Continuing the story
OK, while the clothes are drying lets continue… (And of course, I ran out of time again. I will add the days in Amsterdam soon.)
Update (6-27-07): This entry is more of less complete. I’ve filled in all the missing bits.
Tuesday (Amsterdam)
- Transfered from the hostel I was staying at near the central station - Bob’s Youth Hostel - to a no-star hotel furthur out near one of the major gay areas of the city. Had a hard time finding it because I started by walking a bit to far. It turned out I wasn’t where I thought I was, so nothing seemed to fit my map. Wasted an hour or so wandering around. (With my full pack on my back.)
- Walked around the area by the new hotel (without gear) while waiting for them to get my room ready. (About an hour.)
- Went to a beach an hour north of Amsterdam — Zundvoort am See (or something like that). Pretty nice, though it got a bit chilly later on. I spent a little too much time in the sun, but not too bad.
- Had dinner on the beach. Really good Satay at a pancake place strangely enough. The dutch really seem to have the food down. Everything I’ve had has been excellent, even the cheap stuff.
Wednesday (Amsterdam)
- Hit several of the gay bookstores in town looking for fiction to read.
- Did laundry while reading one of the books I bought.
- Walked around town for several hours, including back over to the homomonument. (The only one of its kind in the world. Very easy to miss, but hey that’s kind of appropriate in a ironic kind of way isn’t it?)
- Mostly just a day to relax and recuperate some. Nothing major in terms of sightseeing. I was getting a bit worn out from all the travelling.
Thursday (Amsterdam -> Freiburg, Germany)
- Packed up, then stopped by the gay bookstore I’d hit previously and grabbed the next two (quite short) books in the series for reading on the train.
- Left Amsterdam and headed to Freiburg Germany. I was looking for a smaller town because I had gotten tired of seeing only cities. Went through Franfurt and didn’t arrive in Freiburg until around 10pm.
- Couldn’t find a hotel room anywhere and ended up having to camp out. (There’s a large solar power exhibition going on. Rooms were aparently booked out 6 months ago.) Was able to rent a tent and had brought my own bag and pad so I was fine. Hey, I finally justified carrying that thing around the entire time!
Friday (Freiburg/Hinterzarten)
- Got up early, but was trapped in the tent for a while due to a rain storm. Didn’t make it out of the camp ground until 11am.
- Talked to the tourist info people and was told I had no chance to find a room in Freiburg untill at least Sunday. They suggested I try a few smaller towns up the train line. I ended up finding a place in Hinterzarten (the first town I tried). Wonderful hotel (4/5 stars), which only cost 46 euro a night. I book for several nights because I was really tired of switching rooms and hotels every night.
- Went back to Freiburg, walked around and explored for the evening. Eat at a small cafe on the square by the tourist info place. Pretty good and I was surprised by how much I could communicate in German.
Saturday (Hinterzarten/Freiburg)
- Slept in, then went into Freiburg for the afternoon. Went up the cable car into the black forest, but I didn’t make it there until late in the afternoon. The last car down was 5pm, so I really didn’t have much time up on the mountian. It was beautiful, but a little cold. Definitely glad I didn’t get stuck over night.
- Back in Freiburg, I wandered around and discovered this great little special interest bookstore with a large English collection. I picked up a great fantasy book which I read that night. (The bookstore is in a passage (side corridor) off the main street you walk up from the station to the shopping district. Just past the small park on your left.)
- Eat dinner a little Itailian place (not great, didn’t get anything like what I expected).
- Went back to the hotel and ended up reading the entire book in one go.
Sunday (Hinterzarten/Freiburg)
- Slept in, then walked through Hinterzarten (the town I was staying in). Eat lunch at local pizza place, which was absolute crap. (Made me slightly sick, litterly.)
- After recovering from lunch, I walked out of town (with a day pack and survival supplies.) I followed a bunch of other people to this wonderful nature preserve/hiking area. Beautifully maintianed trails and once I got off the main one, there weren’t even that many people. I ran into some English speaking folks who told me that the trail led to Tilisee (the next major town over). I ended up walking all the way to Titisee, eating some ice cream and then taking the train back by Hinterzarten on the way to Freiburg.
- Eat dinner in Freiburg and grabbed another book to read. Unfortunately, the really good bookstore I found before was closed and I had to scronge at the station bookstore in their extremely limited English collection. Finally headed back to Hinterzarten, read for a while, then crashed.
Monday (Hinterzarten -> London)
- I spent the whole day trying to get to London. Left Hinterzarten at 7:45 am on what should have been a direct route, but was eventually told (once I spoke to someone in english) that I couldn’t easily make it to Paris and if I did, they wouldn’t honor my Europass on the Eurostar since it was busy. I ended up going back to Frankfurt, then to Koln, then Brussels, then London. For while there, I did not think I’d make it at all. Just about anything which could go wrong did go wrong. Talked to some fellow american tourists on the Eurostar though. Other than that, I had lots of time to sit, think, and listen to music on the train. I didn’t make it to the hostel until 11:30 at night. (12:30 in the timezone I got up in.) It was a very long and not much fun day.