Monday, April 4 through Sunday, April 10

Monday:
Nothing too exciting happened on this day. I went to my classes and slept a lot to make up for the lack of sleep from my weekend in Germany.

Tuesday:
I only had one class this day (yay!). I took a nice nap again before going out for tapas later that night. I met up with Amit, Brittany, Virgil (my new French friend), and a South American girl to go out to the tapas route. We went to a few bars and had so much fun talking. I just love talking to new people. I think that's my new favorite activity. There is also always a brief language exchange of a few phrases which is always fun. French is by far the hardest to learn. The accent is so pretty yet so hard for me to imitate. We went to a bar away from the tapas route after it shut down around 1am and continued having nice conversation. I can't help but giggle sometimes at what non-native English speakers say. It's just too cute. One example, "Do you live in the city or the bush?" I think I laughed for 5 minutes at this question. I always feel bad for laughing, but it's just so adorable. I love listening to non-native English speakers speak English with their accents and interesting word choices. I think we stayed out until 2 or 3am before going home.

Wednesday:
Beach day! I love these days. I slept in, rolled out of bed, and got on the bus with Hannah to go to our favorite beach for the day. I also invited Virgil and 2 of my new friends from Mexico to meet us there. We actually went swimming a few times, though it took us quite a while to get used to the water. We had so much fun talking and soaking up the sun and swimming. Virgil even brought his guitar and song some songs in French, which was adorable. I love moments like those. We stayed on the beach until it was shady and chilly then took the bus back to Palma. The sad thing is that Wednesday was Virgil's last night in Palma. He was here for an internship that he finished, so on Wednesday he wanted to "make party" (another of my favorite European phrases) to say goodbye to everyone. We had so much fun that night. We started as a small group but then the group just kept growing and growing. The most fun bar we went to was a little bar that plays salsa music, and we were literally the only ones there. A few people knew how to salsa dance, so they taught the rest of us how to do it. So we all tried to salsa dance in our own little private bar for an hour or two. It was a blast. Just another one of those memories that I'll never forget. We went to a few different bars after that, and even more people joined us. We ended up going to Shamrock (somehow I always end up there) until they closed. We had so much fun dancing and talking, but we were also sad that it was Virgil's last night. After Shamrock closed, we went to the diner for early morning nom noms. I had pancakes, which were incredible. No one had tried pancakes, so I let them all try them and they loved them. American food, ftw. I love that our favorite early morning restaurant serves American food. It is like a little piece of home at 5am on random nights. After the diner, I slept as usual.

Thursday:
I slept in and went to my afternoon grammar class. Also, when I woke up, I had some really funny sunburn lines. I bought SPF 50 spray (which is the highest they sell here), and obviously I missed some spots when I sprayed myself on Wednesday at the beach. I just had a few spots right along my bathing suit lines that were pretty fried (and are currently peeling) and hurt pretty badly. Every Thursday night, a bar here has ladies' night which means girls get free wine and cava from 8:30 to 10:30pm. I had never been before, because something always came up. So this Thursday was my first ladies night. It was amazing. It was literally almost every person I know in Palma in one bar, plus free cava for part of the night and cheap beer for the rest. I probably knew 20-30 people there, which was pretty incredible for me. I am going to miss my social life here so much. We stayed at that bar until it closed, then I went to a club on paseo maritimo with a bunch of the erasmus students to dance for the rest of the night. Again, so much fun. I can't even begin to describe how much fun I have with these people. Brittany and I danced all night and drank a liter of whiskey and coke.. so much fun. After we left there around 5am, we all headed home to sleep. This was my second week night of not getting home until 6am.. win.

Friday:
I slept... a lot. I woke up super late and met some erasmus students at the beach to hang out during the afternoon. I was pressured into playing circle volleyball with them since I was the only one not playing. They soon discovered why I did not want to play after the number of balls I missed. It was pretty funny, and I am sure they enjoyed laughing at my leet volleyball skills. After I got back from the beach, I noticed that I have actual tan lines. My body is actually taking in some sun and not completely burning.. yay! After the beach, I went back to sleep. Keep in mind, at this point, I had literally gone out every night except for Monday since the previous Thursday. I was pretty exhausted, to say the least. I woke up at 1am to a phone call from a friend begging me to go out, but I was so exhausted that I did not want to move. So I slept more.

Saturday:
What an epic day! We were invited to a beach party with all the erasmus people and also some people from a German private school here. Brittany and I met up early around 11am to get some food to barbeque and drinks. We also were desperately searching for a cooler and found one at the low price of 70 euros (are you kidding me??!?!?!). So we improvised and turned Brittany's backpack into a cooler, which worked so perfectly. We also did this sitting on a bench in front of Corte, while a man laughed hysterically at us filling up a backpack with ice and loading it with beer. We bought some sausages to grill, some other food, and plenty of beer. We made our way to the beach, filling up enough space for about 4 people on the bus with all of our bags of food and stuff. By the time we got to the beach, we were exhausted from carrying all of our stuff and were ready for an ice cold beer from our backpack cooler.. good thing it worked! We immediately got into the water, which was chilly but so refreshing, and began a wonderful day. The Germans had a power generator and a source of music so we danced to music all day and night, thanks to their ingenious invention. They also brought a small grill, so we were able to grill food on the beach which was so much fun and so yummy. We stood in the water a lot, because it was pretty shallow which meant it was slightly warm, but not really. Brittany and I were in the water longer than anyone and were having a heart to heart conversation as the sun was setting behind the mountains.. it was pretty epic. I had a little bit too much to drink, so I can't say I remember the whole night. All I know is that I had an amazing time, and I truly love all my new friends.. and the beach. We took the last bus back to Palma around 1am.

Sunday:
Yes, you guessed it, I slept until about 3pm. Trust me, I needed it after Saturday night. I sat around and did nothing, then I went to the Belgian beer bar just like every Sunday. It is such a fun tradition. We discussed how a Toyota Corolla is considered a small car in the U.S. and is considered normal/big in Europe, how to say "there's something wrong with your face" in Flemish, and other riveting things like that. I really enjoy talking about these slight differences among countries and cultures. It is fascinating and so much fun to talk about with friends.


This week, I made a lot of party and had so much fun. I think I also gained about 20 new Facebook friends this week. More to come.

besos,
Lynne

Germany! Thursday, March 31 through Sunday, April 3

 Thursday:
Brittany and I met up around 1pm to go to the airport to catch our flight to Dusseldorf! We got through the airport quickly and easily and found our gate.. except our gate did not say we were going to Dusseldorf.. it said some other German word. We decided to just get on the plane and figure it out from there. Once on the plane, with much giggling, Brittany asked the flight attendant, "excuse me, where are we going?" I think we both cried from laughing so hard, and all the German people on the plane thought we were crazy. Anyway, we figured out we were going to the smaller airport just outside of Dusseldorf, so it was the right one. I was so excited to fly into the mainland of Europe so I could see the land, but it was quite cloudy and we couldn't see much. I did see some beautiful mountain peaks sticking up through the clouds, but that was about it. We landed in what looked like a farming field in chilly, windy weather. My first impression of the landscape was.. it's so green!!! The grass and trees are just SO vibrant. It reminded me of pictures of Ireland. Anyway, we went inside the airport and waited for Brittany's friend to arrive. We had to go out to the shuttle bus to figure out the schedule and whatnot, so after that, we went back inside to wait for her and to grab our first beer of the trip. It was such good beer that when Maddie arrived, we decided to have another. We had to wait for a few minutes on our shuttle to come, and when we went out to get in, it was a van. The van ride was so much fun. It had 6 seats in the back that faced each other, so we were sitting across from a 30ish year old guy from Argentina, a 50ish year old woman and her 12ish year old grandson (or son) while driving through the German countryside. It was pretty fun. He dropped us off at a train station, which was quite fun to figure out. Luckily, the Argentinian guy helped us figure out where to go. We had to get on one train for a while then transfer to another one to get to Cologne. The second train we got on was a double-decker train.. it was pretty awesome. Once we arrived in Cologne, we took a taxi to our hostel, since we were tired and had no idea where to go. We were so confused when we got to our hostel, though, because it has a bar underneath and that is where you have to check in. Yes, we had to walk through the crowded bar and go up to the bar to get our room keys to check in to our hostel.. That was definitely unexpected. The lady showed us to our room on the 6th floor, and it was sooo cool! Each person has their own little bunk with a bright red curtain. It was definitely one of the coolest places I have ever stayed, but now all the other places I stay are going to seem even worse when compared to this gem. Anyway, so we got settled in and went down to the bar for about 15 minutes to check it out before heading back up to the room and going to sleep.

Friday:

We went to a place called yummy! for breakfast and met two Germans there who offered to show us around the city. We went on a walk through the city to the cathedral first. The city is sooo adorable! I loved all the buildings. The people were a lot nicer than I expected too! The cathedral is enomormous and kind of creepy looking. The stone turns black with age, so it looks very weathered, to say the least. It could definitely be in a horror movie. We went inside and wandered around for a long time. There are so many different rooms in the cathedral. There are also 3 golden, jewel-encrusted sarcophagi that supposedly hold the remains of the three wise men. It was pretty cool to see those. We walked all over Cologne for most of the day. We went on the main bridge to see this long fence that is covered in locks. Couples inscribe their names and a special date (wedding, first day of dating, etc.) on locks and attach them to the fence on the bridge. It was pretty incredible to see the thousands of locks stretched across the fence. I took lots of photos of them and could have taken many more. We had some delicious German beer at a little cafe too. There is one specific kind that our German friends made us try called Kölsch, which is the local brew for Cologne. It was pretty yummy. We somehow ended up a chocolate museum, which was pretty awesome. It had the history of chocolate and there was even a little man-made rainforest with a cocoa tree! I had never seen a cocoa bean pod growing on a tree until we went there. We also got to sample some chocolate from a giant chocolate fountain.. heavenly. Brittany, Maddie, and I went to a restaurant that one of our German friends had recommended for an early dinner. It was some of the best food I've ever eaten. First we tried blood sausage, which was not horribly flavored, but it just kinda grossed me out when I found out what it was. Then for my entree I had a bratwurst with potatoes and salad. It was pretty amazing (aka I am sitting here drooling just thinking about it). For dessert we had apple struessel which was also to die for. That was really the only traditional German food we had, and it was absolutely delicious. After that, we wandered around Cologne some more and went to a few souvenir shops. I found some super cool stuff that I can't wait to gift to people. :) We headed back to our amazing hostel to get ready to go out that night. Our German friends/guides had told us about a club they were going to, so we tried to go there but couldn't find it. We ended up walking down one of the main streets searching for a place to drink and dance. Everyone in Germany walks around with a liter bottle of beer at all times after about 7pm.. I loved it. We went into a few random bars but didn't really stay anywhere long. We spent most of our night talking to random people on the streets, trying to figure out where to go. We met some pretty memorable people on the streets, from a guy singing a German song about Ewan McGregor to us, to a German guy doing the hook 'em horns sign (yes, I'm serious. He lived in Texas for a while. I immediately did the hang 'em horns sign and flipped out.), to some guys getting in a fight (A guy was bothering Maddie, so I pulled her away from him and told him we had to leave. Another guy that we had been talking to earlier saw it and got really mad at the guy I pulled her away from and decided to shove him to the ground and punch him.. that was exciting.), and many, many more. We went into one club for a while that was pretty cool, but it was practically empty so we didn't stay long. I think we went back to our hostel around 3am after getting some late-night doner kebabs. (There are so many kebab restaurants in Europe, and they are open all night long. Naturally, they are extremely busy at all hours of the night. Kebabs are now my favorite late-night/drunk food.)

Saturday:

We checked out of our hostel and headed to a little cafe recommended by our hostel. Again, it was such a great recommendation! Everything we had there was so delicious, and it was all handmade. It had a bench in the open window where you could sit outside but inside at the same time, which was so cute. After brunch, we made our way to the train station to go to Dusseldorf. Our walk to the train station was so much fun. The weather was absolutely beautiful, and all of the Germans were definitely taking advantage of it. I think about 99% of them had an ice cream cone in hand. We walked down this adorable shopping district street, and I wanted to stop in every store. We made it to the train station and on to the train with about 5 minutes to spare. We ended up going about an hour too far away and had to backtrack, but we got it sorted out eventually. The views on the train ride were incredible. The German countryside is so pretty. I tried to take some photos out the window, but it didn't work very well. There was one area that I specifically remember that was 2 rows of little tiny cottages with the most perfect picturesque gardens outside each one with little fences around them. Every single cottage had a family sitting on the front porch while some were working in the garden and children running around enjoying the sunshine. I want to live there. When we were lost, we spent about an hour at a random train station in the middle of the country, which was just another fun part of our adventure. There always has to be some transportation mishap on every European adventure, right? So after figuring out where to go, with the help of some very kind Germans (who all speak English.. so helpful), we made it to Dusseldorf. I was definitely more impressed with Cologne than Dusseldorf. I liked the buildings and people better in Cologne, but Dusseldorf was fun too. First we went to our "hotel" which was pretty old and bad to put our stuff in our rooms. They messed up our booking so we had one single room and one double room. I really disliked that place, but at least it was cheap. We walked around the main shopping district, which was so adorable with a stream (river?) that ran down the middle of the street. We also saw some paparazzi chasing someone, but we never figured out who they were chasing. We went to the restaurant/bar district, which was incredible!!! You're walking along a street full of shops, then you take a turn through this little archway/alley and you're in another slightly bigger alley that is just full of outdoor seating and restaurants. Once you pass through that an another archway, you get to "the world's longest bar" which is a long street packed with restaurants and bars. It was amazing. Since the weather was so beautiful, there were thousands upon thousands of people enjoying it. We picked a little restaurant to eat dinner at and sit outside to watch people on the street. I had pesto pasta with grilled salmon on top.. It was the most perfectly cooked, best flavored salmon I have ever had. I enjoyed that dinner very much, but I definitely liked the traditional German food the best. After dinner, we walked down the bar street and went into a few that were free to dance and have a drink or two. Then we found the mecca of all bars. They serve jumbo cocktails, to drink at the bar or to go. Yes, jumbo cocktails to go. Brittany and I shared a jumbo mojito at the bar, then we got some to go. They also put marshmallows and a gummy cherry on sticks in the drinks to make it even more exciting. We wandered around the streets with our jumbo mojitos in plastic cups with marshmallows on sticks sticking out of them looking for a good dance club. We went into one that was amazing. It was HUGE, compared to the clubs in Palma, and incredibly full of people. We mingled and danced with people all night long. It was so much fun. I think we left around 4am when we realized we had to wake up at 8am to catch our flight. We got more food on the way back, which was also something that I cannot stop craving. I had currywurst, which is cut up pieces of sausage in a ketchup curry sauce, also served with a piece of homemade bread. I think I was crying with joy while eating it, because it was that good (and I was drunk and hungry at 4am). I need to find a good recipe online and learn how to make it, because it is just that good. Obviously, I loved the German food and beer. Those were definitely some of the highlights of the trip. So after devouring my new favorite food, we went back to our hotel and got there around 5am. We were so tired we could barely climb the 5 flights of stairs to our rooms, and we had quite a lot of fun crawling up them. 

 Sunday:
We slept for about 2 hours and got up to take the train to the airport, after eating as much food as we possibly could at the free breakfast at the hotel. We were all feeling pretty horrible and slap-happy that morning, which made it so much more fun. We all passed out on the train, waking up just in time for our stop. We got to the airport about 2 hours too early, so we rested in the airport while waiting for our flight. The airport was so weird. Ryanair is the only airline that uses the airport, so it is extremely tiny. You also have to walk upstairs and through a store then back downstairs again to the gates. It made no sense, except that it exemplifies Ryanair's marketing tactics perfectly. That airline is so annoying, but it is always the cheapest. We passed out on the plane ride almost immediately. Luckily, I woke up just in time to see some mountain peaks through the clouds, which was so beautiful since I've never seen mountains like that in real life. I slept off an on, and also woke up just in time to see the coast of Mallorca as we flew in.. so beautiful. I snapped a few pictures out the window with my phone and felt rebellious having my prohibited electronic device turned on and in use. Once in Palma, it was about 80 degrees. Brittany and I literally went to my house to drop off our stuff and went to the beach to take a walk. "What is our life? We just jetted back from Germany and now we're on the beach in Palma de Mallorca." After our walk, we both headed home and fell asleep. When I woke up, someone had messaged me about going to the Belgian beer bar that night so of course I went. There was a group of about 8 of us that night. I met two new people that night at the bar, one from New Zealand and one from France. I love meeting new people. Both of them are very interesting people, and I enjoyed our chats that night. After the bar, I went home and slept.


I really loved Germany, if you couldn't tell from my descriptions above. I definitely want to visit it again and spend more time there and also go to some different cities. I had always heard the people were mean and that it wasn't such a great place to go, but that could not be further from the truth. Everyone I met was extremely nice and courteous, and I have so many wonderful memories from the trip. I was also surprised at the amount of German that I was able to remember from my 1 year high school course. I was able to read a lot of the signs and even understand some spoken German, which was pretty awesome. I think I might try to learn some more German, because I really like the language and the country now that I've been there.


Aufwiedersehen,
Lynne


(p.s. 222)

New blogs coming soon!!!

Hi everyone! I am working on my blogs right now about Germany and the past week. I have been quite busy with all my new friends and sleeping to recover from spending time with my friends. I promise I will be posting blogs soon!
Hasta pronto,
Lynne