Where to start... I started in Toronto. Then, in the next 24 days, I was in seven different countries, I slept on 9 different beds and couches (not to mention a few planes and two overnight trains), and played five different guitars. In three and a half weeks there were a lot of memorable moments, almost all of them positive and the exceptions being nothing too serious. There were moments where I was glad I was alone because it forced me to talk to some interesting people, and there were moments that I was terribly lonesome and wished I had friends nearby. There were times when I was anxious to get home and others when I thought about staying for good. I drank with the English in Ireland, Fins in Latvia, Aussies in England, Danes in Spain, Canadians in France, Austrians in Austria, and the United Nations of Curling in Germany. After a while waking up and wondering what country you're in stops being fun, and finally landing in your own bed feels like the best thing in the world.
So, like I said, I started in Toronto. I was at the Jays game in the afternoon, watching them lose 3-0 to the Angels. My bags had been packed for a day or two, and I didn't have to worry about flying out until almost 9pm. I managed to pack enough t-shirts, socks and underwear, to last at least a couple weeks, and laundry facilities permitting, the whole trip. Of course, there were flip flops and curling shoes, cameras and a CD player, stuffed into the rather hefty hiking backpack, which I would later find out weighed in at about 16 kilos all put together. After the game, my roommate Mike and I went home for a bit, made sure I had all my bits and pieces, my tickets, and my stampless passport and headed to the airport in his car.
A short while later, I was climbing out of the car at Pearson's Terminal 3, saying thanks and goodbye to Mike, and checking in more than the recommended two hours before takeoff. I found the gate, which was amazingly familiar because it was next to the one we had used to fly to Cuba the year before. I realized I didn't have a book with me so I picked up "The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference" by Malcom Gladwell and a pack of gum. With more than two hours to kill, I sat in the airport bar, had a beer, and watched junior hockey playoffs on Sportsnet until it was time to head back to the gate.
By the time everyone had boarded the giant trans-Atlantic plane, I realized it was the emptiest flight I had ever seen. The plane sat nine people across in three sets of three, but each set of seats had no more than one person in it, and many of them were left empty. I wasn't complaining, however, because it meant I got to stretch out and try to get some sleep in the hours over the North Atlantic, instead of watching "Fun with Dick and Jane" or "Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire." For the record, MyTravel2000 was a completely decent flight. Good movies, good food, good service, on time, etc. The flight, however, was pretty uneventful but I didn't sleep too much. Shortly after the sun came up, we were landing over the green fields of England into Gatwick Airport, where I collected Passport Stamp #1.
I was tired and hungry after being on the plane all night. Really, all I wanted was a shower, some food, and a nap. Because I had to wait three hours before my flight to Dublin, the only thing I could do was have breakfast. And because I was interested in experiencing new things, new cultures, and new foods, I went to McDonald's and got something from the menu that you can't get in Canada. Seriously though, I swore that I wouldn't eat at McDonald's again for the rest of the trip (a policy which would later be violated, but not by choice). I sat around for quite a while, wasting time before I could even check in for my next flight, which was still hours away. I sat outside a Starbucks for a while reading, wrote some stuff in my notebook, then watched people go by for a bit until it was finally time to at least check my bag and get my boarding pass.
Gatwick has a fairly large shopping selection in the South Terminal, but I was so tired I didn't even feel like looking around. I was working on keeping my eyes open, and making sure that I didn't fall asleep on an airport bench and miss my plane. It was really a bit of a struggle, but eventually the gate was announced and I was able to hop on a RyanAir plane to Dublin.
DUBLIN
After a short, but completely reasonable, flight, we landed in Ireland around 1:00 pm. I collected my pack, and found an information desk who pointed me in the direction for the right bus and sold me a ticket downtown for 5 Euro. Dublin was sunny and warm as I waited for the right double-decker bus to show up and take me to the bus station near my hostel. Between the airport and downtown, there didn't seem to be much indication that a city was nearby. It was all very small town and somewhat rural. There seemed to be more industrial parks and residential areas than anything that resembled a city of one million people. Even once we reached urban Ireland, it still felt like a small but friendly town that had expanded along the River Liffee, which bisects the city into North and South. I recall one "sky-scraper" which I think had 15 floors, according to the tour I would take the next morning.
Everything was colourful though, and pedestrian friendly. On this Sunday afternoon, the sidewalks were crowded by people shopping and eating, and by at least one Canadian guy who wandered up and down the same street on the north side of the river three or four times before getting directions to a street around the corner. Apparently, Talbot Place is a small alley off of Talbot Street, and of course Talbot Place has no sign. And of course the hostel itself had construction scaffolding up the whole front of the building so any identifying marks were obstructed from view.
Eventually I was able to check in to Jacobs Inn Youth Hostel, and find my bed on the 2nd floor (which was really the third, but apparently not in Europe). At this point, I was confused as to whether I was tired or hungry or awake or thirsty, but there was no doubt in my mind that I wanted to have a shower with every fibre of my being. I entered my hostel room to find a girl lying down on one of the 10 beds. As I put down my pack, she noticed the cliché Canadian flag patch that every Canadian traveler sews on his/her luggage on this sort of trip, and said "Oh, You're Canadian? Me too."
"Oh really?" I reply, "Where are you from?"
"Toronto," she says.
"Really, me too. Whereabouts?" I say.
"Well, not really Toronto... but Cobourg."
"You're kidding."
5249 kilometres from home. Eight and half hours of flights and two new stamps in the passport later. Up and down the same street, then into the doorway around the corner in a shady alley. The first person I talk to is from the town I was born in. Small world? A little too small.
After a brief chat with her and another girl who appeared later, I found the shower down the hallway and decided that my hunger was outweighing my fatigue. I took off down the same familiar street, past countless pubs (none of which serve food), past a Burger King and a McDonald's (both of which were completely out of the question), over the River Liffee (where the menu was a little suspect), and through Temple Bar which struck me as a Disney Land for alcoholics, but not for people seeking food on a budget.
I walked around for an hour or two, amazed at the number of places that served drinks but not food. Any menu I found didn't appeal to either my appetite or my wallet, and I eventually settled on Molloy's Pub, right next door to the hostel. Of course, after I asked for something from the chalkboard of specials, I was informed that they weren't available yet. Instead, it was a ham sandwich on toast. No cheese, no fries. Ham on toast... and a Guinness.
By now, I was tired. I went back to the hostel to find the room abandoned. The girls were gone, and piles of "boy-luggage" graced the floor and the seven other beds. The girls hadn't yet seen these guys either, so nothing was known other than what we could tell from the luggage, towels, and lacrosse stick on the floor. I went to sleep in bed #7, which was on the bottom in a set of bunkbeds.
I think I slept for about two hours before the unknown guys made themselves known. Five of the guys wandered in loudly (which wasn't a problem considering it was only 7:00) and I shook the sleep out of my ears and made conversation as best I could considering they were speaking a language called English English. As it turned out, the seven lads from Kent were celebrating the upcoming wedding of one in their party, and I was supposed to join them that evening for a pub tour of Temple Bar, which is both a bar and a region of town containing... bars. Kirk and Lawrence were two of the five who came back. Two others didn't and decided to skip the early evening nap and shower to continue drinking somewhere on the south side of the river.
After all the guys had showered and changed, we left the hostel, crossed the river and tried to track down the other two guys. We started at a place called Q-Bar, well aware that they were not there, but we stopped to have a pint just in case they decided to walk in. They didn't, so we went a little farther down the street into another pub next to the actual Temple Bar. According to repeated cell phone calls and text messages, this was where the missing two were stationed, and eventually we found them, and a few more pints. Then we visited another pub in down the street, and a 4 level bar across from that. And sometime around 4 am, I got an outrageously expensive hotdog while the other guys got sandwiches, and the whole gang wandered across the Half-Penny Bridge and back to the hostel were a brief rugby game broke out before everybody crashed. The girls from Cobourg weren't back from their night out yet.
I forced myself to wake up early, knowing that I was only going to be in Dublin for about 30 hours all-totaled. Around 9am, I left a note for the still-sleeping party and checked out of the hostel, leaving my bags in a locker to collect later. I spent a euro to check my email and let people know I had arrived safely on this side of the pond. Like the day before, I found it hard to find a decent meal, and frankly, I don't recall eating anything until later in the day.
The weather was a bit gloomy, but I couldn't let that stop me if I wanted to see anymore of the city. I had booked a bus tour on expedia.com (I couldn't believe it either, I felt like I was in a commercial), and managed to find the stop and board the double-decker in spitting rain. It was a hop-on hop-off tour, but given the lack of time and the unfortunate weather, I just sat on the upper level and rode the loop all the way around. I saw all the major sites, the Guinness factory (which is a massive lot), the Wellington Monument (the 2nd tallest obelisk in the world), various famous homes (Oscar Wilde, James Joyce), and the two major cathedrals (neither of which are Catholic). The most interesting thing for me was to see how much philanthropy the Guinness family contributed to the city. Schools, housing, orphanages, church restorations, etc. It seemed like there was very little that they didn't build or support. Also, did you know the MGM Lion was from the Dublin Zoo? I didn't think so.
After the tour, I wandered back towards the hostel amazingly hungry. As I walked past Molloy's pub, I had a hunch that I might find the English guys inside, considering they'd have to be out of the hostel by now. So I poked my head in, and sure enough, there they were eating lasagna and French fries and drinking more beer. I had lunch with them, although they had claimed the last of the lasagna, so I was forced to have the other thing on the menu, a flavourless pork chop... and fries.
I figured sitting in an pub, eating bland food, and drinking with some new friends was a good way to spend the last couple hours in Ireland, so I grabbed my bags from the hostel next door, and came back to sit with them for a while longer. Conveniently, they had to fly out that afternoon as well so we all rode the bus to the airport together and had one last drink there before we parted ways. Of course, as soon as they were gone, my flight got delayed for nearly 3 hours.
I had another bite to eat, read my book, and wondered if there was anyway to contact Chris in Latvia to let him know I would be late. There was no internet in the terminal, and I didn't have a phone number for him, so I watched planes take off and land and waited to see how long it would be until I would fly away. As I sat there in the airport, it felt like it was time to go home. I had to shake my head to snap out of that thought. That's when it occurred to me that this trip was not going to be one big adventure, but seven individual ones.
It was supposed to be a 6pm flight, which was supposed to get in to Riga around 11pm, after a two-hour time change. It left around 8:30, which got me to Riga around 1 am.
RIGA
A few months before I left, I ran into a friend of mine at Mickey Fynns in Toronto. We were catching up and I mentioned I was going to Europe, and that I was planning on heading to Riga for the World Hockey Championships, at which point he told me that he was going to be there for Canadian Press. Later on he agreed to let me crash in his swanky Latvian hotel room for the two nights I was going to be in Riga. So after trading some emails, he knew when to expect me to show up at the Albert Hotel.
So there was Chris, sitting in the restaurant with other journalists waiting for me from about 11pm to sometime around 1 am. Probably around the same time that he decided I missed my flight and wasn't coming, I landed at RIX and got another stamp on my passport. So about the same time that I was knocking on the door of room 905 at the Albert Hotel, he was out having a beer with some of the other media guys.
I checked at the desk and there was no key for me, and they couldn't let me in because I wasn't an official guest. So they called his room, knocked on his door, looked at the bar, the restaurant, and when it was absolutely certain that he wasn't around, they suggested I have a seat and wait for him to get back. For the record, the girl at the desk was extremely helpful and nice, and spoke perfect English and seemed genuinely upset that I was inconvenienced in my effort to crash in a free hotel room.
So around 1:30 am, I wandered down a deserted cobblestone street lined with casinos and eventually found Double Coffee, which was right where the girl at the hotel said it would be. The waitress didn't speak much English, but was able to understand "food" and brought me a menu, which thankfully had pictures on it. A club sandwich and a cup of coffee later, I paid the bill with a few Lats (which I had procured from a bank machine at the airport) and headed back to the hotel. As I walked in the front door, the girl behind the desk greeted me with a huge smile and handed me a key to room 905. Chris had returned.
I took my bags to 905 and let myself in. Chris was on the phone, but had ended his call by the time I put my bags down. We discussed the timing of things, and apologized to each other for not being around when each of us was looking for the other. He told me what he knew about Riga, how the tournament was going, and what his schedule was going to look like for the next two days. I'm not sure what time it was when we finally went to sleep, but it certainly didn't take me long to shut down.
The next morning we were up in time for the breakfast buffet, which included bacon and eggs, fresh fruit, coffee and juice. The eggs were a bit slimy, but the bacon and sausage was good. Right off the bat, it was clear to see that food in Latvia was going to surpass that of Ireland.
Chris and I walked over to the arena, where Canada and the US were both scheduled to practice. Chris had to do some interviews and I wasn't allowed to go in, so we made plans to meet back at the arena a short while later and I walked around the city on a beautiful sunny day. Riga is an interesting blend of old decorative architecture with a few stylish modern buildings mixed it. It was tough to navigate because all the streets look the same, and there are no obvious visible landmarks. I got a bit lost, but I found some neat statues in a nice park, and managed to make it back to the arena right on time.
Chris met me at the expected time, but had to run back in for a few more minutes to talk to one of the American players. We had a beer on the patio of the Barcelona Bar (about which there was nothing distinctly Spanish) and then walked through Old Riga, which was about a 10 minute walk from the hotel. The Freedom Monument just outside the old town is protected by armed guards who ceremoniously change every hour. It was the site of many demonstrations in the 80s and 90s for Latvian independence from the USSR and holds a deep significance for Latvian people. As the name implies, everything in Old Riga is a little more historic and some of it looks downright ancient, except for the girls who look like models.
In the middle of a square in Old Riga, there were two beer tents set up for to accommodate hockey fans. There was an army of Norwegian fans drinking in one, and an army of Danes in another. Denmark was playing Norway at 4:15 that day. I had tickets to that game, and to Canada-USA, which was scheduled after. After taking a few more pictures, we went back to the hotel.
Chris put on his suit and I got geared up in my Canada jersey. We went for lunch on a nice little patio by the hotel and had an amazing club sandwich and a beer. We walked back to the same arena where we had been before, and split up so Chris could go in the media entrance and I could go through the gate for regular people. On the way to my seat, I stopped by the souvenir shop and picked up a Canada scarf with the IIHF logo on it and an event program. I found Chris and we sat together for the Norway-Denmark game, which Norway won 5-2.
The interesting thing about the games in Riga was that beer was not allowed in the seats, only in the concourse and in the outdoor beer gardens. So in between periods, pretty much every single person in the arena goes outside for a beer or two (at 2 Lats, or about $4 CDN, each). It actually made it a much more social event, because everybody was standing or sitting at the picnic tables together and talking. A number of people approached me because of my Canada jersey and complimented me on Sidney Crosby or the general skill of our team. A few people wanted pictures with me.
Eventually, I started to meet more and more Canadians who were all getting excited for the next game. After the 2nd intermission, I was on my way back in when I stopped to get my picture taken with the tournament mascot, while Chris kept walking with some other Canadian guys. I didn't find him after that, and watched the 3rd period alone.
I met the rest of the Canadian fans back at the Barcelona Bar. The two guys who had been with Chris were there, and they said that Chris had gone to do work stuff. Eventually, about 15 people in Canada gear were drinking on the patio in what had now become spitting rain. This continued for an hour or two, or however long it was until the Canada-USA game started. And yes, I might have chugged a beer through a plastic horn before we left.
I sat with the two guys Chris and I had been talking to all day. We sat in the corner, almost even with the goal line that Canada was defending. There were smatterings of red and white all over the arena (most of the people who had been drinking with us moments before) although Canada came out in their black jerseys, which they had never lost while wearing.
The US scored in the first, and Canada trailed 1-0 at the intermission. As became the custom, the arena would empty to the beer garden and fans would mingle and take pictures. I only recall seeing one American jersey, but there were a number of non-Canadians wearing the Maple Leaf. One such person was a cute girl from Denmark who decided to watch the rest of the game with us.
Sidney Crosby scored in the 2nd period for Canada, which made me feel like some sort of sports landmark had been checked of my list. For some reason "Seeing Sidney Crosby Score a Goal" held more sporting significance that "Going to a Hockey Game in Latvia." Either way, the score was tied and all the Canadian fans were thrilled, when we reconvened outside the arena after the 2nd period.
At some point in the 3rd period, a puck flew down the stairway by our seats to the area under the bleachers. I took off as fast as I could and slipped at the top of the steps and slid down the rest of them on my hip. I bounced up and raced for the puck, as an arena security guard picked it up and put it in his pocket. Nobody else was even close. The dude stole my puck... and I had a massive bruise on my hip. A different security guard tried to throw me out because he thought my fall down the stairs was a sign that I was drunk and unruly, however, the same usher who had been forgetting to ask for our tickets all game came to my rescue and told him that I was just chasing a puck.
I joined my friends again in our seats and Brendan Shanahan scored a power play goal to put Canada ahead 2-1. That's how it would finish, and I sang the national anthem proudly, which got my face on the jumbotron for the 20th time that game. (The next day, I realized this was the same feed that they were using on EuroSport TV, and that my face had probably been seen all over the continent that day. I'm not sure if I made it to Canada).
The party continued out of the arena, down the street to the Barcelona Bar where everyone was in good spirits. After a little while there, the Canadian crew moved out to Old Riga where the official tournament beer tents were. I stopped at the hotel and left a note for Chris saying "We're off to the old town, I'll be the drunk one in the town square," knowing full-well there would be hundreds in the square who might have enjoyed a little too much Aldaris.
Sure enough, when Chris found me I was dancing on a picnic table with about 15 other people from all countries. Swedes, Czechs, Latvians, Danes, Finns, Norwegians, Canadians, and the like... all dancing on picnic tables. So don't judge me.
Sometime around 4am some Finns asked if we wanted to go to a bar. As the excitement in the beer tent was waning, it sounded like a good idea, but Chris declined citing something about wanting to keep a job and having to interview the Latvian president. Of course I joined them, danced, and drank, and wandered back to the hotel well after the sun had been up for quite sometime.
I woke up at 4pm. I read some of Chris's book, watched a bit of tennis on TV, went to the rooftop café for a coffee, then returned to the room to pack my bags. I took a cab to the airport around 7pm, and sat down for the nicest dinner I could find, which turned out to be a steak with roasted vegetables in some sort of cream sauce, and a Coke that probably cost more than the steak. It was really good though, but only after I had to send the first one back because it was bright red in the middle... not pink, RED.
The flight to England was uneventful, except for the beautiful Latvian girl sitting in the same row. I'm quite sure she might have talked to me had her mother not been sitting between us. Mama Latvia could have destroyed me, and I'm sure she wouldn't have had to try too hard. So I got to admire silently and try to sleep as I flew into Stanstead, sometime around midnight.
LONDON
I flew into London for the second time in four days and got another stamp on the passport as I cleared customs at Stanstead. The bags seemed to take a while to arrive, but after the carousel started turning, my pack turned up fairly quickly and I headed through the gate to find my sister Diana, who was supposed to pick me up. I had been in the terminal for about a minute when we found each other, and before long we were in the car with Jon heading to their friend's house in High Wycombe. I hadn't really looked at any maps so I really had no bearing in relation to where I was or which way I was going. Thank goodness the GPS computer was telling John Cleese to tell Jon where to go, and eventually we pulled into a driveway,which someone identified as Clive's.
After a cup of tea and a little chit chat, I slept on the couch in the living room surrounded by an impressive collection of DVDs and medieval weaponry. Seriously, there were several hundred movies from all genres, and a couple of swords and shields for good measure.
In the morning, Di made breakfast for all the boys and I enjoyed my eggs and sausage and whatnot. After a shower, I said goodbye to High Wycombe and we drove to Windsor Castle for a bit. We walked through the shops and around the edge of the massive ancient building but didn't go in. Impressive nonetheless. Apparently the Queen was there at the time, according to a flag flying in a particular place.
Then I got a bit silly. Having passed numerous signs for the village of Slough, I asked Jon and Di to take me through so I could have a look at it and try to pick out a building that I had seen on The Office, a hysterically funny BBC show that featured a paper company based in that town. After finding the round-about featured in the credit, I was satisfied and they dropped me at the Slough train station and minutes later I was on a train to Paddington Station in London.
I knew the hostel to which I was heading wasn't far from Paddington, and fortunately I guessed right on the direction. What I hadn't anticipated, however, was the fact that it was amazingly hot and ridiculously sunny. So by the time I had walked half a mile with a giant heavy bag, in jeans, and a long sleeved shirt, I was fairly sweaty. It was in this condition that I checked into the Astor Hyde Park Hostel.
Then it happened again. I walked into the hostel room (this one had eight beds) and as I put down my bag, a guy sitting on one of the beds said "So Hip It Hurts! You're from Toronto, eh?" I hadn't spoken, he hadn't seen my Canadian flag patch, but he recognized the logo on my shirt, which was from a store in Toronto, and was by now soaked with sweat. His name was Drew and he was from Milton, near Toronto.
As would become a trend for settling into a new place, all I really wanted to do was have a shower. I did that and felt 110% better. I changed into my shorts and a dry t-shirt and decided with Drew that we'd just go for a walk around Hyde Park. It was getting late in the afternoon and the sun was starting to get low, but it was still bright and warm. As we walked around the park, by joggers, bikers, football games, and baseball games, Drew started talking to a couple of random girls, who ended up walking and chatting with us for more than an hour. The whole time, we didn't come close to leaving the park... It's massive (but, for the record, the park in Dublin is much bigger).
One of the girls was actually a Canadian living in London, and the other was a homegrown English girl. We talked about things to see and do, good bars, life in our respective countries, and anything else that came up over the course of our walk, especially an odd inverted bicycle that was powered by a rowing motion. Once we had circled around back to the north end of the park, we parted ways with the ladies and went to find a bite to eat. We went for shwarmas, which were amazing, then stopped at the convenience store across the street for snacks and a couple of beers, which Drew told me would be far cheaper than those found in the London bars.
We sat around in our hostel room and had our store-bought beer, and made conversation with two guys who had just arrived from Indiana on their way to Hungary to shoot a documentary on gypsies. We started talking about video production and it became clear to me that I knew more about it than they did. That being said, they found somebody to give them a grant to come shoot this thing, so good for them.
The hostel had it's own bar in the basement, so instead of heading out somewhere, we hung out down there and met people from all over the world. There were several Australians, my favourite being Tim, who loved talking about North American sports. It was somebody's birthday so somebody bought shots, and we met some girls who I remember nothing about, except for the fact that we talked to them all night. Maybe I'll email Drew and ask him what he remembers...
He'd probably say, "Not much, except for climbing the fence into Hyde Park, chasing ducks, and climbing trees. Oh, and that guy spilled beer on me so my shirt was wet and then I wore your sweatshirt for a while. Oh yeah, and that girl completely wasn't into me."
Other than that, I ended up cutting my hands trying to pull off a "singing in the rain" maneuver with a lamppost, which turned out to be a lot more jagged than originally anticipated. Actually, I hadn't anticipated any jaggedness, because lampposts in Canada aren't stucco. I washed them, dabbed at them with toilet paper, and went to bed.
The next morning, I slept in a little bit. I showered and got dressed and grimaced anytime something brushed up against my hands. I checked my email and confirmed the fact that I was supposed to meet Nicola (my other sister's husband's sister) and Marcus (my other sister's husband's sister's boyfriend) in Leicester Square at 1pm that afternoon.
So, I took my pocket map of London, wandered the length of Hyde Park to the Marble Arch, then cut through the trendy shopping district and Picadilly Circus. I found Leicester Square without too much trouble, and was approached by Nicki and Marcus before I had even started to look for them. They had a day planned for me, which was revealed bit-by-bit, and would rely on a day pass on the Underground. The only thing I knew was that our first stop was going to be Bank, a tube stop near the Thames, Parliament, and across the river from the Millennium Eye.
After the short ride there, we walked across the Thames, past a number of street performers pretending to be statues, and towards the bottom of the Eye. We weren't going up in the giant Ferris Wheel, however, which made me happy. Everyone I had talked to said that it was a waste of time and money. So I was thrilled to see that we were going to be taking a boat tour instead. This was not a normal tour boat though. This was the speedboat tour.
We had to wait a half hour before the boat was loading so we sat in a nearby park until it was time. We got our life jackets, hopped in the orange boat, stuffed out bags under our seats. The boat could really only comfortably seat 8 or 10 people, and I think our boat left with seven and two crew. As we ferried out into the middle of the Thames, the driver/tour guide explained that we couldn't go fast all the time because of speed restrictions and other tour boats, but that we shouldn't worry because we'd still have fun. We made a little loop toward Parliament and Big Ben, before turning around and navigating the Thames all the way up to Greenwich.
Of course, once we made it under the London Bridge (not the Tower Bridge), the driver took the speed up a notch or thirty and bombed it down the river, zig-zagging, doing loops around other boats, then catching air off their wakes. It was like a ride at an amusement park, although I'm sure there was more garbage in the Thames than in all of your average amusement park. It was quite obvious that people in the slow-moving barge-style boats were thinking, "Hey, that looks like way more fun that this."
After we had made it to Greenwich and back, our wise-cracking captain pulled into port and let us out where he had picked us up. We walked up the river to the Tate Modern, which is a gallery for modern art named after a man named Tate. As usual with modern art, there was some interesting stuff and some absolute trash. I did, however, get to see some Picassos and a famous Dali painting which I've always enjoyed. After enjoying the free exhibits, we went to the café on the roof for a cup of coffee. From there, we were treated to a lovely view of St. Paul's Cathedral on the other side of the Thames.
We walked across the Millennium Bridge to St. Paul's and hopped on the tube somewhere else. Unfortunately I can't remember the name of that area of town, but there were a lot of restaurants and bars, and a load of businessmen standing on the street drinking glasses of beer. It was a bizarre sight, considering Canada's somewhat strict liquor laws, but there were no patios, no chairs, no enclosures... just a bunch of guys with pint glasses in the street.
The three of us did not drink in the street. Instead we found a restaurant and sat down for dinner. It was nice to get off our feet for more than a few minutes, but later on I realized just how much we spent on a couple of average burgers and drinks. 22 GBP for two burgers, two fries, and three pops. Considering the exchange rate is somewhere near 2.1, that's nearly $45 Canadian for something that would have cost $25 or less in Toronto.
After dinner, the three of us hopped back on the tube and rode it north to Chalk Farm, which is near Camden. We were off to a place called Barfly to see some bands play. We stopped at a local pub first because we were early, then walked down the street to the club when the music was scheduled to start. A band called Seeing Scarlet was the opening act, and they were much better than the other guys (some crazy group from Wisconsin). I would have bought a CD from the first group, but they didn't have any for sale. On a tangent... I found that these English people don't seem to dance or "bop" as much to the music, which was quite upbeat and fun. I was grooving a bit, but everybody else in the packed bar was standing still.
As the second group was finishing up, Nicki and Marcus decided they had to leave so they could catch their train home. I was kinda sleepy so I wasn't going to argue, so we caught the subway and said goodbye, but not before I piggybacked Nicky and her sore feet down a 200 step spiral staircase, which prompted a very bizarre inner-monologue. "Wow... You can really tell she rides horses from the way she piggybacks."
After they headed off on their own train, I found my way back to the hostel and wandered down to the bar, where we had hung out the night before. Many of the same people were there, including Tim, who had spent the day sneaking into watch cricket at Leeds. It sounded like a good story and he had the time of his life. A few drinks later and I turned in fairly early.
On my last full day in London, I had no real plans other than to find a store that my sister had told me about and do some shopping. Other than that, I walked around a lot with a guy from the hostel named Joel and talked about music mostly. I figure I walked almost 8 miles that day from the hostel, to the Thames, around Whitechapel (unsuccessfully trying to find the Ten Bells, a pub famous from the Jack the Ripper murders), around the Tower of London, and then again around Picadilly Circus after shopping.
With massively tired legs, I picked up a microwave pizza from the mini-mart and ate it at the hostel. I sat down in the common area, borrowed a newspaper from a South African girl, and learned a little bit about how things are in that country. I talked to her for a little bit, but went to bed early because I had to get up at 6am to catch a flight the next morning. I turned my phone on for the first time in a week to use as an alarm clock, and chatted with some Australians. After a chat about The Da Vinci Code and things to do in Paris, I went to bed convinced that I would have to see the Eiffel Tower at night.
Around 5am London time, my phone started to beep at me, which woke me up. I looked at the time and realized that it wasn't time for me to get up yet, but apparently somebody was sending me text messages. It was Chris Roberts, and it was midnight on a Saturday in Toronto. No, I wasn't awake. And no, I wasn't going to call. The alarm went off as planned an hour later.
I had done most of my packing the night before, so I really just had to throw the last couple pieces in. My little backpack was actually a piece of the larger one, so I snapped them back together and threw it on my back, checked out of the hostel, and walked along the north end of Hyde Park to Notting Hill Gate. A short ride on the Tube and I was at Liverpool Street Station. A few minutes and 15 GBP later, I was on the Stanstead Express to the airport.
Stanstead is a major hub for RyanAir, so they have huge number of check-in desks, which are sorted by destination. Of course to complicate things, Girona was checking in next to Genoa, and people going to Barcelona fly to Girona, and not Genoa, which is in Italy. I managed to find the right line, check in with little fanfare, then make my way through airport security in what was becoming a remarkably routine fashion. I found a cup of coffee and a croissant and waited for the Girona gate to be announced, while browsing in the duty free shops.
Once the gate is announced, a tram comes by the terminal and takes you to your gate. I was on the tram heading to my gate when a couple who didn't speak much English asked an airport worker how to find a certain gate. As the tram pulled away from the gate the guy told them that this didn't go there, and they needed to go back to the terminal and get on a different tram. Of course, they didn't understand him and hilarity ensued. He was unimpressed but did his job and notified his airport buddies that there were a couple people who were going to be late for their flight to Genoa.
Before I knew it, we were landing in Spain. As the plane descended, we wobbled massively left and right, dropped so that my stomach landed in my throat four or five times, then wobbled some more as we headed towards the runway. I love flying, and I don't generally get concerned about these things, but I must have looked a bit worried because the Spanish girl next to me looked at me and said, "What do you want? It's cheap!" She was right, and all that aside, we landed the plane and once again RyanAir had succeeded in moving me around Europe at discount prices.
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