Mon Appartement en Paris

Allow me to explain... So the day that I spent wandering around with the Aussies and the Texan we were searching online for cheaper hostels, because the Aloha hostel was bleeding us dry, and we discovered that it's actually cheaper to get a short-term apartment if you have enough people.  We have enough people.  We searched online for a bunch of places, secured our payment, went down to the building to get our keys and pretty much had a 4 person heart-attack-joygasm because our apartment is so goddam beautiful!!!  We have two, count 'em, two courtyards, a beautifully decorated 1 bedroom with kitchenette and bathroom Parisian artist flat.  It's breathtaking!  The first day we got here we pretty much spent the whole day listening to music (our flat comes with a stereo), drinking red wine (I have finally cultivated a taste, which is great because is crazy cheap here!), cooking good food (for once), I did some sketching, we opened all the drawers and cupboards and explored the entire flat, and we wandered the neighbourhood.  It was a magical day!

Since arriving in Paris I've done some sight-seeing and walking around, I did half a walking tour, but we had to bail early because it was raining that cold-stinging rain and it was killing me dead!  I've drank under the eiffel tower twice, and on the eiffel tower once, I've met tons of travelers and a few locals, I've practiced my French (really hard when you're drunk), I've cooked a bunch, I've drank tons of coffee and wine, eaten a bunch on baguettes and croissants and crepes, and just generally rocked out in our beautiful, magical flat! So happy!  We have the place for 8 days, and I don't know if I'll ever be able to leave.  I love it so much! Happy, happy, happy

Salutations de Paris!

Je suis en Paris!!!  I took a bus from London to Dover 2 days ago, then I took a ferry from Dover to Calais.  The ferry ride was absolutely amazing; I felt so cultured and European cruising from country to country while having a snack in the dining room and gazing at the ocean.  I arrived in Calais in the early evening with no real plans, but I managed to find a hostel.  The hostel was fab because I slept on a non-bunk-bed for the first time in forever!! Also it was only 2 people to a room- lovely! My roommate was a charming middle-aged school teacher from Australia.  We wound up spending the next day together checking out the sights in Calais.  Calais is gorgeous and I got up super early to walk around for many hours before taking a train to Lille.  In Calais I had my first french cafe, french baguette, and french crepe whilst in France; it was delightful!  I also saw parks, gardens, statues, and got to practice my French some more.  I'm glad because my French has degraded really badly in the last 6 years and I really need to immerse myself to get it back up to snuff.

Lille is also gorgeous.  The train ride was amazing because I got to see a bunch of the French countryside.  Sadly when I got to Lille I found out that the only two hostels in town were all booked up (blast this having no regular internet access!).  I walked around the centre-ville of Lille for a few hours and then took a train to Paris.  I arrived in Paris in the late evening and had somehow lost the number and address of the hostel I wanted to stay at.  I got the information ladies to look up the number in the phone book for me, but it wound up being the wrong number!  I was looking despondent by the pay-phones when a hunchback man came up to me and offered to show me to an internet cafe where I could look up the phone number.  We got to the cafe just as it was closing, but I managed to convince them to let me dash in and look up the number.  I got the number, called the hostel and got directions.  I finally got to the hostel at least an hour after arriving in Paris and managed to check in sans-problem.

The adventures of my crazy day didn't end there, though.  In the hostel kitchen I met two Aussie blokes (Matt and Guy) who call me Muppet because of my hair (or mupples, or muppie, or mup-tup, etc) and we decided since we were all new to Paris we had to get some wine and go find the Eiffel Tower.  We got 3 bottles of wine, walked over to the tower, and managed to sneak past security and climb onto the cement base to where the steel beams actually start.  We lay on the cement base looking up at the tower for hours just in awe of the fact that we were in Paris drinking wine on the eiffel tower and that life could not possibly get any better.  Today I had to get up super early for breakfast and then spent many hours wandering the city with the Aussies and a guy from Texas that I met this morning.  I'm back at the hostel now watching Lord Of the Rings, of all things, and not sure if I'm going out or not tonight.  Yesterday pretty much counts as 5 days, so I'm thoroughly exhausted.

Uh, er, off to France?

So depending on how you think of it my trip has either degraded (or upgraded) to randomly stumbling into a town and being like, "Okay, what now?" Explanation to come...
First, Liverpool. Oh god I love Liverpool. I arrived in the early evening, found y hostel, walked around the city. It's a beautiful city with a rich (Beatles and non-Beatles) history. I saw China town, the two giant cathedrals, and my first ever real-life Banksey spotting (amazing graffiti artist) yay! I had dinner in a cute little cafe and came to the realization that Liverpool is way cheap compared to the rest of England. The next day I arose bright and early and devoted my day to Beatles related goodness. I walked dowtown to the tourist office and took the "Magical Mystery Tour" seeing many Beatles sights, including all 4 childhood houses, woo! Sadly I couldn't get into any of the houses, or even near them, so no wall licking for me.
Okay, I didn't want to write about this until I got it properly dealt with, but I broke my tooth (back upper molar) on my last night in London. I managed to contact a dentist Monday morning before my touring around and got an appointment for that afternoon. All is well ad fixed now, and thanks forever to Dad for getting me traveler's medical insurance!
Back to apples (OSSSA expression): After the tour I went to the brand new "Beatles Story" all Beatles museum. It was totally amazing, and I bought a bunch of souvenirs there, and wish I had been able to spend more time there. I had to rush though because I had an impending dentist appointment. I did, however, have time to run to the Cavern Club (site of the Beatles first performance) and the bartender there let me hop behind the bar for a photo, yippee!! After that I got my tooth fixed, then went to the grocery store and then back to the hostel. In the hostel kitchen I met 2 Irish lads and an Irish lass that were really cool, so I spent the rest of the night with them. We went to the Cavern Pub (across the street from the Cavern Club, which closes at 6pm on non-concert nights) and watched a man who looked suspiciously like a rotund Paul McCartney who covered Beatles songs. Oh man, a place covered in Beatles memorabelia and listening to live Beatles songs; I can't even describe my elation.
The next morning I took a very long bus to Stratford. Here's where my trip gets muddled because I didn't actually have anything in the way of a plan when I arrived in Stratford. I went to the tourism office that pointed me to a store called "The Old Barn" where the store luggage. I happened upon the nicest people in life who not only helped me get a hostel room, but drove me to my hostel after they closed the store! Yay life! It was too late for sight-seeing so I spent my night chilling in the gorgeous but expensive hostel. The next day I got up early, dropped my stuff at the store again, and immersed myself in Shakespeare. I saw his first house and birthplace (original house still standing, genius! Sadly no photo allowed) where I totally licked the wall oustide his birth-room, the sight of New Place where his last house was and is now a garden, and the house next door owned by his eldest daughter Susannah and her husband, the house where Susannah and husband lived and where he oft visited, and Shakespeare's grave. Seeing the grave was intense! I picked a rose from New Place and tossed it on his grave (which I wasn't allowed very close too, blast!) and spoke to the grave of my immense love for his work. I also strolled along the Avon river, saw a brass-rubbing take place, wandered around the town, monologued in the garden at New Place (Heavenly), and read Othello. Needless to say, I had an amazing day full of adventures.
That evening I wasn't sure what to do with myself so I took a bus back to London. I found a convenient and good but expensive hostel, where I am also staying tonight. Today I went around the city with Nikki and checked out Fleet street, hell yeah! Tomorrow I'm taking a bus to Dover then taking a ferry to France, then who knows? ADVENTURE!!!

Liverpool can be a lonely place on a Saturday night

That's a quote from Yellow Submarine, I'm not actually lonely. I am, however, in Liverpool aka Beatles mecca aka friggin heaven! I love it here! Everyone has the best ever accents, they're all friendly, and there's Beatles stuff EVERYWHERE!!! Screw Disneyland, this is the happiest place on earth.
So since the last time I updated I've had some more London adventures. I met up with Doreen and had a lovely visit with her. I was going to go and stay with her for a few days, but due to an operation she's been scheduled for we couldn't work that out. I then met up with the guys and went and saw Abbey Road! It was awesome. We spent about 2 hours in this 3 block radius. We signed the gate at Abbey Road studios and took photos with the sign, and because there were 4 of us (Cassie, Chris, Nikki and I) we did the 4 person Beatles-esque crossing of the road, much to the chagrin of local motorists. Unfortunately we couldn't get a photo of us all crossing at once because the road is insanely busy, but we did photos of two of us at a time and will photoshop them together at a later date. Either way it was amazing! This all took place on Friday.
Then on Saturday I went with Chris and his cousin and cousin's lady to see Wicked!!! Oh my god, seeing a musical in London, the heart of all musical theatre, was friggin phenominal! Now, I didn't want to write about it until I got it dealt with so no one freaks out, but I somehow magically broke a back molar tooth whilst eating a pastry of all things before the play. I finally managed to get all my insurance stuff in order and get it fixed yesterday, so all is well now, but it was pretty lame.
So, anyway, on Sunday I took a bus to Liverpool (yay) to stalk all the Beatles related sites. I will write more about my Liverpool experiences later, but this is the slowest and most expensive internet ever, so I have to jet because I'm still not sure where the heck I'm heading after this!

London Bridge is ugly

I'm in London! Huzzah! I didn't manage to get a hold of Symon and I felt the travel-itch to get moving on, so on Tuesday night I took an over-night bus from Glasgow to London, England. The bus arrived at about 8am in London, at which point I found my hostel and chucked my bags into the luggage storage room, and then met up with my Aussie friend Chris that I had met in Edinburgh. I must say, I'm quite proud of my sightseeing abilities, because on Wednesday we rocked London! Chris and I walked a total of about 23 kilometres and saw the following things:
The National Gallery
Buckingham Palace
The Palace Gardens (they have black swans!)
The Princess Di Memorial Walkway
Trafalgar Square
Big Ben
London Bridge (which is actually really friggin ugly)
Tower Bridge
London Tower
The London Eye
Maggie Blake's Cause (a famous hooker street)
Tons of old buildings, street performers, proper cops, mounted police, and whatever else we passed on the way. It was the world's longest day of walking and sightseeing but it was so, so very fun and at the end of the day I was more tired that I possibly have ever been! The absolute best thing that we saw, and the thing that completely rocked my life, is the Globe Theatre! Now I'm trying as hard as I can to be frugal, but I had to pay for a tour of the Globe, because to me that was like a Catholic going to rome. It was amazing, and so beautiful, and so historically accurate, and so filled with amazing theatre vibes! I was in heaven! And as I told many a friend I would, I licked the wall! Bwah ha ha!
After walking from after 8am to about 8pm, I came to the Hostel, actually checked, had a much needed shower, and spent the rest of the night playing scrabble as a drinking game (somehow) with Chris, until he had to take the tube back to his Cousin's place, and I full-force crashed.
Yesterday wasn't quite as eventful as Wednesday, but I met up with Chris again, who is now my official London travel buddy, and we went and saw this big parade-thing in Trafalgar Square for the Olympic Athletes from GB. It was okay, but we were really far back. After that we went to Lester square, Camden market, horribly failed trying to find Greenwich market, and then met up with my friend Nikki. Nikki is an OSSSA high school friend of mine who just happens to be in the process of moving to London and literally arrived days before I did! Heck ya! The three of us went to the Museum of London and spent hours walking around that enormous space, then we went to Tesco (my favourite GB grocery store) to get some fixings for a good ol' hostel ghetto-dinner. After that we walked around for awhile, then Nikki went home, Chris and I watched Venture Bros in the lounge, then Chris went home and I read Twelfth Night before tucking in. Reading Shakespeare in London- so cool!!!
So far today I've just come over to Chris' cousin's to use their internet for free, haha, and worked on booking a different hostel for tonight, because my hostel is way too expensive. The plan for today is to meet up with Nikki and our friend Cassie and then go to Abbey Road, yay!

You take the Highlands...

Wow. That's just all there is to it: wow. After spending two days in Edinburgh seeing the sights and partying it up with the kids from the High Street hostel I did a two day "MacBackpacker" guided bus tour through the Scottish Highlands. Please excuse the following swearing but holy fucking shit is it ever goddam beautiful!!! We went through the mountains, to Loch Ness (no monster though, damn), walked in magical forests where faeries are supposed to live, climbed the hill that part of the Macbeth play takes place on, saw the town where golf was invented, saw the ocean, saw the largest river in all of Britain, and lots, lots more. It was two whirlwind, mind-boggling days of amazing Scottish beauty. All the while we were being guided by a delightful Scotsman named Neil. He told us jokes, stories, and lots of History lessons. Also, I fed a big, red Scottish bull named Hamish some potatoes. It was really cool!
On the trip I made friends with a little punkrocker from Colarado named Cliff and he and I pretty much hung out for the whole adventure. One really lovely happening was that the hostel we stayed at during the trip has this huge, stuffed shark. Cliff works at the High Street hostel in Edinburgh and apparently the shark keeps getting lifted back and forth between the tow hostels. So on the morning we left the highlands hostel Cliff chucked the shark out the window to me on the street below, and we took it back to Edinburgh. Good times! So now I can add "Shark theif" to my very impressive adventuring resume.
One of the coolest things we saw on the Highlands trip was this amazing ancient celtic ritual ground. It was very small and tucked in beside a creek and some gorgeous forestry. Their were these celtic carvings on the rock and a ceremonial bath-type thing. Sadly the History of that place is lost and we don't know the significance of any of it. What we do know, however, is that to this day people believe that faeries hang out in that area. All the trees were covered in beads and ribbons and pretty things that people have left as presents for the faeries. I took off one of the necklaces I was wearing and hung it on a tree for the faeries. It was an amazing place with a very surreal energy about it.
After the bus trip returned to Edingurgh I marched over to the bus station and hopped a bus back to Glasgow and spent the night at Pal and Lorenzo's place. Unfortunately Lorenzo's friend from Italy is coming to stay with the boys for a few days, so tonight I have to stay at a hostel. Depending on whether or not Symon and Susie are coming home sometime soon I might take off for England tomorrow, but if they're coming back soon then I'll wait because I'd like to see them again. Either way I have plenty of time to figure things out. Now I'm off to hunt down this amazing vegan restaurant that I've heard all about.

Edinbburgh makes Glasgow looked like an old hooker!

I really like Glasgow. I think it's beautiful and fun and I've enjoyed staying there. But Edinburgh totally makes Glasgow look like a discarded hooker in comparisson. I couldn't believe it when the bus rolled into town and I was confronted by the awesome power of the beauty of Edinburgh. It's amazing! No wonder the Queen's official Scottish residence is in Edinburgh. I can't believe she ever leaves this place! There are gorgeous mountains, a castle and a palace, dozens of statues, beautiful cobblestone streets, and about a hundred ghosts! Edingurgh is one of the most haunted cities in all of Europe. Tonight I'm going to go on a ghost walk; I can't wait!!!
Since I last wrote I've spent my last few days hanging with the boys in Glasgow, which is always a good time, although I fear they may give me alchohol poisoning. Then yesterday I took an early afternoon bus to Edinburgh. I really love it here! I found my hostel (the world's coolest hostel, and it's entirely run on green energy with no carbon footprint- woo!) and spent most of my day walking aroudn the "royal mile" which is a very steep street in Edinburgh that has the castle on one end and the palace on the other. I didn't go into the castle because it was WAY too expensive, but I found a couple free museums, which was cool.
Then I spent my evening and night going on a free pub crawl hosted by the hostel. It was really fun and I met a ton of cool people. Pub crawls are totally the best way to make friends. Yay! I met these two awesome girls from Sarnia, Ontario and I've spent my day touring around Edinburgh with them. The city is beautiful and we did a tour-bus thing so we got to hear all about the history. I freaking love history and culture, so even though it was expensive I'm realy glad we did it. Then at 10pm tonight we're going on a ghost walk that boasts the most famous poltergeist in Scotland: the MacKenzie ghost. I'm absolutely consumed by excitement for this tour, so it better be grand of I'll be a very sad panda.

Where there's a Will...

So just this morning I went with Will to the airport and saw him off, back to Canada. I'm really going to miss that kid! Hanging out with him all week has been great, and we've had some pretty amazing adventures. I'm not too bummed though, because he had a great 5 month trip, and my trip is just starting really. I'm still staying in the apartment with Lorenzo (from Italy) and Pal (pronounced Paul, from Norway) in the flat they just got. Their the friends of Will's that I was staying with the other night, and they've been really awesome and hospitable. However they have eaten all my food! Haha
The weather here has been very bi-polar lately, varying from extreme wet-cold-disgustingness to beautiful sunny-gorgeousness; it's weird. Yesterday was really beautiful, though, and Will, Pal, Lorenzo, and I all went to this huge park nearby and sat on the grass for hours. We then wandered over to the skate-park and watched all the little punks on their boards. I was hoping to see some epic wiping-out, but we only saw one kid fall. Stupid, boring skaters; not taking enough risks! Then for Will's last night in Glasgow we went to a couple different bars, and I found out that a bar called BOX near here does 1 pound 50 cocktails for ladies only, all night every night but Saturday. Hello new favourite bar!
Other than Will leaving and me switching locations, there isn't too much news to report. I'm starting to get really into this weird Indian-poutine thing called "chips cheese and currie". The name says it all! It's no poutine, but it's really good.
My birthday's tomorrow and I'm excited! Although I think I've decided not to age.

Shameless self promotion

Just so everyone knows, my birthday is in 4 days (October 7th). Not sure what I'll be doing for it yet, but I'm sure I'll figure something out. Now if anyone, as I'm sure many of you lovely people are, is planning on getting me a birthday present I must insist nay. Nay I say! If there's one thing I've realised in moving my stuff into storage it's that I have WAY too much stuff. I really, really don't need to ever get more stuff ever again. However, if anyone still feels the absolute need to shower me with gifts then you can send cards via my dad to:
(address removed)
If you want to include a cheque, that's the only gift I could accept, but I in no way need anything else.

In other news, I've been spending a lovely week in Glasgow. Most of my time has been spent walking around the city with Will. I'm really glad that I came to Glasgow early enough to see him before he flew back to Canada, because I haven't seen this kid in 6 years! It's so crazy that we had to both be in another country to see each other. A lot of time is also being spent chilling in the flat with Symon and Susan and their cute little cat Wall-E. I'm not doing as much touristy stuff in Glasgow as I did in Dublin, but it's really cool because I feel like I'm really experiencing the city. I've been to the bars and the clubs and walked around for hours and hours and hours. It's been a lovely week so far.
Tomorrow Symon and Susan are going sailing with Su's parents, so I'm going to stay in the West-end with Will and his friends. Haven't figured out my plans after that, but I'm working on it. Either way, ADVENTURE!!!