In
the summer of 1997 my brother Gabe and I traveled through Europe by
train.
It was
the most fun I've ever had in my life, and I can't wait to go back.
We carried only our backpacks. Somehow, my pack seemed to weigh about
150 pounds more than his at any given point of the trip. I don't know
how that happened. Anyway, please take a look at my pictures as you
read this story about our trip. If you've never been to Europe, you
should scrape up the cash to go sometime. It's awesome. Of course,
compared to the U.S., Europe sucks, so don't spend too much money
to get there. Get a good deal. The entire time we were in Europe we
encountered only 1 day of rain (in Germany.) The rest of the time
it was like Paradise - sunny and warm. I collected little landmark
sculptures on my trip (which may partly explain why my pack got so
heavy...Gabe collected patches.)
We flew to London on August 12, stopping in Washington, D.C.
I think the plane ride was something like 37 hours long...It felt
like it anyway. We finally landed at Heathrow airport and stayed for
3 days at a youth hostel in a dorm room with 2 Australians, a Canadian,
and one French girl. It was cool. All the Australians we met really
like to party and consume lots of alcohol. We didn't party much, because
by the time we spent all day being tourists, we passed out from exhaustion
on our bunk beds. And although I don't drink, I did look hung over
during the entire trip, as you'll see from my pictures. Not the sexiest
photos that have ever been taken of me. The first day was the worst.
Now I know the meaning of the word "jet lag". While we were in London,
we saw the London Tower,
Parliament, The Tate Gallery, Buckingham
Palace, the London Dungeon, Abbey Road, and took a
Jack the Ripper Walking Tour (my favorite.) In London, I got a
little sculpture of Big Ben.
Next was Paris. Paris is amazing. It seemed to me that it was
built for giants, not for us. Everywhere you look, there's something
incredible to see. Gabe and I stayed in a little hole somewhere in
the city - the place was owned by this couple who were about 100 years
old and didn't speak a word of English. If you leave this country,
carry a little phrase book, because those things come in handy. Especially
when you haven't had a bath in a couple of days and all you want is
to be able to ask "Where is the shower?". Or when you haven't eaten
in 10 hours and you want to ask for one of those yummy chocolate croissants
in the train station. Or when you haven't used the restroom for quite
a while and you need change for five thousand lire in order to pay
to go to the potty. (I told you Europe sucks!) Anyway, here I am at
the Eiffel Tower!.
In Paris we saw Notre Dame Cathedral, The
Seine River, The Louvre, The Sacre Coueur at Montmartre,
and the Paris Opera House. Also, check out my new cemetery image of
a beautiful tomb I found in Montmartre Cemetery. Of
course, in Paris I got a little sculpture of the Eiffel Tower.
We stayed at Balmer's Youth Hostel in Interlaken, Switzerland.
(That's where I had the coldest, most miserable shower of my life.
I still don't know if all the hot water was gone or if I just didn't
know how to operate the showers.) Riding through the Alps on the train
was so beautiful. The mountains are massive and blue and the air is
clean and you pass by all these little towns with intricately designed
church steeples standing high above the town and you wonder what the
kids do there on Saturday nights. Switzerland is a very clean place.
We were sitting on steps inside the train station at Bern and the
cops made us get up, because they didn't want people just sitting
around, I guess. We probably looked like criminals anyway. Here's
Gabe and myself near Interlaken.
Next, we went into Italy. In my opinion, Italy would be perfect
if there weren't any Italian people there. They were unbelievably
MEAN AND NASTY, and made the Parisians look like sweethearts.
Maybe it was because it was the end of the summer and they were sick
of blonde American tourists, I don't know. But I have never encountered
such a hostile people. What a beautiful country, though. First we
went into Pisa. We got there late at night, and walked through town
toward the Leaning Tower.
It was beautiful at night and there were a lot of people all around.
That night, we started to sleep in the grass outside the train station,
but I woke up freezing to death. So I made Gabe come inside the station,
where we continued to freeze to death on a concrete floor. The next
day we toured the cathedral by the tower. They
don't let people up into the tower anymore, which is too bad, because
I was fascinated by the Leaning Tower. It's really a beautiful piece
of architecture. I got a little sculpture of it.
That afternoon we went to Florence. We stayed in a real hotel
there, which is where I took the most enjoyable shower of my life,
having spent the previous night on the ground in Pisa.
Our room
had high ceilings and two beds! In Florence we saw the
Duomo, and the famous bronze doors of the baptistery. We also saw
Michelangelo's David. I spent my 23rd birthday in Florence
on August 21st, and Gabe took me to dinner at a real Italian restaurant!
In Florence I got a little sculpture of the Duomo.
Next, we traveled to Rome. In Rome, we stayed in a youth hostel
with a Canadian, one Australian, some girls from Belgium, and a couple
guys from Hungary. That was fun! There is so much to see in Rome.
We went to the Colosseum,
St. Peter's and the Vatican Museums (Michelangelo's Sistine Chapel
Ceiling!!!),the Fountains of Neptune, and the
Ancient City. One afternoon I took off on my own and walked through
the city to find La Bocca della Verita - The Mouth of Truth. I wanted
to see it because it's featured in Roman Holiday with Gregory
Peck and Audrey Hepburn. It's a face sculpture on the side of a church...Gregory
Peck puts his hand inside its mouth and says in his deep voice, "You
know, if you put your hand in there and tell a lie, legend has it
that it will be bitten off..." Apparently, about 75 other people (mostly
senior citizens) wanted to see it that very afternoon for the same
reason. I could barely get close to it. But it was cool. In Rome,
I got a little sculpture of the Colosseum.
After Rome, we headed to Venice, where we arrived late at night.
We walked around for a couple hours and ended up missing the last
train out of town, so we slept on the steps outside the station. That
was actually kind of pleasant, because we were by the water and it
was warm that night. The next morning we headed for Salzburg, Austria.
That's where they filmed The Sound of Music. We were greeted
at the train station by a little chubby Austrian woman with a squeaky
voice who was riding a bike. She took us to a nice youth hostel, where
we stayed with a girl and a boy from Spain. The next day we saw Mozart's
house and walked through town. We left that afternoon for Augsburg,
Germany. We spent a few hours in Augsburg.
That's where my Dad was stationed in the Army about 45 years ago.
We walked around town, had some expensive roast beef (we think) for
lunch, and saw Mozart's father's house. Then we called my half-brother,
Corky, in Stuttgart, Germany. He teaches at a high school on an American
Army base there. So we got on another train...
...and arrived in Stuttgart a few hours later. We stayed with
Corky in the Visiting Officers Quarters on the base. Ahhh, a nice
American hotel room with American showers. We ran around downtown
Stuttgart and went to a big wine
festival one night. That was wild. Germans like to
party and make noise and dance. I ate the best meal I've ever had
in my life at the Schwaben Brau - a brewery in Vaihingen, the town
where the base is located outside Stuttgart. I had cheese spatzel
with onions and potatoes floating in a sea of butter. (Germans must
be born with a cholesterol deficiency.) Corky took us to other little
German towns over the weekend. It was around that time that we heard
on American radio one night about Princess Diana's death. We went
to Rothenburg, an old medieval
town, Tubingen, and Heidelburg. We also visited my favorite place
in Germany, Castle Neuschwanstein! It
was the home of crazy old Kind Ludwig, who used to eat dinner with
his horse in the banquet hall. We didn't get to go inside the castle,
but I will next time.
Gabe and I flew out of Stuttgart on the 21st day of our trip. Thanks
for reading my little story. Please e-mail
me with any questions you have or tell me about your travel
experiences.