Slovenia: Lake Bohinj

Copenhagen photos

Amir, Jess and Peter at Peter's apartment in Bagsvaerd, Copenhagen

A square in downtown Copenhagen

I thought the baseball cap was a nice touch

A quay

Parliament building. The spirally things on the spire are actually serpent tails. Very cool.

Prague photos

View of Prague from the castle

A Notre Dame-esque church on the castle grounds

Tourists like to rub the dog in the bas relief on the Charles bridge for good luck. They've actually rubbed him gold in color.

Jess and Amir in front of the entrance to the Charles bridge

Poland photos

Young boy in the process of contracting an unkown quantity of pigeon-born diseases while his grandmother looks fondly on

One of the few asymmetrical churches

A theater

The entrance to Auschwitz which reads in German "Work makes you free".
Oh those Germans and their senses of humor.

Berlin: Alexanderplatz photos

Juxtaposition of the old (church) and the new (space needle radio tower)

Amsterdam photos

It's hard to tell in the picture but the building in the center is crooked because of settling from proximity to the canals.

Amsterdam loves its shutters

A view of the canals

the Amsterdam Centraal train station

Paris photos

Amir and Jess in front of the Eiffel Tower

Amir and Nicolas

nipple pinching at the Louvre

Jess, Amir and Nic at the top of the Eiffel Tower at night on Nic's 30th birthday July 18th

Peter, Copenhagen & gourmet meals

We had thought to get to Copenhagen, Denmark via Amsterdam because of the train schedules but ended up finding a route from Prague to Copenhagen that was painful but more direct than the Amsterdam route. The first train left at 3:33am from Prague which made for a long, uncomfortable night. Also, unbeknownst to us, the Prague train station closes down from 1am to 3am which put us outside with all our bags looking for a place to hang for two hours in the middle of the night. Thankfully, a bunch of other backpackers were in the same situation so we all sat on benches around a monument a few blocks from the train station across the street from a KFC and McDonalds that were open for food but not for seating.

Our first train (of 4) was delayed so we missed our second train which ended up changing our route and pleasantly reducing the number of trains we had to take to 2. Also a plus was the fact that our second train was a gorgeous, first class fast train with leather seats and all you can drink free coffee, tea and water. It was the lap of luxury compared to the local trains we had been taking to and from Cesky Krumlov.

After some initial confusion due to our unexpected train changes, we found Peter (college friend of Amir's), rather he found us, at the metro station two blocks from his house, where he subsequently brought us. That was Friday evening when we arrived and we've been staying with Peter since then (today is the following Wednesday). He's not only an excellent host, but also a trained chef which means we both need to go on a diet tomorrow afternoon when we leave for Hungary. The meals we have eaten day after day have been unbelievably good and the desserts are so good that there are never leftovers.

On a day with exceptionally good weather, Peter took us on a tour through Copenhagen where we saw loads of people wandering around, tons of stores featuring items that even when on sale we couldn't hope to afford, lovely multi-colored buildings lining either side of a jetty where we sat to eat Peter's wonderful wasabi-mayo veggie sandwiches and BLTs, a church whose tower is surmounted via a spiral staircase going up to the top, and a hippy area where no one wore a bra and everyone's hair reached their knees. It was a lovely day and a fun insight into the capitol city.

Peter's apartment is just a few blocks from a beautiful lake that we've walked almost every day we've been here. There are swans, ducks, blue herons (possibly) and loads of runners, joggers, walkers, cyclers and boaters. One day we all walked the lake track in the pouring rain and had the best time I think I've ever had while dripping wet with rain.

If all goes well at the Danish train ticketing office, we plan to leave tomorrow around 2pm for Sopron, Hungary where we will spend a few days before meeting up with our friend Bergen for a week in Budapest.

Cesky Krumlov, Czech Republic

We left Prague around noon via a local train bound for Cesky Krumlov in the southern part of the country. There was a train change we knew about at 3pm and our scheduled arrival time was 4pm. About 45 minutes into the first train ride, just after we finished eating our picnic lunch of baguettes, edam cheese and salami, the train conductor walks down our cabin shouting something in Czech which he translates for our benefit as "change bus". Amir and I looked at each other, thought for a minute, then came to the conclusion that he meant to say we would need to change to another train car because they must be uncoupling some of the cars at the next station.

The train pulls up to the next station and everyone gets off. We follow suit, looking around to see what other car we need to change to, when 5 buses come into view just on the other side of the station house. Ahhh, we thought. He really did mean that we would be changing to a bus. Go figure. So we all pile on these buses (there were literally 5 when 1 would have sufficed for the small quantity of passengers) and they pull away from the station. About a half hour later or so, they pull into another train station and deposit us there where we all pile onto another train. The track must of been broken or something for a stretch. That's the only explanation we could come up with.

Everything from that point on went as we had expected to and we arrived at Cesky Krumlov at the appointed hour. Amir had done the research on getting to our hostel and said we could either take a 5 minute bus ride or walk 20 minutes to get to our hostel. He opted for the walk as we hadn't had much exercise that day so I went along for the ride. And what a ride it turned out to be. Cobblestones abounded. Let's just say that by the time we arrived at our hostel, crossed 4 rivers, walked up 2 sets of steep stairs and missed the one shortcut, we had sweat through all our clothes and were ready for some beers. Little did we know that would be our only sunny day in this river town hell hole.

Just kidding. It's a lovely little town situated on a river that twists and bends enough to make it seem like it's 8 rivers. There are a lot of bridges here...and tourists floating down the river in inflatable boats. Our hostel is literally on the riverbank and, if it wasn't raining out, we'd be lying on the grassy bank doing absolutely nothing right now. Since the weather didn't cooperate with our intended one day stay here, we decided to extend, after, of course, checking weather.com to make sure we'd have sun tomorrow. So far, it looks like we will.

Last night, after having a grocery store aperitif of goat labeled beers grasping pints with their cloven hooves (brand name is Velkopopovicky Kozel Svetly-good thing we don't have to order them by name), we went upstairs for dinner. The menu was in Czech but translated in German below which made it much, much easier for us to decide what we wanted to eat. NOT. We recognized the word schnitzel and Amir found something resembling steak and then played roulette with our side dishes. Did you know that they charge you for side dishes in the Czech Republic? They also charge you for ketchup, tartar sauce, peanuts and take away pizza boxes. Commie bastards.

There was a drunk guy, 50's-ish, who was crooning Czech songs to himself at a table near us. It didn't take him long to recognize that we were the ONLY table in the entire restaurant both not smoking and under the age of 48. He joined our table and began speaking to us in something that must have been Czech and smelling like he hadn't ever heard of deodorant. It took two other patrons and a waitress to get him to leave our table. Meanwhile, another guy, sort of corpulent but genial, was smiling his condolences in our direction over our unwanted guest. After the guest left, the genial guy ambled over, leaned into within about 3 inches from my face and became an unwanted guest himself. He told me he was an "arbeid", which we took to mean "worker" from the German and he asked me to feel his hand which was very calloused. He also spoke no English but got a kick out of us telling him we were Americans. No doubt he was wondering, as we were, why we had chosen an all Czech, all smoking, all deep fried, non-English speaking establishment at which to dine.

Dinner ended up being a pork steak with fries and cabbage and a deep fried, breaded pork steak with breaded and friend dough balls and cabbage. We shared the meal over some beers and then went back home in the rain to some Absinthe from Prague and our books. Now we're just kicking back out our hostel after a home cooked lunch of chicken and potatoes waiting for the rain to abate.

Prague, Czech Republic

Sunshine, at long, long last. Two days of beautiful, clear, sunny skies and weather in the high seventies or low eighties. Perfect sightseeing weather. Our usual sightseeing habits prevailed and we ended up walking all over the city and seeing things somewhat at random. Prague seemed to both of us the first city we've seen that compared in beauty and style to Paris. There is a church at the top of the hill where the castle sits that could have been Notre Dame's little brother. The castle was really an entire town with a series of palaces sitting next to each other surrounding the big church. The palaces themselves were not ornate and looked more like mansions than the homes of royalty. But we saw numerous other buildings throughout the town that were ornate enough to make up the difference.

Churches, churches everywhere. Not only churches abound, but we also saw several synagogues, one of which was done up entirely in pastels on the outside. St. Mary's church is a stunning architectural feat with twin spires surrounded by capped turret-like things at uneven levels. You can click here to see somebody else's picture of it (someone with a much better camera than what we have). http://www.flickr.com/photos/30724898@N03/3262514997/

The first evening, we went back out on the prowl after walking the whole morning and most of the afternoon. We were in search of the restaurant Radost after Jess Stambaugh's recommendation. Amir wanted to check out the Sunday brunch menu for the next morning. Sadly, the cafe was closed and only a funky bar sporting young dreadlocked hipsters remained open. So we kept walking and hit up an Irish pub nearby that had three female patrons who were all watching and giggling over Norbit with Eddie Murphy, sadly dubbed in Czech.

The next day, Sunday, we hiked up a big hill across the bridge from the main part of town and joined a crowd of families and friends enjoying beers in plastic cups on picnic benches overlooking the best view ever of the city. Then we strolled back down the hill and across the bridge, stopped at a grocery store for supplies, and ended up having a picnic lunch under a shady tree in a square people-watching. Amir thinks that Eastern Europe boasts the scantiliest-clad women in the world which makes people-watching much more interesting. Put it this way, there was a girl at our hostel in Krakow we dubbed "Cheeksy" and not because of her face.

Later in the afternoon, we proceeded to get purposely lost, also on the advice of Jess Stambaugh. We wandered down twisty streets and tried to chose avenues that were less trafficked. So I think we managed to see quite a lot of the city in two days, which is good as today, the third day, it is rainy and we are planning to catch a train at noon bound for Cesky Krumlov near the southern border of the country. After that, we just might hop an overnight train back to Amsterdam to avoid expensive hostel costs and get more time in that lovely Vondelpark en route to Copenhagen, Denmark where we hope to meet up with Amir's college friend Peter.