Amsterdam

I loved Amsterdam. The red light district and the coffee shops what more could you want :) Actually when I arrived I went straight from the airport to church so I started off on the right foot. It wasn’t that intentional though but the timing just worked out perfectly. On a side note C3 Amsterdam is a great church well worth checking out if you’re in the area. The first thing that struck me was that the Dutch are alot more serious about cycling than the Danish. The Danish cycle but it’s more of a fashion accessory in most cases. While the Dutch they cycle and they don’t care one bit how crap there bike is as long as it get you there. Definitely the biking capital of the world. Sorry Copenhagen.

This is proof

Again for the 3rd time I caught up with Miriam, one of my friends from Copenhagen. Felt like we were stalking each other around Europe a bit. So one of the nights I met up with her and Kay and had dinner and checked out Harlem, which is about 20 mins outside of Amsterdam. What I like the most about the city was the canals and the look and feel was just incredible. It did help that the weather was really good. So I completely feel in love with Amsterdam definitely another city I could live in. (Feels like I’m scouting places where I can live but don’t worry Sydney is top of the list for the moment)

Amsterdam through a bike's eyes

So that was a quick snapshot of my trip over the summer. I also went to see my family in England which was really nice to see some of my family. As it’s been nearly 8 months since I saw anyone from my family. Not long now though. So now it is back to Copenhagen 2nd Semester can’t wait.

Cheers
Jono

Barcelona

Barcelona is such a diverse and is an amazing city. It has everything; beach, art, architecture, food and great night life. We actually went when there was this festival on that ran for 2 weeks all through the night. The one and probably the most important thing I learnt while in Barcelona is that the Catalonia region is NOT SPAIN.

The city of Barcelona

Get it right!

Ibiza

No Comment

All I can say

Madrid

In Madrid we had our own personal Spanish guide in Dan. It was awesome to catch up with someone from back home and to check out Madrid with. In the summer time Madrid is pretty quite as everyone heads to the coast. It seems like once summer hits everyone in Europe drops everything and heads to the beach. But still Madrid was really nice and we sampled many cafes in true Reynolds style.

The food on offer at a random festival we stumbled on

Too cool for school at a jazz club in Madrid. (Please note Dan is wearing my sunnies)

Rome

Well Rome has to be my favourite city in Europe. I love history and Rome is jammed pack with it. So much so that the Romans don’t know what to do with it all. So there are ancient ruins of temples and building just lying there with very little protection or information about them. Welcome to Rome. As always the best part of Italy is the food. Pasta, lasagne, osso buco, tiramisu, cappuccinos, etc. The only downside to Rome is the amount of tourists there. It is completely packed and every major tourist attraction has queues a mile long (Literally). But still Rome is the best city in Europe to visit, in my humble opinion.

The classic tourist shot. Got to love Rome!

Ravenna

Italy, what can you say about Italy. It has to be the best country in Europe to visit. The food, the people, atmosphere, the weather and it’s just Italy. Ravenna is just a small town on the east coast of Italy and is most famous for its beautiful mosaics, which are incredible. Also it is famous for being the capital of the Byzantine empire in the 6th century. It was incredibly hot when I was there but thankfully the beach was too far away. So I ended up cycling to the beach and when I arrived found all the Italians EXTREMELY burnt. Also no one was in the water just lying on the beach getting abnormally tanned. Really a site to see all these brown Italians lying and walking around the beach too scared to go into the water (Wish I had my camera with me). So there I the whitest guy on the beach swimming around. I’m sure they all thought I was completely nuts. Anyways Ravenna was a beautiful little town well worth the visit.

An example of the spectacular mosaics

Vienna

As always I love Austria and Vienna is like the icing on the cake of Austria. It has to be one of the most elegant cities in Europe. As you walk around you feel transported to the 18th century with all these majestic and grand buildings surrounding you. In Vienna I met up with some more friends from my exchange in Copenhagen which was fantastic. Definitely could live in Vienna.

Warsaw

The train journey from Budapest to Warsaw was an extremely interesting experience. I’ve caught a sleeper train before but I’ve never experienced getting into a un-air-conditioned shoe box of a cabin at 1am in the morning with 4 other people already sleeping in the cabin. Then trying to get all our luggage into the cabin and get into our bunks without disturbing the other people sleeping. A completely impossible task. So after a hellish experience on the night train (which was just a couple of hours delayed) we arrived in Warsaw. When we arrived into the train station it seems you have been transported back to the 1980’s in the height of communism. As The station is very dark, bland and concrete, extremely depressing. We were actually trying to find the tourist information office and we came across the police station and were thinking of asking them but it was down this long corridor with lights flicking on and off and seemed to just get darker and darker the closer you got to the office. Very eerie. Once we got into the main part of the city it was amazing. The building and design was beautiful and actually reminded me of Nyhavn in Copenhagen. The most interesting thing about Warsaw was this contrast of the communist style and the old town western European style.

Exhibit A - Palace of Culture and Science

Exhibit A - The main square in the old town

Budapest

From Zagreb we made our way to Budapest. I really loved Budapest as it was such a beautiful and vibrant city. I especially like the unique combination of the Buda Castle and Pest region and then the Danube running through the middle. Also in Budapest I meet up with one of my friends from Copenhagen and ended up going around Budapest with her and her Hungarian friend which was awesome. The biggest different between Copenhagen and Budapest was how cheap everything was. It was ridiculous especially alcohol.

Budapest Parliament