We flew into Belfast and got a bus in to the city and then to check into our hostel. Everywhere was really booked out in Belfast, and we were only able to book a 10 person dorm at Vagabonds. We found an awesome burrito place for lunch that was a cross between subway and GyG. It was good being back in an English speaking country again, although Rachael still really struggled to understand what we were ordering with the accent which was pretty funny.
After very little sleep on the bus, and leaving over an hour late, it meant we arrived late in Paris and so hit peak hour traffic, making us later still and stuck in traffic at a crawl. The bus actually went near our hostel and then we spent probably an hour in traffic after that getting to the bus stop on the other side of the city.
The bus depot itself was pretty terrible, essentially a giant car park near a metro station.
We arrived and it was raining, so we quickly dropped out bags at the hostel and went to get lunch. We went to Augustine Keller and got pork knuckle since I had it last time I was in Munich and thought it was great. It was super fatty and wasn’t as nice as last time, which I expect was mostly because I wasn’t massively hungover from Oktoberfest. Rachael loved the building though and her spinach and mountain cheese soup.
I left my Kindle on the train when we arrived in Salzburg which was a bummer, and the first thing we lost for the trip.
The old town was pretty, but outside of the old town wasn’t very exciting. One thing we noticed was just how fast the water in the river was flowing, and the hugh amounts of water pouring in from the various little storm water outlets.
There were lots of references to Mozart, for example his house/museum/your local SPAR supermarket.
We got a train from Ljubljana to Lesce-Bled to a cool hostel that used to be a monastery.
We got a bus to Bled itself and hiked up to the castle that overlooks the lake.
We were going to hire a boat but it started to rain, so we had lunch and waited a bit for it to clear. One thing we weren’t expecting were the huge snow-covered alpine mountains in the background.
We just visited Ljublana as a stopover on our way to Bled, but it ended up being a super pretty city with nice canals and streets. The bus trip had really nice scenery on the way in also. The hostel we stayed out was in the middle of a busy street in the old town and was a bit bizarre really, as it was really quiet inside and they you step out the front door in the middle of a super busy lane-way with a view up to the castle.
We landed in Zagreb and picked up our rental car. We wanted to go to see the Plitvice Lakes but after looking at transport options decided a rental car was our only option and we wouldn’t have time to go visit any of the beaches in Croatia. Because multiple drivers costs lots more, we got it in Rachael’s name and then she she had a bit of a mild panic attack because you drive on the other side of the road and the gears were reversed.
We got in to Berlin quite late, but got up early the next day to do the free walking tour. We learnt heaps of history about the war, and the berlin wall and cold war. One of the first stops was the Jew Memorial which when we saw it was really familiar as I’d seen it on TV and the internet. The designer did a great job, as when you walk through it, it’s nothing like what you expect.
From Varberg, it is as simple as catching a commuter train across the sea to Denmark. Which is pretty crazy, and Johan mentioned how sometimes he pops over to Copenhagen to do some shopping!
We ended up booking a boat to stay on through airBnB for something different. It was kind of cool, Rachael wasn’t a fan as it had a pump toilet and the shower was apparently terrible. But it was a cool novel place to stay for one night.
Next up we got a train to Guttenberg to meet my friend Johan. I was surprised by the amount of forest on the train ride, unfortunately our train seat didn’t have a window but from what we could see there wasn’t many towns on the way. We met Johan at Guttenberg then went to meatball house, and got some Swedish meatballs which were delicious.
From here Johan drove us to his new apartment in Varberg.
