August 20

We were shocked when we woke up at 7:30 am to see people swarming all around us to get to their flights. No one, especially security guards, bothered us the entire night. This is just one more reason why Germany is awesome. They don’t bother the bums if the bums aren’t bothering anybody. It was a little creepy when I woke up to see an old lady in a wheelchair staring at me. After staring for a few minutes she finally asked what we were up to. She told us how great it was for us to be touring Europe and seeing the world. She believed that everybody should do it in their lifetime. I agreed. She said how when she was younger, she wanted to remodel the kitchen but her seventeen year old daughter wanted them to both go travel around Europe together. She decided the kitchen could wait, so she left her home in Canada for a while and went to travel with her daughter.

Once we got packed and ready to take on the day, we began to figure out where exactly we wanted to go. All we were sure of was that we wanted to go to Heidelberg to see the town and the castle as the Guggenbillers had suggested twenty-two days earlier. After that, however, we had no idea how we were going to spend our last full day outside of Paris. After we got to Heidelberg, we asked the information booth if there was a train station near the castle. She told us that there wasn’t and that it was about an hour walk to get there. We grabbed a map and started walking realizing that we had the entire day to get there. Since my bag is weighing about fifty pounds and Ben’s is up to around forty pounds due to acquired souvenirs, we only made it about a half mile before we stopped for our first break. While breaking, we took a look at the map to see that there was actually a train station on the map directly adjacent to the castle. Somewhat irritated, we walked back to the main train station to figure out how to get to the other station. Once we figured it out, it only took us about twenty minutes of waiting and riding to get near the castle. Although we had gotten close, it was going to be no easy task to get up to the castle. The way up to the castle included a climb up a steep rode and then up a zigzagging path back and forth along the hillside. We took a couple breaks on the way up before getting to the castle. This was one of the coolest castles we have seen so far. It is made of red bricks and covered a huge area. Although the towers weren’t extremely tall, there were many and each was impressive. One of the lookout towers had actually broken in half so one half was still standing and the other was implanted into a crater it made in the earth. It was neat that they just left it as it was instead of trying to restore it. Besides the great view of the castle, there was also an amazing view of the town of Heidelberg. There is a river that runs through it called the Neckar, which is also the same river that runs through Stuttgart and Reutlingen. It was definitely worth the climb, despite the extreme heat that is currently stifling Western Germany. It was hot and humid, and we were making the trek at noon which inflated the problem. It will be nice if we can get into that shower at the airport again tonight.

After Heidelberg, we decided to pick a random small town to go to since we have had such success with this strategy. We picked the town of Frankenthal. Before we left the station toward the small town, we reserved our train to Paris for the following day. We were excited to learn that it was a high speed bullet train. We had hoped to do this sometime while in Europe but had heard on multiple occasions that they were ridiculously expensive. We only had to pay 5.00 Euros apiece though. Since I had less than a Euro on me, Ben had to pay for both and now I must pay him back in US Dollars. We also found internet at that train station as was thrilled to learn that our student ID cards had been returned to Reese from London. We had left our student cards our London hostel since nobody was around when we needed to check out back on June 26. Alyssa Sahr had been visiting London and I joking suggested that she stay at Hostel 8 in London so she could pick up our student ID cards. Ben and I were both shocked to find out that she actually did us this huge favor. Ben had actually planned on driving out to Saginaw Valley the day after we got back to get a new one since he needs his to punch into work. This is just another instance of how things have been going during this amazing trip.

Upon our arrival, we had no idea where anything was, but we wanted at least to find a supermarket. I had 0.81 Euro to shop with and Ben had only slightly more. After walking into a few stores to find that they weren’t grocery stores, we finally just sat on a bench in the main section of town. I went out to explore by myself so we both didn’t have to carry our bags. I ended up finding two grocery stores right next to each other and bought a giant loaf of flatbread for 0.59 Euro bringing my remaining total to twenty-two cents to last me three more days. I shouldn’t have a problem since I have a stockpile of four sleeves of cookies, a half loaf of sliced bread, a package of meat (which probably should get eaten soon since I’ve been carrying it around in my bag for five days), the loaf of bread I bought today, and a bag of rolls I found in the train station. I’m sure I can span out this food over the course of three days, especially since I’m already sick of eating cookies and bread, so I won’t have to worry about over eating.

We ended up spending a couple hours sitting and walking around Frankenthal before heading back to the Frankfurt airport to claim a spot for the night. We only need to make sure now to wake up in time to make it to our train from Mannheim to Paris at 1:41 pm.

August 21

We were able to sleep in until 7:30 am. After barely making it until 10:00 pm the previous night, we had gotten more than our fair share of sleep. Again, we spent the entire night unbothered by security guards. We took our time eating breakfast and getting ready for the day. Our only task at hand was to make it to our train in Mannheim by 1:41 pm. We ended up leaving the Frankfurt airport by 8:30 am, so it wasn’t going to be a problem. Once we arrived in Mannheim (about a half hour away) we went to our train’s platform to begin our four hour wait. We lasted about a half hour before we felt the need to get up and start wondering around the area. Since we had less than a single Euro in cash combined, it didn’t look like our purchasing power was going to be too high. Ben did have a 5.00 Euro bill that he was planning on saving to cash in with his VAT refund money at the airport, but he ended up spending it on a pipe and tobacco. I still owed him 5.00 Euros from the train ride, so I bought his pipe for him to pay him back. I also bought a pack of five cheap cigars for one Euro as a way to hopefully pass the time while Ben was smoking his pipe. However, after smoking only one half of the tiny cigar, I had already gave one to Ben and sold the other three to him for 0.60 Euro. I don’t think I’ll have to worry about taking up a bad habit like cigars.

Once our train finally arrived, we boarded and waited in anticipation to reach top speed. I was relatively disappointed because it felt like we were probably only going about 100 mph when we were supposed to be going about 200 mph. However, when I got up to use the restroom, I saw that the sign said we were traveling at 296 kph, which is about the equivalent of 200 mph. Not many people can say they used the restroom while traveling 200 mph across the countryside.

It only took us three hours to travel from Mannheim to Paris and we were immediately reminded why we had disliked Paris. Hardly anybody spoke English and the people who did rarely were of any help. Every time we talked to somebody they would tell us something different. We weren’t in the city more than ten minutes and we were already jumping terminal gate turnstiles to get to the train because the people wouldn’t give us the passes that our Eurail tickets entitled us to. Since we were struggling so much with getting around the city, we limited our excursions to the Eiffel Tower, Arc of Triumph, and Champs de Elysees down to only the Arc of Triumph. It was impressive, but it was even more entertaining to watch the people taking hundreds of pictures as if it might change at any minute. I couldn’t help but thinking about how their attitudes would change if only they have experienced half the things we have over the past sixty-one days. Seeing the Arc probably doesn’t even crack our top 100 list. However, there will be no better site than seeing our parents waiting for us in the airport in Toronto. After leaving the Arc, this was our next task; get to the airport safely without getting arrested and begin the two day wait until our flight left.

At the Charles de Gaulle airport in Paris, we looked around for a place to sleep for the night. It was only 8:00 pm, but I already felt like I could go to sleep for the night. Ben forced us to stay up until dark, however, but we didn’t last much longer than that. I passed the time by watching Ben smoke his new pipe. And when I say “smoke his pipe” I mean that in the most literal sense. He began with one bowl of tobacco, but was able to light another bowl before I could start heading to my bed. After his second bowl had begun to burn out, he started complaining that the smoke was beginning to taste like wood. Pretty soon, his corncob pipe was turning black on the outside. Once the corncob started to burn all the way through, he put in down on the concrete and it proceeded to burn all the way down to nothing. His brand new pipe is now nothing more than a pile of ashes. Not many people can say they literally smoked a pipe to ashes.

After we successfully made it though that excursion safely, we went inside to find a bed. (There is a story from a previous experience a couple years ago that I could flashback to, but it would take much too long, so if your curious you will just have to ask in person.) It didn’t take long to fall into a deep sleep in a corner somewhere in the airport. Sleep came around 10:00 pm.

August 22

I woke up at 4:30 am feeling rested enough to take on the day, but realized the time and rolled back over for a while longer. I awoke again at 6:30 am now feeling as though I had slept until noon, but Ben wasn’t awake yet so I drifted back into sleep yet again. When we finally woke up for good, it was 8:45 am. At which point I felt as though I could sleep the entire day away in I wanted to. However, I did force myself to get up to start taking care of the business of the day. The first order of business was to eat breakfast. Then we packed our bags and began walking around the airport to find out information for our flight the following day. Again, the people weren’t especially helpful and I could begin to feel a general resentment toward us for not knowing French. We didn’t find out anything more than where we needed to be to check in. We figured that we would go to the line as soon as we woke up in the morning even though it wouldn’t be open yet. We might as well wait in line than somewhere else. After sitting around for a while reading books and listening to I-pods, we got on the airport shuttle train to head to the other terminal where we spotted a park the day before. Ben took a nap and I finished my book and ate lunch. We laid around in the grass for a while before heading back to our terminal. There we went and sat on a ledge while Ben smoked his last cigar. The light was just starting to fade when we went back to claim our spots on the airport floor. It was about shortly after 9:00 pm when we called it a night. The excitement of the following day would hopefully come quicker if we slept away the hours.

August 23

The day started with a prompt wake up call from a French security guard at 7:30 am. As I predicted, I was not able to sleep well due to excitement for the next day. When we did get up, however, we went directly to where our check-in line was supposed to be and began a day full of waiting. We sat in line for about three hours before we were able to check into our flight. The only excitement during this stretch came when we heard a ruckus coming from the adjacent hall. I jumped up and ran over to see what was going on and all I saw was a bunch of people running and yelling, “Police! Police!” I went outside to see a man getting chased by a single individual who continued the chant calling for the police. It seemed as though someone had made a pickpocket attempt but was unsuccessful in his getaway. The suspect stopped running when he got to a crowd and started to walk to try to blend in. After another guy found him again, he took off running. Meanwhile, the man in pursuit continued calling for the police. I watched the entire scene for about five minutes and never saw a police officer come to the rescue. During this time, I stood next to four security guards who seemed content to just be spectators. The chase ended up getting too far away for me to see anymore, so I went back to Ben and our bags to continue waiting.

After we had finally checked in and successfully made it through security, we had another three hour wait until our flight departed. Ben had eaten all his food previous to going through security so he didn’t have to carry it, so it looked like he would be making the eleven hour trip with an empty stomach. I had a few snacks left from my grocery stash, but I would need to ration myself if I didn’t want to go hungry at all. Our first flight to Reykjavik was on an older model Boeing 757 which didn’t have the in-seat entertainment system upgrade yet, which made the flight seem a little longer than the three hours it actually took. After an hour layover, we were on our way to Toronto. This 757 had the entertainment system which allowed me to watch two movies and four sitcom episodes, making the trip fly by. After we landed in Toronto, we had our passports examined twice before going through customs and immigration and then picking up our bags. It was only a few minutes later that I videotaped our reunion with our waiting parents. It felt so good to see my parents and join them for the remaining five hours to Reese. I was also thrilled that Mrs. Burnison had made cookies and my mother brought me a root beer which I had told her I had been craving since they are non-existent in Europe. There are no Taco Bells in Canada apparently, so we had to settle for Wendy’s as our first meal back in North America. It looked like we were all out of thrills until we had to go through US customs to get back in the States.

After my mother answered all the questions from the border patrol guard, we were informed that our vehicle and bags needed to be searched since we were coming home from Europe. Ben and I had to fill out customs forms to list all the things we had acquired over the months. The young guy inside the customs building was having a good laugh when we were explaining the stories behind some of our acquisitions. When I told him I was listing my shoes that I found in the woods in Berlin as a ten dollar value he started laughing and asking some more questions out of pure curiosity. He then left after he let me into the bathroom, and when he walked back in from the inspection going on in the van, he jokingly asked, “is that a big bag of parsley in your bag?” We got a kick out of his humor due to our previous experience with grumpy border patrol officers.

Once we made it back into the great US of A, we had no problems making back to Reese. I was happy to see Nate and Cara waiting for us at the Burnison’s house and to see my car waiting for me as well. After we said our temporary goodbyes, my parents followed me to Speedy Q to make sure I had enough gasoline to make it home, since I left the tank with mere fumes sixty-three days ago. I made it home around 1:30 am and was glad to see Granny still awake to greet me. She also had freshly baked cookies and cold milk waiting for me as if she had read my mind from thousands of miles away. At this point I had been awake for over twenty-four hours due to jet lag and longed for my own bed drastically. When I finally collapsed underneath the covers, it was about 2:30 am. It didn’t take long to find sleep. It was good to be home.

I’d like to thank everybody for following and supporting us during our trip. I never imagined how many people would actually take up reading this blog on a regular basis. It’s good to know we have that many people who care and are legitimately interested in our undertakings. Besides learning (or being reminded) about how many great people surround us in our daily lives, we also learned to be thankful for some of the values that we take for granted every day. If there is one lesson that we have learned from this entire trip, it is that the United States of America is the best country to live in on the planet. It will be a long time before I find myself complaining about our government and policies despite all that we think they are lacking sometimes. I would also like to encourage others to go on a similar excursion sometime in their lives. If it is something that interests you, don’t put it off if you can do it now because you never know how long of a window you will have to pull something like this off. Your outlook on life will change for the better; I guarantee it.

Even though I have tried to describe all the details of our experiences, there are still a great deal of things that were not put down on paper. I’m also quite sure that many people have a few inquiries to make, so don’t be afraid to ask. I anticipate enjoying conversations about this trip for many years to come, so I don’t expect to get annoyed anytime soon by repeating stories or answers to questions. I hope to catch up with everybody soon!

The following is a few things I have compiled over the months:

Things I forgot to add:

1. There was an older Canadian guy that practically walked us all the way to Buckingham Palace while we were in London. He was really nice and we had an interesting conversation. He also used a map he had bought in the 70’s to get direct us.

2. I made Ben throw his socks away in Rome. I could smell them through two plastic bags and when he pulled them out I nearly puked. He took them out of the room immediately, but the room never smelled right after that. I made him throw them out and then gave him a pair of mine.

3. There was a gorgeous girl in Barcelona that waited on us at the bar when we were desperate for food. She didn’t speak a word of English so it was really frustrating knowing there was no way to talk to her.

4. While walking down the La Rambla in Barcelona, I accidentally kicked over this guys change bucket he had sitting out in the walkway. We were in a hurry and I was looking up at street signs to make sure we didn’t miss our road when my foot hit something solid and change went flying everywhere. Ben was kind enough to take a picture of me helping the guy pick up his money from the street. The only thing the guy said to me was “Not funny.”

5. June 24th. I don’t know why I decided not to write that day.

6. After a guy was rude to us for not knowing French, Ben said after we had walked away, “Well if it weren’t for my country, you’d all be speaking German!”

7. There was a topless sunbather laying on the pool deck in Rome. It’s not really a big deal, but probably worth a mention.

8. On June 30, we had to get to our train from London to Manchester and check out of our hostel. When we went down to check out, there was nobody there, so we couldn’t pick up our student IDs that we had left as collateral. We had to make the easy decision to leave our student cards behind since we had already paid about fifty dollars apiece for our tickets. Two months later, I found out that Alyssa Sahr actually picked up the cards for us when she visited London herself. They are now waiting for us in Reese as I write this.

General Observations:

1. The United States is the best country in the world to live in…no matter how many problems we think we have.

2. Most people don’t live up to the stereotypes that we have been led to believe in the US. Although a lot of the Irish are short with red hair and the Italians are fiery darker skinned people, most other things are myths. For example, the Irish hardly drink at all because they can’t afford to pay 5.00 Euros for a beer.

3. Almost every public bathroom facility charges you to use it. A lot of them don’t even give you change back if you don’t have exact change.

4. There are few public drinking fountains, especially in France.

5. Even the poorest sections of Europe don’t offer groceries for as cheap as in the US.

6. No country is as fat as the US. This one isn’t even close.

7. Most businesses close quite a bit earlier than in the US.

8. Siesta time is hard to get used to. Don’t expect to find any place to eat in Spain (or even Italy and Greece for the most part) between the hours of 2:00 pm and 6:00 pm.

9. The most comfortable bed is your own bed.

10. People are crazy all over the world.

11. Almost all youth speak multiple languages, especially in Germany, Switzerland, and Scandinavia.



Words of advice to anyone else who wants to backpack through Europe on a budget:

1. When you find free water, drink as much as you can and fill your bottle to the brim.

2. When you find a free public bathroom, USE IT.

3. Drink a lot of water before you leave for your daily excursion each morning.

4. Always try to have some food stored in your backpack. There is nothing worse than not eating for twelve hours just to find that everything is closed.

5. Try to have everything planned at least a day or two in advance. Being spontaneous can be fun, but not knowing where your going to sleep for the night when its 8:00 pm can be frustrating.

6. After booking accommodations, write down the full address and as detailed directions as you can. Then double and triple check it to make sure it’s right. Missing one little detail can turn a fifteen minute walk into a two hour excursion.

7. Pack as light as possible. It’s surprising how little you need. Also, wearing the same shirt for a few days in a row isn’t really as disgusting as it sounds.

8. Pay attention to details, especially while walking around in the cities. It is easy to get lost and you never know when your going to want to remember where you saw that grocery store or cheap hotel.

9. Don’t worry about hygiene too much. It’s one thing to be healthy. It’s another thing to have to smell pretty all the time.

10. Keep your feet happy. If your feet ain’t happy, ain’t no body happy. And I mean NO BODY. Your travel partner doesn’t want to hear you complaining all the time. A good pair of walking shoes and Dr. Scholl’s insoles are a sound investment.

11. If your traveling with the same person for more than a week, you have to learn to just let some things go. Your never going to want to do the same things every time, so just pick your battles wisely.

12. If your in a place that is excessively hot, make yourself get up early to see the sites. It will be much cooler, the lines will be shorter at the attractions, and you can sleep when you get back. You can then go on an evening adventure if you haven’t accomplished enough for the day.

13. You can always delete your pictures and videos, don’t hesitate to take them. They might get annoying after taking a couple hundred, but think of how cool they will be in ten years.

14. Always keep your computer, camera, etc. fully charged if possible. You don’t want to have to cut your picture taking short or not be able to get onto the internet at a crucial point.

15. Have a watch with an alarm. Most cheap hotels or hostels don’t have alarm clocks. When you need to wake up at a certain time to catch a train or a ferry, you don’t want to have to wake up every hour to see if it’s time to get up.

16. Don’t be afraid to ask directions or ask for help. The worst thing somebody will do to you is ignore you. Trust me, it doesn’t hurt, and you will get used to it.

17. Try to learn at least a few common phrases of the country’s language. If you start off a conversation with a greeting in their native language, they will be much more willing to help you.

18. Don’t be afraid to try to speak another language. It will be awkward at first, but the locals will respect you more for trying to speak their language than for speaking perfect English. Remember, you’re never going to see these people again in your life (unless you hit it off), so don’t worry about what they might think of you.

19. Don’t be afraid to try to spark up a conversation with somebody just for the sake of conversation. You may gain a friend for life, or at least gain some key information on the local city.

20. Practice your charades before your trip. It’s amazing how well two people can communicate who don’t even speak a word of the other’s language.

21. Don’t get caught up in the big picture of your trip for too long. You will miss home and your trip will seem never ending (if you do it right anyway), but just worry about one day at a time. It will seem like your on your trip for an eternity, but in another sense, you’ll be a month in and it will seem like you just started a couple days ago.

22. Always let your mom know where you are or are going to be. If you can’t keep her informed for her sake, do it for your own sake. A good mother will annoy you to death if she doesn’t know what’s going on.

23. Don’t be afraid to fit in with locals. Try to take part in as many foreign traditions as possible. Just make sure to respect their traditions and you will not regret it. You may not enjoy it at the moment, but it will make your trip much more memorable. It might also make you appreciate your own life a little more.

24. Take your backpack on a few practice runs before your trip. Your shoulders will probably hurt the first couple times, but it will get better. You don’t want sore shoulders to be added into the equation of the stress of the first few days of a trip.

25. Be sure to read the prices before you order something and remember what they are. Sometimes people will try to take advantage of you when they get a sense that you are a tourist.

26. Try not to stick out. It is a little overrated hide the fact that you’re an American, but some people will hold it against you. I found the best way to introduce yourself is as “an ignorant American.” They usually find it pretty funny and then they’ll assume that you don’t fall into that stereotype.

27. You are an ignorant American. Don’t think that America is better than another culture just because they are different. Trust me, there are many more important reasons as to why America is better.

28. If you’re not enjoying a place, just think about the next exciting place that you will be heading soon. Also, this is why we never planned more than two or three days in advance, because plans change based on what your experiences in a certain place. You may want to stay longer as well.

29. Go to Ireland. The people are the most friendly in the world and the sites are awesome.

30. Thou can not live by bread alone. Although bread (especially French-style baguettes) is extremely cheap and fairly tasty, after eating nothing but bread for a week, you’ll be willing to spend a lot more than you normally would for a good meal. Just allow yourself to eat a decent meal every couple days as a minimum. One solid meal a day is a good goal, but sometimes unrealistic to the typical budget.

31. Try to schedule your trips through Spain, Italy, Greece, etc. as close to spring or fall as possible. The summer heat is nearly unbearable (thus the concept of Siesta time) and the ferry prices are cheaper in low season.

32. Don’t expect to buy anything during Siesta time in Italy, Greece, and especially Spain.

33. Keep a journal of your experiences. It will make for some great reading material over the years. It will also prevent you from forgetting all the many memories you’ll create.

34. Sometimes you must think like a homeless person to find a place to sleep. I good piece of cardboard can go a long way.

35. Don’t dump out your water bottle until you know the drinking fountain works and has drinkable water.

36. Always allow for more time when traveling with a girl. This is possibly the most self-explanatory piece of advice ever stated.

37. If faced with a food shortage, eat the best tasting (and usually highest energy content) food first. This will make you less tempted later on to eat before you absolutely need to.

38. Bring a good, but disposable book to read. After you finish it, most hostels have a place for book trading.

39. When looking for a place to sleep in a big city, just hop on a train to the airport. There are a bunch of nice spots to set up camp in airports.

40. If you are looking for a place to sleep in a city without an airport, you can usually find a night train to sleep on. Then just come right back the next morning if you have more things to do in the city. It’s better than sleeping outside in the rain at least.

41. Never pay for a map. If the tourist information booth won’t give you one for free, just go to the nearest hotel. Almost all hotels have a map of the area and are usually willing to give them to you, even if you are not a guest.

42. Complaining doesn’t make any situation better.

43. If you need a translator, try to find a younger person. In most countries, the youth learn English in school at an early age, even though many people over thirty or forty won’t be able to speak English.

August 16

We woke up from our corner in the airport and proceeded to get the day under way. Our first order of business was to try and find the famous fjords of Norway. When we went to the information booth, we learned that the most popular one was about six hours away. There is a fjord near Oslo, although not as grandeur, so we decided to head to that one. We got on a train to head toward where we understood the fjord to be. We arrived in a small town called Drammen without any knowledge of what to expect. We didn’t find any fjords, but we did get a nice view of the river that ran through the town. We went to the main bridge to take a few pictures of the scenery and the artwork that was for sale throughout the area. We only stayed in Drammen for about an hour and then we headed back to Oslo to regroup. Back in Oslo, we decided to give up on the fjord idea to try to find our next destination, the public spas of Oslo. We were told that they were open to the public, so we were excited to get there to relax a while. We had to carry our packs for about a half hour to get to the spa, and when we got there, we found out that it cost almost 15.00 USD just to get in. We turned around and came back to the train station. We ended up deciding to head to the Swedish city of Gðteborg. Unfortunately, we had a four hour wait before the first train to Gðteborg departed. We went back to our corner spot in the mall where we got kicked out the night before. There, we goofed around on the internet and napped until it was time to go. Online, we discovered that there was an airport in Gðteborg, so we decided to try to get there to sleep again.

The train ride into Sweden was once again a pleasant one. We took many pictures from the train, this time with sunny skies. However, once we got to Gðteborg, it was raining once again. We tried to get to the airport to sleep for the night, but there were no trains that went there and the bus service cost too much money, so we began looking for alternative plans. We found a train that departed for Malmð, which is the border city between Sweden and Denmark. This train didn’t leave until 2:30 am and it was only 10:00 pm. We went to a corner of the train station to find a spot to take a nap. We had been lying down for about two hours before we were awoken by a pair of security guards informing us that we were not allowed to sleep on the floor. We were forced to move to a bench if we wanted to lay down. We did so, but an hour later, I felt another tap on my shoulder. It was the same two guards telling us that, this time, the train station was closing. It was about 1:00 am, so we had to wait the remaining hour and a half outside on the platform. It was fairly cold out and a bit blustery. We curled up in our blankets against a wall until we were able to board the train. Our choices for seats were slim, but we eventually ended up finding two adjacent seats. We both wriggled around to get comfortable until we fell asleep.

August 17

We were forced to wake up around 7:00 am despite only a few hours of uncomfortable sleep in our train seats. We had arrived in Malmð. Next we decided to head straight to Hamburg. We went to the information desk to find out if there were any trains to Hamburg that didn’t require a reservation. He informed us that there was one leaving in four minutes, so we ran from the information booth to platform just in time to catch the train. We were making exceptional time. Unfortunately, the train was packed and it looked like we were going to be sitting on the floor until Ben found a family room booth with seats available. We scooted in there and ended up meeting a couple from Stuttgart, which is the same area that Sarah and Lena are from. When our train went back onto the ferry, we went up to the deck and I decided to finally try a Carlsberg beer since I had a few Danish Kroners to blow. Carlsberg, brewed right in Copenhagen, is supposedly the best beer in the world (and it says so right on the can), but I can say from experience that it is not.

After our arrival in Hamburg, we then set out for the tiny town of Stelle that we had found the Penny Markt in during our last stay in Hamburg. I had 15.00 Euros that was supposed to last me the entire last week of our trip, so I stocked up on groceries. I should now have enough to last most of the week if not the entire thing. It is just a matter of finding a way to carry all this food. My pack was already full from the souvenirs I had been collecting over the past couple weeks, so I had to do a major adjustment. I didn’t want to be carrying around the brown paper bag that I paid 0.15 Euro for in Wittenburg any longer. I had already been carrying it for a week from the last trip to the Penny Markt, and it now had a gaping hole in it and had to be thrown out. But this wouldn’t take place until much later in the day.

After returning to the Hamburg main station, we saw that we had about a half hour wait until a train toward Amsterdam left. We were going to shoot for Amsterdam airport to find a place to sleep, but would probably have to go to the main station first. After our first transfer, however, we found that the train we were on was terminating at the airport which means we would save about an hour of travel time. The Dutch scenery from the train was another unique view. There were forests of birch trees, swamps, and wetlands just outside of Amsterdam. Besides that, everybody seemed to be pretty nice and all the signs are in English, so the Dutch are quickly rising to the top of our list.

When we arrived in the airport, we immediately began to look for a corner to sleep in. It was quite a bit busier than in the Oslo airport, but we just kept going up escalators until there was hardly anybody. We ended up finding a perfect spot in a secluded corner right next to a bathroom. We sprawled all our stuff out and went to take a “sink shower” as we have began to call them. I also did a little “sink laundry” as well. It wasn’t five minutes after I had just got done soaking my socks, though, when a security guard came up to tell us that the area was closing and we needed to leave. So we quickly packed up our stuff and began looking for another place. We ended finding a spot that was quite similar to our other spot with just a little more foot traffic and a father distance to the bathroom. As long as we are not in a spot that we don’t belong in, I’m sure it will make for a comfortable night.

August 18

HAPPY ANNIVERSARY TO MATT AND KENDYL!!!

We were awoken by security guards around 7:00 am telling us that it was time to wake up. I’m not sure if this was some sort of rule or if they were just sick of us being there, but we began to pack up none the less. We walked to the train station and rode to Amsterdam’s central station. We walked around looking for lockers to put our bags in for a while, but all we found were lockers that required a credit card, something neither one of us were willing to give. We were then forced to carry our bags around for the day.

Amsterdam is a city with many interesting sites, sounds, and especially smells. The red light district is only a few blocks away from the main train station, and things start to get shady about two blocks from the station. We weren’t in the city more than five minutes before we smelled our first whiff of marijuana. It was only about 9:30 am and already a girl was walking down the street smoking a joint. We went to the national monument and a few other important buildings before finally making our way through the red light district at around 11:00 am. What we saw may have been the only thing we have witnessed so far that was not embellished at all by its stereotype. The moral ineptitude of the area was so ridiculously disgusting that you really can’t put it into words. The smell of pot dominated your senses while every other building was some sort of sex shop. We didn’t stay long.

After our morning walkabout, we decided to head to a small section on the outskirts of town that seemed to have a large park based on the picture on the map. We had to walk about a half mile from the train station to get there just to find that it was nothing more than a gated village surrounded by swamp. We found a bench and sat down and ate lunch. We sat there and relaxed for a couple hours until neither one of us could resist the urge to nap any longer. We had come to the “park” to find a place to sleep in the first place. We both remembered an area underneath an underpass that had some nice shaded pavement in the median. We went there and set up camp for our nap. It was a little loud being sandwiched between two lanes of traffic and underneath a train bridge, but we both managed to fall asleep relatively quickly. Every once in a while we would wake up when certain people thought it was funny to startle the bums with a honk of their horn, but for the most part, I slept well for an hour. Then Ben decided it was too loud and wanted to move. I had become quite comfortable and wasn’t happy with being woken up because he couldn’t sleep, so I told him I was staying right where I was. After I didn’t budge for two or three more demands to move, I no longer heard him and knew that he had left to go find somewhere else to sleep. I rolled over and went back to sleep. After about another hour, I finally woke up and saw that Ben was no where in sight. As the next couple hours went by, I began to wonder if he had disappeared all together leaving me to finish our trips separately. I had read about fifty pages of my book before he returned with some plans on what to do for the rest of the day.

It was about 5:30 pm by the time I got packed up and we started heading back to the train station. It was well after 6:00 pm before we got off the train in downtown Amsterdam again. We began walking toward Anne Frank’s house to see what that was all about. It was quite a haul to get there just to find out that it cost 8.50 Euros to get in and the line had about a two hour wait. We took a couple pictures and then left for the next item on the agenda. We were going to go to a coffee café for Ben to get some coffee while we connected to their internet. We went into a café which said “internet inside” and asked what network was theirs for us to connect to. The server said that they didn’t actually have a network, but that they just steal it from an unsecured network somewhere on the street. Again, I wondered how many lawsuits would get filed if this were to occur in the States, but we left in search of a real wireless network. I ended up finding one outside on a bench. I had to update my mother of our status quickly, but the main reason I searched so hard for internet was to find out how our softball team did in the state tournament. I was elated to find out we had come in second place, but was disappointed that we had lost both games in the double elimination championship. Either way, it was an impressive feat, one that I hope we can top next year. Although I’m sure to find a number of fines coming my way when I get back for not being there, I should remind them that I did kiss the Blarney Stone while wearing my Munger Softball t-shirt. I also had it on during the entire weekend of the tournament. Hopefully that superstitious nonsense counts for something.

After we had finished using the internet, we continued to sit on the bench and just watch people pass by. We never went more than ten minutes without seeing something I had never seen before. First there was the fact that every other person walking by was ingesting marijuana in some form. Then there was the guy that rolled a doobie right next to us on our bench. Then there was the guy walking by that had a head full of dreadlocks wrapped up around his head as a girl might wear a towel fresh out of the shower. Then we saw a cop up in the window of the apartment building across the street. We saw him go into every room of the six story building to pull the shades up in each window. Then he set up a computer in the corner of one of the rooms. I couldn’t help but think that we were in the middle of some sort of sting operation. What happened next only strengthened this idea. Some guy casually walked by and, without slowing or completely looking at us, offered us some crack cocaine. It was soon after this that we decided our people watching stint had gone on long enough. Even though it wasn’t even dark yet, we felt that the red light district was a little too much for us. We then went back to the train station and caught the first train to the airport.

We decided that we were going to find a different spot to sleep for the night that wasn’t in a restricted area. We ended up finding a corner that was perfect for our situation. There seemed to be no purpose of this corner except to house people looking for a place to sleep before their flight, and if the security guard asks, our flight left the following morning. One of the problems with sleeping in an air port is that the lights are on twenty-four hours a day, but luckily for us, we had found a spot under a shade tree growing in a giant pot. We took our time setting up. I ate some dinner from my bag and went to the bathroom to do some “sink laundry” and take a “sink shower” before bed. I stayed up as long as I could expecting to sleep in late the following morning, but I didn’t even make it until 11:00 pm before I was out for the night.

August 19

At 5:00 am we were promptly awaken by two security guards informing us that we were not allowed to lay down after 5:00 am. If we wanted to continue sleeping we would have to sleep sitting up. Who ever heard of such an absurd rule for an airport? After the security guards left, I propped myself up uncomfortably against my bag and Ben just rolled over and went back to sleep. About five minutes later the guards came back and told us we should probably just go find a seat somewhere. It looked as though our day would be starting prematurely.

We packed up and made our way to the train station to see when the first train to Brussels, Belgium departed. As it turned out, there was a train leaving three minutes later from the platform we were basically standing on. This would have been quite lucky if we had been in a hurry in the first place. As it was, however, we basically had little planned beyond going to Brussels for the day and spending the night in the Brussels airport. As our train was approaching the first stop in Brussels, Ben noticed girls dancing naked in the window of a building on the street side. This told the tale of our opinion of the city. Basically, everything was a dump except the main square in town. It is regarded as the most beautiful square in all of Europe, but it was nothing but a bunch of old buildings and a restaurant. It was a nice sight, but nothing more special than anything else we have seen. The next order of business was to go the Manneken Pis, which is a small fountain on the corner of two small streets. It is world renowned for the unusual location of the fountain. The statue of a young boy is actually spouting water from his penis. What surprised me was that the statue was actually only a little more than a foot tall and the area around the fountain was extremely small. It was a neat little thing to see though. Finally, before we went to find a park to nap in, we had to find a Belgian waffle to try. This wasn’t hard since the cheapest place we found was right next to the Manneken Pis. For 1.50 Euros, I ate the best waffle I have ever had by far. I had bought the waffle before Ben even knew what I was up to, but when he saw my expression after my first bite, he knew that he had to try one as well. My exact words not two seconds after I chomped down into my first bite were “Oh my!” I know this because Ben kept reminding me for a couple hours of how funny my expression was. All I can say is that I will never be able to fully appreciate a waffle again and nobody should ever call their waffles “Belgian” waffles.

After savoring every last bite of my waffle, we went to a small grassy area near the train station to finish the sleep that we had been deprived of by the security guards. Ben was ready to go around noon, but it took me a while to get fully awake to get ready to go. Finally, we got up and went to the train station to head to our next destination. We arrived in Luxembourg about three hours later. We expected more than what we saw in Luxembourg City, but we did take a few nice pictures of the Viaduct and its surrounding area. We basically walked from the train station to the main center, took a few pictures, and walked back to the train station. We did have time to head to a local store, but I was the only one that bought anything; a few sleeves of cookies for the flight and a gift for my dad. I was down to my last 0.81 Euro that I had taken out a few weeks ago. If I can make my groceries last until our flight on Sunday, then I will have successfully strung out 24.00 Euros over the course of nearly three weeks.

Our next and final destination for the day was the Frankfurt airport. This is where we plan on spending the next two nights. During the three hours that we spent on the train, our spirits grew as we realized two things: one-we were headed back to Germany, our favorite country thus far and two-we were only three full days from our flight out of here. It also helped that the train ride through western Germany was one of the most scenic yet. I never caught the name of the river that our train followed through the hillside, but I do know that it met the River Rhine in the oldest German town named Koblenz. During the ride through the hills, we saw many small villages down by the river and at least a dozen castles nestled up on the top of the hills. Maybe this is why we have begun to look forward to riding trains through Germany.

Once at the Frankfurt airport, we immediately began to search for a place to call bed. We found a couple prospective areas right away and then realized that the airport was way to big to inspect every corner. We found a couple benches in the upper level where it seemed no one ever passed through. We sat there for nearly an hour before we sprawled our stuff out to get ready for bed. Ben went to go find a bathroom as I began pecking away at the keyboard and came back to report that he had found a free public shower. He grabbed his towel and left again. Now I am surrounded by three guys, one of which is a three-hundred-pounder with his shirt off and fly undone, despite our belief that no one ever came up to this part of the airport. We may move now when Ben gets back and realizes what has become of his sacred sleeping area.

Well we ended up moving when Ben got back party because he had found another decent spot and partly because the other guy was planning on sleeping nice and cozily with Ben. We moved to another spot and Ben showed me where the shower was. He said that you were supposed to pay to use it but he just waited until the other guy came out and grabbed the door. Then he used the deadbolt to leave it propped open for me to use. It was my first shower in exactly a week since our first day at the Schluckebier’s. When I got back, I hadn’t even sat down in our new spot when a worker from the airport approached us. I thought for sure we were getting kicked out again, but he turned out to be an extremely nice old man who just wanted to take some photos of us in action. He is retiring in a few days after thirty years of service and just wanted to capture some of the memories of the airport with his camera. After he took a couple photos and asked us where we were from, we were happy to hear that he recognized Saginaw as the hometown of Stevie Wonder. We were even more shocked to find out that he was a close friend of Stevie Wonder and actually had stayed with his then fiancé (now deceased wife) during his first time traveling to Michigan. He said he was eighteen at the time and came to the US with only ninety dollars in his pocket. He got in his first car accident in Detroit when his friends hosting him thought it would be fun to let him drive even though he couldn’t even legally drive in Germany yet. After rattling off a few more stories about Michigan, the US, and a few other European cities, he went on his way snapping off a few more photos. We were relieved that his answer to my inquiry about the frequency of people sleeping as we were was that there are people who do this all the time. This should mean that we should be able to sleep as long as we want here tonight. That would be a relief and a luxury.

August 15

We awoke from another great night of sleep on the Schluckebier’s couches and were promptly informed that we would soon be taking part in a Saturday morning Danish tradition. Brian went to the bakery to get bread and pastries for our Danish style breakfast. The best part was the authentic Danish pastries fresh from the bakery. Complimented with some juice and tea, it made for quite a delectable experience. After breakfast, we woke Jonas and Jakob (who may or may not have been a little hung over) to make sure that we got a picture of the family before Brian and Hanne had to leave to meet a friend. Unfortunately, Brian seemed to be coming down with a cold in which I felt responsible for since I had just gotten a small cold when we arrived. He blamed it on his helicopter training course, but I’m sure I had something to do with it. After they left, we hung out with the boys for about an hour before Jonas generously took us to the train station in his new previously owned car. Apparently it is a big deal for a teenager to have a car in Denmark since they have an expression that in Denmark, you buy a car and pay for three. This expression is in reference to the Danish tax of about 180% on any car purchase.

At the main Copenhagen train station, I bought two McDoubles from McDonalds for the trip and we were on our way to Oslo. The rain never stopped during the eight hour ride. Oslo is called the European Sunshine Capital north of the Alps, yet we never saw the sun the entire day. Norway is a beautiful country, though, despite the dark skies. So far, we may have seen more water than land. The entire train ride through Norway saw lakes and rivers surrounded by massive forests on both sides of the train. After we made it to Oslo, we immediately started looking for a place to spend the night. Since Norway is the most expensive country in Europe, we knew we weren’t going be sleeping in a bed somewhere and the rain was still coming down, so finding a place to sleep was going to be a little tricky. We found a corner in the mall inside the train station, but we were pretty confident that we would be getting kicked out shortly after. I was able to connect to the internet and talk to all my family members at the Zimmer family reunion. It was nice to see everybody, but it made me wish I was there, especially when Grandpa came on to tell me that he just cooked me a great big burger with all the fixings.

We got kicked out of the mall shortly after and we moved to our next spot. We found a stairwell to sleep under in the main part of the train station. As we were just starting to doze off (as it always seems to happen) we were awoken by two security guards informing us that we were not allowed to sleep in the train station. We then had to come up with more desperate plans. It was a little chilly outside and the clouds looked capable of dropping some more rain on us at anytime. We needed to employ rule #39 of the Blaise Zimmer Guide to Backpacking Europe which reads as follows: “When looking for a place to sleep in a big city, just hop on a train to the airport. There are a bunch of nice spots to set up camp in airports.” We ended up finding a nice secluded corner spot in the upper level that seldom saw any travelers walking by. There were also free bathrooms (if you can imagine this as a luxury) nearby, so we finally fell asleep around midnight. The only problem with the spot was the occasional announcement on the loudspeaker and the broken ticket machine that incessantly beeped throughout the night. Other than that, we slept great.

August 14

We awoke from the best sleep we have had probably on the entire trip. Brian, Hanne, Jonas, and Jakob had each gone to school and work for the day so Ben and I had the house to ourselves for the day. We took our time getting ready, then headed out to explore the city. The most amazing thing about Copenhagen has got to be all the bikes. On each major street intersection, there has to be at least a couple hundred bikes parked at one time. Everywhere you go there is bicycles running through the streets, even more so than automobiles. As Brain told us the night before, though, they treat bicycles as transportation vehicles instead of recreational toys like Americans. They also had a system called City Bikes which allowed you to insert a 20.00 Kroner coin into the bike racks that were set up all around the city. After inserting the coin, you could take the bike for as long as you wanted and then just take it back to any of the racks to get your coin back. Ben and I were excited to try this out, but unfortunately, we couldn’t find a rack that still had a bike on it. However, the city wasn’t too big and we were able to see most of it on foot. One of the interesting attractions was the statue of The Little Mermaid in Copenhagen’s harbor. There is a fairy tale that is linked to this statue; a tale that was the basis for Disney’s version of The Little Mermaid. This is probably the most famous icon in Copenhagen, yet we didn’t hear about it until the night before while talking with Brian and Hanne.

We made it home before either of the boys had returned from school, so we just relaxed and watched some daytime television for a short time. As was the familiar experience of daytime television, there wasn’t much to watch. It wasn’t long before Jakob and Jonas were home, and they brought a few of their friends over as well. We enjoyed watching them play American video games until dinner. For dinner we had roasted veal, steamed vegetables, potatoes, and a deliciously unique type of gravy. After dinner, we ended up riding with Brian and Hanne out to the wooded area that we had gone to the night before. They went to see Endy again while we were headed to the big party that Jonas and Jakob had invited us to. After Brain and Hanne escorted us to the party and found Jonas for us, they left us and we joined in some of the fun. The party was the second craziest party I’ve ever been to, right behind the San Fermin festival in Pamplona. There were a few thousand high schoolers spanning across this open area in the woods. When we got there, immediately two drunk girls riding a bike together down a hill sped by us out of control. Only a few feet passed us, they began to lose control and wiped out in the dirt. Although the spill looked painful, they both got up and I’m sure the drunkenness help with the pain. Then we noticed that there were many kids who had marker writing all over their faces and bodies. Apparently, as the tradition goes, all the kids from the incoming class were hazed in this way. The party is a tradition in itself taking place on the first Friday after school starts each year. Since drinking is legal at the age of sixteen, everyone in their school is legal to drink. I must say, though, that it felt weird hanging out with drunk sixteen year olds while not breaking any laws. I had to keep convincing myself that I wasn’t actually doing anything wrong or illegal. Once it got near dark, most of the people started to leave to go to their separate parties or clubs for the remainder of the night. After Ben got sprayed in the back twice by beer cans getting thrown down the hill, we decided to head back to the house for the night. It was about 10:00 pm when we left, but we didn’t get to the house until 11:15 pm even though it was only a ten minute drive. We had to wait for over a half hour just to get our two trains that we needed to take to get back.

Back at the house, Hanne had already had our beds set up for us and it didn’t take long for us to conk out for the night. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to stay awake to talk to my family at the Zimmer family reunion. They didn’t have Skype set up until 7:00 pm their time which would have been 1:00 am our time. I could barely keep my eyes open at 11:00 pm, so I knew I wouldn’t be able to make it until 1:00 am. Hopefully I can find a stable internet source in Oslo to catch up with everybody.

August 9

We awoke to the sound of someone’s excessively annoying alarm sometime around 7:00 am., however, I didn’t know the time at the moment because my clock had quit ticking during the night. After we got out of bed, we had about forty-five minutes to get all our drying clothes packed away, get breakfast, and get outside to wait for our tour bus. We rushed through breakfast, but I still managed to make two sandwiches from the breakfast menu to take along with me for the day. All I had was 1.54 PLZ in my pocket which is equivalent to about 0.50 USD. I also had spent my remaining Euros on both of our Auschwitz tours the previous day. It’s not a good feeling knowing you have to make it about thirty hours before you will even be able to purchase anything if you needed to. This is the reason for the squirreling away of food from breakfast.

Our tour bus showed up a few minutes late, so we didn’t end up getting to Auschwitz at the time we were told, but the tours ran constantly, so that wasn’t a problem. Once inside the concentration camp, I began to feel the unfortunate history that was created there. We had passed under the main gate where over one million prisoners had read the same words. In German, the famous sign over the entrance reads “WORK WILL SET YOU FREE.” In one of the German words, there is a “B” that is flipped upside down. This sign was allegedly built by the Jewish workers and they formed the “B” in this manner to warn others to beware that something was wrong. Throughout nearly the entire tour, I had a slightly sick feeling in my stomach from all the evil that had taken place there a little more than a half century ago. The most disturbing displays were the rooms full of women’s hair that had been harvested from the bodies, combs and brushes stacked three feet high, and the suitcases that often bore the names, addresses, and birthdays of their owners. Each of these had filled at least one giant room. Another sobering experience took place while walking through the gas chambers; seeing the holes where the Nazis dropped the gas and the incinerators designed for human flesh in the next room. There were shower heads in these gas chambers to help convince the victims during their last moments that they were simply taking a shower to disinfect before moving into their new home. They were also told to leave their luggage and belongings in a place where they would remember in the luggage room so they could recover it quickly after their shower. If this seems extremely graphic in print try imagining how men’s minds could have become so warped to go along with such transgressions on a daily basis. In fact, some of the Jews themselves would be put in charge of the exterminating with the promise that their lives would be saved. This promise usually lasted about three months before they themselves could no longer be trusted.

Our next stop on the tour was the nearby death camp called Birkenau. Here eighty percent of the prisoners never lived for twenty-four hours after passing through its gates. The area inside the barbed wire fence was more than a half square mile based on my estimation. There were many buildings that served as living quarters for the prisoners that were allowed to live. Inside one of these small buildings, it is staggering to imagine that 800-900 people were kept inside. There were only forty-four tri-level bunk beds in each building according to my count. If ten people fit into each bunk (with beds of straw smaller than a normal single bed), that would only account for 440 people. Even while inside, I could hardly imagine 100 people inside this building. I still cannot fathom the truth. The wash rooms were just as bad. They were nothing more than a line of holes in the concrete above a trough. The workers were only allowed to go once in the morning and once at night and were on a strict ration of only a couple minutes for each use. During plagues of diarrhea and other sicknesses throughout the camp, disease would be the biggest threat. It is documented that even a few guards died because of the unsanitary conditions. After we checked out the living quarters and a wash room, we went to the main lookout tower to get the best view of the entire camp. The camp was built in the area where six small Polish villages had been established. After the Nazis came through and demolished the communities and the people that were their livelihood, they proceeded to use the bricks of the destroyed houses to build their own buildings on the premises. This is the reasoning for the first twenty-six (I believe this was the correct number) houses being constructed of brick while the others were made of wood.

After this tour had concluded, we got on our bus to retreat back to Krakow. The tour had been and interesting and humbling experience, but we still had a couple disappointments from the whole thing. First, we were told that the trains don’t run to the town of Auschwitz so we had to pay for a bus, but we learned this was not true. We were also told that the famous documentary video shown at the museum was included in our tour price. However, when we brought it up to our tour guide, she knew nothing of the sort and dismissed the issue without much consideration. Another issue was that we were told that the whole thing (round trip of two hours included) would take six hours. However, we left Krakow well after 9:00 am and returned before 2:30 pm. In the end, it was still worth the price of admission.

Back in Krakow, we walked back to the hostel to pick up our bags and then went to the train station to figure out when the next train left for somewhere south or east of Poland. It looked like we would be hopping on the 10:15 pm train to Prague. We first needed to find out from the ticket booth if we needed a reservation, ticket, or both. She told us, somewhat rudely, that we would need to purchase the ticket for full price since our Eurail passes weren’t valid in Poland, as we suspected. We decided we would just forget about the reservation and jump on the train anyway to see what happened. We figured the worst case scenario would be that we would have to pay the full price of the ticket on the train. Either way, we would have to wait over seven hours for the train to find out. We ended up spending the majority of this time with Michelle in her hostel. After joining us for the last twenty hours of our trip, she was going to be staying in Krakow for a few more nights before heading to Berlin as well. Since we had nowhere better to be, we just hung out in her hostel and drank their free coffee. We then spent a couple hours sitting on a park bench outside the train station. We ended up boarding the train about a half hour early and Michelle sat with us on the train until a few minutes before it left. We may miraculously meet up with her again since she is flying into Toronto only an hour before we land on August 23. She says she may also come visit us in Reese to find out if all of Ben’s crazy stories have any legitimacy in them. She claims to enjoy a good road trip and has visited Grand Rapids a few times, so this one might actually happen sometime.

While on board the train, Ben and I had just began to doze off when the ticket lady came to look at our tickets. Fearing the worst, we handed our tickets over to be inspected. Reluctantly, she handed them back to us and continued on with her route. As of now, it looks like we will be escaping Poland without having to pay for a ticket. It is midnight now and we should be in Prague by 7:00 am. Then if all goes well, we will be in Berlin by early afternoon.

August 10

Our ride on the train wasn’t as extremely pleasant one. First we had four people join us in our cabinet. As soon as they got up to get off only a couple hours into the ride, another group of three guys took their spots. I was really looking forward to having a cabinet to ourselves for a while which would allow us to close the shades and sprawl out across four seats apiece. Instead, I ended up sleeping with my head on the seat next to me and my feat uncomfortably on the small ledge of the vent. I say sleep, but really it turned into a series of naps because our tickets got checked about every two hours. When the train finally arrived in Prague, my neck and shoulders were sore and stiff from this uncomfortable position. We waited for about an hour in Prague until our train left for Berlin. Neither one of us had much food. I ate a Snickers bar, which turned out to be my only food for about twelve hours. I don’t think Ben ate anything during that time. After an easy ride to Berlin, though, we found a McDonalds with chicken burgers for one Euro apiece. Ben had three and I had two. We then started making our way around the city. There were no free maps, so we were going to have to rely on the kindness of the Germans once again. All we knew about Berlin was the Reichstag and the Berlin wall. We found out that we could see the Reichstag from the other side of the train station, so we walked there first. We had also learned that we could take a free walk to the top of the dome of the Reichstag, so we were hoping to get that accomplished during the day. When we got there, however, there was at least an hour long wait, so we decided to come back in the morning after the worker assured us there would be no queue at 8:00 am. He then directed us to a small section of the wall that we could check out. We started walking in that direction, but got distracted by a huge park with a bunch of nice sleeping places. We decided to lay down for a while. It ended up turning into a two hour nap fairly easily as we never really got much sleep the night before. After our rest, we wondered around aimlessly until we found a map and found our way to the wall. During our walk, we had been looking for a grocery store and a place to spend the night. We found neither. We ended up seeing the wall and then the holocaust memorial among a few other things.

During the past few days, my left foot had really started to become quite sore. Unfortunately, the heavy-duty Velcro walking shoes that I had purchased for the trip had begun to collapse on the right side of my left heal. Over time, this made my steps quite uncomfortable, but not enough for me to dust of my wallet to purchase another pair (which might take excruciating pain to accomplish). We were walking through an obscure trail in the park we had found earlier in search of a place to sleep after our day’s excursion when we stumbled upon a pile of clothes in the woods. It had looked like somebody had dumped their unwanted belongings there. After spotting a pair of shoes in this pile, I was elated to see that they were in decent shape and actually fit me. Now I am walking around in a pair of Puma athletic shoes. To Ben’s disgust, I am still carrying around my other shoes in case these one’s don’t work and to hopefully take back once I get to the States. It takes only the most frugal of men to haul around a pair of shoes for two weeks just to have a slight possibility of being able to return them for $30.00.

Once we finally decided on a place to sleep, we sat with our feet in the water at a nearby pond until the sun began to drop low over the horizon. We went back to our spot and Ben found a mat from another pile of junk in the woods. We laid our mats out under the low lying bush and wrapped our blankets around us tightly to avoid being bitten my the many bugs in the area. We fell asleep rather quickly and comfortably under the bush, even though we were only about 100 feet from a road. However, while only a few hours into the night, I woke from a rain drop slashing on my face. I woke Ben up and we packed up quickly and moved to our first designated rain shelter. This shelter was a monument that was tall and skinny with the roof about fifty feet high. We though that we could hide inside one of its interior walls to escape the rain. However, after setting up inside, we realized that every inch was susceptible to the rain. We then moved to the next building over where all the lights were on under its balcony. We decided to sacrifice inconspicuousness for a rain shelter. Inside the building, there were a multitude of tents spread out inside the building. We weren’t sure why they were in there, but we assumed we would get kicked out of our spot under the balcony early in the morning. Either way, at the time, we had a perfectly dry spot to try and get some sleep. I picked out a flat concrete bench that had no back or sides and Ben found a spot on the ground. Both spots seemed exceptionally comfortable.

August 11

We woke up from one of the best sleeps we have had outside at 7:50 am. The only time either one of us woke up during the night was when people came to open the building up sometime in the early morning. We were somewhat surprised that we weren’t asked to leave then, but we rolled over and went back to sleep. The Reichstag opened its door at 8:00 am, so it didn’t look like we were going to be making it in time to be in the first group. We assumed that there wouldn’t be a problem getting in since the guy told us there was never a line early in the morning. However, once we got there, there was already over a half hour wait. Since we had nothing better to do, we sat in line before entering through the doors. Security was pretty tight, so we were forced to empty our pockets and send our bags through a scanner; something we have become quite familiar with on this trip. Once through security, we were taken via elevator to the dome at the top of the building. I was surprised at the technology employed in the dome. First of all, you were given a free audio guide to take along with you on your walk around the spiral inside the dome. This audio guide was set to inform you of every site in Berlin that you would see through the dome windows. As you walked, the guide automatically adjusted to where you were in the building to tell you what exactly you were looking at. If you wanted to move on before it was done explaining your view, you just kept walking and it immediately started talking about the next site. Inside the dome, there was a complex mirror system that was designed to light the inside of the debate room down below. They had a special rotating shade around the dome that slowly moved around each day to keep the glare from reflecting inside. As we climbed around the spiral walkway to the top, we could see everything there was in Berlin. It was here that we were informed that the building we slept next to was actually the old congressional building. We could see the monument we first tried to sleep under and the building in plain view. Once to the top, our audio guides informed us that the hole in the top of the dome was designed to allow fresh air to circulate inside and a giant basin underneath the hole was designed to catch all the rainfall. The whole thing was a pretty neat experience.

After our visit to the Reichstag, we walked back to the train station to make our way to Hamburg. We had found a grocery store in the train station and we all set to go to Hamburg when we remembered that we wanted to stop in Wittenburg on the way to see if we could find the church where Martin Luther posted his complaints. Neither one of us were sure of the exact facts, but we thought we would give it a try on the way. Since the train to Hamburg wasn’t stopping in Wittenburg, we needed to find another train to get there. It was a pleasant surprise to find that of all the many platforms in the Berlin station, the next train to Wittenburg was leaving on the platform exactly across from the train to Hamburg. All we needed to do was turn around and wait twenty minutes longer.

Once in Wittenburg, we were disappointed to find the information booth made no mention of any catholic church in the area. It didn’t look like we were in the right place if the church even existed anymore. We were able to find a post office and a cheap grocery store though. We ended up finding ourselves back at the train station waiting for the next train to Hamburg less than an hour after we arrived. We needed to wait another hour before our train left. Our train ride turned into an interesting one as well. We met a couple Americans who were in their sixties. At first I thought they might be brothers. Then I started to think they might be gay. Once one of the men told a story about his “friend’s” brother and called him his brother-in-law, it pretty much closed the door on that question. They were pretty interesting, however, to say the least. It was one of those situations that you just had to see to believe. I could not explain these two in a reasonable amount of time…and we can just leave it at that.

After that experience was over, we said goodbye and got off at the Hamburg central station. Our first order of business was to take a nap. We headed for the first grassy spot we could find. It wasn’t very well secluded, but it was going to have to do because we didn’t feel like walking another step at that point. Our hour long nap ended up turning into four hours and the next thing we knew it was nearly 8:00 pm. We still needed to decide where we wanted to sleep for the night. We ended up finding a nice bridge to serve as our rain shelter, so we set up camp in a park right next to the river. We aren’t more than fifty feet from the bridge in case we get rained on again. It has been overcast all day, so it looks like there may be a distinct possibility of that happening. I hope we hear the rain before we wake up soaked because we are set up about fifty feet from a busy set of train tracks and about 100 feet from a main road. Even now at about 11:00 pm both are extremely noisy. I may have a hard time sleeping based on this fact and that I just woke up from a four hour nap only a few hours ago. Ben is already in a coma for the night so it doesn’t look like these points are bothering him. The time has come for me to put down my computer for the night and hope for sleep.

August 12

The night was not kind to us. Among the car traffic, the pedestrian traffic, and the train traffic, sleep did not come easily. On top of that, I managed to develop a cold over the night from the stiff, persistent breeze. One that would progress throughout the day, although never growing into more than a mere annoyance. And as if the night hadn’t been tough enough, it began to rain shortly after I woke up around 6:00 am. I woke Ben up and we walked to our designated rain shelter; a bridge that was only a ten second walk from our places in the grass. It was there that we would end up spending the majority of the day. Even though it was a cold, rainy day, we still managed to find a few moments of enjoyment throughout it.

After the rain had ceased and we decided to try to make something of the day. I started to get packed after wiping off a dozen spiders from my bag as I had rested my bag against a spider’s nest on the wall. When I put my ball cap on, I felt something moving around in my hair. I ended up pulling out some sort of worm about the size of my little finger. After inspecting the rest of my hat, we walked to the train station to find a place to go for the day. We already had our reservation set for the following morning to head to Copenhagen, so we were sure that we going to be spending another night in Hamburg. We decided to get on the train that headed to the other side of Hamburg to see if the other side of the city was more interesting. After making the ten minute ride, we looked out the window to see nothing of interest at all. We just kept on riding. After a couple more stops, we saw what looked like a nice small town, so we got off. There we found a Penny Markt just as in Reutlingen, so we were thrilled. We went in to buy some things to stock up on groceries for the next few days, but decided to only buy a couple things and then come back before we left the town. I ended up buying a pack of oranges for the Vitamin C and Ben bought one of his favorite yogurt drinks he has been ranting about for a couple weeks now. We then found a nice bench down the street and prepared for some serious sitting. I dove into the oranges while Ben got bored and went for a walk. He left his bag with me since he had been complaining of its weight constantly for the past few days. He had already sent some clothes home, but had taken on some souvenirs to weigh himself down. He had been contemplating throwing some clothes away over the past few days. However, despite these complaints, he ended up coming back from his walk with a new pair of pants and a few pair of socks. I made sure to point out that he had lost his right of complaint.

After going back to the Penny Markt to stock up on our groceries, we headed back to the train station while the afternoon was still young. Ben said he wanted to go back to our bridge to take a “shower” in the lake, even though it wasn’t even 70°. We didn’t say a word to each other during the entire train ride because our four previous conversations on the train platform had all resulted in arguments over the price of beer compared to milk in Germany, the cause of World War One, the differences in climate from Michigan and Germany, and the meaning of the word ‘anarchy’. With such a wide variety of conversation pieces gone awry, we each quietly decided to quit trying.

Back under our bridge, Ben decided that it was too cold and the water was too dirty for his bath after all. We ended up sitting around for the rest of the day. Since it was only about 2:30 pm when we got back to the bridge, it seemed as though we were in for a long day of relaxing. Among the highlights of the day was when Ben was eating lunch and he managed to eat a section of his sandwich that a certain bee was also enjoying at the time. By the time he realized that the crunchy part of his sandwich wasn’t a chunk of bone, he had already bit the bee’s head off and had gotten stung with the other end. This caused the inside of his left cheek to throb with pain for a while. He must stink more than I, because he has gotten stung nearly a half dozen times so far and I have hardly even seen a bee on the trip.

Later, after about 150 pages had been read in my book, I decided that I didn’t want to try to keep my eyes open any longer. I snapped off a picture of the hundreds of sailboats on the lake and got ready for sleep. Although it was only 8:30 pm and there were still many people walking back and forth under our bridge, I was exhausted from the previous night and wanted the morning to come quickly. Just after I watched a man haul in a nice fish (which looked like a walleye) about fifteen feet away from my bed, I rolled over and closed my eyes. I fell asleep well before the sun went down.

August 13

(9:00) After sleeping for a majority of the night, we woke up around 6:00 am as the sun had just peaked over the tree line. Our train left for Copenhagen at 7:25 am, but we decided to start walking there right away just in case. We dusted off our blankets and sleeping pads, packed up our bags, and started walking. We got to the train station with about an hour to spare, so we took the time to eat our breakfasts. I imagine that eventually Jagswurst sandwiches will get old soon since I bought two loafs of bread and three packages of this meat. For now, though, it made for a good breakfast with another orange.

After we boarded our train, we were happy to see we were seated next to an American couple in their thirties or forties who had been enjoying a trip similar to ours. We exchanged stories and travel tips for a while until they were upgraded to first class. Then another couple came to sit in the open seats. They only lasted for a few minutes before they found other seats. After the third couple came to sit next to us and proceeded to leave within mere minutes, I began to think that we really did stink pretty bad. This must be a distinct possibility due to our lack of shower for the last four or five days. Even though we have grown accustomed to our stench and my nose isn’t working properly due to a cold, I am still surprised that we can’t smell ourselves. Right now we are going to meet my mom’s old friend from high school, Brian, in Copenhagen. If the first thing he offers us is a shower, then it may be obvious.

(24:00) Before getting to Copenhagen, an odd thing happened with our train. It ran into a boat. It didn’t collide with a boat, but it literally rode right onto the rail tracks inside the ferry. We were told we needed to leave our stuff in the train and head up to the deck of the ferry for the forty-five minute cruise across the sea. Once we crossed the water, we got back onto the train and then rode through the other side of the boat as we continued toward Copenhagen. Once we got to Copenhagen, we needed to find a specific train station so we could figure out the directions I had written down to get to Brian’s house. Everything went smoothly except a fifteen minute detour we took when we went the wrong way out of the train station. It was worth our effort less than fifteen minutes upon arrival. We met Brian, and later his family, who are all extremely kind and hospitable. I took a shower for the first time in at least four days and emailed my mother to let her know we made it safely. We were thrilled to see that the boys, Jonas and Jakob (pronounced Yonas and Yakub), had a Playstation 3 and enjoyed all the same movies and video games as us. Even there television was in English with Danish subtitles.

Later in the evening, we sat down for dinner outside on the patio area. We enjoyed lasagna, salad, fresh bread, and I had a glass of Coca-cola. This was the first pop I remember having during the entirety of our trip. The dinner was delicious and filling, but the conversation was even better. Brian enjoyed hearing about some of the people in the community he hadn’t heard about in a while, and I enjoyed talking to somebody other than Ben. After dinner, we went to the park where Brian and Hanne kept their horse Endy (not sure of spelling). We took a few bikes along for Brian, Ben, and I to ride while Hanne rode Endy, a beautiful Icelandic horse. Hanne told us how Icelandic horses could not come back to Iceland once they left because Iceland has a ban on imported horses still standing from over 1000 years ago. If an Icelandic horse leaves Iceland for a competition or show, they were not allowed to come back, which is how they acquired Endy. As we rode through the park, Brian told us of its history of being a hunting grounds for three different species of deer. He said we would probably see some and boy did we ever. We ended up seeing probably more than 1000 deer during our bike ride through the woods. The deer were unafraid of humans, so I was able to get extremely close to a few. Each species of deer were a different size. The biggest of the deer closely resembled an elk although their body size wasn’t quite as big. Their antlers were massive, however, and we got extremely close to a group of bachelors in an open field. On the other side of the park was a castle that only allowed motor vehicles to through its gates once a week. In the field in front of the castle, there was deer as far as the eye could see. I would honestly believe that there were about 1000 deer just in the field. On the other side of the hill, you could see the sea, and across the water was Sweden. I can’t believe I forgot to take my camera along with me for this little excursion. After we had made the loop around the area, we came back a different way to see Copenhagen’s theme park which was the oldest in Europe. Brian, Ben, and I locked the bikes up and took a walk through the theme park while Hanne took the horse back. After we made our way through, we then rode back to meet Hanne at the horse stable. We then walked the horse back to its grazing area where it stays during every hour of the year as it can handle the cold with no problem.

Back at the house, we eventually settled down for tea, coffee, and a few snacks. One of the oddities was one of the snacks which didn’t seem odd at all at the time. They were black licorice gummies, but they had an odd tang. At first I liked them, then I didn’t, but in the end, I decided I liked them in a unique way. Besides the normal black licorice taste, they also had an extremely salty tang to them which is apparently a Danish quirk. I was told that the strong taste wasn’t even strong compared to most Danish black licorice. Anyway, we again delved into some interesting conversation. It is unbelievable how nice our hosts have been to us. First dinner, then a tour, then tea, and then an immaculate set up for our sleeping arrangements. I told them that they might be careful or else we could end up staying for the rest of our ten days left in Europe.

August 5

Today was moving day. No one was excited about it, but it had to be done. Our German friends had left us throughout the previous few days which made the transition a little easier. We woke up around 7:30 am to make sure we had ample time to get breakfast, finish cleaning up, and take our room key back by 8:30 am. We had to catch the train at 9:27 am to Prague which meant Ben and I needed to start walking around 8:45 am. Tiff decided she was going to take the bus, and with good reason. She had five bags she was toting around which would make any one and a half mile walk miserable. It was relatively hot during our walk and our bags were feeling especially heavy. One reason was that we hadn’t had to carry them for a week and we had gotten a little soft during our luxurious stay at Mark’s. The other reason was because of all the souvenirs we have acquired. My version of a souvenir was a beer mug and a couple shot glasses from the shops while Ben’s was all the condiments and toiletries that Mark had left behind for us.

Upon arrival at the train station, Tiff was no where to be found. I was actually just printing off the itinerary for a later departure time when she strolled in. We hopped on the train with an easy ten hour ride in front of us. This particular trip consisted of five trains and four changeovers. The last two trains were two and four hours respectively. Surprisingly, we never had more than a fifteen minute wait in between trains. Everything went relatively smoothly for the whole thing. The biggest shake up was when we had walked through a couple train cars and had only found seats for us all in the common area part of the train where people usually rode if they were only going to be on for a couple stops. After searching unsuccessfully for a better spot, I suggested that we go back. Ben told me to go back and sit by myself if I wanted to sit there so bad. Before he could even get the words out of his mouth I had already stepped off the train to head back. After one stop on that train, everybody in that part of the car got off and I had the whole thing to myself and a couple mountain bikes being stored there. I ended up laying across four seats and finishing my book and diving into another before the train had stopped.

Once we finally made it to Prague, we found it initially difficult to comprehend prices. Things were supposed to be cheaper here, but a Whopper costs 149.00 CZK. Apparently somewhere between 20.00 and 25.00 CZK is the equivalent of 1.00 Euro which is the roughly the equivalent of 0.70 USD. Needless to say, my mental math skills need to sharpen up throughout the next couple days. The same will be true in Poland (if we go), Denmark, Sweden, and Norway as each uses a different currency. I plan to bring a sampling of coins home from each country as a type of souvenir. I will say that it was pretty funny getting a bill from an ATM with a denomination of 1000.

After we got some money from the ATM we checked into our hostel and began to make ourselves at home. At this particular hostel, there are many free amenities you can get by leaving a small deposit for each. I now have a towel and a key to a locker the size of a prison cell. I can rest assured our stuff is locked up and have a towel to dry off with for the first time this trip. I’m actually going to take a shower right now. Since I worked up quite a lather today, I plan on making it a long one. After that, I’m going to bed after another long, exhausting day of train travel.

August 6

We slept in until about 8:30 am before hunger got the best of me and I got up to go check out the breakfast menu. Saw me get up and decided to join me. The night before, we had paid for the breakfast at a discounted price but were never informed of the menu among the formalities of check in, so we were interested to see what was on the docket. We were not thrilled to see that our best option of the three different menus was a roll, a slice of bread, a slice of processed “cheese”, and a small glass of orange juice. Needless to say, we didn’t sign up for breakfast for the following morning. Part of our accommodation at this hostel, though, was free, unlimited coffee; something that Ben and I planned to take full advantage of. Before we took off for the day, Ben had already had four cups while I had downed three.

We left the hostel with only about an hour before the clock struck noon. We had no major plans, but expected to explore the majority of the city during the day. Prague is supposedly known for its cheap prices, good beer, and culture (since it escaped all but a single bomb in World War Two according to a guy on the train). While we were still trying to adjust to a new currency, we were hesitant to start shucking out our coin. I had 300 CZK to make it through the day while the other two had much more apparently. We spent the majority of the day checking out many of the shops and food peddlers along the streets. We crossed the famous Charles Bridge and were impressed by the dozens of artists lined up ready to draw caricatures of anybody willing to spend 900 CZK. Ben and I enjoyed looking at the drawings of celebrities while we tried to guess which one each picture resembled. We also found ourselves sitting outside the shops while we waited for Tiff to find the right souvenir. We tried to convince her to think like a man and quit making so many informed decisions, but it didn’t work so well. Ben spent quite a lot of time and money in his search for the perfect souvenirs as well. Meanwhile, I just tagged along, not too interested in blowing money that I could easily use to feed myself. I ended up getting two hot dogs (one a footlong), an ice cream cone, and a dish from a Chinese restaurant. Unfortunately, the soy sauce came out too quickly and the sauce I generously applied to my spring roll thinking it was sweet and sour turned out to be fiercely spicy. Although the taste was nearly unbearable, I wasn’t about to let it go to waste. Ben and Tiff also got quite a laugh from the scene. I used a fistful of napkins to wipe the perspiration from my face and, at one point, used one to wipe my tongue in hopes of relief. I had no such luck. I had flashbacks of a certain hot wings story many of my friends and family might recall.

After I had recovered, we ended up having an extremely typical day, with the exception of one instance. We went to the town square and checked out the castle and the cathedrals just like in every other city across the face of Europe. When we finally had enough, we started to make our way back to the metro station to head back to our hostel. After we had asked at the main train station if our Eurail passes were valid for the metro and were assured they were, we had used them to get to the city center. However, once we tried to board to get back to the main train station, we were asked to show our tickets by a metro security guard. Once we showed our tickets, he went to his supervisor, then came back to inform us that they were not valid. On top of that, he told us that we each had to pay a 700 CZK (about 40 USD) fine for trying to board the subway illegitimately. We explained how little sense this made and told him that we didn’t have any cash anyway. He pointed us to an ATM and I pointed to the exit that we were going to walk out. We all just walked away, up the escalator toward the exit. I never even looked back, but when I got to the top Tiff and I noticed that the guy had rode up the escalator with Ben and was still trying to get us to pay this fine. At this point, I thought perhaps our good fortune of escaping the law with an act of ignorance had worn out. We again got into a pointless argument lasting a few more minutes before he finally realized we weren’t paying the fine. He then tried to get us to pay for a ticket to get onto the metro. We explained that we would just walk then as we turned our backs to walk out of the station. I never looked back to see if he was following us again, but when we got out of the station he was no longer in pursuit, so we managed to escape another stressful situation successfully. I can only imagine that the man fully intended on pocketing any money that we would be willing to fork over. He may have underestimated our hardened grittiness. Or could it be frugality?

The rest of the day was quite uneventful. We made it back to our hostel with no further confrontations. It was about 7:30 pm before we got settled back down in our beds. We each had a couple things to occupy our time until bed. Tomorrow looks like it will be filled with more traveling and sore shoulders.

August 7

(21:00) Tiff woke us up around 7:30 am; about five minutes before she needed to leave. Ben and I both got up to escort her to the train station which was about a half hour walk. Tiff had one gigantic rolling suitcase, a smaller rolling suitcase, a backpack, and a large purse. Ben pulled the big one and I the little one. We walked Tiff all the way onto the train and wished her luck, which it looked like she was going to need. I’m not sure how she planned on carrying all her bags during her transfer, let alone to and from an airport. She said that she had doubled her luggage since she has been in Europe which is why she had to buy the giant suitcase the night before. It will be interesting to see how she did.

After Ben and I walked back to the hostel, we had a few hours to blow before we had to be back at the train station to catch our train to Vienna. We spent the time drinking coffee, goofing around on the internet, and taking showers. Both of us had showered the night before, but since we had put the deposit down on our towels, we decided to get one more use out of them during our spare time. It didn’t take long after checkout, however, before we were long past the point of perspiration. The train ride didn’t allow for much comfort either. The seats were relatively small and there was no air conditioning, so the only cool air came through the open windows. Every time we stopped I would break out in a sweat just sitting in my seat. Despite this fact, the four and a half hour ride really wasn’t that bad. I guess I have just come to accept air conditioning as a luxury on these trains. I was able to make it through a hundred pages or so in my book and we were in Vienna before we knew it.

In Vienna, we really had no clue what there was to see. We immediately grabbed a map and started heading toward what looked like the city’s center. Along the walk there was a multitude of different statues and historical buildings that we forced ourselves to take pictures of for if no other reason than just to prove we were there. We walked over a mile to the main parts of the city before deciding that we had had enough already. It was a nice city, but it was just a city as we saw it. There were at least two times during our walk when I was talking and I forgot which city we were actually in. I even forgot what country we were in at one point. I guess there comes a point when culture shock turns into cultural indifference. We walked back to the train station to find out when the next train left to the border station of the Czech Republic and Poland. If all goes well, we should be getting to Auschwitz in the morning. However, right now it seems like a big “if”. Since the farther east we have been going the less informed we have been, we aren’t really sure if the train we plan on taking will get us to our destination. We were told that we were all set, but another sign told us that we needed a reservation. Since we have already traveled to the other main station where there is no longer an information booth available, it looks like we are going to find out the hard way. We figure that the worst thing that could happen is that we get kicked off the train somewhere closer to our desired stop and will be forced to find a place to sleep there until we can escape. This could get interesting, but hopefully not.

(24:00) Well it got interesting as it always seems to do. Due to the fact that the night entailed no sleep other than a fifteen minute snooze, I’m just going to include the following events as part of the next day.

August 8

(14:00) We ended up meeting some people at the train platform that seemed to be in the same situation as us. In fact, each of the three people we encountered were all going to a different destination but weren’t sure if the train was the correct one. One of the people we talked to decided that she was heading the same direction we wanted to go and we invited her to join us. We ended up getting on the train with the intention to get off at the stop before Poland to sort out our situation from there. Our friend, a Canadian girl, was trying to get to Krakow, which was just on the other side of Poland’s border. Somewhere along our ride of dire uncertainty, Ben and I decided that we would ride as far as they let us or to Krakow depending on whichever would come first. We struggled to find a seat for the longest time before a train worker saw us standing in the walkway between cars and directed us to a few open seats. We sat there for a couple hours until a couple came and claimed the seats as their reservation. We all ended up moving to another cabin where there were three more open seats. There we stayed for the remainder of the trip; a trip that we never imagined would take as long as it did. The first problem started at a stop somewhere in the Czech Republic. Our train had remained stationary at the stop for forty-five minutes before finally resuming our progress. However, at this time (about 1:30 am) the train was delayed so far behind schedule that we didn’t know when we would need to start looking for our stop which we were supposed to arrive at around 2:00 am. I guess we all thought the other would look out for it or that we had more time than we thought, but we all managed to fall asleep. When I woke up, I had no clue where we were, let alone what country we were in. Our Eurail pass isn’t supposed to be applicable in Poland, so we figured once we were near crossing the border they would come check tickets and make us exit at the stop before the Poland border. If not, it looked like we would be heading to Poland after all, somewhere I have been excited to visit since my History of Poland class last year. Well we ended up getting our tickets checked at least three times after crossing the border, so it looked like it wasn’t going to be a problem. However, by the time we figured out where we were, we were told that the next stop was Warsaw, a mere seven hours past our original destination. Our arrival time would be around 9:00 am. We decided to try to go back to sleep and accept our fate. I was kind of excited because I had been disappointed that we wouldn’t be able to visit Warsaw due to the anticipated extra cost. Ben ended up sleeping for a couple hours, but my train sleeping skills failed me. I ended up entertaining myself by watching Ben smash his head on his chest every five minutes when his head fell off the head rest each time he fell deep enough into his sleep. After waking he had no recollection.

After we finally arrived in Warsaw, we admittedly had no idea what we planned on doing. Ben and I basically assumed we would walk around for a couple hours before heading back to Krakow for the night. This was a problem for Michelle (our Canadian friend) because she didn’t have unlimited train travel as we did. She decided she would just buy a separate ticket to accompany us in Krakow. With that being understood, we went out to explore. The first thing we wanted to do was take a nap. Carrying forty pounds on my back with a tally of fifteen minutes of sleep for the night wasn’t something I was excited about doing, although I didn’t feel as bad as I could have under the circumstances. We found a park somewhere near the train station with an extra long bench that could accommodate both of our long sets of legs. Meanwhile, Michelle decided she would walk back to the train station in search of a map while we watched her bags. I had just began to drift into the state of mind somewhere between deep thought and sleep when I was awakened by loud Polish speaking above my head. I opened my eyes to see two police officers hovering above me. I explained my deficiency in Polish and they struggled to tell me in English that there was no sleeping allowed in the park. They were nice enough about the situation, but who ever heard of a law about sleeping. It made me wonder how many pages of legal documentation it would take to fully clarify the transgression of “sleep” under United States’ legislation. I was still in the midst of laughing off another encounter with the police when I saw Michelle marching back toward us, map in hand. We immediately began to plan our walk around the city based on the map. We ended up seeing all the usuals as far as cities went. Two things that did stick out, however, was the eternal flame above the guarded monument of the Unnamed Soldier (apparently dedicated to all unnamed soldiers of World War Two) and the statue of Joseph Pilsudski, who I remember studying in History of Poland. Once this two and a half hour excursion had come to an end, we looked for the first train back to Krakow. We ended up getting on a train leaving Warsaw at 1:05 pm that was set to arrive in Krakow in 4:00 pm. When we got on the train, we had no idea where we were supposed to sit or if we were even supposed to be on the train at all. Shortly after had boarded, we had already been walking around looking for seats after being kicked out of two reserved seats when we were asked to show our tickets. The man looked at my ticket and told me to follow him to the workers’ cabin. I thought for sure we had broken some rule, but he struggled to tell me what exactly we had done wrong. He seemed like he was trying to help me even though I wasn’t sure what he was saying. He mentioned something about having to pay for a reservation; a price that was fairly reasonable, before just telling us to walk to the train car in the back of the train. We weren’t sure what we were headed to, but when we got there, we were pleasantly surprised. We ended up sitting in what seemed like a first class cabin with a television (Polish of course), personal controlled air conditioning, and a plug in for my computer. This was the nicest train we had ridden on in a while, one that we still believe we really weren’t supposed to be on. Who would have imagined that this train would come in Poland.

(20:00) Well I managed to fall asleep for a little while on this train, but it never fails that the train worker always comes to check tickets shortly after I fall asleep. He woke me up and then informed me that we indeed had to pay for the reservation fee. The price for both was 37.00 PLZ but we told him that we only had 30.00 PLZ which was partially true, and then we told him that we didn’t have Euros or credit cards to pay with, which were not at all true. We just didn’t trust him to take our credit cards or convert our Euros to our favor. Needless to say, he ended up scribbling the total from 37.00 PLZ to 30.00 PLZ (about 10.00 USD).

We got to Krakow on time and we went to the information booth to figure out our options for Auschwitz and about a place to stay. We ended up getting a nice hostel and booked our guided tour of Auschwitz for the morning. I am surprised more than anyone that we are actually paying for a guided tour, but it was almost the same cost to take the bus and walk around without a tour. It was more than we wanted to pay to see it, but this is something that I have imagined seeing for many years. I am more excited for the morning than I thought I could every be. This should be an extremely sobering experience.

Our hostel is a little expensive, but only because we didn’t book it in advance. However, we will be getting our money’s worth since they have free breakfast, free internet, free coffee and milk, and free laundry. Not to mention the twelve hours that I plan on sleeping tonight. It is shortly after 8:00 pm and I can barely keep my eyes open due to lack of sleep. The tour bus is picking us up sometime between 8:30 am and 9:00 am. so we will need to be up and ready to make sure we don’t miss our bus.