Big Adventures, Little World

It wasn’t until about 8:00AM the next morning when we arrived, hungry, aching, sleep deprived and slightly angry at the train not being what we thought it was. There was a big plus to the train though, not just for Munich, but in Paris and London as well, and that was the fact that the stations are all in the heart of the cities. This meant no traveling an hour or more to get to and from airports. We trudged off to find the hostel, even though we figured we probably weren’t going to be able to check in for at least another 5 hours, which we confirmed once we arrived. We could at least leave our bags there while we went off to have some much needed food. Other than that, we didn’t have much energy for anything else, so we just went back to the hostel and relaxed in the lobby while we waited for The Fanatic Tour Leaders so we could check in.

Finally, it got to 2:00PM and we could check in. We had already got our instructions, wristbands and T-shirts from the Fanatics organisers, so we got our key and went up to the room so we could shower and rest to get some energy before the night’s activities. So that we did. It was about 6:30 that night before Mark and Sam arrived at the hostel and it wasn’t long after they had arrived that we were all heading to the Augustiner Beer Hall for some dinner and some drinks. We were walking there, so we’d picked up a few beers each while we waited and for the road as well. One of the beauties of most countries in Europe is that you can walk the streets drinking alcohol.

Once we arrived at the Beer Hall, it was barely even a minute before we had someone taking our order (which was just 1 stein for every person) and then only a few minutes later when he came out again carrying 14 steins of beer, 6 in each hand by the handles, then with 1 rested in between the handles on each hand. It’s very impressive. The steins would weigh at least 1kg each, and then each was filled with a litre of beer, so it would total close to 30kgs or more! Just incredible! Next thing, we were hungry. We’d been hanging out for some of the famous pork knuckle and it was well worth it too! A big knuckle of pork covered with pork crackling and gravy. Oh it was delicious. We all smashed them down along with our steins of beer and sat around talking with some of our new friends before we left early on after our long days, and in preparation for our early start and big day at Oktoberfest the next day.

After the train ride to the city we got back to the hotel where after our long day we lay down for a nap. After about an hour or so I woke up, and was getting pretty hungry. I had also promised to take Elese out for dinner, so I woke her up as well. She was grumpy, and all she wanted to do was sleep, but I dragged her out and we found a cafe down the road. It was a nice little cafe, and after looking at the menu I knew exactly what I wanted. It gave me the chance to try one of the things that I hadn’t had a chance to the last time I was there and that was Frog’s Legs. I even managed to get Elese to try a little bit of them too! They don’t really have much flavour to them at all. They taste a little bit like chicken, but it mostly depends on the flavouring that is put on them, and these ones had a slightly spicy tomato flavoured paste/sauce on them. It was really quite nice, but I would like to try them again with some different sauces and see how they differ. We moved on to the main course, which we didn’t have any French delicacies at all, but they still tasted amazing, but then it was on to desert. After having some of Bel’s crème brulee when we were in Avignon, I wanted to have a serve all to myself, so I ordered that, and Elese had the same. It was delicious, and made me want more of it, but I am not sure of where to find it and if it will ever be as good anywhere else.

Our next days activities included starting at the Catacombs of Paris, which is a series of underground tunnels where there is the bones of between 6 and 7 million Parisians. It is located about 20 metres underground and is mined out quarries. The bones and bodies were all transferred there from 1786, from cemeteries around Paris as they became too full. While only a small part of the tunnels, the part that you can walk through is over a kilometre long and walls of bones line the majority of it, with other bones arranged in certain way, as well as tombs. It is cold and dark walking through, and also a little bit weird, creepy and macabre, but intriguing and amazing at the same time. It is a very strange mix of feelings down there, but it’s not something that is disgusting or disturbing at all.

Next stop was the Eiffel Tower, via the supermarket to pick up some picnic food. We couldn’t really find what we wanted so just picked up some bits and pieces and headed to the Champ de Mars, some of the grassy areas around the Tower. There wasn’t much chance of sitting on the grass though as it had been raining, but we found a bench and had our own little picnic, before making our way to the tower to go to the top. I’d been up to the second level before but not all the way to the top, and Elese didn’t get the chance when she was previously there, so we got the elevator all the way to the top level. The views are much the same from the second level to the top, you just get to see a bit more out over the city. Luckily, we had some clear skies for it as well, as there was a lot of fog in the morning and if it hadn’t disappeared we wouldn’t have been able to see much at all. We spent a bit of time up there looking out all around the city, but then it was time for us to head back to the hotel, get our bags then make our way to the train station for our overnight journey to Munich. Along the way we stopped off at the Arc de Triomphe, and watched the cars go around the 10 lane, without lines roundabout but we didn’t see any accidents, despite the crazy driving. Then it was down the Champs Elysees where we wandered down to where we would catch the underground.

DISNEYLAND! That’s all that really needs to be said. I had mentioned to Elese a long time ago that one day I would take her to Disneyland, but I don’t think she ever full believed, so she was very excited, so was I, after all, it is a magical place. I had been to Tokyo Disneyland previously, but that was 10 years ago when I was 15 and couldn’t really remember a lot of it so I was looking forward to it and while a lot of it is based around and aimed at younger children, it’s still easy for anyone to have a great time there. There’s plenty of rides, and we went on as many as we could, including Thunder Mesa Riverboat, Phantom Manor Haunted House, Big Thunder Mountain roller coaster, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Peril roller coaster, It’s A Small World (which Elese hated), Mad Hatter’s Tea Cups, Alice in Wonderland’s Curious Labyrinth maze, and Star Wars Star Tours simulator. Our favourite though was definitely Space Mountain: Mission 2 which is a roller coaster that goes through, a mountain I guess, in darkness with lights and laser effects throughout the whole ride. It was great! The only thing I thought that would make it better was if it went faster. We spent most of the day there until just before it closed, wandering around, riding the rides, looking in the shops (although the shops were quite disappointing) and taking in the atmosphere of the place. It was a lot of fun, we both thoroughly enjoyed it and got to do almost everything we wanted to and planned out on doing when we arrived.

Towards the end of September was an exciting time as Elese was arriving on the 27th before we would make our way to Paris for a few days then to Oktoberfest in Munich. So much to look forward to, and I needed to be at the airport to pick Elese up around 1:00PM. So what did we do the night before, we made our way out to the Slug of course for £1.50 drinks of course! We had a great night, and the next morning Dung and I got up looking a little worse for wear and off we went with Mark to greet Elese at the airport, a long with balloons and random signs we had written! We waited for a while and eventually Elese came walking though the doors with all of us excited to see her. Then it was off for our journey home again, and Elese’s new home so we could relax and get some rest before Elese and I ventured of to Paris the next morning.

These early morning were always the same, always filled with excitement as it was off to some other destination. It’s tough, but the rewards are worth it. Getting to travel the world and experience so many other cultures and different things. We had to get to King’s Cross Station, so we could catch the Eurostar under the water to Paris. This was a lot less exciting than I had anticipated, and I think I slept through most of it anyway. I guess all I really wanted was to be able to see the water out the side and see all the fish swimming around, even though I knew this wouldn’t happen, it would have made the journey more exciting!

After reaching the hotel, we did what seemed to happen most of the time after these early morning trips, and that was sleep. The early mornings did take there toll, and after a couple of hours of sleep, we had enough energy to head out. We’d both been to Paris before, so we had a few particular things we wanted to do, but other than that we tried to get out and do some of the things we hadn’t had chances to do on each of our visits previously. We were staying in the Monté Marté area, which was just down the road from the Moulin Rougé. We walked through the streets for a while, having a bit of a look around the area and then made our way up to the Sacré Coeur, which in French means Sacred Heart. It is a large beautifully white basilica that sits at the highest point of the city and has some great views from the area surrounding it. We walked through and while being similar to other churches and basilicas I had been in, it still manages to amaze me, as they are all so different at the same time. After a bit more of a wander we headed back to the hotel where Elese had another nap. She was tired, which was no surprise as she had only arrived in London the day before and was somewhat jet lagged and definitely lacking in sleep. It was early, but we decided to call it a night.

The next morning we got a bit of a sleep in before we made our way out to the city of Troia (Troy) with our new tour guide. He was a youngish guy with long hair, whose English was quite good, and seemed to know every bit of Australian slang possible, and came out with telling us just after he introduced himself that he had ‘rocked out with his cock out’ the previous night, and had ‘kissed a ranga or fanta pants’. As we stopped at a cafe on the way to the site of Troia and ate Turkish pancakes and had a beer, he wanted to know more and more slang, but there wasn’t much more we could teach him. He was a funny guy and I think that if it wasn’t for him telling us the stories of the city of Troia, and the story of the Trojan Horse, it wouldn’t have been anywhere near as entertaining. Don’t get me wrong, it was an interesting place, it’s just that there it still about 90% of the cities of Troia still underground. When the first city of Troia was destroyed, Troia II was built on top of it, and then Troia III on top of that when that was destroyed, and so on. So at the moment, there isn’t really that much to see, as there has only been 10% excavated. They do however, hope to have 90% of it excavated, working at full capacity of 4 months a year, and with enough funding, in 200 years time! A lot of what had been excavated had been destroyed during initial excavations by German businessman Heinrich Schliemann as he was generally only interested in jewellery and treasures.

Later that afternoon it was back on the bus, and then onto the ferry where we made our way across the Dradanelles once more, and then onto another bus for the 5 hour drive back to Istanbul. At about 11:00PM that night we made it back to our hotel in Istanbul, and then it was off to bed to get up early again to get to the airport and catch our flights. Mark and I heading back to London and Chandy making his way onto Germany. It was a pretty full on week but definitely filled with interesting things and some amazing sights and events. I now very much want to go back to Gallipoli next year for the ANZAC Day dawn service.