note of that.
I saw the biggest snail ever. Seriously. They all live in Holland (I actually saw 3).
I have proved to myself once and for all that I can navigate. I made my way on bike through Holland with a map that only showed half of where I wanted to go ... and I never got lost. I am so awesome.
Stuttgart, Deutschland:
I went to Frühlingsfest in Stuttgart with Chris and his Swedish coworker, Bjorn. Here are some things I learned:
1. Swedes like women.
2. Sweden secretly controls the whole world
3. Sweden is better than Turkey
4. Others have noticed that Chris just pretends to do work (nothing gets past a Swede)
5. Swedish is the craziest language ever (Sked is pronounced hwed)
Luzern, die Schweiz:
Let me preface this story with some background information. The weekend before Chris and I went to Lucerne, Switzerland, Chris spent the weekend in Vienna. He had a great time, met up with Sareh, Tom, Nate, Ana and others. They had a nice dinner, had some wine, went out to some pubs after that ... oh here's a fun fact, HE LOST HIS PASSPORT. Not a good thing to do. He made his way back to Germany fine ... no pass control between Austria and Germany. On the Friday that we were going to leave to Switzerland, he took a train to Frankfurt to go to the consulate to replace his lost passport. When he got there, he had to pay about 80€ and they told him he would get his new passport in about a week and a half, and that for now his photo copy of his passport would get him by. So ... on to our trip ...
Our last adventure took place the following day. The weather report said there was going to be a 100% chance of rain on this day ... so we donned our raincoats before setting off. The sky was overcast, but no rain. We walked around for a good portion of the morning and early afternoon ... bought souveniers and stuff, then decided tobring our purchases back to the hostel. Once there, we decided to shed our raincoats, as they did not seem necessary. Another bad idea. We went back to the old city and saw some more parts of the town then decided to have dinner. We were looking around for a restaurant when I felt a rain drop. We found a reasonably priced restaurant (a.k.a cheap) and walked in. We were greeted by stares from about 20 people, all holding beers. I looked up at the ceiling and motioned for Chris to do the same. The ceiling was covered with soccer scarfs. Hello "Feisty Goat". No one seemed to be eating in this "restaurant" ... just watching the soccer game on the TVs. We left. As we stepped outside, the heavens opened up and someone poured a bucket of water on Lucerne. There was thunder, lightning, and torrential rains. We spent the next 30 - 45 minutes running from doorway to doorway frantically searching for restaurants that we could afford (damn expensive Swiss) and trying to stay dry (both futile). We had finally given up and were just walking through the rain, our sweatshirts soaked (no raincoats, of course), when we saw it: Mr. Pickwicks English Pub. This was it. This was the Holy Grail. One look at the menu prices, and we went in. It was another soccer pub, but people were eating here ... and it was soooo cheap (well, cheap for Switzerland). We sat in the Manchester United section of the pub (hooray, English soccer) and purused the menu. Chris spotted it first: hamburger and fries for 15 CHF (6€). I could not remember the last time I had a hamburger ... and these were good hamburgers: big, juicy, homemade, delicious. We definitely won that evening.
