Venice

After an absolutely horrendous night train journey, which included 4 hours on a train station floor and 4 hours following that of sat awkwardly in a 6 seater couchette, we finally reached Venice and NESSA AND RYAN! We were all v v v excited (although me and Alice were also extremely tired), and went to our little room to freshen up before we headed into Venice.

Nessa told us beforehand about the mass of water when you go into Venice, but even being told about it, I was not expecting there to be SO much. It’s like crossing the sea to get to an island… well I supposed it is just that.

It’s just so pretty. No cars are allowed, so there are water taxis and water ambulances and everything, it’s like a strange little water land.

We wandered about for a bit trying to find San Marco square (with a pizza stop off on the way, of course, mm), turned out that we’d already been in San Marco square without even knowing what it was, so that was fun… Haaha, such sausages.
We then bought some gelato and sat by the water and ate them whilst watching the boats pass by :)
On our way back to the hotel we got very, very lost. Venice is made up a back streets and alleys and random big empty square of nothing, it’s so difficult to navigate around. So that took us a good 2 hours and another ice cream. But we MADE IT! And then went to Mcdonalds. Of course.

On our second day (well, Nessa and Ryan’s third), we headed out with a mission of pizza, gondola and gelato! Best day ever! Oh, and a second mission of not getting as lost as we did the day before.
We managed to find a gondola on one of the many, many, many canals, and paid for a 30 minute ride with a nice (and good looking) Italian man. The ride was so nice and relaxing. Even Nessa who hates boats and gets sea sick loved it. It’s so smooth and lovely! I think we would all agree that we would have gone on one again if it was much cheaper, but ah well, we had the experience and loved it :) aww, gondolagondola.
We then went back to San Marco square and got another icecream (we’re in Italy, okay?!). I got mint choc chip and cookies and cream, yummmm. I think it was my favourite icecream there. Although I did really love my mango one that we got on our way back to the hotel from a random little shop.

On the last day we say our goodbyes to Alice as she left for home, had a fun fun few train journeys back and forth to try and get to a certain place, decided we didn’t want to pay that much to get into said certain place, and ended up back in Venice eating pizza and gelato again. Because, when in Venice!

Split

Our initial plan whilst in Split was to explore other islands close by via boats. We weren’t expecting the boats to be quite so expensive. A tour of all five islands in a day was 110 euros, we just didn’t have that, especially with me having some of the most expensive euro places coming up. So, we just decided to stick around Split.

When we got there at 7am, the hotel man picked us up from the train station and took us to some random apartments where we left our luggage as we weren’t allowed to check-in till 2pm. Ugh. We were tired and hot and yuck, and we had 7 hours to kill. It wasn’t the greatest time. We wandered around Diocletian’s palace and through the little market areas, before tiredness truly hit and we ended up just sitting staring at the sea for a good 2/3 hours to pass time.
Eventually, we could check in, and our room was just down the road from the most popular beach, Bacvice beach (also known as ‘sandy beach’ although it wasn’t sandy… ookay). It was always so busy, so I could see what they meant by most popular! There was a really cool inflatable obstacle course in the middle that I wanted to go on, but Alice wasn’t able to swim in the sea, and I didn’t want to be a loner bum, so I gave it a miss too.

Because we couldn’t afford boats to and from other islands, we just decided to go on a ‘semi-submarine’, which was a boat, but with a bit underneath where you could go and see the fish. It was really cool, we saw some nice views of Split and a few fish under the sea (no jellyfish or mermaids though, sadly). So, that was something new and fun.

Apart from that, it was pretty much a chill-out time. Wandering around the palace area which was full of restaurants, shops and markets, and sitting beside the water with an icecream.
We didn’t have any meals out as I stole (well, technically borrowed) the kettle from the room next to us so we could have our pastas. Oh wait, I tell a lie! We did have one meal out. It wasn’t great enough to document though.
Yep, think that’s it for that.

Zagreb

Hello, hello, hello.
I'm sorry that I haven't blogged, internet has been v scarce!!!

Zagreb started off pretty dramatically when I realised on the train there that we were supposed to ring them 24/48 hours before arrival to ensure that somebody is waiting there for check-in, because they have limited reception hours. So after a mini freak-out that we would be on the streets, a fair few texts and a huge favour done by Abbi who (bless her) rang our hotel for us to check if a receptionist was there, and THANKFULLY there was! She was a very happy chappy too and became a little friend the whole time we were there – even provided us with biscuits, yummm.

Zagreb itself was nice, but I don’t think it’s somewhere that you could spend a lot of time. Although the areas surrounding it look amazing.
On the first day we just had a wander around. I bought a couple of lovely little things and we also browsed the market. We also had a huge stack of pancakes from Kava tavana (I could have spelt that completely wrong then) which were sooo nice but v. filling.
We also used our trusty Europe book to hunt down a pizzeria that it recommended. The pizza was amazing, but we couldn’t finish ours at all, they were huge. We were baffled as to how everybody around us seemed to be managing wiping their plates clean with no problem at all. Super Croatians.

With our hotel, we got given a leaflet about Plitvice lakes, and so we decided to take the offer and pay 200 kunas (which is about £20) to be taken to the lakes and back by a man called Marijo, who also bought us water as ‘a present’, awwwwwwww.

Plitvice was beaaautiful. I’ve never seen water so clear and so blue in my life. It was like something you’d see on a Disney film, or a landscape painting of the most picturesque perfect place. It was amazing.

We walked around for about six hours (apart from the parts where we were on a free boat ride!) which we thought would be way too long for us, but the place was so big and pretty, it went in no time at all.
Then we headed back to the hostel and had our leftover pizza :)

On the last day it was raining so much all day. It just didn’t stop. There were a few museums in the Upper town, so we just decided to head there and go the Natural History Museum that I spotted on a sign post (with high hopes that it was somewhat like London). It was a terrible little museum. Half rocks, half taxidermy. None of it in English neither, so lord knows what we were supposed to learn. It was 15 kunas (£1.50) though, and allowed us to dry off after the man at reception kindly let us know ‘ooh! You’re soaked!’. Yep, we figured from the rain drops dripping off our noses!
Afterwards we headed back to kava tavana and had a toastie (thought of you Mum!), and then headed back to the hostel where our new friend allowed us to sit until our night train at 11pm. What a sweetie pie. So we sat and had a cup of tea and biscuit whilst making the most of the wifi before another dreaded night train.

Vienna

When we got to Vienna, we managed to get to our hotel before it began raining. And lightening. And thundering. Basically the full works. So we dashed to the vegetarian restaurant next door, and we stayed in the restaurant so long after we finished eating our tea that the lady who works there ended up bringing us free dessert, so that was nice! Afterwards we decided to call it a night. We couldn’t go anywhere in that weather, so we chose to catch up with some TV (oh, btw, Abbi RUINED Hollyoaks for me, I am very sad).

The next day, we went to the zooooo! Vienna’s zoo is the oldest zoo in the world and claimed to be the ‘best in Europe’. I’m not even joking, I totally agree. Not like I’ve been to every one in Europe, but it was amazing. It was such a perfect zoo. The enclosures were amazing, the animals seemed really happy, and it was just amazing. I also got to see my first polar bears! They were chilling outside, and it suddenly started pouring it down outside, so we ran into the bit where you could see them in the water, not expecting them to appear, but all of a sudden one dived in!!! It made me jump SO much, but it was amazing. They swam down to the bottom to get some fish, and it was all so beautiful. It’s probably the highlight of my trip. It was so unexpected; I just loved it so much. I had to buy a postcard thing of polar bears in the shop afterwards – and a pen, of course - Got to get a zoo pen.
The weather held out pretty well to be fair. There were a few downpours, but nothing that ruined our day. I want to go back! It was amazing. I just wish I could have read all of the information bits, because they were all in bloody German, or Austrian, whatever they speak, they were all in that.

Because the zoo is on the palace grounds, it was only right that we had a wander around the rest of the grounds.
It was HUGE! The grounds were beautiful though, it’s definitely somewhere that I’d have liked to take a picnic or something. It’s so quiet and pretty :)

We’re on the train to Croatia as I’m typing this (CROAAATIAAA!), so I am very excited, although a little sleepy because it take 7 hours… zzzzz. But I have a sandwich and peaches to get me through. I would have sweets, but they’re up on the luggage shelf thing, and I’m scared that my bag will land on my head if I even try and get it down. Pff.
Anyway, enough rambling. CROATIA!
Please keep your fingers crossed for us that the Vienna weather doesn’t not follow us.

P.s. Sarah, I’m on to three bags!
P.p.s. Nanny, I bought you a present :)
P.p.s. Wayne, try a bounty milkshake if you can!
P.p.p.s. Keeley, have a slice of cake for me – I am very jealous! P.p.p.p.s. Mum, please don’t destroy my bedroom.
P.p.p.p.p.s. Seriously, do not destroy my bedroom.

Budapest, Hungary | Interrail

I love Budapest.
The language is impossible, the road crossings are weird, and there's no healthy food in sight on the menus, but it's great.
There's even a crossing here that if you don't wait for the green man at, you genuinely get fined!

We got here really early for check-in, but the lovely man at reception changed our room for us so we could check in, bless him. We must have looked really lost.
We had absolutely no idea what to do, so we decided to go for our first guided tour, which was quite good actually. But it was SCORCHING hot, and I wore a cardigan to make sure my poor burn was covered up, which made it even hotter. Phew, it was waaaaarrrmmm.

Afterwards, we went for food (best burger I've probably ever had), and icecream! And sat outside the basilica (well, at least I think it was) to lap up the end of the sunny day.

The next day, after a very very very long walk, and getting lost, we went to the tropicarium. It was 33 degrees, so it was quite nice to sit in the cool and watch some sharks for a bit and laugh at some monkeys. I also discovered something that I've never seen before!

No idea what they are, but they were funny little things.

We then went to a ruin bar (after a much more successful route back), which are bars that existed during the time that Hungary were poor, and had no money to do anything. So ruin bars stayed open by collecting things off the streets and creating something new with them. It was actually really cool!

Next stop Vienna!

Oh, I also need to plug in how comfy our bed is - because it is SO COMFY.

Kraków

It's getting really difficult to write these now because everything has started merging into one big bloop!

Kraków was really nice. I just think that I really like Poland (Nessa, taking you next time to convert menus for me... I sucked at that).

The first full day there, we went to Auschwitz. We all know that I hate history and the whole thing bores me, and I'd love to say that being there wiped that all out, but it didn't really. It was interesting at first, but the Auschwitz first part (the museum) was pretty much a textbook cut out and stuck on walls.

I really likes the visual stuff though, like seeing the bunks, the toilets, and reading about how they killed them and stuff. But the reading part just wasn't for me. We went in the gas chambers though, which was horrible, there were scratch marks on the wall and everything. It's all a bit surreal how it was real life.

The second day, I got burnt. It's going to rain, they said. Thunderstorms, they said. How about 32 degrees all bloody day! Should have learnt from living in England never to trust the weather.
We walked up to the palace which was really pretty, and also found the dragon which comes from a story of how Krakow got its name!

I even know the full story, feel free to ask me on a later date ;) Or google it... probably a better idea, I'm not the best at rambles.

We also ate a lot, went to a market, ate the best icecream in the world ever (no exaggeration) and went to the jewish quarter to pass some time (our night train wasn't till 21:54).
It was very hot and there were a fair few school trips going on, but I really liked it.
I think I might become one of those 39-year-old Poland travellers!

Wroclaw

Okay, I fully love Wroclaw.
Everywhere is so colourful and an unknown artist has put over 200 gnomes around the city, so we went on a little gnome hunt in the little time that we had to browse around (which wasn’t long as our train was 2 hours earlier than we thought. Well, I thought, I’m the one in charge of all that, haha. God knows where we’d be if it was down to Alice.

Our hostel was above a KFC (Mum), and it was actually really nice for £7.50 a night! It was really clean and the beds were super comfy. It was bang next to the Old town Square as well, which is where all of the pretty colourful buildings are.
We browsed around when we got there, trying to find a vegetarian restaurant that our Europe book recommended, but we couldn’t find it (let’s just not mention the fact we found it the next day), so settled with an Italian, because we had no idea what other menus said. Polish isn’t even close to English, so it is so difficult to even try and figure out what words mean. Determined to try something polish though, just in English on a menu, hahaha.

After being kept awake by a man snoring (UGHUGHUGH), we awoke in time to check out and then go to the McCafé for breakfast (mmm chocolate croissant), and go on a gnome hunt.
We have no idea what was going on, but there were loads of groups of children and a huge obstacle course thing in the centre. It looked so cool, I was a bit upset that I couldn’t join in. We even got hugs by a lifesize gnome, how exciting. But yeah, that was really sweet, some of the kids even wore gnome hats.

I do wish we had an extra day to wander about and discover all of the gnomes and more of the place itself, but ah well, I always have the future times!
On the train on the way to Wroclaw, a group of 39 year olds (Nanny) came on the train, they were all English and were travelling Poland. I hope I’m cool at that age too!

Oh, also, there were these really cool statues called the ‘unknown passenger’ which go down into the pavement at a crossing and then come out on the other side of the road – I thought it was really cool! Almost as cool as the gnomes.

P.s. Happy Birthday to my funny little sister xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
P.p.s. A riveting conversation by me and Alice: A: “I want to see a deer” L: “you want a CD?” A: “see a deer” L: “CD?!” A: “deer” L: “D?” A: *laughs* L: “CD? C a D? D a C? C a… SEE! OH! SEE A DEER!”… Nanny coming out right there.
P.p.p.s. Alice had now has a women shout at her in Czech and Polish. Too funny.