krakow, bratislava and budapest

Arrived in Budapest this afternoon after two days in bratislava, and again, there is an annoying keyboard where the Y is where the Z is and vice versa' so apologies if things are spelt incorrectly- it takes alot of getting used to! Also, im able to upload some photos as the hostel computers are the best ones ive encountered so far and the internet is fairly fast.

I shall start with krakow, where we spent 4 days. the weather for the first two days was amaying- around 34°c average, and what we had been used to in prague and berlin. the first day, we did laundry and had a wonder around the little city. we also did a free walking tour of the jewish ghettos which was interesting and saw where the shindler factory was. there was alot of references back to that film and between the three of us, none of us had seen it! so we consulted Tony, the guy who we had bumped into again on this tour, and who we had met on the train from prague to krakow before. that evening we went to a little jazz bar down a dingy little cellar and watched some awesome band play with our new room mate Thomas, who was a jazz bassist from germany. That night the most horrible thing happened, where a drunken dickhead (who was probably irish) was checked into one of the spare beds in our room, and after falling onto the floor, vomited all over himself and the floor. kate woke up, and seriously effed and blinded this guy who was paraletic when jack ran out to fetch the receptionist. worst night ever. the hostel was full of disgusting 18yr old irish girls and boys whose aim in life was to live like they were in the hills. flipping disgusting. Anyway, we did meet some nice people. we spent some time with a guy called jared from BC, Canada, who always had a story to tell and got us into pierogies. seriously, never eaten so many pierogies in my life!

we also went to auschwitz the next day which was moving. i never realised the full extent of the extermination which happened in ww2 until visiting birkenau, where the cabins and buildings are mostly still standing. crazy stuff. we didnt make it to the salt mines as it was way too expensive (well out of our budget anyway). the third and fourth day of krakow rained like a mofo. it wasnt nice but thankfully we didnt get caught out in it to catch our deaths.

The pope ˇˇˇˇ In Kates words "he looks like he wants to go raving!" the tour guide didnt get the joke. the poles are very religious....!

After krakow, we had a night train to bratislava, which was an experience. we had a 3 bed cabin between us and we were quite suprised by the modernity of it considering the stories we had heard about night trains. we got on the train at 10pm and got off in bratislava at around 5.40AM. and check in at our next hostel wasnt until 1pm so we had a good few hours to kill on about 2 hours sleep. the train had been so shaky so a good nights sleep was well out of the question! All we had wanted was a shower and a kip, but we caffeined ourselves up with mcdonalds breakfasts and coffee, which is actually not that bad considering! So we had about a day and a half here, and the first was pretty much a write off. the second, we did another free walking tour, informing us mainly of the history of bratislava which is good, because i really wouldnt have known about it otherwise (except wiki, but internet time is pretty limited).

So now we are in budapest. got the train in this morning, got to our hostel, checked in and we were waiting for a tour around the hostel when who turns up at the door?! only soner kemal! he is here for around a month, but travelling to cities nearby such as bratislava and belgrade in serbia (which hes leaving tomorrow for), with his mate marcus from home. we went to a little weird tea shop which is decorated like an arabian shisha lounge and served the biggest tea selection i have ever seen. it was pretty cool. then we trekked up to the citadel on the buda side in the blazing 3pm heat. it was hot hot hot (still is). Apparently, according to those sign things on the highway which tell the time, date and temperature, it was 42°c which is RIDICULOUS. it definitely felt that hot by the time we got up to the top.

Tonight, we are being cooked a traditional hungarian meal by the hostel for free and it smells blooming yummy from where im sitting. then were going to meet up with soner and marcus later for a few drinks in some places they recommended. should be good fun!

hope alls well at home.

Lyn. xo

dis party is on FIREEEEE!

yo from krakow! just got here after a ridiculous 9 hour journey on two trains. bloody sloooooowwwww! in blazing heat too. but we met some nice people on the way i guess. not had the chance to update the blog since cologne as my wifi on my phone is kaput and there hasn't been any computers at our last hostels.

so the last time i wrote was in cologne. we went up the dom cathedral- never walked up so many steps in my life! but the views from the top were amazing. Germany is so hot right now(!) it's unbearable! we spent about two days in cologne, drinking alot of kolsh. from here we went to berlin for around 3 days. we did a 4 hour walking tour of the city (!!!!) in the greatest heat wave ever. learnt a whole lot about the history of berlin and the war and stuff, it's all been very educational! our hostel was on a boat- a little bit run down, but had character and a nice top deck to watch the world go by in the evenings, about two minutes away from the east side gallery of the berlin wall. There was a currywurst van party on the night we got there with djs sat up on top of it and flashing discotheque lights and actually really good djing! It was great cos there was a kiosk (newsagent type) next door where we bought our beers for around 1euro! great night, but we had so much to do during the days and it was, again, ridiculously hot so we had to pace ourselves incase we got heat exhaustion or something like that.

anywwaayy, from here, we went to prague which was beautiful. two nights and 1 and a half days here was enough to get a grasp of the place. the architecture here is amazing, and it's a wonder how it is still standing with it being so old. there were ALOT of tourists here, especially in the old market square. the first night we were there was the first night of the prague jazz festival and we stumbled across it by pure accident. we saw the Stanley Clarke Trio for FREE and it was amazing. the whole atmosphere of the crowd was uncomparable. it was alot of fun.

now we're in krakow. we have 4 days here. tomorrow we are going to find a laundrette and do some laundry- exciting! everyones running out of knickers (inc jack) so it's getting pretty desperate. the next day we'll go to auschwitz-birkenau, and the next the salt mines. we have more time here than any other place to kind of relax a bit. next stop: bratislava which will be our first sleeper train. then it's to Budapest (!!!!) to see Soner Kemal and his mate from home. looking forward to the big outside club place i've been told about. we've not really had chance to party much which isn't that bad, seeing as though we're doing so much during the day, but i think i'll crave it by the time i get to budapest. lolzz.

i'm mega hungry now so im going to go to mcdonalds and get a euroburger. or rather a 3zloty burger which is LESS THAN A EURO!! WINNER!!

rice and peace xxxx

greetings!

gooten taag! Just "landed" in Cologne, and the heat is nearly unbearable! Free internet access is finally allowing me to update this blog, despite the letter Y on the keyboard being where the Z should be! The train from Amsterdam to Cologne was lovely and airconditioned, nothing like these south west train lines in the UK. Jack said he's going to write to the prime minister to sort it out...

Amsterdam was fun, the weather was nice, not as hot as it is here, but still very nice. We saw lots of prostitutes in the red light district, one named paula who should have probably been in the blue light district instead. We watched the netherlands match at a dutch pub, which was amazing fun, and then on our wonder back to the hostel via town there was party central mayhem going on: trams stopping, people screaming, car horns beeping, people dancing on top of statues and monuments! it was mental! all good fun though. A little bit gutted that germany are out, as we could have had fun drunken times planned for sunday evening in Beerlin.

Our hostel in Köln is two minutes away from the train station and the Dam, so we're going to have a little wonder around after we have checked mail, emailed home, facebook, etc. May decide to post again before heading to Berlin but depends on how much time we have.

Hope everything is well with you all. Anz exciting news to tell??

Lots of love,
Lyn (and kate and jack) xxxxxx

First

I have been told I need to keep a blog to record my adventures of my European tour and as an easy way to keep you all informed of my trip. Can't promise it'll be very interesting or very well written but if you know me well enough to be reading this then you will know I don't really care what you think...! Anywaaaayyy I will try and keep it updated as much as I can!