Eric's 2001 European travelogue

Interactive map | Photo gallery: Slide show or thumbnail index

		2001.10.08 New Orleans » Atlanta » It is 8:30 a.m. Eastern Time, and I am at the Laptop Lane at the Atlanta airport. Even though my flight to London doesn't leave until 6 p.m., I had to fly out of New Orleans early this morning (6 a.m., to be exact), because all the later flights were full. So I have most of a day here in Atlanta. I'm planning to stock up on reading material in a minute; I think I'm going to need it. At least I'm meeting a friend for lunch.
		2001.10.09 » London Ah, London. I like this place. We are just about to turn in for the night. Today was mainly spent recuperating from the trip. Kit and I arrived from opposite ends of the world (he from Hong Kong), and I was rather impressed that we made it to the same spot with no problems within a couple hours of each other. We walked around SoHo, the area of London where we are staying, this morning to get our bearings. Picked up some lunch from a nearby deli and brought it back to the room. Then I slept for a couple hours to help cushion the time change. Kit wasn't tired, because it was early evening Hong Kong time. I, on the other hand, was exhausted. Around 3 p.m. we left to walk toward Holborn where we had an early dinner and attended a panel discussion on new media at the London School of Economics. We were both a little too tired to fully appreciate it. Dinner was very good, though, (as was lunch) dispelling in my mind once and for all that nasty rumor that England has terrible food.
		2001.10.10 London We woke up refreshed after a long and much needed sleep, and we were ready to see the town. First stop: The obligatory visit to Buckingham Palace for the changing of the guard. But (oops!) Kit had the date wrong and the guards weren't changing today. We instead visited Westminster Abbey and looked for the graves of all the famous Britons we could think of. Both of us thought we remembered reading something about Princess Di being memorialized there, but we didn't find anything. Next we crossed the river and bought a ridiculously expensive ticket to ride (or fly, as the promotional literature put it) on the London Eye, the imposing Ferris-wheel-on-steroids that overlooks the city and its environs (and dominates the skyline). We were pleasantly surprised that the view was worth the price of admission, but we declined to buy the photo snapped of us on our way down. London is expensive, no question. But, I've concluded, there are deals to be had -- if you know where to look, which, most of the time, we didn't. For example, we were fleeced out of 35 quid each for what turned out to be nosebleed-section tickets to see the ABBA-inspired musical, Mamma Mia, tonight. Despite it being one of the more sought-after shows in London, I was still appalled at the price. Especially since I am not an ABBA fan.
		2001.10.11 London » Bath You don't need to go far here to be reminded of the terrorist attacks that happened last month on the other side of the Atlantic. As this morning's Guardian pointed out, today is the one-month anniversary of that event -- a fact that stuck in my mind all day. We did catch the changing of the guard today in all its pomp and circumstance. Afterward we walked through St. James's Park to Trafalgar Square, where we caught the tube to St. Paul's Cathedral. We arrived along with scores of men (and a few women) in formal uniform dress, who turned out to be members of fire brigades from around the London area. All were headed to the cathedral. "What time is it in New York?" Kit asked. Eight a.m. Just an hour before the time of the attacks a month ago. As we approached the cathedral, we realized this was a memorial service for the New York firefighters who died Sept. 11. We listened to the bagpipers play "Amazing Grace" outside. It was a moving reminder of the solidarity Britons feel with the people of their former colony. Another reminder had come at dinner last night, when an elderly British couple sitting next to us recognized us as Americans (our accents being dead giveaways). "I just wanted to say that we are so sorry about what happened in your country," the woman said, "and we are with you every step of the way." After we watched the firefighters file in and the bagpipes stopped playing, we left the cathedral and had some lunch nearby before moving onto the Tower of London. As time was running short, (we had a train to catch) we didn't go inside. We headed to the Tube station but were evacuated due to a "reported emergency" -- perhaps a bomb hoax, we guessed. We later heard that Victoria Station had been briefly evacuated, too. Anyway, despite the interruptions, we made our train out of London and are now in Bath. Tomorrow London Underground workers are staging a one-day strike; we figured that would be a good day to be out of town.
		2001.10.12 Bath We are staying in a lovely old mansion-turned-hostel on a high hill overlooking the town. And we may, in fact, be the only people ever to visit this city without seeing its famous Roman baths. We've been too busy doing other things -- like trying to find our way to Stonehenge. We missed what was, apparently, the day's only tour bus that way when we failed to give ourselves enough time to get to the bus stop in the morning. So we took a train to Salisbury and caught a bus from there for the short ride to the ancient stone ruins that continue to baffle anthropologists -- and, evidently, a greater number of tourists. I, for one, was baffled by the government's decision to allow a highway to be built within 10 feet of the so-called "heel stone," believed to be the key to the whole structure. After Stonehenge, we walked around Salisbury, a beautiful (if a bit touristy) city along the river Avon. Especially inspiring was the enormous cathedral. Its 400-foot-tall spire dwarfed everything else in the town. In keeping with our practice today of being fashionably late (when the "fashionable" part doesn't count), we missed our train back to Bath while we were enjoying tea and scones at the local Woolworth's (there is no bad place to have tea in England). While we were waiting for the next train, we strolled through an attractive little park next to the river. Back in Bath we devoted the evening to laundry, trip planning and other housekeeping chores. I attempted to call ahead for a hotel in Paris for tomorrow night. The conversation went something like this: Them: Bonjour. Blah, blah, blah... Me: Bonjour. Parlez-vous Anglais? Them: Non. Me: Um, uh... Je cherche une chambre pour, uh... uh, demain soir. Them: Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah... Me: Eh, uhhh... Excuse-moi? Est-ce que vous havez une chambre? Them: Non. Me: Ah. OK. Merci.
		2001.10.13 Bath » London » Paris Today was a travel day. Woke up in Bath and went straight to the train station, where we caught a train to London. We then took the Eurostar to Paris, where my limited French was immediately put the test when we tried to figure out how to buy tickets for the Metro. It failed utterly, and I became another helpless American asking, "Parlez-vous anglais?" Somehow we made it to the hostel. The hostels we've stayed in have been cheap and friendly, but I am looking forward to Nice, where we'll be in a private hotel room.
		2001.10.14 Paris Today we hit the streets. We walked Paris from the Notre Dame to the Eiffel Tower, by way of the Champs-Élysées, along which we encountered the first car-dealership-cum-theme-resaurant I'd ever seen. Here you can sip on a latte and eat pommes frites while you ogle your favorite Citroën. It's a concept so silly I can't believe I didn't see it in America first. Of course, we rode to the top of the Eiffel Tower, which I was very happy about. The last (and only other) time I came to Paris, the weather was bad, and I couldn't see anything. This time the sky was blue, and we braved a very chilly wind (and a long line) to take in the stunning view from the observation deck. I was interested to learn that Gustave Eiffel had built a small apartment atop his tower, which he used from time to time. I'm sorry to report that most of the food we've had in Paris has been of the unremarkable, tourist-trap variety, mainly because we haven't strayed far from the tourist areas. Which is mainly because all of Paris is a tourist area.
		2001.10.15 Paris » Nice We are on an evening TGV train to Nice, zipping through the French countryside and shrouded in a suffocating haze of cigarette smoke, because I forgot to ask for a reservation in a non-smoking car. We're not even halfway through our 5 1/2-hour journey, but I can't wait to get off this train. We visited the Louvre today. Neither of use being big art fans, we opted for the abridged tour. This consisted of speedwalking through the extensive collection of French art (which, we decided, featured way too many bloody Christs and naked people), shoving our way through the crowd gathered around the Mona Lisa so we could get a glimpse, and then spending most of the rest of our time in the café. I am not proud of this, but I take solace in the fact that the museum's ticket-sellers were on strike today. So at least we didn't have to pay to be cultural Neanderthals. Sadly, the exhibit I would probably have enjoyed most (Dutch and Flemish art) was closed for the day. In the ridiculously long line to get in (we didn't have to buy tickets, but we did have to go through security), we spotted the same family (Dutch, as well as I could figure) we had stood in line with yesterday at the Eiffel Tower. Small world (er, city, I guess). We just stopped in Aix-en-Provence, where I spent a few days when I was in France two years ago. Since then, apparently, they have built an impressive new train station there. We arrive in Nice at 10:30 p.m. I hope they don't give away our reservation.
		2001.10.16 Nice Today we relaxed and unwound in Nice. We slept in and took a leisurely stroll down to the waterfront and the old town. In the afternoon we hiked up the hill east of the city for a view of the sunset over the Mediterranean. At dinner, back in the old town, I tried fish soup. OK, I know this entry is boring, but I'm writing it three days after the fact, and I've forgotten whatever interesting details I might otherwise have included.
		2001.10.17 Nice » Monte Carlo » Nice We hopped a train this morning to Monaco, playground of the rich and famous. Atop the hill overlooking the city of Monte Carlo is an unremarkable palace, home to members of the ruling Grimaldi family for centuries. We visited the Yacht Club of Monaco and stared at all the multi-million-dollar boats -- and the expensive cars parked alongside them. We spotted a couple Ferraris (and I think a Maserati) amid a sea of Bimmers and Benzes. The occasional American car looked out of place amid the upscale European competition. Monaco takes up just a few square kilometers and has only 30,000 inhabitants (of which just 5,000 are citizens), but it has its own stamps, phone company, customs service and, as you can see at left, flag. Its train station operates as part of the French rail system, and the official currency is the French Franc (as I understand it, there are special Monegasque coins in circulation there, but we didn't see any). After Monaco, we returned to the real world -- where people do their own laundry -- and did ours.
		2001.10.18 Nice » Antibes » Cannes » Nice Antibes, on the coast a few miles west of Nice, has a small, cozy old town enclosed by high walls. I was acquainted with Antibes on my last trip to France, and I found it as charming this time as I remembered it. Cannes, on the other hand, didn't inspire us greatly, and we left after a short walk along the waterfront "walk of fame" -- where the world's biggest names in film left their handprints and signatures. I found Julie Andrews sandwiched between Michael Douglas and Sharon Stone.
		2001.10.19 Nice » Pisa It's a tower. It leans. Big deal. I'll never understand why so much has been made of an architectural blunder. Perhaps the fact that they didn't just tear the thing down and rebuild it is what intrigues people. But for us, just getting to Pisa was the most interesting part of the day. In Nice, we squeezed ourselves into a packed train bound for the Italian border and missed our connection there. So we took another full train (though this one we could actually sit down in) to Genoa, where we boarded a ridiculously overcrowded train to Pisa. We rode the whole way in the narrow aisle of a compartment car, literally shoulder-to-shoulder with other disgusted travelers (and a few disgusting ones, too). Think New York City subway at rush hour. Then imagine a three-foot-wide subway car. Finally, picture a two-hour commute. Now you know how happy we were to get to Pisa. Which is, I guess, why I was kind of disappointed when the town didn't really appeal to us. We decided to move on to Florence the next day.
		2001.10.20 Pisa » Florence One thing I can say for Pisa (or, at least, for our hotel) is that I had the best shower of my whole trip here. Hot water, good pressure, a spacious shower. When you're traveling on the cheap, you can run into some pretty shady showers (Paris comes to mind). Anyway, I started the day a happy man. Before we left Pisa, we did a quick tour of the sights around the Campo Miracoli (Field of Miracles) -- including the cathedral, baptistry and cemetery. We climbed the stairs to the top of the baptistry, a tall, domed cylindrical structure that's said to have such perfect acoustics that an unamplified choir singing within its stone walls can be heard clearly two miles away. Just before lunch we gathered our bags and left for Florence, the Italian city I most wanted to see. Our train ride took us through picturesque rural Tuscany, and when we arrived in Florence, the city didn't disappoint. We walked up some more stairs, this time 468 of them (I counted), to the top of the imposing 14th-century cathedral in the center of town. The splended view was well worth the grueling climb. Kit is a soccer fan, so we looked for (and, to my surprise, found) tickets to tomorrow's A.C. Fiorentina game against Verona.
		2001.10.21 Florence Florence, we are reminded, is a tourist trap. We took one look at the line in front of the Uffizi Gallery this morning and kept walking (remember, we are cultural Neanderthals). We crossed the Ponte Vecchio and walked through the Pitti Palace to the Boboli Gardens, which are situated on a hill that affords a spendid view of the city. Afterward, I went on a search for some shoes. I had brought two pairs with me, but I left one in Bath, and I wanted some more warm shoes before we get to Switzerland. Plus, what better place to buy shoes than Italy? I got a good price on a nice pair of walking shoes. In the afternoon, Kit and I hiked across town (and well outside of the tourist areas) to the soccer stadium. On the way there, we found a busy pizzeria full of soccer fans looking for a pre-game bite. After some excellent calzones, we sallied forth to the stadium to watch A.C. Fiorentina get trounced by Verona 2-0. Kit and I were both surprised and reassured by the formidable police presence and the fact that the visiting team's fans were kept inside a cage-like barrier to prevent contact (fights) with home-team fans. This evening, as we were walking around in search of dinner, we were stopped by three Italian men (probably, we later surmised, of Middle-Eastern descent). "Excuse me," one said in fractured English. "Where do you come from?" When I replied, he gestured at his cohorts and said, "We are friends of bin Laden -- like it or not." I wanted to ask him if he would say that to a relative of one of the thousands of people who died on Sept. 11, but I bit my tongue and walked away. We have seen a number of signs of anti-Americanism here in Italy -- clearly from a small but vocal minority. In Pisa I took a picture of one of several anti-U.S. graffiti messages scrawled across walls of buildings. It read "Amerikano merda," which I am fairly sure isn't complimentary. Certainly, most Italians don't share those views -- if for no other reason than economics: I read today that tourism officials in Rome estimate 250,000 Americans have canceled plans to visit in the wake of the attacks, costing the city millions.
		2001.10.22 Florence » Stresa Our planned half-day train ride to this lakeside resort town turned into a full-day adventure, thanks to an unexpected strike by railroad workers in Florence. Shortly after we arrived at the train station this morning, the noise of whistles blowing and people yelling replaced the sounds of trains coming and going. The departure board showed all trains as having "indefinite" delays. We waited a while, and when it seemed clear things weren't going to get better, we started exploring other options for getting out of Florence. None proved overly desirable, and we decided to have one more look at the board just in case trains had started moving. And, sure enough, they had. We were able to squeeze ourselves onto crowded train (par for the course here in Italy) to Milan, where we connected with a train to Stresa, situated on the western shore of Lake Maggiore and not far from the Swiss border. We arrived just after dark, and, though we couldn't see anything, we took a walk down to the lake anyway. We're planning to get up early in the morning and walk down to the lake again before we catch our train to Interlaken.
		2001.10.23 Stresa » Interlaken » Grindelwald We woke up early this morning to watch the sun rise over Lake Maggiore -- and to catch a 9 a.m. train to Switzerland. We arrived in Interlaken shortly after noon, following a picturesque train ride through the Alps. A short walk around Interlaken gave us the distinct impression that we were here in the off-off season. Hardly anything was open. Consequently, we had some difficulty finding a (cheap) place to have lunch. We finally stumbled upon a fast food place serving bratwurst, and our stomachs wouldn't let us pass it up. After lunch, we boarded a train on a privately-run railway to the resort town of Grindelwald, in the shadow of Mount Eiger. For most of the journey, we traveled on ordinary, narrow-gauge rails. But this train also had the capability of negotiating steep grades with the assistance of cog wheels on a third rail. At Grindelwald, we were faced with a grueling 20-minute hike (climb?) up a steep hill to our hostel. We got a rather expensive (but very nice) room in a brand new building with a view of Eiger's north face, the side many people have died trying to climb. In Grindelwald we happened upon a gondola that ran some distance up the side of a mountain -- one of the few things open here. So, even though it was nearly closing time and we could only spend a few minutes at the top before we had to come down, we decided to take the short ride and snap a few pictures from the top. This evening: laundry.
		2001.10.24 Grindelwald and environs We wanted to take the train to the Jungfraujoch -- the highest train station in Europe at an elevation of 11,333 feet -- but the top was in the clouds, so we decided to forgo the long, expensive ride up in favor of a hike to the spectacular Trümmelbach falls and a steep ride up a funicular railway to Mürren, a resort town that lies on a cliff overlooking a valley some 2,000 feet below. Back in Grindelwald we bought some cold cuts, bread and wine at the grocery store and brought them back to our room, where we had our cheapest meal yet in Switzerland. I am continually impressed with how efficient the Swiss are: Trains, for example, run exactly on time. The precision and innovation in engineering (particularly when it comes to ways of transporting people up the steep sides of high mountains) is astounding. And everything is spotless.
		2001.10.25 Grindelwald » Giessen Another travel day. We woke up early and walked down from our hostel on the hill to the train station in Grindelwald (much easier than the hike up). From there we went to Interlaken, where we caught a direct train to Frankfurt. From Frankfurt we hopped on another train for the short ride to Giessen, where my aunt and uncle live. Klaus picked us up at the train station, and Irmgard had tea and apple strudel waiting when we arrived. After two weeks on the road, living in hotels, it feels nice to actually be in a home.
		2001.10.26 Giessen and environs We slept in and enjoyed the big breakfast Irmgard had set out for us. Then we took a bike ride into town and did some shopping. I bought a gray turtleneck -- anticipating the need for more cold-weather clothes. We returned in time to take a short excursion by car to a nearby schloss (palace, though this heavily-fortified one looked more like a castle). Kit had expressed an interest in seeing a castle, so Klaus took us to the next best thing. The added bonus was that Kit got to ride on the autobahn with Klaus, who personifies the speedy-German-driver stereotype, at the wheel. The palace and city built around it are called Braunfels. An earl who lived here, we were told, earned the nickname Texas Karl, because, apparently tired of nobility and in search of adventure, he came to America and founded the city of New Braunfels, Texas. Back in Giessen, we had dinner with my cousins. Thomas and his wife, Susanne, brought their daughter Clara, who was just a newborn when I saw her last year. And Anita drove in from Berlin for the weekend. Kit was a good sport when the conversation around the table repeatedly lapsed into German.
		2001.10.27 Giessen » Weimar We left Giessen shortly after noon for Weimar, in the former East Germany. Weimar has several claims to fame. First, it was home to Goethe and Schiller, Germany's most celebrated writers (Bach, Liszt and Nietzsche also lived here). Second, it is the site of the post-WWI treaty that set up a democratic German government (hence, the Weimar Republic). Third, it is the birthplace of the Bauhaus movement in design and architecture. And finally, it happens to be the place where my friend Maja has decided to attend college (majoring, of course, in design). Maja and Catherine, an American Fulbright scholar teaching in Germany, met us at the train station. After a brief tour of the city, we walked back to Maja's new apartment, which she shares with three other roommates, and Maja made a pizza for dinner (assisted, minimally, by the rest of us). The odd thing about this apartement is that there is no sink in the kitchen. Residents are expected to install their own kitchens (sink, stove, cupboards, fridge, etc.), and, having only been in the apartment a month, Maja and her roommates haven't gotten to the sink part yet. This meant using the bathroom sink, which made dinner preparation interesting. After dinner, we went out for drinks and stayed up entirely too late.
		2001.10.28 Weimar We slept in this morning, and, thankfully, the switch from daylight saving time gave us an extra hour. Still, by the time we got moving it was almost noon. We took a walk around Weimar, passing by Maja's university, Schiller's house, Goethe's house and several statues of Schiller and Goethe -- including one of the two together. Goethe, Catherine explained, is the homely one, while Schiller is quite dashing. We visited the Bauhaus museum and puzzled over some interesting designs. Nobody seemed able to explain exactly what "Bauhaus" entailed, except that it was the first artistic movement that reached across all elements of design -- from print to furniture to texties to buildings. After lunch, Kit, Catherine and I caught a bus to nearby Buchenwald, one of the notorious Nazi "work camps" that operated during WWII -- and later was used by the Soviets for a similar purpose. Maja had gone back home to prepare an assignment for her photography class. We arrived at Buchenwald too late to enter the museum, which was closing. But we were able to walk around the grounds and get a small sense of what the place might have been like 60 years ago. All the block houses had been torn down, replaced with dark gray stones that contrasted with the lighter gravel paths. Though it wouldn't have been apparent while the buildings were standing, with no obstructions it was clear that Buchenwald lay on a hill with a beautiful view of the land around it. On this afternoon, it was cold and rainy, and twilight was beginning to settle over this bleak expanse of rocks and stones. As we left we passed a group of American visitors reciting a prayer in unison. Back in Weimar, Maja was still waiting for her colleague, who was to be the model for her photo shoot, to call back. We passed the time with another group-cooking endeavor -- this time spaghetti. After dinner the apartment got crowded as Maja's roommates returned from their weekend away, another friend arrived, and Maja's model, a photogenic young woman of Danish descent, finally showed up. The project: photograph the model, whose name I forget, displaying various emotional reactions to the book she is reading. Crying was the most difficult -- in part because the tears didn't come easily, but mainly because we couldn't stop laughing long enough for Maja to take the picture. After the shoot, Maja discovered that she had set the wrong shutter speed on her camera. I hope she at least ends up with something that's usable.
		2001.10.29 Weimar » Prague We woke up early, but Maja had already left for the photo lab. Kit and I gathered our things and said goodbye to Catherine, and grabbed some breakfast en route to the train station. Our picturesque train ride took us along the river Elbe from Dresden to Usti nad Labem, in the Czech Republic, and afterward along the Vlatava (Moldau in German) to Prague. For much of the ride the rivers wound their way through mountains of dark rock (basalt, I think), resulting in some really spectacular scenery. We arrived in Prague and were immediately accosted -- in English and German -- by people shoving brochures in our faces and asking if we needed a place to stay. We had already identified a hotel in our book, so we politely (and, sometimes, impolitely) avoided them in favor of a telephone, which we used to call our hotel. We took a tram (streetcar) to the hotel, dropped off our bags and went exploring. We ate a forgettable dinner at an empty restaurant on the river in the Old Town. Then we crossed the Charles Bridge, built in 1357, and walked around the Lesser Quarter before returning to our hotel.
		2001.10.30 Prague First stop today was the Prague Castle, situated on a hill above the Lesser Quarter on the west side of the Moldau. Inside the huge castle, we visited St. Vitus' Cathedral and walked through a shopping area where you could buy all kinds of glassware, as well as the popular Matrushka Dolls (those ceramic containers, each of which contains a smaller one, which in turn contains an even smaller one, and so on). We were reminded of London when we happened upon the changing of the guard at the castle, which houses the executive branch of the Czech government. After another forgettable meal and a stop at the hotel, we walked through the attractive Old Town, on the eastern side of the river, parts of which are over 1,000 years old. There we found the astrological clock that was prominently mentioned in our guidebooks. On the hour, it is supposed to "do things." What we were expecting, I'm not sure, but I was disappointed when the top of the hour came and a couple of figures next to the clock danced around for a few seconds and then stopped. "That's it?" Kit asked. After the disappointing clock, we went in search of food. This, I should mention, is always something of a challenge -- in part because Kit's taste in food sometimes differs from mine, in part because we are trying to stay on a budget, and mainly because there are so many restaurants (and so many of them are tourist-trap rip-offs) it's hard to know which ones are the "real thing" and which are just there to take your money. The food we found in Prague wasn't, as I've said, overly inspiring, and tonight's meal easily topped our lowered expectations. We ate at an Italian restaurant run by real Italians (maybe the Czechs just can't cook). We were skeptical when we showed up at 7:30 and the place was empty (I guess that's early by European standards), but it had started to draw quite a crowd by the time we left. On the way back to the hotel we walked through New Town, some of whose buildings are "only" 500 years old.
		2001.10.31 Prague » Berlin When JFK made his famous "Ich bin ein Berliner" speech in West Berlin, the tale goes, what he actually proclaimed was, embarrassingly: "I am a jelly donut." (In German, a Berliner is a sweet pastry filled with jam or jelly.) After discussing this assertion at length with native German speakers, I can conclusively report it to be false. "Ich bin ein Berliner" is a perfectly acceptable way to say, "I am a citizen of Berlin" -- although it could be taken, by an idiot, to mean "I am a jelly donut." Kennedy (or, more accurately, his speechwriter) might have been more precise by saying, "Ich bin Berliner" (omitting the article), which could only have had the meaning he intended. We woke up early in Prague to catch our train to Berlin, and my cousin Anita picked us up fromt he train station. We got the abridged driving tour through downtown (which still took a while, because we hit the streets at rush hour). We drove past the winged victory (a couple times), the Reichstag (the new, old capitol building) and the Brandenburg Gate (which, while under renovation, has been turned into a giant billboard ad for Deutsche Telekom). Then we made for Zehlendorf, the suburb where Anita and Kai, her boyfriend, live, and took a walk through the town before meeting Kai for dinner. We ate at a very good Indian restaurant and followed up our Tandoori chicken with some drinks at a nearby pub (which, this being Halloween, was decked out in jack-o'-lanterns; I can't believe how big this holiday has become here).
		2001.11.01 Berlin Berlin in a day. I didn't think it could be done. I'm still not convinced that it can. We got a late start on the morning but still managed to see (if not for long): the Reichstag, the Brandenburg Gate, an exhibit on the Stasi (the notorious East German state police), a fancy Volkswagen showroom with cars from every VW-owned make (including Rolls-Royce), an exhibit at the German History Museum, the Alexanderplatz, the Gedächtniskirche, the Kurfürstendamm and the Potsdamer Platz. Exhausted, we returned to Zehlendorf, where Anita made spaghetti. She and Kai introduced us to Berliner Weisse beer with raspberry -- supposedly a Berlin tradition. But, for being in a country so passionate about beer, we found this one a little disappointing (it tasted more like a wine cooler to us uncultured Americans).
		2001.11.02 Berlin » Utrecht We had some difficulty finding a hotel room in (or even near) Amsterdam, so we settled for a place in Utrecht, a college town 20 minutes southeast of the Dutch capital. On the train to Holland, about an hour from our stop, an American couple stopped breathlessly in front of the door to our compartment. They were dragging two enormous suitcases and several smaller bags. We had heard them for some time before we could see them: "Sorry ... Ouch! ... Oh, excuse me. ... Damn! How long is this train?" The woman poked her head into our compartment, which was empty except for Kit and me, while her male companion wrestled a suitcase outside. "Do you speak English?" she asked, in English. "Oh, thank God," she said when I answered yes. "We're going to Rotterdam. We were in the back of the train and they told us the train splits at the border and we need to move to the front." I explained that we were also going in the direction of Rotterdam and had been assigned to this car. "So, do you mind if we sit here?" she asked. I said no, and in came two weary travelers and their herd of bags (half of a particularly large one stuck out into the aisle because both it and our legs wouldn't fit in the compartment at the same time). Lines had formed in the aisle while all this was taking place, and as the other passengers were finally able to squeeze past, the man explained that most of this luggage was, in fact, his lady friend's, and it was his curse to carry it around Europe. To which she retorted: "I need all of it." This was when it dawned on me that parhaps those nasty stereotypes Europeans have about American travelers aren't all that far off. In any case, our overburdened compatriots managed to get themselves and their luggage off the train at the correct stop to catch their connection. In what condition they made it to Rotterdam I'll always wonder. We arrived in Utrecht after dark and dropped some things off at the hotel before venturing out for dinner and drinks. Utrecht, being a college town, seemed a pretty happening place, but we turned in fairly early so we could get up early and visit an even more happening place: Amsterdam.
		2001.11.03 Utrecht » Amsterdam » Utrecht Amsterdam is a Jekyll-and-Hyde kind of town. On one hand, it is a cultural gem. It is home to two of the world's greatest collections of art -- the Rijksmuseum and the Van Gogh museum. In this town you might stumble upon (as we did) a world-class brass quartet playing Mozart and Beethoven on the side of the street. And Amsterdam is rich in history as the capital of an empire that once stretched to places as far-flung as South America, the West Indies, Africa and Indonesia. And then there is Amsterdam's seamier side -- the Red Light District -- a haven for druggies and sex fiends whose practices are illegal (or at least frowned on) everywhere else. Wending its way through the narrow streets and dead-end alleys is a restless, flailing mass of humanity, illuminated in neon. Mostly, there are the curious, like us, who come to Amsterdam to take in the whole spectacle. But to others this place is, of course, an emporium -- a free-trade zone specializing in products of moral ambiguity. We chose to sample both Amsterdams -- visiting the Rijksmuseum, the Sex Museum and the Red Light District -- and something in-between: the Heineken Experience, a slick, fun (but mostly predictable) museum/marketing gimmick for the world's second-largest beer maker. The highlight (of course) was the free beer at the end of the tour.
		2001.11.04 Utrecht » Charleroi This morning we walked around Utrecht, a pleasant, bustling city built (as it seems nearly every Dutch city is) on a network of canals. Our only mission today was to book a hotel room for our onward journey to Scotland and to get ourselves to Charleroi, Belgium (near Brussels), from where our flight to Glasgow will leave early tomorrow morning. In the afternoon we boarded a train that we thought was bound for Rotterdam -- the connecting point for the train to Brussels -- but somehow we ended up in The Hague. Were Holland not such a small country, ending up in the wrong major city would have been a problem. But Rotterdam and The Hague are barely 20 minutes apart (you can see the skyline of Rotterdam from The Hague), so the whole ordeal didn't set us back long. On the train from Brussels to Charleroi, we sat across the aisle from a man who had bought a separate ticket for his small dog. Kit noticed this when the conductor came by and the man handed him two tickets, gesturing at the dog. The dog was lying on a pillow on the seat across from him, looking quite bored. On arriving in Charleroi, we found a hotel, had dinner and went to sleep early so we could wake up at 4:30 a.m. to catch our flight.
		2001.11.05 Charleroi » Glasgow 4:30 a.m. Europe time is 10:30 p.m. Eastern time and 9:30 p.m. Central. This disturbing fact flashed through my mind several times this morning as we groggily got dressed and packed, and dragged ourselves to the airport. We had found a cheap fare to Glasgow from Charleroi, which is why we came this far south just to go north again. By 9 a.m. British time we found ourselves in the middle of Glasgow's Central Station, wondering what we should do with the rest of the day. Since it was early (and unlikely our bed-and-breakfast would have a room ready for us yet), we decided to lock up our bags and go for a walk, even though it was raining. We found a pedestrian mall and ducked inside stores from time to time for a break from the constant, chilly drizzle. About 11:30, thoroughly sick of the weather, we found a restaurant and decided it was time to eat. The server informed us lunch wouldn't be available until noon. We said we'd wait (there was no way we were going back outside) and ordered tea in the meantime. It occurred to me as we were sipping that this was already our third tea of the day. We must be turning British. Lunch was good. I had duck with black pudding mash (potatoes mashed with a concoction of sheep's blood and oatmeal, somewhat akin to haggis; it tastes better than it sounds). After lunch we made our way back to the train station, collected our bags and located the nearest Underground station. Inexplicably, Glasgow's subway doesn't stop at its main train station; the nearest stop is a couple blocks away. In defense of the Glasgow public transit gods, though, they do quite cleverly refer to their bus service as the Overground.) After a short Underground ride and a long walk in the rain, we made it, somewhat the wetter, to our guest house, where we relaxed, drip-dried and watched the British version of "The Weakest Link", sans commercials, on the BBC.
		2001.11.06 Glasgow » Loch Lomond » Inveraray » Glasgow After getting a much-needed load of laundry done this morning (we tried yesterday, but the laundromat had closed at 4:30 p.m.), we mustered all our courage and embarked on a great adventure: we rented a car. What we got -- a tiny Ford KA -- looked a lot like the washing machine we'd been using. Ford knows better than to try and market this car in the SUV-happy U.S. But in Europe, where gas is four dollars a gallon, the KA is immensely popular. This being Britain, our KA was configured for left-side driving, with its steering wheel on the right side and a left-hand gear shift. One look at the car and I knew this was going to be an interesting experience. Kit drove first, and I sat helplessly in what (in my homeland) would have been the driver's seat as we headed toward Loch Lomond. Kit negotiated with little difficulty several confusing-looking roundabouts (the Brits love 'em) on the way out of Glasgow, but I soon found that he was hugging the left side of the road a little too closely (a natural tendency, I'd imagine, for a driver who's used to steering from the left side of the car). After nearly clobbering the left side mirror several times (once against a large, moving bus), Kit agreed to let me drive and spent a while in the hot seat (that is, the left one) himself as I helped him become intimately acquainted with the shoulder and the curb. Eventually we both got the hang of it and learned to keep a healthy distance from the left side of the road. We drove along Loch Lomond, made famous by the song, and headed to the town of Inveraray, on neighboring Loch Fyne. Inveraray Castle is the ancestral home of the once-powerful clan Campbell. Since it gets dark really early here this time of year, we decided to head back to Glasgow and get an earlier start tomorrow. We ate dinner at a pub downtown.
		2001.11.07 Glasgow » Fort William » Oban » Glasgow The weather in Scotland has not been in our favor. It has rained seemingly non-stop since we got here, and today was another soggy one. Of course, you shouldn't really expect anything else this time of year, and I suppose we did have fair warning. Anyway, we refused to let a few raindrops dampen our spirit. We set off again in our washing machine of a car, this time for a more distant destination: the Highlands. Armed with our map, we drove through some of the tallest mountains in Great Britain on our way to Fort William, stopping along the way to take pictures. I'm not talking Alpine size, but these are clearly no mere hills. Fort William is a stone's throw from Ben Nevis, which is, in fact, the highest point in the British isles. Of course, what I say about Ben Nevis is all speculation because visibility was so poor while we were in Fort William that we never even caught a glimpse of it. We did, however, buy a few souvenirs, eat a tasty lunch and get thoroughly drenched during our short stay in Fort William. We headed back to Glasgow by way of Oban, another nice town that we would have enjoyed more in good weather. In Glasgow we turned in our car and breathed a sigh of relief, knowing we'd gotten through our driving adventure in one piece. I've decided I'd gladly take driving on the left-hand side in Britain over driving on the right in, say, France or Italy. Tonight we found a brand-new, six-story, umpteen-screen movie theater (larger and more impressive, I must say, than anything I've seen in the U.S.) and couldn't resist the urge to see a movie. I suppose we could have broadened our horizons by screening some high-brow British film, but the familiarity of home won out, and we ended up seeing -- don't laugh -- "American Pie 2".
		2001.11.08 Glasgow » London We took a morning flight from Glasgow to London's Luton airport. I should mention that London has a total of five commercial airports with scheduled passenger service. All are accessible from central London by rail. New York City has three airports (five, I suppose, if you count Islip and Newburgh). Of these only JFK has rail service into Manhattan. In London we checked back into the Oxford Street Hostel -- and got the very same room we'd stayed in at the start of our trip. We hadn't really planned to have a spare day in London, but since we arrived early in the day, we did some more sightseeing and went in search of theater tickets for tonight. We snagged tickets for Kiss Me Kate, which was billed as London's hottest new show, at some obscene price. I later read it was the same production that had been running in New York for several years. It was only new to London. Still, we enjoyed the show and came straight home afterward so we could get a good night's sleep for the trip home tomorrow.
		2001.11.09 London » Boston Kit had to get up early to catch his flight home. I got to sleep in. At 7 a.m. I mumbled some sort of groggy farewell to my fellow traveler and promptly fell back asleep. Around 10 a.m. I left for Gatwick airport to catch my flight to Boston. The flight was refreshingly short, compared with some of the trans-Atlantic flights I've been on. When I was a kid, my parents and I occasionally flew Delta's Frankfurt-Dallas route, which seemed to take forever. Unfortunately for my parents, I've never slept well on planes. I can only imagine what Kit's earlier trans-Pacific flight must have been like. I arrived in Boston mid-afternoon feeling surprisingly well-rested -- and happy to be back on American soil. I met my friend Kerry at South Station on her way home from work. I'm spending the weekend with Kerry and her husband before I head to upstate New York to visit my dad. I've covered a lot of ground these last 33 days. I wanted to get a better sense of what it might be like to live in Europe -- which I hope to do eventually -- and I think I succeeded in that goal.
Update (2001.12.16): As you can see, my travelogue is finally complete and posted. Thanks to all who had the patience to read this far. Happy holidays, and all the best in 2002.

Back to top