London – We flew into Heathrow and the plan was to
catch a train to Jamies grandmothers house in Oxford but her house was
flooded. So we got a tube to Camden & met up with Jamies cousin
David who agreed to let us stay for a few days. The first night in
London we met up with some of Jamie’s friends. We didn’t really want
to do any of the touristy stuff in London, but we did go the National
Gallery and Trafalger Sqaure. The exchange rate for pounds to Canadian
dollars was pretty brutal so we didn’t spend much. We caught up with a
friend from school, Nicole who was in Kensington. We walked past Hyde
Park but we didn’t go check out the Princesss Diana memorial, so I
didn’t get the chance to pee in it. If London wasn’t so ridiculously
expensive I would love to live there, going to the pub for a pint is a
great way to spend an evening.
Amsterdam – I
knew this would be the highlight of the trip, I’d heard a lot of
stories about what we should do and where to go in Amsterdam. To be
fair there is a lot of cool stuff to do if sex drugs aren’t your thing
…. we did go visit Anne Franks house, and the Rijksmuseum which has
about 1000 Van Gogh and Rembrandt paintings. But my favorite museum
was the Heineken Experience which lovingly tells the story of Hollands
favorite beer with interactive displays. As you make your way through
the “museum” there are 3 different pubs where you get to sample the
beer.
The nightlife in Amsterdam is amazing, we went to Boom
Chicago which is an improv comedy club. I was surprised how everyone
in Holland spoke English, and the Dutch have no accent. It sounds a
bit American and a bit English, but I would have a hard time spotting a
Dutchman.
I wanted to check out a coffee house in Amsterdam, but I
was not planning on trying any drugs. We went into a coffee house on
the first night & they had a menu of what you could buy – they had
cookies and brownies and doughnuts, and hashie milkshakes. I tried a
brownie, it was supposed to be the equivalent of 2 joints. I think I
was more influenced from the jug of beer we had at boom Chicago. On
our second night in Amsterdam we decided to get a gram of marijuana.
I’m not an expert but it was good stuff. Amsterdam has to be one of
the most interesting places, the people dress like Vogue models. The
red light district was not as sleazy as I expected, it seemed pretty
touristy actually. I was surprised when Jamie suggested we go see a
live sex show, I was happy to try anything & everything we could on
our trip. It was just regular sex, a guy & a girl, 2 lesbians and
then a jungle woman with triple-D boobs having sex with a guy in a
gorilla suit. It was something fun to do as a one-off, but I don’t
think it would be something you would do every week, like instead of
going to the movies you would catch a sex show.
On our last night in
Amsterdam we met up with the rest of our Contiki group. There were 50
people in our group, mostly Australians & New Zealanders and some
South Africans, Canadians, Americans. There were a couple of
Brazilians and Tawainese too, so it was a good mix of people.
Munich
– we were all pretty hung over when we left Amsterdam at 6am to drive
to Munich, Germany. Our tour guide was Rachel, a cool chick from New
Zealand, she basically talked to us like a school teacher & told us
we would have to stay with the group & leave when she told us or
they’d leave without us. We arrived in Munich at about 4PM, just in
time to go see the Glockinspeil. Rachel told us it was the highlight
of Munich … basically it’s a huge cuckoo clock. It went for 10 minutes,
and there were literally 1000s of people watching. When the clock
finally stopped chiming we went for a tour of Munchen. In the middle
of the city is a park where office workers go & sit and eat their
lunch and take their clothes off … it was a nudist park! We went to a
beer hall in Munich for dinner, the very one where Hitler used to go to
give some of his famous speeches. German food is pretty good, the
main course was literally just a pork leg … no vegetables, no side
dish, just meat! I had 2 steins with my dinner so I don’t remember
miuch else happening in Munich, except back at the hotel half the group
went to bed & half the group went to the bar for another drink.
Jamie and I met a local Munchen man who offered to buy us a drink, cos
he enjoyed speaking English and just wanted to talk to us …. ahh ok we
went to bed pretty quickly then. We drove to Switzerland the next
morning, but we did make a stop at the Dacchau concentration camp, they
turned the original buildings into a museum. I have to respect Germany
for not trying to cover up their darkest chapter in history.
Geneva / Lucerne / Zurich
– the trip itinerary was very full, we spent a lot of time each day on
the bus traveling to our next destination. We arrived in Zurich at
lunch time, it’s the one city in Europe that looked exactly how I
expected & was looking forward to explore it. Too bad Rachel gave
us 30 minutes to see the city & have lunch …. just enough time to
grab a McSwiss burger. The Swiss Alps were beautiful and I definitely
want to go back with my snowboard. It was funny seeing the Australians
and South Africans get excited about seeing snow for the first time.
In Lucerne we saw a yodeling demonstration and had a traditional Swiss
dinner. But the highlight of Lucerne was the hotel, which was
basically overtaken by our group. It’s where the group really bonded,
and I leant heaps of new drinking games.
Cannes / Nice / Monaco
– it was a long drive from Lucerne to Cannes, with a short stop in
Zurich. When Rachel gave the group the choice of having a quiet night
at the camping grounds or going to Monaco we unanimously voted for
Monaco. Jamie & I were dressed up to hit the Grand Royale casino
…. I wanted to order a vodka martini, Jamie wanted to bet 10∍ on
black. There was a 20∍ cover charge to enter the Grand Royale, so we
hit the mini-casino next door. Jamie was insistent that he was going
to gamble in Monaco so he put 10∍ in the giant slot machine … and won
950∍! Back in Antibes we got a bottle of vodka to celebrate. The
funniest moment of the trip was in Monaco when Rachel pointed out
Prinicess Stephanie’s palace to us, and Aussie Dave yelled out ‘jeez
its bloody nice hey, I thought my house was nice but this is bloody
beautiful!’. We got to spend the next day in Cannes, you feel like a
schmuck seeing all the sports cars and huge yachts and villas. The
only other interesting thing that happened in Cannes was a guy in our
group nearly got arrested for taking photos of topless women on the
beach. There was a circus with lots of carnival rides next to the
campgrounds where we were staying. After a few beers a bunch of us
went on the giant drop, it wasn’t until we got to the top when Derrick
reminded everyone about the 13 year old girl who lost her feet on the
same ride. But we survived and went back to the huts for more beer and
card games.
Barcelona - Spain was the last
stop on our contiki trip. I’ve always thought that Italy has the
worlds most beautiful women, but Spain is a serious challenger to the
title. The architecture in Spain was amazing. It was the groups last
night & we went to a flamenco demonstration & to a nightclub
which was I was looking forward to doing for the whole trip. I tried
Sangria in Barcelona, which was pretty smooth so I drank more and
more. Maybe it was the alcohol but everybody was pretty emotional
about it being our last night, a bunch of us are planning on reuniting
for another contiki trip next year.
Paris –
Jamie & I flew to Paris the next morning . Air travel in Europe is
realy cheap, our tickets were $30, the same that it costs me to get a
train to Toronto! I’d been to Paris twice before & Jamie had been
a bunch of times before too. We had 3 nights in Paris and Jamiie said
he wanted to blow his 950 winnings from Monaco on a fancy hotel, but we
eventually decided to stay at a hostel. We got a room at the
Woodstock, a pretty famous hotel near the Sacre de Couer. We’d planned
on doing a lot in Paris,, but we were both pretty knackered, so we
ended up going to the Louvre and Les Invalides. We met a Scottish guy
at the Woodstock who spoke fluent French and he & Jamie explored
the Latin Quarter. I thought the Parisiens were pretty rude, but I
would have been disappointed if they weren’t. We got kicked out of out
hotel room at 10:30 (they have a rule you’re not allowed in your room
between 10:30 and 5), and our room got flooded from the sun roof that
was left open. Our last night in Paris was the best night of the
trip, we were planning on a having a few quiet beers at the Woodstock,
but the bar was full of tourists participating in a drinking
Olympics.
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