Euro Tour: Day 3

We packed up all our stuff in the morning, loaded into the buses and were off once again. The buses dropped us off in the center of Burges where we had free time to explore until 2:00. It was raining so heavily though it really wasn't fun hanging out in the city so we spent our time at a coffee shop, going into stores, and we found this awesome thrift shop where we had a little fashion show. Even got some of the guys to try on some cool 70’s shirts! I got this really cool knitted vest thing, my souvenir from Belgium.

At 2:00 we met at the buses again and at last we were Paris bound! Euro tour had finally begun as many of the guys said! The drive from Bruges was about four hours long and then when we got near Paris traffic started moving a lot slower. The moment we saw a tiny portion of the Eiffel Tower the entire bus erupted in Cheers! I can’t believe it The Eiffel tower, Paris! Why I’m I so lucky in life?! 

Checking into the hotel took forever, and we have to “absolutely silent,” here.  The French don’t like us making the entire ruckus we normally do.  After our three course dinner we got a little bit of free time to wander around the area were staying in, which is like the slums of Paris, but it was still nice to go out for a walk after a day in the bus. Paris is such a busy city and we’re not even staying in the center of it! I’m so so so excited to get out and see the center of the city of love tomorrow! 

Eurotour: day 2

Today we spent the whole time getting to see two cities in Belgium. We left Köln early in the morning and drove about four hours to Brussels. There we got a few hours to get out and explore the city on our own. Unfortunately we had pretty bad weather the whole time. It was raining pretty hard most of the time and even began hailing for a while. I ventured around with Crash, Lucas, Johnny, and William. We saw a bunch of beautiful old buildings and palaces, and got really delicious crepes for lunch. The architecture in Belgium is stunning! The designs are so grand with all their gothic styling and lots of gold details. I could really feel the French influence in all the buildings. In Brussels one of the most famous tourist attractions is this little statue of a boy peeing into a fountain, and the people dress him up in different costumes for different occasions, so of course we had to go see that. We also got waffles from a little stand which is a must do in this city.

Finally it was back in the buses and on the road to Bruges, our next stop in Belgium. We got to our hostel in Bruges and then left to the restaurant where we had this amazing three course meal. Rotary really spoils us here! After that it was free time again until 11:00. We split up into our little groups and headed off. My group and I pretty much walked around the entire town. Bruges isn't that big but Crash was determined to see this bridge he had seen on the map. We covered a lot of ground in two hours. We found all the wind mills, walked along the river, saw some more beautiful cathedrals and clock towers. It was a really nice evening. We were also lucky the rain had cleared up so walking around was a lot nicer. So that was my day in Belgium. What an amazing country. I would have loved to have more time here in Bruges, it’s such a sweet town, with really old brick building lining the skinny cobble roads. It’s supposed to be one of the best preserved towns in Europe! But time to move on. Next stop Paris!! 

(photos from day 2 will be up on my flickr soon) 

Eurotour: day 1

Lucas and Emilie stayed the night at my house the night before Eurotour. We went out in the evening, and walked up the Schlossberg, and got ice cremes with Verena. The next morning we had to get up at 5:00 in the morning to meet up with all the other Grazers and catch our train arriving in Linz at 9:00. We were still the latest group to arrive and had to quickly load into the buses. Our group fills two buses. One bus is filled with all the Americans and Canadians, and the other bus is all the Latin Americans, Europeans, Australians, New Zealanders, and Croatians. Were such and disproportionate group.

Our first destination was to Köln, Germany. It took almost ten hours to drive there from Linz, but luckily we got to stop a few times along the way. Getting to see everyone again was so great. I love these kids so much. We've all become such a family to each other.

Finally we arrived in Köln around 7:00 we got our rooms and had dinner right away. After dinner we got free time to explore Köln until 10:00. I went out with Crash, Johnny, and William, we found our way to the Dome and the old city and took a few really nice pictures. Köln is really a beautiful, old city. It’s too bad we only get to spend such a short amount of time here. We made it back to the hostel and was exhausted. But before bed my roomies and I had to watch an episode of Game of Thrones. What a perfect start to Eurotour! I can’t wait for all the shenanigans still to come. 

I posted the pictures we took on our evening out in Köln. Here's the link to my flickr account:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/saminosterreich/sets