Day 21 - Cesky Krumlov

I woke up just in time to turn off my alarm before it started ringing. It's 6:20am and I'm to meet Sam and Chris at 6:45. It's just around the corner, so after a quick shower I'm off to meet them. The train station is a short walk from their hostel. We will be taking the 7:16 train to Ceske Budejovice where we will have 10 minutes to make our connection to Cesky Krumlov.

Should be doable.

Well it's not. Halfway to Ceske Budejovice the train stops and we are all ordered off.

"Bus."

That's all we're told. So we walk out of the station and there are a couple big busses all lined up out on the street. We hop on, and after a few minutes we're off. After about a half hour the busses stop and we all clamber onto a different train. It becomes apparent that we won't make our connection in Ceske Budejovice. The next train doesn't leave for another 2 hours. That gives us only an hour or so in Cesky Krumlov before we head back to Prague.

Is it really worth going?

Ceske Budejovice is a commercial and residential city by the looks of it. Doesn't look like we'll be having much fun here. We look into taking a bus the remaining 45 minutes of our journey. They leave frequently and it costs 34Kc.

Two dollars for a bus? Yes please.

We hop on the next bus and off we go. Now we'll have about three hours in Cesky Krumlov. Our plans to rent a raft and weave through the town's river might still come to fruition. So when we arrived in Cesky Krumlov, the three of us set off towards the city center in search of a raft. On the way, we hike up a small hill and find ourselves presented with a spectacular view of the picturesque town. Houses and buildings are nestled between hills and the river which makes it's way around the center of town, almost as if it were a moat. It only takes us about 5 more minutes to find a place to rent a raft. 700Kc for a raft for 3 people. They will drop us upriver a ways and we can float down at our own pace. It should take around 1 to 2 hours. It's an awesome deal. Chris and I buy a local beer from the rafting company as well, because where else can you raft for hours down a river while having a beer for less than $10?

The woman behind the counter explains where we'll be going, where we'll embark, disembark, and how we'll be going through the rapids. She rattles through it all, with English that doesn't extend much farther than her pre-rehearsed speech. She says something about how we might destroy our raft on the last drop. No time for questions and we're on our way.

We hop in the van with our raft on top and we're joined by an older man, a middle aged man, and a boy. It seems like they're a grandfather-father-son combo, but we aren't sure. They're in a traveling choir. Sounds interesting. Eventually Sam and Chris, and I are dropped off at a berthing place under a bridge with our raft. We pile in, Me in the front, Sam in the middle, and Chris bringing up the rear. We're given a waterproof bag for our stuff, but I can't put my towel in there. It stinks, horribly, and would probably make everything else smell. It had been packed up while damp and has acquired the musty smell of a hostel.

I have really got to wash this thing.

Until then, off we float. It's gorgeous, and after these long days of walking around cities I can't think of anything I'd rather do.

After 15 minutes or so, Chris and I want to go for a swim so we moor up on some rocks along the river bank and tread into the river. We make our way upstream and float back down to the raft a few times before convincing Sam to get in.

When are you ever going to have the chance again to float down a river in the Czech Republic?

"Never," she says.

And she's completely fine with that, but we don't take no for an answer so I head back and stay with the raft so that she can get in.

After about a half hour we all clamber back into the raft, some more gracefully than others, and set off down river. After the first of nine equally spaced rapids we realize that we are moving dreadfully slow and need to pick up the pace so we begin paddling. Eventually we come to the part of the river that wraps around the city. It's incredible. Big buildings built upon jagged precipices, red roofs, beautiful churches, and quaint cottages perched along the banks of the river. We slow our pace to enjoy the sights.

I want to live here.

We begin to float on past the center of town, but before we do we come upon the rapid that "might be problematic." We head down through the narrow chute and we find ourselves bearing down on some rocks to our left, then rocks on our right, then a temporary bridge straight ahead. It's a tricky few seconds but we navigate it without popping our raft.

Teamwork.

We finally come to a point where we are supposed to return the raft. We hop out and set off for the train station. We get there and wait. Longer than we should. Our train is late again. Fearing that we might miss our Connection in Ceske Budejovice, we sprint to our train. But that one doesn't leave on time either. After another train-bus-train combo, we get back to Prague. We part ways, but I might see them tonight at a bar crawl.

Because when do I ever not want to bar-crawl?

When I get back to the hostel it's down to business: wash that towel. I complete the task in the sink and hang it up to dry before heading to a pizza place the hostel recommended. It's just down the street and the chef is Sicilian.

Sounds good.

I order the Pizza Marco, which is recommended to me by one of the employees and take it back to the hostel along with a 12Kc beer. I sit down on the back patio with other travelers and eat the pizza. It's really good; olives, onions, garlic, and peppers adorn a thin crust with light sauce.

A few raindrops start falling as I finish the pizza, so I head upstairs to shower and change before walking to the old clock tower to meet the other bar crawlers. I decide against a rain jacket.

It rains so sporadically, I bet it will hardly rain on my 25 minute walk to the old square.

I head downstairs and there are a couple Czech policemen down at the reception desk. They mean business. The neighbors complained about the noisy people on the patio.

Oops.

I leave the hostel and get about a third of the way to the clock tower before the sky opens up. It's pouring rain, I'm soaking wet, but there's no point in turning around. Not with those cops there.

Eventually I get into the town square and run into Sam and Chris. They're just as wet as I am. All of Prague is wet, really. A creepy Aussie approaches us and asks if we'd like to do a bar crawl.

That's why we're here!

He leads us to the Drunken Monkey, where 400Kc gets you 2hrs of open bar and free shots at a couple different clubs on the crawl. After a beer and a few shooters, Chris and I open up a game of beerpong in the back and guys from Alaska and DC take us on.

Victory is sweet.

Remaining internationally undefeated, we let a group from Ireland take over and head to the bar. The Aussies behind the bar are completely sloshed and have given up washing glasses. They've climbed on top of the bar and are pouring waterfalls of shooters in to eagerly awaiting open mouths. It looks like a bird feeding worms to her recently hatched chicks.

After a few more drinks they completely run out of beer at the bar. Just the shooters. The place is blasting American music, and when Born in the USA comes on I head to the bar and tell one of the Aussies I can't pass up a shooter if this song's playing. He hands me the bottle and grabs another for himself.

Apparently we're now pouring our own lemony waterfalls.

The Drunken Monkey clears out and we all head off to a few clubs where we'll be greeted at the door with a round of different shooters. A few hours of madness ensues. Chris and Sam and I eventually decide to leave for Charles Bridge to take some photographs with the castle lit up in the distance. When we get to the bridge we discover that, in fact, it is not lit up. The photographs are nothing special. We head back to our respective hostels and part ways one last time. It's been an awesome day, but I'm off to Munich tomorrow. They're off to Krakow, Poland. I invite them out to California, say goodbye, then head off into the night. 9:07am train tomorrow.

I forget to set an alarm.

Day 20 - Prague

The beer keeps coming. Guys are enjoying buying rounds for the whole bar, because where else can you buy a round for a couple dollars? At 12:15 we head off on a pub crawl. It's 200Kc and includes a taxi ride to the first club. It's cheap.

We pull up to the first club after leaving the taxi, which felt much like Mr. Toad's Wild Ride. We meet up with our pub crawl group and we're about 160 strong. People everywhere. The club handles the volume easily, buy after about a half hour or so we leave it to go to our next stop. The Temple Club used to be a church, but it had since been turned into a club. Jesus would not have approved of what was inside. A runway goes along the center of the club, and on the podium at the end of it stands a scandily clad girl in furry boots dancing away. The inside still looks much like a church, with some pews left for sitting, high cathedral ceilings, and a balcony. I'm getting tired, but our group shows no signs of stopping so I decide to have a Red Bull. It's around 2am.

Another two hours go by and I find myself up on the runway clubbing away. Eventually I see the rest of my group leaving so I head out the door with them, but they're not heading home. They're heading to the club with five stories and I'm coming with them.

So be it.

The club is crazy big and there are still a ton of people everywhere. It's a great time, but I had more fun in the church. At around 5:45am I decide to leave the club and head home. As I walk outside I'm hit with blinding sunlight and I find myself faced with a difficult question.

I'm already in the historic area, do I sightsee now or do I wait until after I've slept?

I decide my mother wouldn't approve of me staying out without sleep so I head home. I remembered how to get back on the tram from the historic area so I did just that. After brushing my teeth it's 6am. I get into bed and hear Tyler coming in just a few minutes later than I did.

What a night.

Around noon I finally decide I should get out of bed and tour Prague. I head out of the hostel and take the tram back to where I was just a few hours ago. This time however, the place is crawling with people. I arrived just in time to watch the clock tower do its hourly show with wooden figures popping out of windows. I walk around the old town square, the Charles bridge, and the town building. It's all so sinister. The buildings have dark, jagged spires and their crowned with statues that have blackened over the years. It's dark, but it's beautiful. I cross the Charles bridge on my way to Prague's Castle. From the castle, the views of the city are amazing. Most buildings have red roofs, but the red is speckled with church spires and historic buildings. Eventually I walk back to the hostel from the castle. I book a couple hostels and send an email to Chris about going to Cesky Krumlov in the morning.

Now, what to do about dinner?

Since the kitchen has pots and pans I decide to cook. But first I've got to get beer. The store around the corner sells them for 12Kc, which is about 50 cents. It's cheaper than water.

I get back to the hostel and decide to cook the meals my ex-girlfriend Michelle bought for me a few years ago. I have two pouches. One is Chana Masala, and Indian meal with rice and garbanzo beans. The other is cheesecake. I decide to make them both, since this hostel has pots and pans. All I have to do is add boiling water to the Chana masala and cold water to the cheesecake. They're meant for backpackers.

Space food.

After I finished preparing them I brought them outside to sit and eat with the rest of the hostel. Everyone gives me a hard time about my space food, but everyone who tries it loves it. It's actually delicious.

After dinner I check my email to find that Chris has replied to me. He and Sam are going to come to Cesky Krumlov tomorrow with me. I asked them if they wanted to grab a beer tonight and they said they could meet at 8 and wanted to watch the Olympics. When I meet up with them, they haven't eaten yet tonight. I recommend Usadu. We watch some of the Games, and after they finish eating we head off to a beer garden nearby. One of the receptionists at my hostel recommended I go there if I wanted to watch the olympics.

He was quite right about the place.

There are big, long wooden banquet-style tables and a massive screen that's showing the olympics. It's perfect.

After another beer, the Games are over for the night so we head back to our hostels and split off after we agree to meet at their hostel at 6:45am tomorrow so we can catch a train to Cesky Krumlov.

Day 19 - Prague

Off to Prague. But I'll take my time. Trains run every two hours and I'm in no rush to get there. I'll take my time, exchange Euros for Czech Koruna, then head off. In our room there's a couple we met yesterday, Sam and Chris, who are packing up as well. Sam tells me she and Chris are headed off to Prague, but they're on a later train than I am. Eventually I'm all packed up and I head out of the hostel. I say goodbye to my friends Christian and Alex who are staying in Berlin, exchange currencies, and head to the train station. After waiting on the platform for a while, the train pulls up. It's got a bunch of compartments in each car, each having six seats. In the car I've boarded they're all reserved so I walk through the train with a hoard of people in front of me looking for seats. In the next car someone says hi to me as I'm walking past. It's Sam and Chris. They caught an earlier train and have seats in one of the compartments. There's two available, although they are marked reserved, but I sit there anyways. After the train leaves the station two girls approach me and claim the seats. When I leave the compartment i decide to sit in the hall since there are people already sitting there.

All the seats must be full.

I take a seat out in the hall near the door so I can talk to Sam and Chris. They're dating and just finished university at Nottingham. They're traveling Europe for a few weeks and decided to go to all the cities that they wouldn't do on a weekend trip.

"It's easy for us to take a train from London to Paris for a few days."

They're a nice couple. He's a tall, good looking guy and she's shorter with blonde hair and pretty as well.

After a few hours, a man in their compartment is getting off the train so I swoop in on the seat before anyone else can. Sam and Chris and I continue talking. They're in Prague for two nights, just like I am. I tell them about the trip I have planned to Cesky Krumlov. It's a walled city 3hrs south by train or bus. It's a gorgeous city that's been recommended to me by friends back home. I'll be going on Monday in two days time to sightsee and either rent a raft or do a rafting pub crawl. I invite them along. They say they'd like to come if they can, and it seems to fit with their schedule.

Awesome.

We exchange contact information and make plans for Monday, but I'll email them before then to see if they're still on board.

Eventually the train comes to the station and we part ways. They're in a different hostel although it's near mine. I headed off to reserve a seat on my train to Munich in a few days, which again "wasn't necessary," then I headed off to the hostel.

Hostel One is awesome. Ita got a bar, free computer access, a kitchen with utensils, and a BBQ. It's got 6 floors and a basement. Of course I'm on the 6th floor. Elevator is broken.

Take a hike, kid.

After putting down my stuff I head downstairs to ask Hugo, the guy at the reception, where I can go to get some authentic Czech cuisine. He recommends Usado, highly.

Sounds good to me.

The walk to Usado is a short one, and on the way I pass another TV tower like the one in Berlin. It's got statues of babies or aliens, I can't tell which, crawling all over it.

What's with these Eastern European TV towers.

I sit down in Usadu and the place looks authentic. Everything you can imagine is hanging from the ceiling of this place and there's a burly woman, who's either pregnant or has had too much beer, walking about the place serving up mugs of Czech beer. I order a beer, and a "Bramburger." It's a piece of chicken stuffed between two Czech potato pancakes and covered in a creamy sauce and mushrooms. It's very heavy, but delicious. Thick, but manageable. I quite like it. The beer is good as well. It's got texture to it. Unpasturized. Dinner and a beer costs me 200Kc. It's cheap.

After dinner I'm thoroughly stuffed so I head back to the hostel in time for the bar to open down in the basement. One of the guys from my room, Tyler, is heading down there too. He's from Calgary, Canada. The bar has a cold, damp basement feeling. It doesn't take long for that to change. After everyone piles in it soon becomes a steaming sauna with sweat heavy in the air. It's gross. A girl from New York and I take on a team of guys from Canada and win, marking our first international victory. We leave the table with a perfect international record.

At the bar, a big Aussie is serving up beers for 15Kc, which is roughly 75 cents. It's cheaper than water. The hostel also gives out a free shot when you buy your first beer, and a free beer if you 'like' them on Facebook.

At the bar, the clock strikes midnight.

Day 18 - Berlin

I need to do laundry. Badly.

I pack up all my stuff and inquire with the receptionist as to where I can find a laundromat. I won't be coming back to this hostel. I was able to book a room at the hostel Christian and Alex are staying at for my last night in Berlin.

In the laundromat I have no clue what I'm doing. I don't understand a single word of German and the pictures on the walls are so primitive it's impossible to derive any meaning from them. After a few minutes of tinkering around with the machines I figure it out and start the laundry. And wait.

Eventually I roll up all my clean, dry clothes and meticulously pack my bag. Ready to leave, I throw on my bag and it feels fantastic. It's no longer bulky and unorganized.

I head off to my new hostel, St Christopher's, throw my stuff in the luggage room, and head off to tour the city. The old Soviet TV tower, the Berlin Wall, the Berlin Cathedral, and much more. I know I've only just scratched the surface, so I'm excited for the tour.

I head down to the Brandenburg gate a few minutes early so that I can take it all in. It's an impressive structure, and Victoria, the goddess of Victory, is perched atop the Gate in a chariot pulled by horses. It's a powerful image. Eventually I meet up with the tour group and we are divided into smaller groups, each with about 30 tourists and a guide. Ours is an Aussie.

How are there so many Aussies in Europe.

The tour lasts a little more than three hours. We saw everything. Checkpoint Charlie, The Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe, The French and German Domes, the site of the Nazi book burnings, the place where Hitler shot himself, and much, much more. And we learned 800 years of German history.

Best tour ever.

After the tour I leave our guide and head back towards Checkpoint Charlie to see the Topography of Terror. After spending some time at the monument I head back to the hostel. In the bar I run into Christian and Alex and we come up with a plan for the night. We decide to eat dinner, have a couple drinks, then head out to a club.

People riding public transit to a party.

I'm going big at dinner. I order a bratwurst with potatoes and sourkraut. It's amazing and very filling. After dinner we have a couple drinks then head out.

The club, Cassiopeia, is massive. It's a few stories tall with a big beer garden to boot. There are different DJs spinning in each room and it's all different styles of music. We stayed out 'til 5:30am. I danced a lot.

Day 17 - Berlin

This morning is a struggle.

Pack the bag. Get in the shower. Eat some food. Get on the train.

It all sounds so difficult.

I manage to get it all done in time to hop on the train to Berlin. It leaves at 10:56am and is due to arrive in Berlin at 5:20pm. On most trains a seat can be reserved to ensure that you have a seat. I tried to reserve a spot yesterday, but they said it wasn't necessary.

I disagree.

The train is absolute chaos and people actually do have reserved seats. If you tried to sit in a seat, someone would come along in a couple minutes and show you that they have a ticket for that seat. Eventually a elderly woman and her husband offer me a seat at their table. I take the seat and thank them in poor German.

Eventually they get off the train and a younger girl comes and sits next to me and doesn't speak English. I fall asleep for a few hours and wake up when we are stopped at a station. I look at the timetable for the train to Berlin and notice that we shouldn't be at this station.

I swear I got on the right train.

The train leaves the station and continues on. The announcements on the train's PA are no longer in multiple languages. Just German.

What is going on. Where am I going.

We continue on for miles, but only at around 30mph. More German announcements. I decide to stick it out and see what happens. Worst case would be me ending up deep in Eastern Europe and I have to find my way back. It seems doable.

After another hour passes a man working on the train comes by and hands me a card. It looks like I need to fill it out, but I have no idea what it is.

Customs? I must have left the EU. Crap. My train should have been in Berlin over an hour ago. I must not have caught a connection somewhere.

Yet another hour passes and I'm still not sure what's going on. More announcements in German. We're still moving at a glacial pace and none of the stations correspond with the route to Berlin. The girl next to me is upset and keeps making phone calls. After one of them, she turns to me and asks me where I'm going. In English.

Oh so now you speak English.

I ask her what's been going on and she tells me there was an accident on the main line. We have to go around it, but there are no high speed tracks nearby. The card I was given was to request a partial refund since we'll be more than 2hrs late to Berlin. Suddenly it all makes sense.

Danke.

After finally getting to Berlin I start walking to my hostel. When I step out of the massive train station I'm able to spot the Bundestag. It's a massive stone building with a big glass dome. I tried to reserve a spot on a free tour of the dome when I was in Amsterdam, but I was unable to. I'll have to visit the done another time. I find the Heart of Gold hostel after about a 20 minute walk and it's a nice place with a bar in the reception area.

I'll come back for a beer later.

I try and get in touch with Alex and Christian but I don't have any luck. I realize after all the traveling I'm starving so I head off to find something to eat. When I come back to the hostel from dinner I meet two girls from The States. Minnesota and Wisconsin. They tell me you can bring your own beers into the bar and there's a store that sells pints for €1,70 around the corner.

Sounds like a plan.

I walk to the store and buy two beers and return to the hostel. I sit around out back with Minnesota and Wisconsin and have one of the beers before the hostel employees tell everyone to come inside so that we don't disturb the neighbors. The girls decide to head to bed so I head off to meet new people. I join a table with a few guys at it. Two guys from Chico, California and a few Aussies. We talk about man stuff. They also highly recommend that I take the free tour tomorrow at 1pm. It meets at the Starbucks in front of the Brandenburg Gate. They hate tours and paid for a crap tour in Rome, but this one's fantastic.

"The really good ones are the ones where they work for tips. They want you to really like the tour so that you'll tip them well after."

Makes sense.

Eventually I decide to head to bed so that I can get up early and tour the city. I didn't get any sightseeing done today with that delayed train.

Day 16 - Amsterdam

I woke up early today in a fit of panic. My alarm was going off extremely loud and it was vibrating my bed. Turns out the alarm was for the guy on the bed above me. Thoroughly awake now, I went down for breakfast. Bread, butter, an apple, cereal, and coffee. Afterwards I run into Cam and Hugo. They're headed off to the zoo and then to the Van Gogh museum during the middle of the day since it's supposed to be even hotter than yesterday.

Yesterday was hotter than hell.

I decide to go to the zoo with them, and messaged Alex and Christian to tell them I'd meet them at the Van Gogh Museum at 1pm. At the zoo we walked around for hours and eventually stumbled upon the California sea lion exhibit. They're barking, flying in and out of the water, and eating.

Feels like home.

After a few more exhibits I leave Cam and Hugo to meet up with Alex and Christian. Cam and Hugo aren't going to the museum 'til 3, so I tell them we'll meet them at the entrance when they arrive.

Im excited to be at the museum. Van Gogh is one of my favorite painters. I very much enjoy his brush strokes, textures, and his colors. Towards the end of the visit I find a hidden gem among all the famous paintings and prints in the museum: the original print of the poster for Tournee du Chat Noir. It's awesome and I want a picture, but I can't have one.

After a total of two hours we finished walking through the museum.

Much more manageable than the Louvre or the British Museum.

We meet up with Cam and Hugo and hang out for a bit outside before we split off and head to a grocery store to get food.

At the grocery store there isn't a single sign in English, but the prices speak for themselves. I find the cheapest bread and the cheapest meat for the sandwich I'll soon be making. The cheapest thing in the store turns out to be "Krab Salad" so I go with that.

I sure hope this doesn't mess up my stomach.

We sit down on a bench outside the store and make our meals. My sandwich isn't half bad, but I'm cautious about the amount I eat incase it doesn't agree with me later.

Afterwards we headed to a park to sit down. While we are there some kids on a park bench next to us try to sell us weed. They left after we declined their offer. After a few minutes of sitting around we split up. They're off to do a boat tour, and I'm off to see Anne Frank's house on the other side of town. Unfortunately I won't be paying and waiting in line to go inside though. After a half hour of walking I arrived at the house. It looks just like any other house on the canal.

I shudder.

After a few minutes outside the house I head back to the hostel to shower and wait around for a bit before heading over to meet Christian and Alex.

I walk over to the hostel but they still aren't back yet, so i sit down out front and become friends with an Aussie. Once they finally returned to the hostel we had some wine outside before heading out to some bars and clubs. We ended up bumping into Cam and Hugo on the street, and after a long night in Amsterdam we all stumbled back to our hostels.

Day 15 - Amsterdam

Before I leave for Amsterdam today I've got to check my text messages. Two of my friends from Santa Clara are flying in to Amsterdam this morning from The States. We're going to be meeting up today in The Netherlands. I check Facebook. It looks like we'll coordinate when we're all in Amsterdam.

The train is an easy 3 hours, and I find my hostel easily. Smooth sailing. I get in touch with Alex and Christian and we agree to meet at 7pm. I've got plenty of time to kill so I decide to go for a walk. On my map I can see that the flower mall is along the canal fairly close to my hostel so I head that way.

There are canals everywhere in Amsterdam. And there are bridges all over the place to allow people to cross. It's amazing. Along the rails of the bridges there are as many bikes as could possibly fit, all locked up, waiting for their owners to ride them all around this crazy city. The same goes for the boats. If they're not being driven around they're all docked along the sides of the canals. It's cool. Up ahead I spot three guys boating down the canal in a bright yellow wooden clog with their shirts off. Just a couple bros being bros.

I get to the flower mall and it's crazy. I didn't realize there was such a big market for flowers. I only every bought them for high school dances and Valentine's day. Or when I'm in the doghouse.

I keep walking around and find a place to eat. The big front doors are open and there's a cat lazing around on the floor inside. I go for a chicken sandwich with peanut sauce and a side of WiFi. The chicken sandwich is amazing. It's very peanut-saucy and hot. A few minutes into my meal a guy in a fedora sits down at the table across from me and orders a bowl of ice-cream. He looks completely stoned.

After lunch I look for my hostel on the map and start walking back. The streets are incredibly busy with people walking and running in and out of stores. And there are Vespas and bicycles whizzing by constantly. I almost get hit by someone as they ride by so I start walking more cautiously. A couple minutes later someone comes out of one of the doors to a shop on my right so I try to get out of her way but Holy Jesus, I found the Red Light District.

I respectfully declined her offer to come inside and continued walking back to the hostel. I'm even more cautious on my way to the hostel now.

After I get back and shower it's time to head out to meet the guys at their hostel. I head downstairs and walk out the front door of the hostel just as two guys in my class at Santa Clara come in. I know Cam, but I haven't met Hugo before. I can't believe I'm running into them here. They're in Amsterdam for two days. I tell them I'm heading off to meet Alex and Christian for dinner.

Crazy.

I head off after we agree to meet up at some point in the next two days. We'll message each other on Facebook.

I get lost on my way to find Alex and Christian, but with the help of four Aussies and an iPhone with Google Maps I make it alright. I was only just around the corner. After some quick hellos and a little bit of talk we head off to find dinner. We settled on €5 pizza and pasta and it was well worth it. Afterwards we head off in search of a sports bar that's advertised 10 shots of Jäger for €10.

When we find the place it's on a plaza right next to where a breakdance crew is about to perform. They tell us they want our money after the show.

We decide to stay and watch, but we'll head into the bar right behind us at the end when they ask the crowd to throw a few euro in their buckets. The show was entertaining enough, but we left at the end, as did the majority of the crowd. We stand outside the bar, which has a street cafe and tables outside, debating whether or not to keep walking around or go in. Next door to the bar a couple of girls start yelling at each other. Then a girl throws a punch.

Now it's a fight.

A bunch of girls start running into the scuffle and fists are flying everywhere. They bust through the little door that leads out of the sidewalk cafe and crash into the tables where people are eating. Glasses break, fists fly, and people are clearing their tables and getting out of the way. Just when I think it couldn't get any better, a couple big guys run in and try and pull the girls off each other. It's no use. (By now the breakdancers' crowd had turned around to watch the spectacle). It's way too much to handle for the two guys and the fight is raging on, when suddenly a behemoth security guard comes into the mix and hacks away at the girls arms to break them apart. Then he carries two flailing girls, one in each arm, walks them through the cafe, and throws them out into the street. Then he comes back for the other girls and shoves them away from the restaurant. After all was said and done, the security guard got a roaring applause. Much more enthusiastic than the applause the dancers received.

In the end, we finally went into the bar then out around the city after the Jäger. We decide to meet at the Vincent van Gogh museum tomorrow.

Day 14 - Brussels

My alarm goes off but I decide to sleep in. I'm exhausted and Brussels is a pretty small city. I have all day. Eventually I get up with just enough time to shower and check out of my room.

I toss my stuff into the luggage room and head off to do some of the walking tours my map has laid out for me. The first one takes 55 minutes, the second 80, and the third 50. It's a lot of walking, but there are definitely highlights. The European Commission, The European Parliament, fries, and chocolate.

After touring the city I decide to head back to the hostel before going to see the manekenpis, a statue of a boy peeing. It's the iconic symbol of Brussels.

I get back to the hostel and check into my new room, 405. It's got six beds and there are two girls in there at the moment. They're from Australia and they're heading to happy hour right now then off to a pub-crawl later. They invite me to come so I head off with them and their friend Jean-Michel who's also at our hostel. Jean-Michel is from Montreal, Canada. He's a big dude.

I'll just have to see the manekinpis before I leave for Amsterdam tomorrow.

We get to Celtica and there are four other Aussies there already. They're in room 404, right next to us in the hostel. They leave for Amsterdam in two days. Jean-Michel and I join the Aussie boys and we have a few pints before heading back to the hostel and out to the pub-crawl.

We head back to the hostel to eat. The Aussie girls are having vegimite sandwiches. They want me to try it.

So I do. And it tastes like crap.

Jean-Michel makes me eggs and toast. It's much better.

After eating we head out on the pub-crawl. The guide is kind of an idiot, but at least I'm having a good time with the French-Canadian and the Aussies. After a bar or two we walk to the next and pass by the manekenpis. My journey in Brussels is complete. Now all I have to do is get up in the morning and catch a train to Amsterdam.

Day 13 - Paris/Brussels, Belguim

Woke up on the floor of Kim's room freezing cold. It's time for me to go. I'm leaving the country today and have to check out by 11am.

I get back to the hostel and the cleaning staff has already begun going through the rooms. I quickly pack up. I need a shower too, but I'll just have to organize my bag in Brussels. I head to the shower with all my stuff but they're cleaning them. I head to the showers on the very top floor of the hostel with my stuff so I have time before they get cleaned. After I shower and throw my stuff in my bag I head off to the train station, Gard du Nord, where I've learned I can catch a train to Brussels. At the train station I decide to buy a EuroRail Pass so that I can travel by train to different countries. Logic tells me that my cheapest option is a pass with 10 travel days over a 2 month period. Sounds good.

The next train isn't for a few hours so I walk around Paris and grab some good at a sidewalk cafe that has WiFi. I order a salad and it's incredibly good.

During lunch I check to see if I've received any messages from Mike, my roommate last year in college. He studied abroad in Belguim and he's there now visiting his girlfriend Pauline. She's from Brussels.

Mike says he and Pauline can meet for a beer in Brussels tonight, but tomorrow they're going to Paris. I write to him, then I get back to the station in time for the train. Off I go.

After an hour I get off the train and take the tram to my hostel. I'm staying at 2GO4, a hostel Pauline recommended. I only reserved one night, but I'm going to need two. When I get to the hostel, reserving a room for the next day is no problem at all. I'll have to switch rooms though tomorrow. That's okay with me.

I get a hold of Mike and tell him I can meet in a half hour. He's at Grand Place, Brussels' big historic square. The square is impressive with big, authentic buildings on each side. When you're in the square it feels like you're surrounded by walls.

Mike and Pauline arrive at Grand Place and say that they are able to have a few drinks and stay a while. I ask them if they're still going to Paris tomorrow. Apparently it was a surprise because I ruined it. Mike didn't tell me he hadn't told Pauline where it was they were going.

Oops.

After a few minutes we all head off to Delerium. It holds a spot in The Guinness Book of World Records for having the most beers commercially available in a bar. They've lost count of how many kinds of beers they offer their customers now, but when they set the record they had 2004. Their list of beers is the size of a phonebook and the bar is three stories.

Down in the basement we have a beer. Pauline orders me a Schouffe and gets different beers for her and Mike. Behind the bar the man heads off to the back and comes back with three bottles. He sets them down and opens each of the bottles in a matter of seconds. Clink clink clink as he hits the bottles with his opener.

Caps are flying everywhere.

He then starts pouring them. Big, high pours into each beer's respective goblet. It's great fun to watch.

After we get our beers we sit down on stools at one of the massive barrels they have scattered around the place to be used as tables. The beer is delicious. I'll have another later, but after this one we're heading to the Floris Bar next door to have some absinthe. After the beer and absinthe we walk to a different bar in the same building. The rum bar. Pauline orders a big mojito for us to share. The glass is so big that we have to put down a €10 deposit, just incase we break it or try to steal it.

After the mojito Mike and Pauline head home so they can wake up early to head to Paris. I head back to Delerium and order another beer. A French guy next to me asks me how it is. He's here with his friend. They leave tomorrow for Amsterdam. I leave in two days.

We talk for a while but we're interrupted when a girl gets up on a stool a few barrels behind us and starts cheering. I cheer back. Now it's a party. One of the French guys bets me she's American. I don't think so. We put a beer on it and I head off to find out.

There's a whole lot of them in the group and they're all from Brazil.

Thanks for the beer, Francois.

We hang with the Brazillian crew for a while until they leave. Then we find a different group. They're from Brussels. One of the guys seems a little stiff but the rest of there group is fun. Turns out the stiff is an accountant. Go figure.

Eventually I say I've got to get home. It's around 2am already. When I get back the door to my dorm-style room is open and there's a young American guy completely drunk sitting on the floor having a beer. It's been a long night for him he tells me. He got sick earlier. With happy thoughts in my head about switching rooms tomorrow, I fall asleep.

Day 12 - Paris

Last night at 1:00am my roommates came home. They're from The States. I told them I'd be setting my alarm clock for 8:30 since I'm to meet Jen and her friends at 9:30 at the post office outside the Porte d'Orleans stop on the metro.

I wake up to my alarm at 8 and smash the off button with my hand so it doesn't keep ringing and waking my roommates. It won't turn off so I smash it a few more times before I realize it's the alarm on my watch. Once I realize what's happening (I set two alarms in case one didn't go off) I turn off my watch's alarm. Then my alarm clock starts ringing.

So much for not waking the guys.

I head off to the metro and grab a piece of bread on the way out. After changing trains a few times I pop out of the Porte d'Orleans station and Jen is there waiting.

Probably one of my most successful mornings. All hell didn't break loose when I tried to get somewhere.

We meet up with the two others that are coming to Versailles with us: Greg and Kim. Kim was with us last night at the bar. She's from Chicago. Greg is from Buffalo and goes to Ohio State.

We grab a quick bite to eat before taking the metro to the train station. I grabbed a croissant. My first bite made me salivate. Flakey outside with a warm, soft inside. Every bite was cherished.

We take metro and the train to Versailles. It was an odd route, made inconvenient by the construction on the easiest lines to the station, but with the three Parisian residents with me I just followed along.

The Palace of Versailles is a short walk from the train station we got off at in Versailles. We turn the corner to head up the street and I see it in the distance. It's a massive chateau with ornate gold decoration and a golden gate that bars entry to those without tickets. We paid €25 each to see not only the Palace but the gardens and Marie Antoinette's Estate. We wait in line for an hour to get in and finally we do. We walk all through the Palace, the garden with its massive fountains, and Marie Antoinette's Estate. Towards the end of our stay we decide to go back to their apartments at the university (I'm to use the ATM so Jen stops paying for me), buy wine, go out to dinner, get a beer at the top of Mountparnasse Tower, and then head down to the Seine where we will enjoy the wine.

We walk to the train station and when we get there there are a few trains waiting to head off in different directions so it takes a few minutes for us to figure out which one we need to take. Jen and Kim figure out which train we need and head off to the platform. I start following but Greg is still reading the sign so I shout for him to hurry up and come with us. Kim and Jen are walking down the platform looking for a car that is somewhat empty still. I'm not entirely sure I'll get to the same car as them so I walk close to the train so I can hear the alarm that announces the doors are closing. I hear a quiet buzz already coming from the train and realize that it's the alarm. I dash for the nearest door and grab the handle on the inside of the train. The doors crash shut on me. They make an absolute racket as they shut on me, pause, and continue to shut as I pull my body into the car.

That was close.

I'm not convinced Greg was able to get on a different car behind me, so I start to walk down the train to find Jen and Kim in a car farther up. As I'm walking, the train pulls away from the station and I see Jen and Kim standing out on the platform. I start shouting through the window at them but it's no use, the train had picked up speed and we we are long gone.



I try to retrace our route from this morning, and I'm pretty sure I've half remembered, half figured out how we got to Versailles. The next step is to decide where I should try to wait for them. I figure a station where we needed to change trains would be too risky if they took a different route, so I decide to go all the way back to Porte d'Orleans. I get back and wait outside the station for them. A few minutes later Greg comes out. He had made it on a car behind me and called Jen. She told him I was somewhere on the train so Greg waited at a train switching station for me, couldn't find me, and so he caught a later metro back. We went off to buy wine and met the girls a half hour later back at the dorms.

Jen tells me that Valerie, who was with us at the top of the Eiffel Tower yesterday, is coming to Montparnasse and the Seine. We relaxed a bit then all left for dinner. The five of us sat outside at a restaurant that Jen and Valerie had been to before. I order the smoked salmon taglieatelle that Valerie said she had last time. It's phenomenal. I don't even know how describe how good it is. After dinner Valerie and I hatched a plan to order different deserts and split them with each-other. And a brilliant exchange it was. French toast and molten chocolate cake.



After dinner we walked to Montparnasse tower. It's the only skyscraper in Paris so it has great views. You can pay to take a tour at the top, or you can go one floor lower and have a drink. We were going to do the latter. We ride up the elevator to the 56th floor and immediately we look like a bunch of termites running through the place. Everyone is dressed nice and the receptionist tells us there is a dress code. Pants and closed toed shoes. Jen and Kim will wait at the bottom of the building for us so we can have a quick drink and take pictures. So Greg, Valerie, and I walk back up to the fancy and elegant hostess.

"Trois," says Greg.

"Toilets?"

"No. Trois." he holds up three fingers.

She looks at us confused, then looks at the girls behind us who didn't meet the dress code and are going back down the elevator. She realizes what we did.

"Tres simpa!" she says. You can tell she wants to help us, and she's excited to see that we found a way around the dress code. I later learned simpa is a shorter way of saying simpatique.

She starts to lead us into the bar area of the restaurant but immediately you can tell it's full. It's a small little thing with only a few seats. She asks us to come back but let's me take a photograph of the view of Paris.

Eventually we take the metro to the Seine where they have just dumped tons of sand along the concrete banks to make it seem like a beach. It happens once a year and only for a little while. We open up the wine and sit around until the beach closes at midnight. From there we decide to head to an Irish pub to meet up with others.

After a few hours at the bar, the metro has long stopped running. I plan to walk home, but I want to stay with them until they catch a taxi home. It takes forever to flag down a taxi but eventually they do. The last of the group that I say goodbye to is Valerie, so after we say bye she leaves and runs over to the taxi before it leaves her behind. I start walking home. I only get as far as the other side of the street before I run into Kim.

Shouldn't you be in that taxi?

She had been on the other side of the street trying to get the group a taxi. They must have thought she went home already.

But now she's out at 2am with no money, no French, and her phone is at the apartment.

I can't leave her here.

I tell her I'd get her home but I'd need a place to stay once we got there since I wouldn't want to pay for a taxi back to the Bastille after paying for hers. We agree that I'll sleep on the floor.

It takes a very long time to stop a taxi. It takes even longer to explain where we need to go. No French. I remember the street is jaurdon so he puts rue jaurdon in his gps and we start off. It takes us a while to realize it's the wrong way. We discover it's boulevard jaurdon, not rue jaurdon.

It's an expensive misconception.

We get back and the taxi driver is simpatique. He rounds down our fare to the nearest ten dollars.

Merci.

I ask Kim to hold my sunglasses while I pay for the cab. We get out of the cab and take two steps before she starts screaming. A bird had just pooped all over her hand.

And my Ray Bans.

Day 11 - Paris

Today's a big day!

I'm heading off to do all the touristy stuff and hopefully meet up with Jen later. I'm going to go to the Louvre, the Eiffel Tower, and the Arche de Triomphe. I eat the bread and butter they give me for breakfast and head off to the Louvre. I arrive around ten. I wait in line for 15 minutes before going through the metal detector. Another 5 minutes for a ticket and I'm in. I start on the -1 floor and work my way up. The Louvre is shaped like a horse shoe so I start at one end and walk the whole floor until I get to the other end where I take the stairs to the next floor.

Rinse and repeat.

The French have decided that the ground floor is floor 0, so after an hour or so I get to the 1st floor. Mona's floor. She has many, many spectators gawking and snapping photos. She's unbelievably small.

I continue to walk the halls, admiring the centuries-old priceless art. And I find my favorite painting. I don't look to see who painted it.

For some reason I don't want to know.

It was one o'clock when I left the Louvre and walked through the park. I stopped to have a sandwich at a cafe in the park. I know how to order food in French so I give it a try. It sounds like I have peanut butter in my mouth.

I finish the poulet mayonaise sandwich and walk to the Eiffel tower. It's pretty big. I go sit down in the grass and a girl comes up to me and asks me to take her photograph in front of the Tower. She's from Taiwan and lives in London. She's covering the Olympic games while getting her Master's. She's adamant that I give her my information. She wants me to come visit in Taiwan.

Maybe on my next adventure.

I tell her I'm going to go and head off, walking to my last stop. I pass by Ferraris, tinted Mercedes, and '60s American muscle on the way to the Arche de Triomphe

How very interesting.

I get to the monument and it's in the center of a roundabout. Cars fly by, darting into the circle without hesitation. They weave in and out of traffic and fly out on a different street. It's completely insane.

I take the metro back to the hostel now because the free wifi starts at four o'clock and I want to try and contact Jen. She's written me a message saying she's going up in the Eiffel Tour with a friend at 6:30. I've already seen it today, but I tell her I'll go anyways.

I take the metro down there and find her waiting in line with her friend Valerie who's also from The States. She's from Kansas City, Kansas and goes to school at The University of Tulsa in Oklahoma. She's funny, and also very pretty. She's short with red hair that glows orange in the sun, green eyes, and a great smile. She loves to laugh. The three of us take the ride up the elevator to the top of the tower. The photographs are magnificent. The views are better.

We walk around to the other side of the tower and find a man proposing to his girlfriend. She says yes, jumps into his arms, and cries. I wanted to buy them champagne at the cafe at the top but I'm flat out of money. Jen helped to pay for my ride up. I'd pay her back after going to an ATM later.

After leaving the Eiffel tower we head off to have a beer. After, we head to the Bastille area near my hostel so I can throw down my bag. The Bastille is a great area for nightlife as well. We buy crepes at a little cafe and they're delicious. I decide to have a crepe with fromage et thon. It's amazing.

Like a tuna quesadilla, only better.

After we eat we head off to find a bar. A few of Jen's friends meet up with us and we play a few drinking games. After a few hours they've got to leave to catch the last metro of the night back to the dorms at the university where they're staying. I walk them to the station and arrange a time and place to meet Jen and her friends in the morning. We're going to Versailles tomorrow.

Day 10 - Paris

Alarm didn't go off this morning when I set it for 8, but I woke up shortly after anyways. I ran about the house packing up my things. Evan was coming to pick me up and drive me to Belfast International. My easyJet flight would be at 13:30 to Charles de Gaulle in Paris. Neily and Adam woke up while I was packing so when Evan came we said our goodbyes and off I went with Evan at 9:30. It took two hours to get to the airport in Belfast.

The lines weren't bad getting through security so I bought some food and ordered an Americano. Way too hot to drink.

A half hour before my flight they announce the gate number I'll depart from. I run off to the toilets to start my airport ritual.

Time to put the clothes on.

Unlike Ryanair, easyJet doesn't have a weight restriction. Only size matters they tell me.

I gamble. I have it figured that if I take out just my bulky pants my bag should be small enough to meet their standards. I get dressed and head to the boarding queue. I'm wearing four pairs of pants and drinking my piping hot Americano so I am dripping.

What a freak.

In the end, my bag was never checked.

I sit down at the window seat and a couple of young Irish boys sit in the two seats next to me. I'm still sweating profusely. I need to get these pants off.

This will look horrible if I start taking pants off on an airplane next to a couple kids.

I strike up a conversation with them, solely so that I break the ice and explain myself before I eventually start taking off my pants in front of them. After this uncomfortable encounter I spend the majority of the flight blogging.

We land in Paris. Nobody looks French.

Everyone looks so hostile.

It took me forever to figure out how I should get to the city. I decided the RER train from the airport would be the best. After a while I decide this stop is as good as any so I get off the train. I walk up the stairs to get out of the subway and find myself in the middle of a packed French music festival.

Beer and wine sold on the street, people flocking to the square with their own drinks, and good music.

Welcome to mainland Europe.

I'd love to stay for a while, but after a few songs I decide I'm checking in later than anticipated at the hostel and I've got to get going. A few more metros later and a short walk and I'm at the hostel. I throw down my stuff and use the Internet to see if my friend Jen had written to me yet. Jen and I graduated from Santa Clara together. A few days ago, Jen told me she's living in Paris and that we would meet up at some point. Facebook tells me today's not going to be the day.

Time to meet some friends.

I walk down to the Bastille to take photographs and find some food. I decide a bottle of wine would be the easiest way to meet people in Paris so I buy a Bordeaux. And a baguette. And Brie.

I start to bring it back to the hostel and I realize I don't have a bottle opener so I start going from store to store trying to find one. No luck at first, but eventually I walk into a Chinese electronics store. They sell wine too.

"Parlez-vous Anglais?"

"Yes I do."

"Do you have a corkscrew?"

"Oui."

He must have a stash of them behind the counter because he doesn't even get up to give it to me.

"..and cups?"

Again he just casually grabs one from behind the counter as if he were just giving me change.

I came to the right store.

I head back to the hostel and eat dinner and drink my wine. A few guys my age sit down next to me and we get to talking. They're from Andalusia, Spain and are heading down to the river, la Seine, tonight. Last night they brought a case of beer and did the same. They said there was music and dancing so they're expecting the same tonight.

We hang out at the hostel for a few hours then head down to la Seine. Tamara would have told me there's a certain spirit in the night.

Smells like teen spirit to me.

The youth are singing, dancing, and drinking late into the Parisian night. Paul McCartney is even there with us. It goes on for hours with sporadic cheers of "Bastille! Bastille! Bastille! drowning out the night.

At 2:30am the Spaniards want to head back so they can rest up before going to Brussels tomorrow. I tell them I want to check out Notre Dame since I'm already so close to it.

We agree to meet up in Berlin.

Day 9 - Carndonagh

Today Adam and Neil will be working and Ann is preparing to head off to Scotland later today. Joe Paul will be taking me around in the morning. Joe is Neily's brother and lives just up the road from Neil and Ann. He comes to collect me at the house and drops off another distant relative of mine at Lily's to open up the bar and tea room. A couple kittens have been out in the back patio for a couple days now. They're not sure what to do with them. If I had it my way they'd be living there permanently.

A couple of resident mouse traps.

We leave the bar and head up to Joe's house for tea and biscuits. After tea he's going to be showing me the family's old house as well as some other sights around the Inishowen Peninsula. We finish up and walk next door where the old house is.

Every night in Carndonagh it's been getting dark around 11:30pm, so I knew I was far north. But not this far north. I had walked into Santa's Village. Joe Paul used to run a piggery but got out of the business when the margins dwindled. The old piggery as well as the old house had been combined to form a grand winter attraction for kids and families. We walk through the place and there are decorations everywhere as well as pens and stables filled with hay where Joe Paul keeps goats and rabbits and other animals that he borrows from locals during the winter to entice visitors. In the largest room of the piggery sits Santa's Sleigh, a huge Christmas tree, rooms for kids to write letters for Santa and drop them in the post, and toy shops for playing. Joe Paul tells me he used to host big dances up here and points out the bar that still sits in the corner. They had to shut it down after the police raided them.

"Oooooo Jesus" he says when he tells me the story. Whenever Joe Paul really gets going he fires out "Ooooo Jesus" a few times.

It takes a while to walk through the place since Joe is not only telling me about all the stuff he has in the wintertime for kids, but also the important stuff. The history.

My family lived on that homestead for many years. (In the 18th century, my ancestor Paul "Newman" Doherty left the Isle of Doagh during a sandstorm and came to Ballyloskey, Carndonagh where the family is now.)

Again, I digress.

We get to the end of the tour and there's a fenced in area where the deer usually is when Santa's Village is open. It's out on the other side of the house at the moment. We're going to feed it.

We walk down to the house and put on huge rubber boots before going out since it's been so wet lately. Then we walk down to the field and there it is. In all it's glory. A big. fecking. raindeer.

Ooooh Jesus.

"Rudy!" Joe shouts at him.

It takes me a while to realize Rudy is short for Rudolph.

We head into the field and set the bucket down for Rudy to eat from and I pet him. And his antlers. Those big. fecking. antlers.

Rudy's wearing a muzzle and he's tethered to a stake in the ground with about 50yds of line. Plenty of room to roam. When Joe Paul first got Rudy from a breeder he had a real hard time getting him into the field.

"It should have been put on YouTube," he says. "The breeder dropped him off and the reindeer wouldn't want to go into my field."

"We couldn't catch him so I phoned the vet to ask how I should get him into the field."

The vet suggested a tranquilizer gun but you could only get one miles away. They went with Valium. 500 Valium.

"I cleaned up every single pharmacy for miles. Once I had 500 I mixed it into his feed and after he was doped up on the Valium three guys ran up and put a rope around one side of his antlers. Then another three guys roped the other side of the antlers. Four guys wrapped a rope around one of his hind legs."

So there they were, eleven Irishmen pulling and fighting a massive, drugged up reindeer while it staggers into trees and bushes trying to get him into the field. They finally got him into the big field with the high fences and all was grand that winter at Santa's Village.

Then September came and Joe Paul is driving up the road to his house and there's Rudy out walking the streets. He hopped the fences like they were nothing during mating season.

Joe Paul couldn't believe his eyes. Better round up the boys.

It took a week to catch Rudy again. They would finally corner him near the fence of a big field and then Rudy would bound over it like it wasn't there.

"We only needed 300 Valium this time to get him back."

So eventually the 11 boys roped ol' doped up Rudy and got him back in the field. Now he's tethered, just for good measure. The Valium gets expensive.

After petting, feeding, and taking pictures with Rudy we walk back up to the house and drive off to the bogside so I can 'foot turf,' they call it. Turf is decomposed plants, centuries old, that is dug up, dried, and burned during the winter to heat the houses in Ireland. It looks like dense, oily soil that dries to look like coal logs. (It's much cheaper to heat a house with than oil). We drive up the hill and park the car, but it's too wet for footin' turf so we just walk around a wee bit.

After, Joe drives me to see the Carndonagh cross (a 7th century stone cross) and mass rock (a place in the forest where the Catholics would come to pray and avoid Protestant persecution during the Penal times). Then, still wearing the big rainboots, we head up to the Carndonagh Cathedral.

The cathedral is a massive stone church, built in the '40s, that sits high upon a hill overlooking the town. Inside, an old Irish woman is vacuuming the church and stops to talk to us.

Sorry for slopping mud through the church while you're cleaning...

She tells us a wee bit about the church. She told us that before the building started, the parish priest had to go ask for the bishop's permission to use dynamite to blow up the rock on the hill to make way for the church's future foundation. The bishop said it would be fine. The priest said, "That's grand of you. Ive got it out in the car." The bishop told him to get the hell away from his church with it.

Eventually we head back to the house and have lunch. During lunch, Peter shows up. He's another relative and he'll be taking me to the Isle of Doagh to see the old reconstructed famine village. It's very touristy, but it explains a lot of Ireland's history.

During the tour of the famine village, the proprietor runs around from scene to scene ahead of the group and uses different props to help him with his story. He's a crafty fellow. He talks about the Irish wake tradition after a person dies and I don't know whether to believe half of what he's saying. Some of the things he's saying are just too funny, and he's so serious that I want to bust out laughing. But I hold back. After all, this is no laughing matter.

Eventually the tour ends and I'm dropped off at The Arch Bar in Carndonagh at 9pm to meet Adam for a few pints. It's much emptier tonight and Adam's boy Duffy that was with us down at Lily's on Sunday is behind the bar. The Guinness is just as good as it was Sunday. After a pint we head over to The Persian Bar next door for another. Patty Paul and Joe Paul walk in while we're there, so we pick up a wee following before heading to the small bar across the street that's run by the town undertaker.

It's quiet when we walk in, but it only takes us a minute to get the place going. The Pauls know everyone in the bar, and everyone in the bar knows I tried to walk from Sligo to Bundoran.

Ooooh Jesus.

After an hour or so, John Paul meets us at the bar. We've got almost all the boys with us for pints and the bar staff is great. They let me get behind the bar and I take photographs pouring a pint.

By now it's closing time and I'm dead tired from the undertaker's pints. We thank them and leave, but Adam and I have one more stop. We walk back up to The Arch and Adam knocks on the side door. Duffy rolls it open then closes it behind us. We'll have a wee pint while he closes up. After we're all done we head back to the house in a taxi and feast on late-nite lasagna that Ann had made for us before leaving for Scotland.

I'm leaving early in the morning for Paris. I'm too tired to do anything though. I'll pack my bag tomorrow.

Day 8 - Derry, Northern Ireland/Carndonagh, Ireland

Today Evan Paul (a relative of mine around my age) is going to take me into Derry, Northern Ireland. It's about a half hour away. The Loyalists call it Londonderry.

The city is full of history and was an important city during the reform and The Troubles. It's nickname is The Walled City. For good reason. When we parked the car and walked over we were immediately fronted by a massive stone wall that rivals China's. We spent a few hours walking around the top of it, taking photographs, and looking at massive cannons. From the top of the wall you can see differences between neighborhoods outside. One Loyalist/Protestant neighborhood is painted in the British tri-colours: red, white, and blue. The Republican/Catholic areas are glowing with the Irish green, white, and gold.

We stop into a museum and look around. We also watch a shirt film about the history of Derry. If you asked me about Derry's history I'd give you the same answer a girl would give you if you asked her about a boy she's seeing.

It's complicated.

We leave the museum and walk about the wall looking at the guild hall, churches, and cannons. Lots of cannons.

Then we head off to Gringing Avalia (although it's spelled incorrectly it's even harder to pronounce). It's an ancient stone lookout post that could see for miles. The view is impressive.

We drive back to Carndonagh after a few hours of touring Derry. When we get back, Neily Is about to pick up Adam from work at the hotel so I go along for the ride. After we grab Adam Neily stops into Ballyliffin Golf Club so I can see it, just incase the weather won't let us play a round of golf tomorrow. It's been wet since Monday.

We get back to the house then decide to head to Lily's for a few pints before dinner. On the way we pass a big, old building.

"Your granny used to go dancing there, Neily tells me. "You paid a few pennies to get in, or you could bring a can of milk and get in free. Your granny Francey would sneak over to the neighbors house and milk their cow at night before going. They could never figure out why it would be dry some mornings. She could milk a cow better than any of the men as well."

That's my granny!

We head home for dinner and it's top-notch as usual. The mashed potatoes are amazing...

..and the butter.

Day 7 - Carndonagh

Tap tap tap. Tap tap tap.

Neily opens the door. "Macklin, it's about 3:30 now."

I slept in. Late. Adam wasn't up much earlier than I was so when I got downstairs he was making breakfast. Bacon, sausage, eggs, pudding.

Yum.

It's been more than 2 years since I've had pork, but I'm more than willing to have it now.

"Try everything in Europe" people have been telling me, so there's no way I'll be turning down this Irish breakfast.

The food is AMAZING. My two-year celibacy from four-legged animals is over and it's well worth the wait. I finish everything and a few minutes later I'm feeling heavy after the rich food and yesterday's drinking so I head off on a run. Fifteen minutes down the winding road of the countryside and fifteen minutes back. Everything is so green. The mist is thick today, nothing like the warm sunny day we had previously. A dog starts following me about halfway through the run and I'm hoping he's not hungry.

He isn't.

After I get back and clean up we head off to see Cabadooey, the house where my granny lived for some time. It's an old thatched-roof cottage next to a stone house whose roof has fallen in. It's incredible to think of the history here. Years ago, they were making moonshine here. To hide the bottles, they buried them underground out front. When the authorities came, they threw feed for the chickens on top of the hatch in order to cover it better than the sheet metal could on it's own. The authorities never found the 'shine.

After Cabadooey, we headed off around the Inishowen Peninsula (the northernmost in Ireland where Carndonagh and Malin are situated). The mist is thick so it's hard to see much. On a winding road in the hills of Mamore Gap, Neily stops the car and asks me which direction the road is sloping.

We're headed downhill.

He puts the car in neutral and lifts his foot from the brake. The car starts rolling backwards UP the hill.

How bizarre.

"The Electric Bray" he calls it. Neily tries to convince tourists that the sea pulls you up the hill.  Others reckon it's the holy well nearby.

We turn 'round and start back to Malin Head. We check out the beaches in the north and then we head off to the northernmost point in the country. We hop out of the car and I look down at the water. People have left some white-washed stone messages on the cliff below. The largest of which reads "EIRE." There's not much farther north than this. Iceland would be one of the few.

I might not ever be this far north in my life ever again.

The thought's almost sad.

We head back towards Carn and we stop in Ireland's northernmost pub, Farren's, to have a pint before going home.

This will probably be the northernmost pint of my life. Sad.

Afterwards we head back to Lily's bar before heading to the house.  Neily has a bit of business to attend to before dinner.  I look around the bar now that I've not had a full day of drinks in me.  I spot a newspaper clipping from Ireland's national newspaper behind the bar.  There's Neily Paul's picture, holding an orange on the national news.  I read on. 

"After Rory McIlroy won the US Open, he took a helicopter to Ballyliffin Golf Club (his home course a few minutes from Carndonagh) where he would be shooting photos for Oakley.  When he left the chopper, he had an orange in one hand, trophy in the other, and no spare hand to offer to the directors.  He tossed the orange in the rough behind the helipad when he stepped off the helicopter. Everyone swarmed Rory to take pictures. Neily went 'round the chopper to find the orange.  It took five minutes, but he surfaced with it.  He'll never part with it."

I turned to Adam to ask how long it finally took Neily to throw the orange away.  Adam tells me he never did.

"It's right up there you see."

Sure enough, Neily Paul had put the orange in a jar with a preservative, high above the top-shelf spirits.

An Irish trophy.

After I die from laughter and admire other odd collections around the bar, we head to the house and have dinner. Pork, ratatouille, Neily's mashed potatoes of course, salad, and wine. It's delicious.

Why did I give up red meat for two years??

Dinner is fantastic and afterwards I'm thoroughly exhausted. I head up to bed and fall asleep.

Day 6 - Lily's Bar, Malin

I wake up as if I've just come out of a coma. Today is going to be a struggle. Last night was the first I'd really drank. I pack up my things and head to the bus stop. I realize my camera is still charging so I run back to Richards and grab it. I also use the phone to call Ann, Richards mum, to tell her I had made it to Bundoran the night before so I'd be in Derry at 10:20 in the morning. She's delighted. Both because I saw Richard and because I'll be there soon. She agrees to collect me in Derry.

She's a saint.

The bus leaves at 8:25. I board the bus and immediately a wave of exhaustion comes over me. I can't fight it. I wake up at the stop just before Derry. (Derry being my stop, as well as the bus' last stop).

We pull into Derry and I can't believe I was originally supposed to have been here 26hrs ago.

Maybe if I hadn't spent 17hrs in the airport.

I step down from the bus and look around for the Doherty's light blue Peugot. It's not there.

Oh boy.

Not even a second later, Ann comes running around the corner and I throw up my arms to give her a hug. She's parked around the corner and we hop in the car (me in the front left seat where the passenger sits) and of we go to get me coffee and water. We go to the hotel nearby since everything else is closed on a Sunday. We eat breakfast there as well. After breakfast we get back in the car and off we go to Carndonagh.

What a sensation. Yesterday James told me that when I eventually sat in the front seat of a car I'd be in for a wild ride. He was absolutely right. Everything is backwards. At least Ann's driving is calm and ordinary compared to the ride i had from James yesterday. Yesterday we were passing cars on 2 lane roads, bombing down winding streets, etc. Today I'm only just in the front seat of a car that seems to be heading down the road into oncoming traffic. But this is Ireland, so it's right to be on the left.

We get to Carndonagh in 30 minutes and we walk into the house. Adam (Ann's son and Richard's older brother) is in the house waiting for us. He says it's good I've gotten here so early since now I've got a full day of drinking ahead of me. I understood what he said, but later I'd find out I really didn't understand what he meant.

A few minutes after we'd arrived at the house, I decided I'd stay a while longer. I was scheduled to be in Dublin Monday, but since I only just got to Carn today, Sunday, (and I'd driven through the whole of Ireland by now anyways) I booked a flight from Belfast, Northern Ireland to Paris on Thursday. I won't be taking anymore rides through the whole of the country again.

After I change flights, Adam and I drive up to Malin where Neil, his dad, owns Lily's Bar and Tea Room. Neil is Ann's husband and my mum's cousin, which is how I am related to the Carndonagh Dohertys.

Years ago, my grandmother Frances was born in Carndonagh and lived here until she left for San Francisco where she met my grandfather. My mum has a lot of cousins in Carndonagh which means I have a lot of second cousins here. Neil, or Neily Paul as they call him here, being one of them. Here there are so many families that all have the same last name (eg Doherty) that they've all been given nicknames to distinguish themselves from others. Neily, Ann, Adam, and Richard are the Pauls.

I digress.

Adam and I pull up to Lily's Bar and we walk in. Neily comes out from behind the bar to greet me and gives me a hard time about the crack I've had getting from Stansted Airport to Carndonagh. It's noon, and at the bar at the moment are a few of Adam's mates having pints. We join them and I have a Guinness. It's the best I've ever had.

There must be something in the water that they use to make the Guinness.

I sit around, telling the boys the time I had getting up to Carn from Stansted. We have a few more pints then head out front to sit down in the sun as we pint. Pinting is an activity in itself.

It's a lovely day for a Guinness.

Most of the boys are drinking Smithwick's, an old Irish ale so eventually I switch to that. It's delicious: much lighter than the Guinness, yet without compromise. I'll never drink an American ale again. We sit about Lily's, pinting away when Neily comes out front and suggests that Adam take me up to watch Gaelic Football, Ireland's national sport. We walk up to the field to watch Malin's team, which is one of the country's best. The sport is a mixture of rugby and soccer and it's brutally amazing to watch. Three points for scoring in the net, one for kicking it over the bar. We watched the rest of the game and Malin won by two points with two brilliant scores over the bar from a difficult angle at the very end of the match.

We walked back to Lily's and sat down outside with the boys for another pint. Im starting to get hungry so I head back to the kitchen area to see about having some food with these pints. Gemma is about my age. She's a lovely girl, very pretty, and works about the bar and tea room for Neily. On Sunday she was preparing the sandwiches. I ask for chicken salad and she does one up for me. We chat a little while. She will be graduating from college in September. I thank her for the sandwich and bring it out front to sit down and eat.

It's delicious. The best I've ever had.

Back outside, one of the boys keeps trying to pour a shamrock in the head of the Guinness but he keeps failing. Neily tells us you can only do it when the Guinness is poor quality. And his is the best. Another guy is in the dog house since his girl is flying from Liverpool to Derry and expects him to be waiting with the car. But he's at the bar. He'll stay and have another pint.

It's probably around 7pm now and people are starting to pour into the bar. Young guys, older men, and a few women. Most of the men are impossible to understand. A few guys brought guitars and the singing starts. Bob Dylan, The Beatles...all the best. It's a great time, and at this point, Lily's is the most happening bar in County Donegal.

Right now I'm sitting around the table pondering different things as the pints keep coming and I come to three conclusions:

1. I've been here all day and I've seen people knocked, people bumped, and glasses tipped 45 degrees...but not a single drop spilled. It's amazing. The Irish are quite talented. (Eventually there would have been a broken glass, but not until 10pm.)

2. The people are all so friendly. I've met a million people today and they all have time to listen to ya, to tell ya stories, and to introduce ya to their friends.

3. If you have finished half of your pint there's another one on the way.


Around about 10 or 11pm we hop into a taxi and head over from Lily's in Malin to The Arch in Carndonagh. The Arch has live music and a few people in it. We're the first taxi there, but a few more follow. Now the majority of the group that was at Lily's has arrived at The Arch. I have a few more pints and chat with everyone. This day couldn't be better. The men tell great stories and the women are class. Everybody drinks.

Around about 2:30 we leave the bar and head home in a taxi.

14.5hrs of pure bliss.

Adam reckons I had a great time Saturday night with his wee brother Richard, but I'm drinking with the big boys now.

Day 5 - Stansted/All of Ireland

The terminal is brutal.

Any other time it might be halfway decent, but the olympics are in hot pursuit and there are all sorts of last-minute modifications that will help to accommodate the mass influx of people. Jackhammers, saws, forklifts, and other heavy equipment went off throughout the night. I woke up every 30 minutes or so all the way up until 4:20. My alarm was set to go off in 10 minutes so I cancelled the alarm, rolled up my sleeping bag, and headed off.

Anyone who has ever flown with Ryanair will tell you that their bag restrictions are no laughing matter. Only one carry-on per person. That carry on has to be a certain size and less than 22lbs (10kg). Back home, I weighed my bag after I had packed about 90% of my stuff and it weighed 27lbs. So here I am, 2 hours before my flight, walking to the bathroom to go put on every article of clothing I can find in my bag to get the weight down. I decide not to layer my socks to ensure that my shoes can still fit. I put on all my boxers, starting with the tightest to help minimize the uncomfortable bunching of fabric. I put on all my pants: first the khaki dockers shorts, then the jeans, then my conferrable pants/shorts that zip off at the knee, then my sweat pants. I throw on every shirt I can find (six in all) and I button up the top button since I'd rather have people think I'm a big burly fellow than a freak wearing 18 articles of clothing at 4:30 in the morning. I leave the bathroom but I'm not entirely sure if I've dropped my bag's weight enough.

I walk towards the Ryanair zone and it's a zoo. Lines everywhere, people yelling, babies crying, and bags being shoved into the pre-established cage that passes judgement on whether your bag is small enough to fly or not. A man looks an me approaching, asks if I'm checking bags, and asks to see my boarding pass.

"Go ahead through security."

Yes sir.

I walk to the security queue and it's enormous.  It takes me an hour to wait in the queue, and when I get to the front the woman checking the boarding passes tells me I have to go to the other queue (queue 50) to get a different boarding pass since mine for whatever reason didn't have a bar code.  I walk to queue 50 and when I get there a man working for Ryanair asks what I'm doing.  I tell him my story and he looks at his schedule of flights.  It's 5:45 and my flight is at 6:25.  He tells me I'm going to miss it now.

"Go to the ticket queue and buy another ticket."

I go to the ticket queue and try to get the next flight to Derry.  I wait in the queue for a half hour, and when I get to the front the man says the next flight is tomorrow evening.  He tells me that Knock is the next closest airport and he says he can get me a flight at 7 this evening.  I buy the ticket and he gives me a receipt to take to queue 50.  Queue 50 weighs my bag. It's 9.89kg.  Just under the limit.  Queue 50 gives me a boarding pass and I walk through the security queue with it. I get to the front and I tell the woman who originally rejected me that I have missed my flight.  She looks dejected.

"I forgot to tell you to cut to the front of queue 50 then return to the security queue and go around and cut to the front of the security queue."

You have got to me kidding me.

If she worked for Ryanair I would give her hell, but nothing I say or do will get me my money back or get me a new flight.  I go through the queue and get a hold of Ann, my mom's cousin who I'll be staying with.  She's a saint for dealing with my nightmare, and she tries to figure out how I'll be getting from Knock airport to Carndonagh now that I arrive 2 hours away and late at night.  It's now 9:00 and I take out my passport and boarding pass.  My flight leaves at 7:00am.

7:00am. 7:00am! RYANAIR. Your idiot employee sold me a ticket for 7am and told me it was 7pm.  I wouldn't have even been able to catch the 7am flight when you sold it to me!!!

I freak out. Partly because I've missed my second flight this morning, but mostly because I feel awful for Ann and the Dohertys. The Dohertys live in Carndonagh, which is about as far north in Ireland as you could possibly go. It's about a half hour away from the Northernmost point of the country. I run back through security and get to the ticket desk. I give them hell but they don't care. It is Ryanair after all. The next possible flight to Ireland is to Shannon Airport, 6 hours south of Carndonagh. I buy the flight and go back through security. I'm sweating from the running and the 6lbs of clothes I'm still wearing. I might pass out from exhaustion. I finally get to the other side. My flight doesn't leave until 5:30pm. I wait forever, making friends with everyone. At this point I'm a celebrity. People overhear me tell my story to someone and then they want me to tell it again. I make friends from London, Denmark, Italy, America, Spain, and Ireland.

I am Tom Hamks.  This is The Terminal. I've been here forever.  Please, just get me out of here. 

I look at all the bus tables from Shannon, and tonight I'll only be able to get as far north as Galway, and that's still in the southern part of the country.  I meet a man and his wife in the queue to board the plane.  His name is James.  I tell him my story and he asks how I'll be going north after I get to Shannon.  I tell him I'll probably be hitch hiking, trying to get to Sligo by the end of the night.  (Sligo is about 2/3 of the way up the country.)

"You'll be thumbin' it to Sligo, eh? I can give you a lift to Galway, maybe even farther north."

YES. Thank you.

I finally board my flight to Shannon,  and James tells me he'll see me after we land.  James and his wife are waiting for me after customs.  His wife is from Brazil and speaks mostly Portuguese. They're in Ireland for his nephew's 10th birthday.  There's a BBQ tomorrow at the party.  In exchange for giving me a ride he asks that I help pay for the petrol.  I go buy a map and check to see how much the bus would cost to Galway.  It's €15, so I decide to go with James.  I ask him to give me a minute and I run off to the bathroom in the airport to take off the 6lbs of clothes I've been wearing for hours.  I come out of the bathroom, we look at the map, and he decides that he can drop me off in Sligo.

YES! James is the man.

We hop in the car and set off for Sligo.  His wife pops in a CD.  The Brazilian music is amazing.  They sing, dance, and I slap my knees to play the drums in the back of the car since I have no idea what the words are.  He and his wife speak Portuguese to each other, James and I speak in English, I speak to his wife in Spanish, and she talks back to me in Portuguese.  It's a linguistic adventure and I'm having a great time.  He lets me use his phone, and I call Ann to say I'm on my way to Sligo where I'll probably be staying for the night.  She tells me Richard, her son, lives in Bundoran just 30 minutes up the road.  James has already gone farther north than his final destination, so if I decide to go from Sligo to Bundoran I'll have to figure out a way on my own. 

James drops me off in Sligo and I look around for a hostel.  No vacancies.  I stop a taxi and ask him how much for a ride to Bundoran. 

"€50." 

Too much. Maybe if I hadn't paid for three fights to Ireland.

I start walking.  Fast.  Its 11:15 at night and it's still somewhat light out.  I'll hitchhike (or thumb it) to Bundoran.  I walk for 15 minutes but now it's getting dark.  I'm prepared for this.  I open the pocket of my backpack where my flashlight is.  No flashlight.

Oh crap.

Now im out in the night, its 11:30, miles away from Sligo and any sign of a bed.  I decide I've got to keep going and after about another 30 minutes I find myself where William Butler Yeates is buried, and there's a pub up on the right of the road.  I stop in to ask how far it is to Bundoran since my map doesn't show any towns where I am.  There's a young woman working behind the bar and a bunch of grey-haried men sitting at the bar.  They ask me how I got here.  I said I walked from Sligo.  They're jaws drop. It's either because they don't understand me, or if they really can't believe that I walked all this way, but they ask me over and over if I had walked from Sligo.  Just to be certain.  And then the pints came.  I was drinking pints with the men as they deliberated over how I'd be getting to Bundoran.  One offered for me to sleep in his shop, another said tehy might be able to phone a friend who drives a taxi to get me to Bundoran cheap.  They call up the taxi and for me it'll be €30.  That's fine with me so I take the ride. 

I get to Bundoran and I realize I'll have no way of recognizing Richard.  It's been 10 years since I've seen him, and all I know is that he works at Bundoran Surf Co.  I call him on a few different phones but he doesn't pick up.  I start walking to the surf shop thinking I'll sleep on the door step if he isn't there.  It's 12:30 though, so of course he won't be there.  I walk past The Kicking Donkey, a happening bar with music blasting, and three girls ask me if I want to go in the bar with them.  I start to tell them no, I've got to find my cousin Richard, but then I realize I wont be finding him anyways.  Why not spend some time with the girls!  I say yes, and we go in the bar. 

Here come the pints.  They wont let me pay for a drink they entire time I'm with them.  It's a fantastic time.  They're wonderful girls, especially Lorraine who is a lawyer in Belfast, Northern Ireland.  She's been letting me use her phone to call Richard and try to get a hold of him. Eventually he calls back, and Lorraine gives him hell on the phone about how is cousin is left to himself this far from home.  Richard comes down with his friend Claire to collect me and I say bye to the girls. 

Richard's having his birthday party in his caravan (trailer) behind the surf shop.  I stop in and throw down my bag just in time for us to all head to the night club Aqua.  We get to Aqua and there's tons of dancing, drinking, and talking.  I'm having such a good time that I had completely forgotten all the crap I had dealt with that day.  Eventually we leave the club and head back to the caravan, and I sleep in the hostel attached to the surf shop, safe and sound.

What a day. God bless the Irish. I'm in God's country now.

Here is a map of Ireland.  Shannon Airport is near Limerick.  I hitched a ride to Sligo.  I tried to walk from Sligo to Bundoran, which isn't on the map, but it's right on the river that's on the map north of Sligo.  I got 1/3 of the way.