Travel Plans

Hey Everyone!

I'm writing this post about my travel plans partly because I'm super excited and partly to make sure there are no holes (just kidding, my plans are flawless)...

Okay! First, on Monday, I will go to DIS and print any final things I need (such as city maps and hostel reservations). Then I will make my way to Central Station and hopefully finish with everything else early enough to catch a 10ish train so that I will arrive in Hamburg at 14.30. I then will spend the afternoon in Hamburg and will prolly just walk around a little and try to see a few things. Then I have to make my way back to the train station and catch a night train at 21ish to Munich. Then I spend the night on the train and arrive at 7.00 on Tuesday.

Then I have to catch a train at 7.20ish to Vienna and will arrive around noon. Then I will meet up with a friend and I'm spending Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday in Vienna. There are a lot of things to see there so we're pretty pumped for that leg of the journey. We are also staying at this hostel that looks pretty great. We have a private room and the hostel has lots of neat facilities like pool (Erik I'm going to practice so much, I prolly won't even explore the city) and Foosball! The hostel is very like ecofriendly and bragged about that a lot online (I can dig it). It is also right up against a forest with trails and stuff. Not really sure if I'll have time for that, but it at least sounds like a nice location.

Then I leave Friday morning for Salzberg which is supposed to be very pretty. I will be staying there on my own for 2 days and exploring. Salzberg is also where the Sound of Music was filmed for anyone who doesn't know (that should give you an okay idea of what the place looks like). The hostel I'm staying at apparently plays the movie everyday at 10.30 (which I found hilarious).

Then Sunday morning I continue to Munich and will explore for 3 days. I will definitely make an effort to try some beer (Vivek told me I had to) and to meet some people at the hostels. Apparently it is ridiculously easy (to meet people).

I then leave on Wednesday morning for Berlin and will explore there for three days. Then finally I will leave on Saturday morning and go to Hamburg (eat lunch) and then continue to Copenhagen and I'll get back around 20.00 on Saturday night.

So that's the plan. 3 days Vienna, 2 days Salzberg, 3 days Munich, 3 days Berlin, home (plus an afternoon in Hamburg). So overall, 13 days (2 of travel to and from Copenhagen). Additionally, because I will not use up all my travel days on my Eurorail pass, I'm going to try to do a weekend trip with a friend to Germany for one of the Christmas markets in late November or early December which would be really cool to see.

I will be staying in only hostels and will be sleeping in rooms with strangers for 3 out of the 4 hostels (4-6 people a room) and will also be mostly on my own for 3 of the cities. I am quite excited to be on my own and kinda planned it that way. Furthermore, I do not have a suitcase, only my heavy clothes and a backpack which holds all my clothes, travel documents and random accessories. (I will have to rent linen and towels from the hostels)

The trip is overall quite expensive but I'm also not doing it as cheap as possible and am still doing it fairly cheaply. I'm not sure what the final price will be but at the end of the trip I'll let you guys know.

I have 2 hefty books for reading material and my ipod and charger. My ipod is full of podcasts and music. I plan to be never bored on the train (I'm not sure how I ever could be because trains are too awesome). In fact, I'm very excited about this method of travel because I just find it a lot less stressful way to travel (no airports involved) and I'll be able to see lots of countryside which I will love (that is why I am leaving in the morning for going to every place (except for the one overnight), so that I can see lots of neat things on the way).

Oh and about the couchsurfing. I looked into it but just was not comfortable doing it on my first trip like this. Additionally, I don't have any references yet and they like you to have a few before you start actually couch surfing (or get verified which I need to be at home for). So I might try to meet up with someone from couchsurfing.com for coffee or something because you can do that. That way I can get an idea of things to see in the city and will get some references on my profile. So yeah, it will be only hostels for me on this journey but I will be on my own quite a bit so I feel like I'm still doing quite a bit to get out of my comfort zone and explore. But I'm not ready for couches yet. Maybe next time.

Also I like my plan because I get to spend a good amount of time in each of the 4 cities I am visiting. I've talked to a lot of DIS kids about their travel plans (because everyone asks eachother constantly even though you can never remember because everyone is going to different places in different orders) and some people are going to like 8 places in 14 days all by plane. Sounds pretty hectic to me. Obviously the mentality is that they want to go to as many of the major cities as possible in order to be able to say they've been to them but it doesn't seem like you'd really get a feel for the city of even be able to see that much unless you stayed for at least 2 nights. I even heard of one group who on some days will land late morning spend a few hours in the city and then catch another flight later that day. If you ask me, that sounds pretty kray kray. Although, most people are going to 4-6 places it sounds like. But yeah, just wanted to share that.

So those are my plans, not too exciting of a post, I'm sure the post-travel post(s) and pictures will be more exciting. I hope everyone has a great weekend!

Also the sun just set. It is 17.38 (5:38 PM). Tonight we fall back an hour... The sun will set at 4:30ish tomorrow... I don't leave for 7ish weeks... Yup.

Nick

P.S. Erik, I will write a post on Positive Psychology perhaps (might have to wait till after the trip) tonight or tomorrow cuz I think it is pretty interesting (and I would love the opportunity to just explain it anyways).