Steve & Ella's Excellent Adventure

Köln : Laundromat & Internet Day! Greetings! Alright, so Tuesday (22nd April) I think we both made a mental decision to have a bit of a lazy day and abuse the privilege of the free internet in our hotel (which was on selectively during working hours) and catch up on some correspondence and draw some maps for our next four German cities after learning our lesson heavily with Köln! Not making THAT mistake again... Great thing about google maps, they really are so very helpful. They even provide you with information on S-bahn/U-bahn station locations and any trams/buses. Really COOL! So we spent the morning looking up Frankfurt, Münster and Düsseldorf and the location of our hotels and drawing primitive maps! ;o) We had also had breakfast included in our nightly rate, so we had to be up at a decent hour anyway to make it in time for our breakfast otherwise we would have gone hungry! The day before we had also found a supermarket and supplied ourselves with some basic foods - bread, m...

Destination : Köln (Cologne!) Hi all! Monday (21st April).... saw us wake up in our comfy hotel room and the anticipation of catching a train to Cologne, Germany. Another train? Well, we decided earlier on it would be easier to catch trains rather than go through the hassle of going through security etc if we caught a flight. Besides I like trains... Since the station was a hop, skip and a jump from our hotel room it didn't take us very long to relocate ourselves. One positive thing was that we didn't have to weave through the madness of the market which we had arrived to on the Saturday afternoon. We also had left early enough to avoid any crowds in the shopping plaza as well... Cool! So standing on the platform waiting for our train, which was actually to Düsseldorf we grabbed our first glimpse of the German ICE (Intercity Express) train. WOW! It is really a remarkable train.. Maybe the locals aren't so impressed with them.... Silly tourists... ;o) I spose it is much lik...

Utrecht : Armin Only! Sunday (20th April), the day after our "Armin Only" experience.... we had crawled into our beds around 8 O'clock in the morning after a night out at an all night "Hardcore Dutch Dance Party".. and I spose that is just what it was. Steve was completely excited and enthusiastic about the event. Me? I decided to go in there with an open mind. I still enjoyed Techno/Dance/House music on some level, mainly when I was in the mood for it. I have to admit that around 4 days after my illness in Brugge, I was feeling a bit worse for wear and more than likely dehydrated on some level still... and knew that I wouldn't have the energy to be up on my feet constantly. Not like these hardcore party people anyway! On the way to Jaarbeurs (the trade centre) where the whole thing was going to be held, we grabbed our dinner at the shopping centre at Utrecht Centraal Station. We arrived promptly on time around 10pm. There were a few people wandering around...

Destination : Utrecht - Armin Only! Saturday (19th April), Steve and I packed up our bags from Brussels and quite thankfully I was happy to see the back of it after it really being a blur! On the other hand we were heading into The Netherlands - Utrecht. At some point in London before we embarked on this crazy adventure Steve and I were looking for something different to do while travelling around. I had looked into maybe seeing the Foo Fighters in Germany as I knew they were touring yet somehow I ended up agreeing to attending the Armin Van Buueren - "Armin Only" show in Utrecht. Without hesitation, Steve ordered the tickets online before I got a chance to change my mind! ;o) So here we were standing at Brussels Midi (Brussels Sud) waiting for our next train "Thalys" to take us to Amsterdam. It was a tad chilly that morning, so when the station staff announced that our train was going to be 15 mins late, we decided to get off the platform and head back undergroun...

Brussels : Comic Museum! Tuesday (the 18th April), Steve and I awoke at our usual time of 8am and Steve dragged me downstairs for the breakfast the hotel had kindly included into our overnight cost. It was a nice breakfast actually, Cereal, French bread, a selection of ham, cheese, and boiled egg..and a number of sweet toppings as well as tea and coffee. I was feeling a little bit better that morning and happily brewed myself a cup of tea..and Steve a coffee... If anything I personally was just frustrated with the events of the past couple of days. Steve, most probably felt a little bit powerless to help. I had my imodium, acidophilus and it just had to run its course. The side effect from the whole ordeal was that I was still feeling dehydrated and a little run down from not eating for two days. ... but I sensibly had continued to drink water from the minute the whole thing started as well as dosing myself with Gastrolyte to replace the electrolytes I had lost.... And my appetite was ...

Destination : Brugge to Brussels! Monday (17th April), Steve and I grabbed a local train to relocate ourselves from Brugge to Brussels. Quite frankly, I was glad to see the back of Brugge and start a fresh after my horrendous run.... or runs.. quite literally! Moving between Brugge and Brussels is really a no brainer and in just under an hour we were there.... As usual, it was the same story in every city we've arrived at...we ALWAYS seem to go in the wrong direction first (dragging our luggage behind us), so a massive block and then finally end up back on course only to realise that if we had gone the opposite direction we would have been at our hotel in about 2 mins flat... but who's counting ;p Our hotel, Hotel Madeline was located at Rue De La Montagne or Bergstraat.... in a nice square called " Marche Aux Herbes" or "Grasmarkt". Right near by was the Hotel Ibis, a supreme chocolate shop and lovely choice of shops.. both food and fashion. On arrival a...

Brugge : Chocolate Museum! Wednesday (16 th April), I awoke feeling exhausted. Steve hadn't really been completely aware of what had transpired overnight, because like I said I had been as quiet as possible while travelling in and out of the room for my frequent visit to the porcelain room! I couldn't even consider any breakfast, so I sent Steve downstairs to have his and then asked him to head to the Apotheke and pick up some Imodium in a desperate attempt to rectify my problem and be able to get up and get dressed and head to that Chocolate Museum. By about lunch time, I felt almost well enough to get up and get moving and urged Steve that we should head out and try and see the city. Brugge , of what we experienced that early afternoon, was just lovely. Peaceful and picturesque. It had a very relaxed feel to it...and weaving through it were a number of canals that just added character to the place. The main language used in Brugge is Flemish - a dialect of Dutch. I have...

Destination : Paris to Brugge! Tuesday,the 15th April. Steve and I checked out of St Christopher's Inn and took ourselves to Gare De Nord to catch another TGV train towards Lille Europe. At Lille Europe, we were transferring to Lille Flandres (another station just down the road) onto a local train to Brugge, Belgium. At Lille, Steve and I had a couple of hours to kill before our connection from Lille Flandres to Brugge. We had hoped to find a luggage locker and get our stuff off our hands so we could have a quick look around town and find some lunch as well. Unfortunately Lille didn't oblige us in that retrospect so we ended up camping out in the McDonald's in the station utilising a little of their free WIFI, having a little munch...and reading some literature. On arrival at Brugge, as a general rule Steve and I wandered around a little bit in a circle trying to find our hostel "The Lybeer". When we did finally find it, we found the folk there to be really friend...

Paris : Notre Dame & La Defense! Monday (the 14 th April) after I woke up feeling almost human and HUNGRY, Steve and I took ourselves downstairs to enjoy the breakfast St Christopher's Inn had provided for us... Yum! We had also both decided that we were kind of running out of a few clean essentials (undies etc) and needed to do some washing. Lucky for us there was a Lavarie (or Laundromat) just half a block down the road. Lucky? Hmm not sure... turns out we just picked one of the dodgy machines and found our load of darks going round and around and around and around... with no end in sight. One of the lights on the machine was flashing and the little timer display (which was working fine on the other load) wasn't displaying on this one... TRAPPED the washing was... I thought to myself "What are we going to do?". Those of you who have visited a laundromat before know that if it isn't manned (like the nice one we had in Queen's Park), then there is ...

Paris : Sacre Coeur & MontMartre! On Sunday (13th April), I awoke with a jackhammer in my head. Truthfully, I'd had a headache overnight - it had kept me tossing and turning all night and well into the morning. I was not impressed and I think Steve was like "Oh No, not another headache!". I couldn't eat breakfast at all that morning hardly even though St Christopher's Inn had thoughtfully included one in the cost of the overnight price. After an evacuation of my stomach contents before breakfast, a dry bread roll and some pain relief for my head around midday I thought we had better get moving. THIS IS PARIS after all! Right? We had a tentative plan to visit Sacre Coeur and the Montmartre Cemetary and maybe visit the museum of Science and Industry which was not far from the hostel. We didn't bring a map of Paris with us because a) someone forgot it and b) we thought we couldn't get lost in Paris... or so we thought. I mentioned in the previous blog th...

Destination : Grenoble to Paris! Saturday (12th April), Steve and I awoke to a moderately cool, but sunny morning. Today, we were getting on a TGV train to Paris Gare De Lyon to get reacquainted with the city. The day before, Friday we had spent the entire day in our hotel room in Grenoble. WHY? Because, the heaven's had opened overnight from the day before (our skiing day) and stayed open for the entire day. The temperature had also plummeted and it had remained a nice and chilly 3C for most of the day. We did venture out at some point to get dinner and froze our butts off and headed straight back to the hotel room thinking "Mmm, I think we'll stay in today!" On some colder days in London, we had just braved it or just had to go to work... but the wind had SUCH a chill in Grenoble and it was raining fairly hard we couldn't even keep my umbrella up and Steve's silly waterproof poncho was keeping him dry down to the waist... further down he was getting saturate...

Grenoble : Les Deux Alpes! Thursday (10th April), Steve and I got up bright and early and caught a scheduled bus up to the slopes at Les Deux Alpes! The first thing I thought to myself was "OMG, bus trip....up a windy and steep incline.... I am probably going to be sick". So I promptly took my nausea medication and jumped on the bus! The scenery up the mountain side was indescribable - the reality of actually being in the middle of the French Alps just had seemed a dream or a crazy idea we once had... AND TODAY it was actually for real! I at some point almost passed out because my medication had kicked in and was making me really dopey..LOL That and Steve had been kind enough to donate the cold he had the week before to me and my body was battling a sore throat. One thing about being a couple.. you tend to share EVERYTHING, even colds and flu's whether you want it or NOT! When we got on the mountain, we found it to be almost an entire town. Probably not surprising since t...

Grenoble : Le Maison Turistique! Wednesday 9th April..and our first real day in Grenoble. Steve and I awoke to an overcast and dreary beginning to our day. Being completely new to the town, we decided to utilise this day to absorb what the town had to offer. We also wanted to get up to the alps for a bit of a ski the following day and wanted to find out how to get there and by which bus route. At the Hotel Ibis, breakfast was not included in our nightly rate. So, this morning we had to go and find our own breakfast. We took ourselves to Grenoble Gare to pick up our booked train tickets for our journey to Paris, and then to Brugge and from Brussels to Amsterdam. If there is one thing the french get right is making things easy. Their rail system to so fast and efficient as well as being easy to book and use with automated machines at train stations as well as being able to book online and retrieve tickets later. They have two major companies the TGV (Trains a Grande Vitesse) which cover...

Destination : London to Grenoble! Tuesday 8th April and our final morning in London! After a little bit of a sleep in, Steve and I packed up our life in two smallish suitcases and headed to London Gatwick to embark on our European Vacation! First destination - Grenoble, France. During the planning of our European Tour, Steve and I wanted to incoporate some skiing into our holiday. The idea of Grenoble, France came after a friend of mine lived in Grenoble for several years while studying at the University in town. The postcards she so lovingly sent to me back home in Australia were just so breathtaking and beautiful - I always had it in the back of my mind that I would visit there oneday. So when the opportunity came in considering skiing in the French Alps, I immediately suggested to Steve that we book somewhere in Grenoble. Anyway, after checking out of our hotel Steve and I jumped onto our blessed Jubilee Line one more time before leaving London in order to get ourselves to London ...

London : Greenwich Mean Time! Monday (7th April), was our last full day in London. Today, the weather was not as welcoming after the snow fall the night before. We awoke to a chilly start to the day, but our bed hadn't been so kind to us. We discovered overnight that it was much smaller than what we had become accustomed to in our flat in Willesden Green. It was also very soft and we found ourselves sinking into the middle. I think by around 8am, Steve and I had enough of our hotel room bed and decided to get up and get ourselves down to the breakfast that had been included in our overnight cost. After a deliscious brekafast, Steve and I headed back up to our room to finalise a few final things.. Today, we decided to have a look around the South East side of town. Take ourselves to Canary Wharf and check out the financial district of town and then to Greenwich to the Observatory and the Prime Meridian Line (dividing the East and Western Hemispheres). During our time in London, we ...