Paris and the tale of InterRail

I am not sure where I left off but let us begin this blog with Paris, as days before that seem to have faded from memory.

I arrived at Victoria coach station around 8:30pm after going alone to watch Star Trek into darkness. (which was an excellent action movie) I waited until 9:30 to check in, then boarded the coach.

This coach.. National express, never again! Tiny seats, no leg room, reclined back about an inch, small storage space, I was uncomfortable the entire trip. My back got to be about as worse as it gets sitting down, leading to a feeling of claustrophobia because the only way to deal with that pain is to lay down, stretch etc, which is absolutely impossible to do on a coach like that.

After falling in and out of sleep that left my neck sore and my head cold from leaning on the window we finally arrived in Paris. I was rather disorientated after getting off the coach and managed to convince myself to walk 3miles in the opposite direction of Paris..

I made it to the Louvre and from there I knew which direction I had to take. I arrived at the "Perfect Hostel/Hotel" around 9am, after booking a check in for 5pm. The receptionist was extremely happy and helpful, checking me in there and then, key card to the room and everything, I just had to wait until after 1 to go into the room. So I left my luggage (a medium sized back pack and a compression sack) in the luggage room and headed into paris.

That first day I did a lot of reminiscing, visited places I had gone to previously, to the hotel me and Emily stayed in, places we had eaten, walked. I walked from the hotel back to the Louvre, down through the gardens to Champs Elysees and around Arc De Triomphe.

I checked in around 5pm the room was really nice, clean beds, bright room, huge lockers, balcony! A little while later a man came in called Peter, he and his Australian family were visiting on holiday. He had an awesome looking glass eye, metallic colours that shifted when they caught the light.

That evening I was rather exhausted so walked down to the gardens by the Louve, bought some dinner (juice, goats cheese and cucumber sandwich) and spent the evening there although a large portion is closed off at night these days it seems.

The second day I did much the same, but included a trip to the Eiffel tower which is still quite impressive in my mind. Spent some time in the garden there too, it was probably the best day for weather so I laid there for a while. I also picked up an adaptor because my phone was running low having forgot to bring one from the UK. That evening I decided to see a movie, but the times were awkwardly placed and I had no intention of waiting around the shopping district for over an hour to see a film. So headed north of my hostel to the red light district around the Moulin Rouge, it is almost depressing but still something to see.

This day I also changed rooms into a room with an en suite bathroom, but no balcony and a little more cramped (but the shower was really nice)

The next day I visited the Notre Dame, it was bright for most of the day while I walked there and around the area, but by the time I came upon the building itself it was raining, not heavy, just overcast and drizzly. Which in my opinion sets the scene really well. I also climbed the stairs this time as I had not done that previously, there are rather a lot of them.. but it was interesting to look out from there.

I had a moment in the Notre Dame where I have a feeling a freaked quite a few people out.

They have donation boxes EVERYWHERE, €2 to light a small candle €4 to light a bigger candle, €2 to buy a commemorative coin. With noticed saying they are in need of money to keep things going. 

And yet they have added a treasury.. filled with jewels and armour, paintings etc. 

And you have to PAY TO SEE IT. 

That elicited a "HA! slightly cackling laughter" from me. No one can see the irony it seems as they slapped down €8 a person. 

Also at some point this day Toni contacted me and reminded me about InterRail, which spurred me to buy a pass and book a coach home from Bercy so I could pick the pass up from my aunts and plan my trip in London.

Now after this I was not faring so well, my back got much worse, to the point I was sitting down at every opportunity that presented itself. I ended up going back to the hostel, around 8pm and laying down to rest for a little while. Woke up at about 11:30 having accidentally fallen asleep, to my new room mates coming in. Having just woken up with had a very short blurry conversation in which I found out she was from china, now living in london, and had just been to italy, and then I fell asleep for the night. 

On my final day I decided to travel out to La Défense, always an interesting place. My back on this day was also acting up more than usual, so it was good to be in a relatively small area and to hop from store to store,and sit outside.

Then I travelled out to Bercy the next day, found a gentleman to give the last of my metro tickets to (no reason to waste them!) found the coach station, then headed to a restaurant to have a final meal before boarding the 10 hour coach. I ended up having french onion soup, cheese omlette with chips and salad, and two cokes. I would have had an apple tart too if time was not a bit short. 

I then boarded the coach with my things, walked back to the station to buy 2 drinks and some nuts. And settled in to what would be a COMFORTABLE journey. This coach only cost me £4 more than the national express. The seats were huge, reclined far back, but due to a lot of leg room did not disturb the person behind, they had dinner trays, cup holders, large storage plug sockets! And maybe the best of all, the isle seats could move 3-4 inches out away from the window seat. This may seem insignificant but those extra inches gave a sense of personal space which was just missing from every other piece of public transport I had ever been on. 

Once I was back in the UK, I managed to get one of the last few trains back to North London where I crashed on Ashleys floor. 

The next day we decided to head back to Essex to meet up with friends (Toni and Liam) We did some shopping at lakeside and then went back to Liams house in Basildon where we watched Archer, a show I was not inclined to like until now.

On the sunday I woke up around 10 and at about 1pm I left to go to my aunts/uncles in Grays. 

I spent the rest of the day with them there, catching up on what I have done, what I plan to do soon and my future plans. 

I arrived at this hostel at about 11:30, after being driven to the train station at Grays by my uncle and then 2 trains to get to willesden green. I had to open a cool little metal locker to find my keys and instructions on what room I am in. That night all I did was make my bed (in the pitch black darkness because everyone was asleep) push all my things into the corner by my head, and sleep. 

Then yesterday I woke up early, showered in the near darkness due to the lights not working. And headed out to find a nice internet cafe to try and figure out how to use my InterRail pass. I think I did some very swift research and realised I was only 4 stops on the picadilly line from a train travel agent (EuroRail) I headed there and started planning my trip. 

I booked tickets from Paris to Lisbon, Lisbon to Madrid, Madrid to Barcelona. But then hit a snag because I could not book the ferry from Barcelona to Rome through them. 

So I headed to a different closer internet cafe in London Trocadero to sort that and plan more of my trip. Getting the ticket for the ferry took a long time, because the companies website kept crashing and my card was blocked by Halifax even though I had informed them. 

I then on the spot came up with the rest of my journey:

Rome - Zurich - Munich - Vienna - Bratislava - Berlin - Hamburg - Amsterdam - Brussels. 

I made a bold decision in Brussels, as I will finally get to see one of my closest and oldest friends, Anna. Who I have not seen in over 6 years. 

I then booked a couple of hostels to begin with, one night in Paris near the station I am leaving from, and one in Lisbon, right on the beach. 

However last night I put all my clothes save the strange clothes I sleep in, in the wash. Then it turned out that the dryer was not working. So I had to wait until this morning to dry my clothes after maintenance fixed it with his mind.. (it was working when he arrived, stupid machine!) And they are due to come out in 3 minutes so this is perfect really. 

Today I am going to go back to the internet cafe, to book more hostels. 

And then hopefully it is off to ashleys for nice pub meal.

And that is where I leave you, more to come soon!

New Hostel-Birthday

So perhaps tomorrow was a bit overzealous..

The Philharmonia Orchestra was incredible. Music has always had a strong hold over me and I can easily use it to change my mood but that was intense. I described it on another site as Beautifully emotionally exhausting. Which I think describes the evening.

Next came my birthday weekend. I left the Nottinghill hostel early in the morning, after paying the receptionist to store my bike there for the next week. Me, Ashley and Claire spent my birthday wave boarding around Friary park. And in the evening after dark we came back to go on the child's playground..

Saturday the plan was first to go paintballing, which changed to going to the beach. But the traffic was so bad the people we had planned to go with had already been and left the beach. So we met up with them in Basildon to just do something, this was possibly the last time I would see my friends in a while so it did not truly matter what we did, as long as they were present. And it turned out to be a great day anyway, we played some pool and 2 games of quasar.

Then we decided to all stay there overnight, so the next day we went swimming and then spent some time at a park.

The swimming was a breakthrough for me. That was the first time I have ever been swimming with my friends, barring a small bit of tubing I did in Thailand with Emily, which I did not feel comfortable about.

But I felt GREAT, I love swimming. My back felt better because there was hardly any pressure on it.

Then me and Ashley headed back to london Sunday night.

Monday morning I woke up at 8am, got straight on this laptop and planned the next leg of my journey. I booked a new hostel in London near Wilsden Green called the 247. I also booked my first hostel in paris the "Perfect Hostel/Hotel" hopefully it will live up to its name. And I booked a national express coach from London to Paris on the 13th.

Yesterday I woke up early, took my old laptop down to the post office to send it off to be sold. Then I made my way to this new hostel which is AMAZING compared to the last one it is:

Clean
None smoking (the last one was meant to be but it was a loose definition)
The people are nice, including a lovely host.
There are 3 kitchens fully fitted with microwave, ovens, hobs, plates, cups, mugs, free drinks.
The rooms are bigger with less beds
A fridge in the room
A table in the room
Free lockers
ample sitting space in the common room and dining area
wifi that reaches everywhere in the hostel!

And the kicker? It. Costs. Less.

Okay, time to live another day!

First travel post

Hey there, My name is Jack and I have been travelling for just under a week.

I am still currently in my own country, England. I am currently staying in the Nottinghill Hostel just north west of hyde park. I love the area and the closeness of the underground (both Bayswater and Queensway are very close, meaning access to most of London easily)

I have spent a balanced amount of time here being with friend and being alone, which I think has been a healthy start to all of this.

On Monday I joined an event on Couch Surfers. A "game night" which entailed board games in a pub near bank station (The Crosse Keys) with a group of strangers. They all seemed like a nice group of people, I was sat between Katerina and Domynika. It was a very enjoyable night and I will be going back there next Monday if I am still in the country.

On Tuesday I spent the day wandering around London, some cycling in the morning and then I went over to the Tate Modern. It took me a while but I once again acquainted myself with my distaste for most of the art there. Culminating in a piece that was literally a sheet of paper glued to the wall.

I did however perform a little social experiment that is explained and showed in a video here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-18JrRuNVC8&list=UU1bsAzqQF1Fzny4GxAF22Dg&index=1

Wednesday was spent with friends, Ashley met me at about 3pm at Shepherds Bush westfield, we had a meal for half price courtesy of orange Wednesdays at Pizza express. I had a vegetarian pizza with artichoke, Ashley has lasagne. We then spent about 3 hours wave boarding on my part, long boarding on Ashleys.

Part of that was at a park in a dried up swimming pool, a few things happened there that really made my day. A 3 year old came up to me and tried to barter with me, his toys for a go on my waveboard. His mother assumed we were good people, allowed our little interaction to happen (he ended up on Ashleys long board)

Then we went to a wetherspoons pub outside of White City station,  Ashley had a burger and I ended up having a jacket potato with cheese and an egg (It was a delicious mix!)

Claire then arrived and we went to see Iron Man 3, which was an excellent movie!

We parted ways at 12:50, the next night bus came at 1:21, completely skipped the area I needed due to road works, so I was not back at the hostel until around 2am, and not in bed until 2:30 because of some tricky manoeuvres needed to get changed and ready for bed in a small toilet (I refuse to do this in the room at that time because everyone is already asleep)

And then right at the end of the night I realised my new bunk was right next to a plug. So I spent the time until 3-4 am talking to Kaitlin over facebook chat!

Also asof now I have just booked a ticket for the Philharmonia orchestra tonight so more on that tomorrow!