Venice, Berlin, Amsterdam, and Brussels!!!

ok, so we've been slacking...we are starting to feel more tired and tore up so we tend to choose to sleep over blog...BUT, here we go!

Venice:
Rode on a gondola, the gondolier sang for us!

Did lots of shopping, there are a lot of creepy mask stores...eek

Ate the best gelato of the entire trip. In total we ate gelato 11 times and Venice had the best. GROM...it was the most flavorful and creamy. i miss it already.

Our hostel was a two bedroom apartment-like thing, it was nice to no be in bunk beds but the hostel manager was a bit OCD and had signs posted up everywhere

LOVED the canals and bridges. Venice is a maze where none of thes street signs correlate to the map

Tried a bellini and a spritz. The bellini was apparently created in venice. The spritz is a flavorful wine thing.

Saw a lot of funny shaped pasta! They were rainbow (or technicolor) and in crazy shapes. We liked the ones that were penis shaped =)

Berlin:
We stopped in Munich and devoured delicious food. I ate a half of a chicken and Jenny ate a farmer's skillet. It had potatoes, bacon, chicken and egg. It was amazing and filling to the point that we kinda felt sick.

Our sleeper train was really cool too. It looked like two chairs in a compartment, but everyting folded out into bunk beds!

Took a walking tour in berlin and learned a lot about the history. Stood on the spot where hitler killed himself, took pictures with the berlin wall, Saw humbolt university, saw the place where 20,000 books were burned, heard escape stories over the wall, saw the hotel adlon where micheal jackson dangled the baby, the TV tower, walked through the memorial of the murdered jews of europe, etc.

Ate weiner art schnitzel (tee hee), currywurst, arabian food, and bratwurst. Second best gelato was in potsdamer platz.

We gambled! So on the train ride there, I sat in seat 26 (my birthday) and Jenny sat in seat 22 (her birthday) and we were feeling lucky. We randomly went into this baller casino that had a COVER charge. Each used 20€ to play roulette. We bet 22 and 26 each time. Jenny hit 19 and 20 and made some big bucks. As soon as I was on my last chips, We hit 26 and both made some monies. Played for only 20 mins and Jenny made 166€ and I made 46€!!!!! =)

Drank Alster (beer and sprite). It was ok, but still not sweet enough. Met up with the two jans (pronounced YAN - not JAN).

Found out that if you pretend that you are angry, the german pronunciation is better. So I walked around reading street signs and poster angrily and sounded ridiculous....people were looking as us funny. Can't handle this...

Went to a hippie flea market....suspect that most things there actually had fleas.

Saw prostitutes at night. They were surprisingly hot and skinny. They all have high stripper boots and corsets on.

Amsterdam:
When we arrived in Amsterdam it was POURING down rain. We were drenched from head to toe and had to do laundry to dry off. also had to buy umbrellas at the train station.

Our hostel was pretty cool. It had its own bar, coffee shop, good security, friendly staff, cheap laundry, and in the middle of the red light district. The only Con: our room smelled like boy. the boy to girl ratio in the city is like 100:1. they were not crackin, they must flock to amsterdam for the hookers......

Ate tons of fast food and pastries. Fast food is open late for all the people who have the munchies after smoking.

Coffeeshops are not like strabucks. They are actaully places to buy weed and weed brownies and smoke. Aparently, smoking weed is actually illegal in amsterdam written law, but its one of those things that no one really enforces.

Rented bikes and almost died several times. Amsterdam is mostly cobblestone and canals...it has more canals than venice! As a result, most people ride bikes there. There are streets only for bikes, bike lanes, and street lights specifically for bikes. We rode around a bit but the bike traffic was too crazy. Jenny was scared and pedaled really slowly...

Ate the best breakfast! Our hostel had a free breakfast and it had the softest bread buns ever! We gorged ourselves every morning

Walked around and looked at the prostitutes. They stand in window/doors and guys can just go into their door, do their thing, and leave. The prostitutes rent their window for about 150€ a night and sex costs around 50€. (we learned this from our tour guide, not from experience). Our book said that they make about 500€ a night....do the math...thats hardcore.

Went on another pub crawl. This time there was unlimited vodka drinks and we drank a lot. There were TONS of boys there. Met two canadians from vancouver. Jenny had a meltdown...she didn't handle her alcohol well that night. I was too drunk to notice.

Went to the Anne Frank house where she hid and wrote in her diary. Also saw the van gogh museum. That was sort of the extent of our touristy things....the rest of the time we shopped and ate...hella.

CHIPSY KING: french fries in a cone with our choice of sauce (sauce cost an extra 50 cents) lame! but it was good. they give you these mini forks so you dont get your fingers all greasy and saucy!

Amsterdam was lots of fun, good way to end the trip... :)

Brussels:

The weather was kind of crappy again...but only for an hour or so. it down poured like it did in amsterdam. Marissa had to buy another umbrella cuz the one she bought in Amsterdam got tore up. haha (literally!)

We ate lots of CHOCOLATE...no gelato...but that was a yummy substitute

Ate some Belgium Waffels with strawberry and whipped cream topping. delicious!

We went to the Grand Place which was holding the international beer festival with over 115 brewers. too bad marissa and i dont like beer...but it was crackin. tons of ppl. pretty cool.

We went to a pub later on in the night and drank the sweetest tasting beer. it was raspberry flavored and red...tasted like raspberry sparkling cider. called "floris mirabella"..i think thats what it was called.

Met another australian...not as cool as all the other aussies weve met... he was a larry, and a boris (Boring Boris) and sort of an ANDY :(

We went to tons of chocolate stores, they smelled so good. you walk in and get a big whiff of chocolate. its pretty crazy.

We saw the pissing boy statue...not as cool as what the travel books said...

Shopped a lot...

We got suckered into eating at this restaurant because the guy said there was chocolate mousse for dessert...however, we did NOT get any! it was some weird lemon cake thing... soooo sad!

Brussels was cool. Were glad we stopped there for a night. definitely worth it for the chocolate!


Now we are in London. got in around 11am today. We are staying at my friends house. I get home in a few days on the 9th, and marissa gets home on 12th.

Cant believe our trip is basically over. it was crazy! seen a lot of beautiful things and places, met cool people, and some not so cool people, eaten lots of good food and desserts, taken thousands of pictures, dozens of videos...

overall great trip so far. We will be home soon!