LONDON
I made my way to Metz to meet Danielle by an extremely early train to make our bus to make our plane from Frankfurt Hahn Airport... Oh the things we do for traveling around the world. Dani and I made it to the airport pretty early which of course gave her spare time to shop some more (honestly I have no idea how she packed all the stuff she had at all) But while in the airport I found the coolest Henessy cover and, no people, I am not an alcoholic but I had to buy it. Although our whole plan of enjoying our little purchases on the plane was shot down when they put them in vacuum sealed bags and said we couldn't open it on the flight. BUMMER (reading that back now makes me sound like an alcoholic, lol)
-started with being beyond afraid that they would not allow my bag on the plane (although this whole frenzy definitely comes back in later because I can't seem to not buy things for myself)
-landed in the airport... and of all the things we needed to do, we had to buy a Coke to see if it tastes like it does in America (because the rest of Europe's coke is stored at a different pressure which makes it taste so much better). Sadly, it tasted like American coke, guess it's back to Pepsi or better yet water when I get back to the states.
-saw one of the coolest things before our bus into the city from the airport: There was a book vending machine chilling outside.
-after getting into the city and trying to figure out what bus to take to our hostel... which also included trying to avoid dying due to the English being the weird ones and driving on the opposite side of the street. I literally almost died like 10 times while in London bc I would assume that no cars were coming from my right when in fact a bus was zooming from my left.
-the first night consisted of a Cinco De Mayo party at our hostel which was pretty darn whack but we did enjoy some good Chocolate Schnapps shots (this is still not helping the "I am not an alcoholic" talk)
-Day 2 was our shopping day in London and we hit the streets pretty early after I was able to force Danielle to roll out of the bed.
-OXFORD street (London's Mich Ave) is banging although London looks at your wallet, grabs it, and says "YOU MY BITCH!!!"... that seems to be an accurate synopsis of the shopping experience. There is one store called PRIMARK which is soooo cheap. (Shoses on deck for like 3 pounds, shirts for like 2 pounds) which is the reason why for the rest of my trip I had to wear 3 pairs of pants, 2 hoodies, a cardigan and stuff my pants with chargers, books, etc so that my bag met the weight requirement for my flights.
-our shopping day also marked the arrival of Kurt in London but unfortunately shopping kept us out about 3 hours later than the time we were supposed to make it back to the hostel.
-our next adventure was trying to go out for the evening and as it always happens I forget my ID because I am an idiot so we had to go to the not so popular club... Although they were playing some decent music and we had some good drinks on deck so the night turned out pretty great
-Let me not forget to mention that somehow between Dani about to open the gates of niggadom and the staff at St. Christopher's Inn messing up the reservation, I had to stay at another hostel for one night.
Day 3
-This was the day of the touristy stuff.... i.e. seeing the Royal Palace, etc, etc This marked the free part of my day... the rest of it London still had my wallet in that chokehold
-I was pretty upset I didn't get to mess with the guards but I must mention the Queen gets a full fledge parade every 3 hours and that's if she is home or not... #BALLIN
-It was also really cool to see the place where the Royal Wedding took place, although the two people that got married I could care less about
-We went to Wimbledon and I thought it was just a Stadium but it actually a little town of some rich ass people because those houses were too nice! Although I found it quite odd that as we were looking for the stadium, people were acting like they didn't know which direction it was... I was thinking Pimpin you live here, you should know where it is because it is the only thing your town is known for! lol
-This is probably the single most important bullet point for this day... WE FOUND A KRISPY KREMES and now that I think about it Danielle and I probably paid damn near two dollars per donut but when I say it was worth.... it truly was! Gave me a glimpse of what was to come in like 20 days at that time-We rode the London eye which was really nice... has really beautiful views of the city
-That night we grabbed a few beers and started walking and set out on our journey to find the Tower bridge (which according to Danielle should actually be the London Bridge!) and I must say I agree because after seeing that bridge the London Bridge seems extra regula'... and I do mean regula'
-This night also marked Danielle's last one before she was off to Metz to literally pack and depart for the states in a day. I gotta say, it definitely hurt a little because she was my traveling buddy, but the fact that she was going home made me realize that it was all the sooner for me to do exactly the same.
Also, every day of the trip in London consisted of trying to find a chicken place and it is killing me because I can not remember the name of it...but Danielle got me on the name... check the comments
MILAN
this will be short and to the point
-Beautiful city and I definitely see it in my shopping future once that Engineering money rolls in.
-It was really cool being there also because I was trying to figure out why everybody was in red and black and sitting outside the bars to watch the TV screens... apparently Milano's football team won the championship the night I was there, and it was really cool to be a part of that celebration.
VENICE
My words honestly can not do this city justice. It is beyond beautiful and amazing... NO words can truly describe just how wonderful it is!
I guess I can try to put it like this... if you know me, you know that I am in love with Paris... from the lights, to the streets, to the people.... Venice slowly engulfed my heart in a gondola and took me on a trip deep into all of it's beauty and left me in a dream... Itt is one of my favorite cities in the WORLD!
-The main source of transportation is by boat so you get to ride through the city and view it in magnificent glory.-I went to Lido and was able to make it to the beach of the Adriatic Sea... It was amazing because the beach was isolated and you could look out and just admire the beauty.
-I also was able to visit Burano in the Venetian Lagoon and if you ever need a place to make you happy... this is it! All of the building are painted these vibrant colors and as I once read on someone's blog... if you go there you will have no choice but to smile because it just does that to you
-Also visited Murano which is another island in the lagoon which is famous for glass blowing/making... I am so sad that I got there late and catch the glass makers at work (Lido and all of it's beauty took up so much of my time) but I definitely got to see some cool works of glass art.Food wise... Oh My "face fucking chickens" (I had to bring it back for this one) Goodness ... from the pizza to the gelato to the pasta to whatever I had in that restaurant that they fed me... it was AMAZING
-Italians are honestly my favorite people in the world... the language sounds so beautiful, the food tastes great, and Venice is a city like no other!
MADRID
-What can I say to Madrid.... I could have easily studied here also. The city is so gorgeous-I got to visit a really cool museum of contemporary art and we just need to step it up in America on what we make available to students in our cities bc in most of Europe a student ID either gets you in free or a ridiculous discount.
-Apparently this dude saw my shoes, thought they were really cool, and struck up a convo. He turned out to be studying abroad too, and it was really weird because his name last name was Brodney (no joke) It was nice meeting him and he gave me a tour a really huge park in Madrid, which housed the only statue in the world dedicated to the devil... weird I guess.-It was really exciting to see black swans!!! I didn't know they existed but I definitely have the visual proof and I have to say that they are beautiful.
-The majority of Madrid just included me taking soooo many pictures of everything I saw in all of it's beauty.
PORTO
-Hands down one of my favorite cities I have visited.
-From the steep hills and the wonderful river with all the amazing restaurants along the way... UNFORGETTABLE-So happy that I was able to get all of my ships custom made gifts here... YO to KSKP!!!
-I was able to enjoy a wonderful dinner of fish (my first fish I had that still had the eyes intact... I felt fancy) and Porto wine (which Porto is famous for in the World)
-I see Porto as a city that me and my wife can return to after our kids are all grown up and can just reminisce over a wonderful dinner
-Funniest thing was trying to find the bus station in Porto because they don't believe in huge signs but instead all the buses are housed in a random garage on a regular street corner. Basically I almost missed my bus to Lisbon which definitely would not have been so great
LISBOA
-My main mission was to end up on a beach... point blank period and I have to say Lisbon has some beautiful ones. I spent my first night at Costa Caparica and watched the sunset over the Pacific Ocean... tremendous
-The next morning Randy made it in and we had one mission which was to end up on a beach, so we ent back to Caparica and spent the early afternoon there. I was good with my pitcher of Sangria and the nice sound of the waves crashing against the shore. That water was about cold as hell too, but nonetheless refreshing!-We met some really cool Turkish girls at our hostel and spent the night out with them... although we didn't make it to the club because they like to go out at 3 in the morning (in Champaign the bar is closed by then LBS)
-Lisboa has the cheapest drinks in all of Europe and I found my favorite one: 1.5 Liters of Caipirinha (pretty much all Vodka with some ice, lime, lemon, and brown sugar) for 6 euro... I was good for the entire night off of 12 euro (This is impossible in France) There is this neighborhood of little streets and sideways full of little bars and the people just pack in there and drink UP!
-Randy and I did like a 3 mile hike trying to find a damn castle (which we didn't go in) but we did spend like an hour taking pictures at the castle ruins... which we decided was where the concubines and servants of the king lived
-Funniest thing happened when we went into this huge cathedral (they really do it big over here... this aint yo St. Sabina) and apparently didn't know we weren't supposed to walk up the aisles and take pictures. Not our fault though because they put up the barrier after we had walked past, lol. Although, it did explain why the people were staring at us.
-We went to a Brazilian festival, which confirmed... I will be going to South America! There was a party in the parking lot that was beyond cracking. I must say Brazilians know how to party (point. blank. period) Grandma (this random old lady from our hostel that tagged along for a trip to the fest) ended up dipping off and was like she had to stay to get it in!
-Best thing about Lisbon/Portugal... hands down FANTA PINEAPPLE... It's my crack (which I don't get because I am allergic to pineapples... but it tastes so damn good) Randy can testify that I walked in and out every store on a mission to find my FANTA Ananas! It's so good that just now while typing about it I googled how I can get it in America! LBVS
-What sucked in Lisbon was missing my bus back to Porto because of the location of the bus station once again. I ended up at one train station.... thought I was at the wrong one, so took 30 mins to go to the other one, only to find out the bus station was at the first.... UGHHH, I ended up on the 9:00 bus which meant I got back to Porto at 12:30am and if it wasn't for the bus having WIFI I would not have been able to make it to the airport. The thing about Europe is that most of their public transportation stops running at 1 AM.... so once I got off the bus I ran to that train station and made it to the airport.
-What sucked was that after all this craziness I had to pay for my bag (that lady was a bitch! and I really wouldn't want to say that about her but she was) I guess I was so used to traveling in all of the other European cities I forgot how the rude the French can be... Thanks RyanAir! But in the end I looked at it as not being that bad because my bag was overweight on all my trips so I took the 40 euro and divided it by 5 flights which makes it like 8 euro/flight.... had to make myself happy again although I hope wherever that flight attendant is right now... she trips and falls (ok I'm kinda joking)
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