Elst

So we are hanging out in the town of Elst, in the Netherlands. We are staying at my great aunt and uncle's house, which is a super nice change from the hostels we have frequented as of late. It is really enjoyable to be able to sit back and visit with alot of relatives I have never met before, but I think my kidneys are having to work hard with all the tea and coffee I have consumed. I like it, though. We spent one night visiting a friend near Hamburg, Germany. We went to a birthday party and were surprised to see the food. Instead of chips and chocolate there was probably five different kinds of salad along with cheese and meatballs. Most people seemed to load up with salad. It seemed strange to us, but then again, it is North America with the obesity problem, so I think more salad would be a good idea.

Now we have mere days left in our trip. we go to Amsterdam on Wednesday, fly from Schiphol to Gatwick, then Gatwick to Halifax on Thursday.

See ya,

Nolan

Ps. If my mother is reading this, I have tried twice now to send an email, but first my hotmail account wouldn't send it (a few days ago) and then I accidentally somehow exited the window of my other account. now I am tired, so I am going to bed. I'll try another one sometime soon

Rhine/Berlin

Hello All,

I seem to be slipping in my postings. We checked into our hostel here and had to write the date. I thought, ´hmm, 21st or something,' but no, it was the 23rd. So... the days are going by quickly.

We took the train from Salzburg to Frankfurt, and then grabbed another train to what we thought was a town called Mainz, close to the Rhine River. It was actually Mainy-Kastel, which is different than Mainz. But we dealt with it and found another train that we could take. This train was stopping at St. Goarhaussen, our stop, according to our guide book was before St. Goar, so we thought the train would stop there. What we later realized, as we sat on the train, was that St. Goar is not an abbreviation for St. Goarhaussen. They are two very distinct towns, on two very opposite sides of the river, a river which has few bridges. So we jumped off the train at another town, walked 1.2km to a place where we could catch a boat across, found out that the boat had stopped running, walked part way back, caught a different ferry across the river, found another train station, took the train down to the town we were staying, hiked up a super steap path/steps and finally found our hostel. We were kind of tired. The hostel, though, was super cool. An old castle overlooking the Rhine River.

The next day we hopped on a boat for a river cruise down the Rhine. The river is pretty cool in that every few miles is a super old castle to see. I guess back in the day each castle would collect tarrifs from passing ships. We toured the ruins of one of the main castles which was used more for fortification, I think. We felt kind of the wrong age wherever we went on the Rhine. On the boat, we were way younger than the vast majority. In our hostel, there were some huge groups of elementary school kids that would run around almost all the time. Us and some other travellers bunkered down in our room and then in the restaurant thingy and complained to each other. But it was okay.

Yesterday we came to Berlin. The amount of recent history (nevermind older stuff)is pretty incredible. We popped into the Reichstag to go up into the big glass dome before walking down to check out where `Checkpoint Charlie'. The museum there was kind of random, but it had some pretty neat stories of escape attempts. Lots of different ideas ranging from fake documents to hiding inside various items such as two suitcases put side by side with a hole in between to a homemade hot air balloon. We also toured the Berlin Jewish Museum, which chronicled the history of German Jews.

Today ends the main tourist part of our trip. Tomorrow we´ll be staying with a friend, and then we´ll be with relatives until almost the end of the trip. It will be nice to get to know a few people on a deeper relationship than: name, nationality, where been, where going, how long. This is kind of the standard hostel talk that is sometimes hard to break out of. Anyway, it should be a good week.

See ya,

Nolan

Salzburg

Ross and I have been here for a few nights now. It is a pretty nice little city. I don´t think we´ve really met an unkind person here yet, which is cool. The hostel weare staying at is pretty lively, so we´ve met some interesting people, which has been fun. A huge bike ride yesterday left us really sore and sun burned, but it was super fun to see the little towns around the city. Tonight we´re heading to a concert of some of Mozart´s music. It is in an old castle overlooking the city, so that should be super cool. Tomorrow we´re heading to the Rhine River where we hope to take a boat on the river and check out some castles.

See ya,

Nolan

Medicine

Hello all,

I thought I would let you know I was accepted into the College of Medicine. I´m super pumped. It hasn´t really sunk in yet. I feel a little overwhelmed with all that will be ahead, but I think the challenges will be worth it. Thanks to all of you for your help, I think I will need lots more of it.

Nolan

Venice/Innsbruck

We stopped in Venice for a super short visit, more just to see it and say we´ve been there. I must say, though, that it is super cool. However, the number of tourists crammed onto that island is quite amazing. Stepping out of the trainstation is the Grand Canal right in front of you. There are no cars, so instead of buses, boats ferrz people around the city. While walking in the streets (usually just small lanes, some only a few feet across, there are canals every 50 meters or so. Usually there are the typical gondolas filled with tourists moving by. We decided that the price (80-100E) and the fact that it would be two guys riding together was too much of a barrier for us to try it out. The central tourist square is pretty much wall to wall people during the day. Where there aren´t people, thousands of pigeons fill the space. Rumor has it that the birdseed sold to the tourists has a birth control substance added, but Ross and I figure that poison would be alot more effective.

From Venice we took a train to Innsbruck where we planned to do some sweet hiking in the Alps. It is a holiday here today, so you would think it to be a perfect day to head up into the mountains, right? Wrong. It has rained all day so far, and the
cloud cover is really low so we can barely see any of the mountains. So today hasn´t been the most productive of days. It hasn´t been too bad, though. We have walked around alot, figured out our next train ride, been to the tourist info place twice, eaten a good lunch, and now get an internet fix. Kind of nice to take a break for a day and just relax.

Ross and I have been noticing how we are pretty cheap travellers. Alot of the museums here are free, but have many opportunities for giving donations, none of which we have obliged. We carry around old pop bottles and fill them up with tap water from the bathroom instead of buying water (although we did each buy a coke for 3.80E for lunch, ouch)Panhandlers get nothing from us. I enjoy the buskers along the street, but again, no money for them. haha. It has been fun.

From Innsbruck we head to Salzburg, home of the Sound of Music. The plan from there is to spend some time on the Rhine River, Berlin, then visit a friend near Hamburg, and then visit relatives in Holland.

Have a great day,

Nolan

Rome

Ross and I are finishing up our second day in Rome. We were originally planning to stay another day, but we feel that most of what we want to accomplish can be done in 2. We took an overnight train from Geneva to Rome (somewhere around 12 hours) and then checked into our hosel. From there it was straight to the Vatican City. We weren't able to get into our room, so we didn't shower. It was super hot out, so we were sweating alot. I can't speak for Ross, but I was certainly in need of some freshening up. A book we have had mentioned the Pope may make an appearance, so we wanted to check it out. Unfortunately, PB was a no-show. Not that the Vatican was disappointing. The whole thing was huge, with St. Peter's Basilica the centerpiece. It was sweet to just chill on the steps of St. Peter's Square and watch people go by. tons of tourists like us, thats for sure. Inside the Basilica it was alot of statues of past popes. Pretty interesting and huge, but I think we've seen too many churches because it is taking alot to impress us now.

Today we went to the Colosseum, Roman Forum, and Palatine Hill. It was neat to watch people excavating (I think) the ruins as we walked by them. It was kind of like there was still stuff to discover, right underneath our feet. The Colosseum was super neat. It was built in the 1st Century AD, but since then it has been used as a quarry for other projects and then restored again, so it is sometimes hard to know what is super ancient, and what is only kind of old. But overall, a very impressive building. Anyway, I need to go find some hostels so we can have somewhere to sleep come a few days.

see ya,

Nolan

untitled

this is our last day in switzerland. We seem to have exhausted most of the major things to do in Geneva, so we have spent our time today drinking coffee and taking the water buses across the lake. They have free bikes for loan, but we were not fortunate enough to get any as the bikes seem to be popular. It would have been a nice city to bike in, though. One of our biggest problems so far has been finding washrooms. It seems like there are not an abundance of public WCs in Europe. On our first night in Geneva we wanted to go to a movie, so we found the theatre playing Spiderman-3 in english. But we didn't have enough cash on us to pay, and we both had to use the washroom. We ended up walking for blocks in order to find an ATM so we could get some money so that we could buy a ticket and then use the washroom. Somewhat frustrating. But just one of those things, I guess. Tonight we travel to Rome on the train (12 hours) which should be exciting. Rome looks like a pretty crazy city, so we're looking forward to seeing what it offers.

Have a good day,

Nolan

Geneva

So we're in Geneva, Switzerland now. We took the train from Paris this afternoon. Tonight was Spiderman at the theatre, tomorrow, we'll see. Probably the UN Europe building and the Red Cross Museum. I guess Geneva is pretty much NGO central, so there is lots of english and guys in nice suits. But an interesting place, nonetheless. it is nice to have abit of a slower pace after the hectic London and Paris. The plan is to go to Rome from here on the overnight train on Saturday. After that, it may be Pisa and the Venice, but we are hearing rumors of a train workers strike in Italy, so that may change our plans. We're waiting to see.

Paris was cool. Most of the major sites were seen, but nothign too crazy to report.

See ya,

Nolan

Paris

not much time, but we have been in Paris for the last few days. I think most of the major sites have been seen. We spent much of the day today at the Louvre. tomorrow we take the TGV to Geneva. Then from there it is on to Rome. Thats all from me for now. I hope things are going well wherever you are.

Nolan

more london

So, two full days of touring in London has been pretty sweet. The jet lag hit pretty hard the day we got here, so we tried to do abit of stuff, but basically were just walking around this giant museum (British Museum) half asleep. So we went to bed and slept for a long time. Yesterday we did the Buckingham Palace, Westminster Abbey, Big Ben, etc. Route. The Changing of the Guards was kind of cool in a sick, touristy, sort of way. Ross's guide book said something about the CoG being the only place and time where all of London's tourists are in the same place at the same time. I would tend to agree. It was packed. I think the most interesting thing about it was probably just watching thousands of people jostle for a position to watch these guys march past. It kind of seemed like the British put on this spectactle so all the tourists can go home happy. There doesn't really seem to be much of a purpose. Anyway, we left happy, so i guess it works. The House of Parliament and Westminster Abbey were also pretty interesting, but no real stories. Today we went to church at St. Pauls Cathedral, which was amazing. The sounds of the mens choir echoing off the stone walls was quite spectacular. We then toured the Tower of London and went to Greenwich to stand on the Prime Meridian, which was cool. Much of the fun has just been workign to get around the city. I think we pretty much have it figured out now - the day before we leave.

Tomorrow we take the train to Paris, where we'll be for a few days, pending the finding of a hostel, which I need to do now.

See ya,

Nolan

London

quick update: we arrived into London Gatwick around 6am. Took a train to the actual city of london, and then eventually found our way to the hostel using the 'tube'. That was pretty fun, but Ross and I are both getting tired, so a nap may be in order before the day is done. But for now I think we're off to see some sites. Perhaps Big Ben or something.
See ya,

Nolan

Nova Scotia

Here I am in Truro, Nova Scotia. My old hometown. The day started at 4am in order to be at the airport for a 6am flight to winnipeg then hamilton then halifax. pretty exciting stuff. I feel pretty tired from the flying. It felt like everytime I got on the plane, they had moved the seat in front of me further back, so I had less legroom. Maybe it was just my posture getting progressively worse. The plan is to sleep here then catch a flight to London tomorrow evening. Should be fun. I was looking at my Lonely Planet book and saw that the British Museum in London has tons of neat stuff and its free, so i'm thinking thats going to be a good place to visit. its pretty hard to turn down free. Anyway, not much to report here. Just a long day of westJet's somewhat cheesy service.

see ya,

Nolan