Heterosexual lifemate comes for a visit

After completely lazing around Copenhagen for a few days (example, did not realize the time changes from UK to Denmark until the second day) Holly arrived! I showed her the glorious Keops (Holly napped and enjoyed the bathroom size shower) and then we had an outdoor lunch on Radhuspladsen. By 1, we were on our train to Stockholm (Holly slept). Our first Stockholm night was spent checking into our hostel, which was a boat. Yeah, we slept on a boat and the corresponding room size was what you would expect. Also, the song I'm on a boat was sung throughout our Stockholm stay (I even had my flippy-floppys). Our boat was docked right across from the Nobel Prize building, so we had a great view out of our little window. That evening was spent wandering Gamla Stan (old town), getting dinner, and catching up over a couple beers.Our first morning in Stockholm was a tale of the epic search for a map. First stop, checking the hostel check in. No map. Second stop, tourist information. No map, except for sale. Obviously we refuse to buy a map. Lunch break. Decide to get by with the brochure maps, which do not cover everything/leave out half the street names. We eventually get a real map when we ask the front desk for dinner recommendations that night.

That afternoon we met up with Natalie's (Holly's friend from high school) siblings. We all decided to go to the Vasa Museum, which is this museum built around this giant ship that they raised from the harbor. It sunk on its maiden voyage because it had way to many cannons and couldn't actually sail. Epic fail.

After the Vasa, we decided to go this excellent muffin shop that Holly, Natalie's sister (I know its confusing) and been recommended. We found the street and we were at number 7. The muffin shop was number 99. The walk that proceeded worked off any muffin calories we later consumed. We said our goodbyes and Holly and I picked up bagettes and cheese for a cheap dinner. After dinner, we proceeded to go out. This included being sketched on by 30 year old Swedish men while hanging out in the hostel bar (why 30 year olds were in a hostel? I have no idea) and making friends with French girls who sympathized with us once the guys gave up.

Our next day was shopping day! I had to take advantage of cheap(er) Swedish prices, so after lunch we wandered around the shopping district all afternoon. We also tried to go to the palace to not be totally useless, but it closed early. We decided to keep it mellow, so after we just went out to a leisurely Italien dinner and saw Sunshine Cleaning at the movie theater.
Easter Sunday was our last day in Stockholm, and we filled it up. We made sure to leave early to go to the palace and we made it this time. We toured the royal suites, and saw where visiting heads of state stay. I have to say, it was a nice palace, but needs some restoration work. As we came out of the palace, the Swedish military was doing a special marching perfomance right in front. This performance included the marching band, who had their own tour bus.We stopped in the Royal Church (see mom, I did go to church on Easter) and proceeded to Skansen, the open air museum kinda like Williamsburg. It was pretty cool, but not all the shops/houses were open because of Easter. Also, demonstrations were often given in Swedish. However, we did get to see Swedish animals including a moose. Our train back to CPH did not leave until after 10, so we had a veeeery long dinner at a buffet and also some sweet chill time in the Stockholm central train station. Surprisingly, our overnight train was a lot slower than our train there, but had fewer stops and beds! It was way more comfortable than we expected and I saw another sunrise.

Upon arrival in Copenhagen at 7 in the morning, Holly took another nap. We then had lunch at a Shwarma place and I proceeded to take her on my intense walking tour of Copenhagen. Almost any walk is worth avoiding a clip! We went to the Little Mermaid, I showed her all the palaces, Nyhavn, and we ended up sitting in one of my favorite parks. We decided to take advantage of the lack of open container laws in Denmark and each bought a beer at 7-11. Park time eventually turned into a bit of a naptime until we both started to get cold. We warmed up with a cup of coffee at Baresso (Danish Starbucks) and then I showed Holly the glory of Peder Oxe. It was not the full experience, since it was basically empty the day after Easter but the burgers were just as good. We wrapped up our day with some hyggelig time at Laundrymat.

Our next day started with some delicious St. Peter's bakery and then a little shopping. We had a delicious lunch at RizRaz, a vegetarian buffet. We did a bit more of a walking tour and saw the statue of Kierkegaard (for Holly) and had 7-11 slushies (for me). That night I made Holly a wonderful pasta dinner and we proceeded to pick up Allison (another friend from Oxford) from the airport and had a night of fun at the scottish pub.

Wednesday was Holly's last day in Copenhagen and it was action-packed! We spent our morning touring Christiania and we of course had to stop at the bakery there that is sooo delicious! We then toured the Carlsberg factory, stopped by H.C. Anderson's and Kierkagaard's graves, and had a great indian dinner. That ngiht we met some Danish people that Allison's boyfriend knows. Overall, it was a great visit! I loved being able to see Holly and it made me nostolgic for school!

Edinburgh,

We arrived in Edinburgh early on Wednesday (another sunrise down). Our hostel had a great location, right on the Royal Mile. Unfortunately, that also meant we had to walk up a giant hill with all our luggage to get there.

The view of Edinburgh Castle from the park that used to be a sewage lake. Surprisingly, flowers grow very well there. We decided to wander and explore, and ended up finding a free walking tour. It was great, because it really helped orient ourselves to Edinburgh. My favorite part of the tour, the story of Greyfriar Bobby. He was a stray that the night watchman at the graveyard adopted. After the watchman died, the dog returned to his grave every day to sit and watch over him. It was a really sweet story. The rest of the day we spent showering, eating dinner, and having a couple drinks at the pub. We called it a pretty early night after the lack of sleep on the bus.
The next day we kept it very mellow. We slept late, had a leisurely lunch, hung out in the park for awhile, and then spent our afternoon at the Edinburgh castle. It was a gorgeous day, with wonderful views. It was super clear and even after our tour of the castle we just spent hours hanging out at the top enjoying the view and sun. We also enjoyed the free sample of whiskey at the castle. It had honey in it, and made us all mistakenly believe that we loved to drink straight whiskey. I have to say, although I love Dad's whiskey sours, any other whiskey besides this brand would not be my favorite thing to drink. We spent our night at the best comedy club in Scotland. It was a night with five different comedians, four of which were really funny. The first however, was painful to watch.


Look at that gorgeous clear sky! Not what you really expect in Scotland.

We started our Friday with a visit long breakfast. Then we split up until the afternoon. Kelly and Emily headed down to the extremely foggy beach and I went to the National Gallery of Scotland. I had an interview for my university collections internship (which I ended up getting). I feel like I might have gotten purely out of novelty, because the hostel's internet was out that day, so I had a half hour to rush to Starbucks and only got on skype 3 minutes before it started. I doubt they had any other interviewees that had to conference in from a Starbucks from Edinburgh. After meeting up again, we went to Elephant House Cafe.

The Elephant House is another part of our Harry Potter tour. This is the cafe where J.K. Rowling would sit and handwrote the first Harry Potter. The Edinburgh Castle was inspiration for Hogwarts. That night we went on a pub crawl. It seems like we saw all the other Americans visiting Edinburgh at the time! Craziest coincidence of the trip, Kelly met a guy who is from her hometown near Atlanta. They even had a lot of the same mutual friends.

Saturday was our last full day, so we decided to head to the National Museum of Scotland. It was our first day of bad weather, so it was nice to spend time inside. It was a cool museum, with lots of entertaining exhibits and was still in the process of a huge remodel. It even had Dolly the sheep!
After the museum, we decided to test out the specialty of Scotland, haggis. Rating of taste= not bad, rating of texture= horrible.
Looks=also horrible

Our last night in Edinburgh was spent at a couple pubs, and we called it an early night. Emily and Kelly both had very early flights. My flight was a little later, so I hung out in a cafe and read my book for a little while. Unfortunately, I could have hung out in the cafe for even longer, because my flight ended up being delayed over four and a half hours. Of course, I didn't find out about the delay until right after I spent my very last pound. Going along with the bad travel time, the metro was also broken when I finally made it back to Copenhagen, therefore delaying me another hour. The next few days were spent lounging and lazing while waiting for the next segment, Holly's visit and Stockholm!

London: where songs from Mary Poppins and Bedknobs and Broomsticks ran through my head

I arrived in London and made our way to our hostel, where I was supposed to meet up with Kelly and Emily, two of my friends from DIS. Our hostel was super-sweet, it was a former Victorian mansion owned by Samuel Palmer, a biscuit king. We stayed in a 21 bed room, which actually was not bad. We got really lucky I guess, we didn't have anyone obnoxious in our room.

Palmer's Lodge Hostel

I had some time before Kelly and Emily were going to get there, so I walked around exploring the neighborhood a little bit. I found this beautiful park where I just sat listening to music and reading my book. I was so grateful for the sun!
After we were all reunited, we set off on our quest to find everything Harry Potter related. First stop, Platform 9 3/4!


Mission successful! Next stop was Tottingham Court Road, which Harry Potter devotees will know is where in the 7th book, Hermione takes Harry and Ron after the Burrow is attacked. We of course then had to get fish and chips at a pub, to start off London right!

On Sunday we started off our day by visiting the excellent London markets. We started off at Spittalfields, which was the best market. It had tons of really cool clothes, jewelry, and food. We then walked to two other markets, Brick Lane and Petticoat Lane. After a lunch from an indian street stand, we headed off to our third HP destination, the London Zoo. We of course recreated Harry discovering he was a parseltongue. Yes, we are huge nerds. We had a excellent thai dinner, then went to a pub to meet one of Kelly's friends.

Our next morning we started off with buying some cheap theater tickets, then headed off to our bike tour. This time, I rode the bike Big Red (couldn't resist the name!). We rode around Hyde Park, Kensington Park, and past Buckingham Palace.The President of Mexico was there recieving a official reception for G20, so we saw the royal artillary first and thought ourselves lucky. Then, the crowning moment, suddenly we couldn't go by. The Queen herself was going by in her carriage.

There she is! I don't have a great picture, but you can see her little pink outfit with her pink hat and everything. The rest of our tour was slightly anti-climatic after that, but we saw Trafalger Square, Wellington Arch, and Westminster Abbey. After our tour, we got a recommendation for a cupcake place in Notting Hill. Actually it was on Portobello Road! Kelly and Emily did not understand my excitement, but I can blame my wonderful sister for being obsessed with Bedknobs and Broomsticks. Portobello road was seriously stuck in my head the entire trip. After a quick stop back to the hostel, we quickly made our way to West End to see Chicago! It was great, very differnt than the movie. The movie is so full of costumes and intense production, while this version of the musical was very bare, with the band onstage. It was an interesting contrast.

On Tuesday we started our day with a quick trip to the British Museum, mainly just to see the highlights, the Rosetta Stone and the Elgin Marbles. We then had a delightful picnic lunch at the Princess Diana Memorial Fountain. Afterwards, we decided to rent a rowboat and row in Hyde Park. Important lesson learned, I will never be a professional rower. After our idyllic lake time adventure, we walked over to Kensington Palace for high tea. We felt very sophisticated and ladylike. We then split up for some alone time, I went to Primark. I am lucky I didn't study in London, because although Copenhagen is in general more expensive, the shopping in London was much more tempting! We met up again at the Tower of London, Had a beer, walked across Tower Bridge and had dinner.

Next stop, Edinburgh! All we had to do to get there was to take an overnight bus (slightly miserable).

Berlin, or my excuse to eat

City 2 Berlin

Day 4
We went on another bus ride/nap to Berlin. We were dropped off at Potsdamer Platz for lunch and some exploring time.
Potsdamer Platz is a really cool modern building. This is the roof. The modern feel of Berlin is one of my favorite parts. It is so different than most other European cities. It feels much more American. We continued walking around and ran into the Memorial for the Murdered Jews in Europe. It is full of various sizes of tilted blocks and creates feelings of loneliness and isolation.
The memorial, we ate at the German restaurant right behind it, this is where I had my meal of weisswurst. Delicious as long as you don't think what is in it.

Next we went on a tour of an Berlin Underground bunker from WWII. We couldn't take any pictures, but it was cool. They had this really cool paint that glowed in the dark so they could see how to get around despite blackouts.

That night we went to one of the coolest parts of the trip, the Unsicht Bar. For non-german speakers, that means the blindness bar. After quite the journey to get there, which included wandering around Berlin for an hour in a group of 33 people looking for the wrong address. Once we got there we divided into our tables and met our waiters, our blind waiters. To enter into the PITCH BLACK restaurant, we had to line up holding shoulders. The waiter placed us into each of our seats. Literally, you could not see anything. It was crazy trying to eat, cut things, pour my beer into its glass, all while not being able to see anything. Everyone talked louder and ended up eating with their hands. It was true though, with one sense deprived taste was heightened. The view down into the Reichstag

Day 5
Company 3-Bayer Schering in the morning

We had another one of our delicious meals. This time, we ate on top of the Reichstag looking over Berlin. It was great food AND we got to skip the giant line for the Reichstag. It was really cool, I hadn't been to the top of it yet. It has this giant glass dome on the top and you walk up around the domes along these ramps. You can also look down onto the floor of the German government, symbolizing the transparency of the German government after the Nazi regime. Unfortunately, after walking around the dome my camera ran out of batteries, so I didn't have it for the rest of the day. We went on a bike tour around Berlin. Our tour guide was really funny, and with our luck, it immediately started to rain/sleet once we started to bike. I was obviously really good after all my biking practice in CPH. My bike had a name, Donna Summers. Therefore, Last Dance was stuck in my head the entire ride. We hit all the major sights, Checkpoint Charlie, the Berlin Wall, Potsdamer Platz, Brandenberg Gate, the Reichstag, Berliner Dom, and Museum Island.
After a short coffee break, we tried to go to the Jewish Museum. The coffee break was a mistake, because we were too late to go through the Museum. Instead, we walked to the Pergammon Museum, where DIS paid for us to get audio guides. It was amazing, it is this huge greek temple in the middle of Berlin. We then had a late German dinner.

Day 6
Company Visit 4- Zendome (they make geodesic domes)

We had some time before lunch to walk around Alexanderplatz, where this great little Easter market was going on. There were these adorable little goats! I spent most of my time just watching them.


The little baby ones just kept hopping around!

We then had lunch at a German Brewhouse, where I stuffed myself with more excellent German food. We then took a train out to Sachsenhausen, one of the first Concentration Camps. We had audio guides to tell us more about the camp. On our walk back to the train, we noticed some ominous clouds. We were right to be scared, because it started to pour when we were only halfway through our walk. We all got on the train soaking wet, then split since the tour was officially over. We went out to eat by KaDaWe (the famous department store in West Berlin) and the Gedachtniskirche, the famous church they left bombed out as a memorial to the devastation of WWII.

After dinner, I made a stop back to our hostel to pick up my luggage and then off to my hotel. Well, after the train ride and getting slightly lost while looking for the hotel, I arrived around midnight. Even though I had only about 6 hours of time there, it was totally worth it. I had my own bed and shower! The next morning I saw my second sunrise, since I had to be up so early for my flight for LONDON!

Prague

Finally updating the blog, sorry for the long delay! I am going to do a lot of posts to cover the travel break.

City 1, Prague
Day 1
So my travel break started with a sweet 14 hour bus ride from Copenhagen to Prague. Sunrise number 1, along with my first overnight travel of the trip. We arrived Sunday morning, quickly ate breakfast and then went off on a walking tour, where we hit all the major sights, including the Astrological clock, Charles bridge, and walked all the way up to the Prague Castle. It is the world's larges castle complex. Prague is a gorgeous city with lots of different styles of buildings, my favorite was the art nouveou. They also have a mini Eiffel Tower, spotting it from the hill made me feel like I was on the drive to Kings Island. We also then spent our after checking out some of the other sights in Prague, including St. Vitus cathedral, St. Nicholas church, and the Mucha museum. I really enjoyed the Mucha Museum, he is the artist who created all the art nouveou Parisian posters from the early 20th century.Then we all met up again for a private tour of a traditional brewery. They make this excellent really dark beer, and we got a free glass out of it! There was a group of Italien tourists and another of Japanese tourists, and we got in a competition of drinking songs. Well, by competition the Italiens and Japanese actually had drinking songs to sing, and we tried to think of any American drinking songs. Our most successful was Take Me Out to the Ballgame.
Day 2
We had an early start with a visit to Johnson and Johnson. Boring, but had good snacks and unlimited coffee. Next was lunch at a place where we were supposed to eat like medieval knights. Well, the food wasn't actually like traditional food, but it did feel like we were eating in a dungeon. That afternoon we took a bus to Ruckl crystal factory. The Czech Republic does not have safety regulations. The glassblowers actually drink beer while doing their glassblowing, while wearing flipflops and t-shirts. According to our guide, beer is much better than water in the heat, due to its nutrients. This explains why the Czech drink the most beer per person anywhere in the world.
Day 3
Company trip number two, Microsoft. They just pushed their new products most of the time. Today was full of crazy Prague weather, it was snowing when we left Microsoft, sunny the rest of the day, then later snowed again while thundering. I didn't think that was possible. We had a free afternoon, so we went to the Prague national Museum, which was full of taxidermied animals and had one cool exhibit about Czech history. I think it seemed so much better because it was actually in English along with Czech. Then it was shopping time! I got a cool pair of Euro sneakers, they are purple. My new goal is to look as Euro as possible. That night we had a DIS pub crawl, which was pretty disappointing. We went to only 3 pubs, and had the same beer at each one.


Astrological Clock

View from Charles Bridge, looking at the castle