Gutenmörgen Berlin

I am so tired sitting around an empty airport from 11pm until check-in at 4am really wore me out, I grabbed an hour or so sleep on the plane but now im in the hostel and I can only get in my room at 2pm wahhh!

also the tube dudes are on strike so theres like no public transport running in berlin until like the day I leave which means im going to be doing a TON of walking around

first impressions are good though its such a contrast to paris not only in architecture but on the fact everything is so much cheaper, where I´d be paying about 8 euros for coffee and cake in paris its like 2.50 here! i´ve strolled around the neigbourhood and theres is street art everywhere I´ve already seen a space invader! ate breakfast in some little cafe and now im back in the hostel, german keyboards are weird the x and z keys are swapped around and you can type these ßßßßß things which are like a sss sound

theres no plugs for my camera at the hostel internet cafe though so to post pictures ill have to go further afield I think

anyway i think im going to pass out in a chair, talk to you guys ßoon!
sam x

last day in paris

ill let you guys know what goes down in berlin soon!

k bye!

sam

whatzzzz goinnnn onnnnn

space invader at montremarte (http://www.space-invaders.com/) I've seen a ton around paris where he's from and they're all so good!

hey guys! long time no blog, I've been really busy but also the internet at the place has been busted and everywhere else is riduculously priced, I dont have time to tell you everything I've been doing but ill post some photos and tell you about them! k?

ok so on the 4th I went to Musee D'Orsay (the one that is a converted railway station with the big clock (above)) and saw a lot more influential art including a whole room full of Monets impressionism work which he did in Giverny, repainting the same scene in a range of seasons observing how they had changed, next to that was a room full of van goghs (that mental dude who sent an ear to a prostitute as a sign of his love)

monets bridge in his garden at Givernyone of my fav van goghs

then at night I ate at this really nice french bistro on the corner of rue de la roquette I had roast chicken with a creamed mushroom sauce a dressed salad and roast potatos it was yummy then I think I fell asleep really early because I had walked so far during the day.

on the 5th I caught the metro as far as I could out of central paris to Porte Dauphine and spent the morning reading , strolling and picnicking in Bois de Boulogne (this big park kinda thing) it was sunny and good to be able to breathe some air that didn't smell like perfume, car exhaust or urine.

in the afternoon I checked out the opera house at the bastille and then walked down promenade plantee an old 4.5km stretch of raised metro line converted into a garden giving awesome views of all the streets below and all the stuff going on it was pretty epic and relaxing even though my feet were sore at the end of it!

that evening was the night opening of the pompidou centre which houses the modern art mueseum and is a building with no exterior skin, its all glass and the cables which are usually inside the building all run along the outside meaning that riding the elevators up to the gallery gives you amazing views of the city!

inside the mueseum I joined a big group of american art school students for their tour I even got a green sticker off one of the american guys to show I was an official member of the tour group I got told about all the periods of art with plenty of great examples, I saw some amazing picassos and some of his cubist stuff which I didn't dig as much as his earlier stuff anyway so it was quite late by the time the tour was over (it was led by this well spoken eccentric english guy who was mental) I got back to the hostel on some busy metros and helped like some chinese dude get off at the right stop!

then today (6th March) I tried to hunt down a market or two, had a coffee in the cafe which amelie was filmed, bought some provisions in a supermarche and walked all the way from the bastille to my hostel (thats quite a long way) but it started to rain so this afternoon i've been relaxing in the hostel reading up on my next destination and napping about on the sofas its a really good relaxed place and everyone is really friendly, I would definitely stay here again when im next in paris! maybe you guys should all come down and we could have a ball!

tommorow im going to breakfast with the californians , meet my new room mates (i just went in and they were all asleep so i think they are more jetlagged americans haha) check out and stow my bags in a locker and then probably have quite a chilled day, maybe get a coffee by the canal , ride the metro around and then ill have to get to the airport and nap around until about 4am when I can check in for my flight to Berlin!

stay safe

Sam x

tu es beautiful

hey guyz today I had another ace day but I only have 20 minutes to tell you about it! haha ok it started off quite cloudy so I chilled in the hostel until about 10.30 and then it started to clear up and I caught a metro to Chatelet , walked around some of the big department stores and les halles (this big underground shopping centre thing) by then it was really sunny again, I called in at the pompidou centre but theres an evening opening on wednesday from 6pm and its free for 18-25 year olds :)

I bought some fresh spiced olives and a big baguette for lunch and walked all the way through paris from the seine all the way up to montemarte stopping to soak up some rays along the way.

montemarte is like a village which slowly got consumed by an ever expanding paris, its where all the starving artists like picasso and da vinci used to squat and exchange paintings for food, it also houses the last vineyard in paris

I climbed the steps of the sacre couer first of all and from the top was some amazing views of paris then I wandered around the upmost part of montremarte where all the artists paint your portrait and sell their art, theres also a ton of traditional french cafe's all packed with tourists.

after a long time wandering the sun was starting to set and I walked back to the steps of the sacre couer that I started on where some cool dudes were now performing for the crowd on their guitars playing mostly reggae , alot of marley but then also an actually good rendition of that bad james blunt song haha I put a euro or two in their guitar case and walked back down to boulevard rochquart toward the moulin rouge and the red light district.

some horrible woman tried to drag me into the most appalling brothel in the world no joke! its so terrifying having a super skinny woman in too much make up grab your hand and try and lead you somewhere that looks super gross haha I then got to the free night tours start point outside moulin rouge and went on a awesome tour of montremarte and the red light district by the crazy mexican new yorker , it was all english and everyone was really nice and welcoming and I didn't get robbed! the tour was 2 hours altogether and really informative and ace

ok I've got to go now i have one minute left on the timer!

speak soon

sam

after

after posting that last blog I had a drink with some really cool texan called matt who is studying in france and has been doing some travelling himself, he reccomended a few places to go and see while im here and also some stuff to do in milan then i got to talk on the phone to my bestest buddy for a bit before passing out in my warm bed :)

its actually quite cloudy this morning so i might leave the bike hire to another day and just mooch around the big shopping centres and maybe see a movie in an independent cinema.

overdosed on fine arts

The end of my second day in paris im copying this from my journal that I wrote with a beer at the hotel bar like an hour ago.

Its been another action packed day at Chateau Golden! Today was the first sunday of the month and aswell as being mothers day (hi mum love you!) a ton of the mueseums where gratuit (free!) meaning that I had to visit as many as possible! I started the day really early before my crazy dutch room mates woke upand went down for breakfast. Taking advantage of the buffet style dining I consumed copious amounts of orange juice and coco pops, I also stowed a baguette and a sachet of honey for my lunch (saving precious €€€'s!) first of all I wandered through a little street market to as metro station catching a metro straight to the Louvre. Arriving early meant I avoided a load of the tourists and therfore queues , I got x-ray'd and stumbled into the gigantic foyer, grabbed an english version of the map and set off to the denon wing which houses italian sculptures and paintings including the Mona Lisa and Venus De Milo two things I knew I definitely wanted to check out!

Arriving at the room displaying the Mona Lisa there was already quite a crowd and to be honest im not that sure why. Basically imagine a badly aged, pretty small painting of a average looking brown haired girl with a bit of a omniscient look

on her face and thats all it is.

No painter has ever dared to restore the classic painting and so even behind it brightened colour enhancing, bullet proof glass its still only a small warping portrait of a mystery lady and not to disimilar to many other portraits of the era. I guess its just the recurring reproduction of Mona Lisas' Smile which helped her gain the popularity, along with the wild myths surrounding it, including one explaining how the image could be a self portrait of Da Vinci himsel in drag from there I perusd the awesome and collection of egyptian artefacts which was much cooler and exciting, they also drew some pretty funny paintings of guys riding camels.

The Venus De Milo is pretty hot for a armless model and I completely loved all the japanese dudes pulling wild poses next to her whilst their disgruntled wives took their photo, my favourite was the guy proudly posing next to her builders bum, The sculpture also has a pretty interesting history too but im too busy to drawl on about it so check it out on wikipedia or something!

After snacking down on a cheese sandwich leftover from the day before, I moved to the exhibition underneath the louvre which explored the galleris history along sections of the restored and excavated original walls, I looked around the dungeon a bit too and it was really dark so I left heading along the bank of the seine to the palais toykyo which houses the mueseum of modern art.

The exterior was a bombshell, a homeless guy in a monks cowl pushing a trolley full of crap harrassed me for change, the walls were covered with graffitti and broken wine bottles littered the ground, I paused considering whether I should even bother going up the stairs to the entrance but scared of walking past the monk dude again I marched onward through the sliding door and its so luck I did. the place is amazing, housing some of frances most beautiful works of art including Dufy's humongous mural 'le fee electricite' (the elecrticity fairy) which tells the story of electricity from aristotle to the power station in beautiful bright colours covering an entire exhibition room it was magnificent!

There was a intruguing exhibition downstairs containing a room full of old childrens clothes and telephone directorys from all around the world lining the walls, static memories of thousands of people in the world gathering dust in a basement gallery of a dilapadated mueseum.

Dufys 'le fee electricite'

Next to that was a instalation of hundreds of TVs running different films immersing the visitor in a minefield of sounds and images conveying thousands of feelings and mentally making your brain work in overdrive trying to figure out what the heck is going on. I want to upload all my photos here but its so tricky so you'll have to wait til im home and I can flickr them all

my lunch break consisted of an apple my honey baguette and a glass of hot red wine from the mueseum cafe, in the building next door was a boutuqye of local artists work on sale ranging from 100 euros to 1000+ for pieces ranging from skeleton necklaces to rubiks cube coffee tables somewhere I would definitely return to if I ever make some money.

behind the mueseum is replica of the statue of libertys torch put there in 1987 symbolising the franco american relationship, freedom and liberty however the site is now remembered for something much darker, below the torch is the underpass in which princess diana was killed.

from here I headed back along the seine to the petit palais containing the mueseum des beuaux arts encompassing pieces from every period of art from the ranaissance to the 1920s including monets ' sunset at lavacourt' the central quad also had a nice garden I sat in for a while.

I did a ton more stuff today like exploring the bastille one of paris' biggest nightspots and home of some upcoming artists and their galleries/workshops but my time on this coin operated internet machine has nearly expired so ill let you know about it sometime soon, I also ate pizza from the home of the METRE LONG PIZZA lolol it was epic, so yeah ill leave you with some photos because happy hour at belushis started 30 minutes ago (glass of wine 1.80!! buy one get one free on beerz!!) so ill speak soon!

tommorow im hiring un velo (a bike)!!!!

stay safe

Sam x

view from my window tonight

Riding The Parisian Metro Is Like Going To The Theatre

so far i've had hip hoppers, accordion players, a ventriloquist and some dude who made some dumb duck noise with his mouth harrassing me whilst riding the metro but I think that just makes it even more awesome, you just cruise over and under the ground passing loads of awesome graffitti and seeing a ton of interesting stuff! I'm trying to be economical though so i've been walking as much as possible, I still need to go out and grab a bite to eat later but my legs don't want to function anymore!

As you might have guessed i made it to paris in once piece and im in my awesome hostel just got back from trekking, going to shower and go hunt down nutrition :)

It was only when I arrived in Paris Charles De Gaulles this morning that it hit me I was actually there, its so surreal but totally liberating. Knowing nothing and nobody is definitely daunting but fourtunately i've already made some friends , Pat Cartwright from liverpool talked to me all the way on the plane, looking forward to her birthday meal in the eifel tower shes probably enjoying some snails right about now and then when I got off the train i met this cool couple from huddersfield Nick & Rachel, in their twentys they were definitely much more in my age group than Pat (she was 50+ im betting lolol) and we chilled then adventure through the airport together , collected our luggage, found the train station (eventually!) and chatted the 45 minute ride to the city centre away in no time before going our seperate ways at the metro link.

TODAY i've done a load of stuff and its been so good, the sun has been shining, theres very little wind and its was warm enough for me to wear just my polo shirt until six!

I would like to type about everything I saw but I already want to go out there adventuring again but after the 4am start this morning I think i need an early night
so instead of typing loads of noodles about what I did today ill post some captioned pictures

chilling at the Arc de Triomphe before heading down Champs-Élysées to look at all the posh shops it really is the most beautiful street ever all the buildings are flawless and all the specialist independent cinemas rock out some cool movies.

Eifel Tower! some mental chinese lady insisted she took 5876786 photos of me standing in front of the tower pulling stupid poses after I took a picture of her and her family, I loved it haha

st martins canal just nearby the hostel, this place is lined with boats with opera singers on that double up as bars, I think i might check them out tonight ha! the weather was so perfect today :)

oh and finally I witnessed an illegal breakdancing contest in front of the eifel tower it was totally rad the burly black guy was the best because he danced like a russian