Contiki: Day 17 – Vienna to Prague

| May 27th, 2008 | No Comments » | Austria, Contiki, Czech Republic, Travel

This morning we had breakfast at 7:15 so Ryan and I headed down and for a good hotel, I expected a pretty good breakfast. Of course it was hardly edible. There was bacon and eggs but the bacon was burnt to a crisp and the scrambled eggs were in a pan soaking wet. There’s nothing worse than soaking wet scrambled eggs. It was like they had been sitting in a bucket of water before they were plopped in to the pan. It was disghusting. I had an orange and a piece of some sort of cake. Another bad breakfast… I should be used to this by now.

After breakfast we loaded the coach and headed into Vienna to take a walking tour that our tour manager had planned to give us. We walked around to some of the most famous sights in Vienna and after we finished we had a few hours free time to roam the city. There really is only one main strip that is worth walking down in the old town of Vienna. Bruno, Juliana, Ryan, Johnny, and I spent a couple hours walking up and down the strip stopping into some stores along the way. Before heading back to the bus we sat down and grabbed some lunch at this Pizza/Pasta restaurant. We all had pasta and it was really good. A deal at that, It was 23 Euro for 3 of us to eat and that included food and drinks. The meal was great and I was really happy with the price.

After lunch we headed back to the coach and headed straight for Prague. We stopped once on the way at a gas station and I took up a Coke, a Kitkat, and an Ice Cream bar to the counter and then realized that they don’t accept Euro in Prague. Damnit! The total price for those three items? 64 Czech Korun! I tried paying with credit card but they had a 200 Korun minimum. I ended up throwing my items in with a bunch of girls and paid them back afterwards. After getting my snacks I headed to the exchange office next door to the gas station and exchanged 30 Euro into Korun. I got 657.00 Korun for 30 Euro. You feel rich until you realize the Czech Korun is worth absolutely nothing. Haha. The conversion rate was 1 Euro = 21.9 Korun. A bottle of diet coke was 26.00 Korun. Kit Kat was 17.00 Korun. Pretty interesting huh?

We boarded the bus and after a few more hours of driving due to traffic we finally arrived in Prague at our hotel (Hotel Ibis). I love the Ibis hotels. They are a modern hotel chain, like Holiday Inn, Best Western, etc yet they are much nicer. They are modern, and the rooms are very nice. I really recommend the Ibis hotels, in any city that you visit. The Ibis in Paris was great too! Only slight issue with this Ibis here in Prague is that it’s about a 40-45 minute walk into the new town of Prague. If you’re a fast walker, it will take you about 30.

We chceked into our hotel and again were rushed for time because we needed to be down at our included dinner in 30 minutes. Ryan and I both took quick showers, got dressed and headed down to dinner. Dinner wasn’t too impressive tonight. Some dry steak, and rice that tasted like it hadn’t been cooked. Very dry! I wasn’t satisfied with it at all.

After dinner we headed to a place called the Beer Factory, a popular nightclub/bar here in Prague. The local beer here in Prague is the Pilsner Urquell. It’s dirt cheap too. You can get a pint of Pilsner Urquell for 47 Kroun, which is a little under 2 Euro’s, or $3.00. Believe me, that is VERY CHEAP for beer here in Europe. I’ll also remind you that I’m here in Eastern Europe where prices are much cheaper than most countries in Western Europe. Hmm, I think I like Eastern Europe!

After the Beer Factory Bruno, Juliana and I walked back to the hotel to have an early nights sleep. Tomorrow we’re doing a walking tour through Prague and we’ll be visiting the Prague Castle, the largest castle in Europe!

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Contiki: Day 16 – Munich to Vienna

| May 26th, 2008 | No Comments » | Austria, Contiki, Germany, Travel

The drive from Munich to Vienna was another long one. Ryan and I woke up pretty early to grab breakfast and it wasn’t too bad. The only problem was that once again there were two separate rooms for breakfast and as usual we get sent to the room that has a lot less food, drinks, and more. On the way through the first room I snagged a few pieces of fruit and a few glasses of juice, the staff wasn’t too happy. Oh well.

After breakfast we headed off on what was supposed to be a somewhat short journey turned long journey to Vienna. We made 1 stop along the way in a small town but unfortunately I don’t know the name of it because I slept pretty much the whole ride. When we arrived in this mystery town I stumbled off of the bus like a zombie and didn’t even know what country I was in. I had to ask a few people where we were before I realized we were in Austria again. I’m pretty sure that I just needed to catch up on the lack of sleep that I’ve been getting on this trip. It’s not even that I’ve been out late or anything. It’s the fact that I’m sleeping in a different bed mostly every two nights, and sometimes we’re in a city for one night, then another city the next.

After we left the mystery city we drove straight to Vienna. On our way we stopped to drop a few people off at the Schonbrunn Palace in Vienna if they weren’t going along on the Contiki Optional: Schnapps Museum. I’m not a big fan of Schnapps myself but I figured I’d go to see how it was made, what types this company produced, etc.

We arrived at the famous Austrian Schnapps Museum and Mr. Fischer greeted us as we walked in. Mr. Fischer is the proud owner of the Schnapps Museum and also still to this day produces austrian award winning Schnapps. He explained the history behind the Schnapps factory and it was somewhat interesting. His personality was great, and he made a bunch of jokes through out his talk with us. After talking with us, he took us to the store out back where everyone was allowed to take 3 shots of any type of Schnapps that they would like to try. He was pretty laid back and most people had more than 3. I only tried one, it was called “Vienna Blood” and it was 56% alcohol which is around 112 Proof. Let me remind you that everyone was taking shots and it was only about 2:30 in the afternoon.

After the Schnapps Factory we headed off to pick the others up at the Schonbrunn Palace and head to the hotel (The Pyramide?) to check in. When we arrived at the hotel we grabbed our room keys and ran down to our rooms. Everyone just wanted to relax, and not be stuck on the bus. Ryan and I walked into our really nice room. The walls were covered in glass, two nice big beds, a really nice bathroom and all. I was really happy with the hotel but of course it seems that when ever we get a really nice room we only stay one night in the hotel. I found out that the hotel had free WiFi which has been such a rarity on this trip so I was really pumped about that.

We had about 1 hour before we were back on the coach and heading into Vienna to walk around while the others enjoyed the Contiki Optional: Mozart Concert & Dinner. I didn’t participate because I’m not a big fan of classical music, but my room mate is and he really enjoyed it. I ended up walking around with a few of the girls and we went to an Australian Pub located right off the main road in the old town of Vienna (Kartenstrasse). The meal was really good, it was the first really good hamburger that I’ve had in a while. We chilled out and had a relaxing dinner for once, so that was nice.

After dinner we walked around a bit more and visited St. Stephan’s Cathedral on Kartenstrasse. I have to admit that I’m pretty sick of seeing churches on this trip, I feel like I’ve seen 300 of them at this point. I don’t even bother going into them much anymore because I feel like a lot of the churches in Western Europe have been really similar. Not St. Stephan’s though. St. Stephan’s was a really gothic looking church. The pollution in the city has turned the bottom half of the outside of the chuch a charcoal color and the top of the church is the original white sandstone. We walked into the church and I was even more amazed. The architecture was amazing and I was really impressed. I couldn’t believe how different this church was to the others that I’ve seen so far in Europe. It’s a must see in Vienna!


After St. Stephan’s we headed back to the coach and drove back to the hotel. I was glad to be back home. I’ve spent too much time on that bus lately! When we arrived back I jumped on the internet and made some calls back home. Tomorrow we’ll be doing a walking tour around Vienna and then we’ll have free time until around noon time before we head of to Prague (Czech Republic) for the next two nights.

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Contiki: Day 15 – Hopfgarten to Munich

| May 25th, 2008 | No Comments » | Austria, Contiki, Germany, Travel

This morning we awoke to another great breakfast at Haus Lukas. On the menu today was Pancakes, toast, yogurt, and pretty much everything else we had yesterday. I can’t complain, it’s the best food we’ve had all trip! It gives you a great start to your morning.

After breakfast we loaded up the coach to head to Munich! Our first stop on the way to Munich was only about 45 minutes from Hopfgarten. Before leaving Austria, we had to see the Swarovski Factory here in Austira! The girls were freaking out due to excitement of being able to visit the actual Swarovski Factory. I was just envisioning the prices the whole time. We unloaded the coach and headed inside for a closer look. We had an hour to waste so I walked around the shop a bit and window shopped. Supposedly the prices are lower than the actual retail value, but I wouldn’t know the difference. All I know is that that stuff is crazy expensive!

After daydreaming of my trip to Europe ending today due to being absolutely broke, I decided to walk towards the exit. We all loaded the bus and now we’re headed to Munich. Our next stop will be Dachau?, a concentration here in Germany. I’m really looking forward to visiting the concentration camp because I was hoping to be able to make it to Krakow later this summer to see Auschwitz.

We arrived at Dachau and walked about 5 minutes until we arrived at the entrance. The words in german on the iron gate to enter Dachau say: Arbeit Macht Frei which means with work comes freedom. I will only say that Dachau is a place that you need to experience for yourself. I won’t get into it because explaining the camp doesn’t do it justice. We watched a 30 minute film about Dachau after walking through different parts of the camp. Dachau admission is free, and everything inside is free, including the 30 minute video in the theatre. This is a must see if you’re in the area. (more…)

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Contiki: Day 14 – Hopfgarten, Austria

| May 24th, 2008 | No Comments » | Austria, Contiki, Travel

This morning we woke up expecting a great breakfast because that is what we were promised. I have to say that the breakfast at Haus Lukas is probably the best breakfast you will get anywhere on your trip. I’m happy to say that we received our first breakfast of Bacon & Eggs! Everyone was going crazy. I couldn’t believe that we weren’t having croissants this morning. I piled on the bacon and eggs and enjoyed every single bite. They also had strawberry yogurt, all sorts of cereals, toast, granola and more! For drinks there was orange juice, apple juice, and milk. Ahh, this breakfast was heaven!

After breakfast most people met out front for the Contiki Optional: Mountain Biking tour. It was a guided tour by mountain bike and small BBQ lunch at the end of the ride for around 30 Euro. Bruno, Julieana and I decided not to do the optional but decided that we would rent our own bikes and explore at our own pace. We grabbed our helmets, hopped on our bikes and took off into the valleys of Hopgarten! It was such a great time. We felt that we made a good decision because renting a bike was only 15 Euro, half of what the Contiki guided tour cost. Plus, we grabbed a map of our own and headed off on our own excursion for the day. It was one of the best decisions we’ve made all tour, for sure. We had a ton of fun, got some great photos and went all sorts of places that the guided tour did not. We stopped by the river that runs through Hopfgarten and splashed our faces with the clean, absolutely freezing ice melt water coming straight for the mountains. It was great! We arrived back at the hotel at just about the same time as the contiki crew did, and we must have rode about 20-25 kilometers. Again, renting your own bike is something I would really recommend. It’s cheaper, and you have much more freedom to go wherever you would like for the day. There is nobody telling you what to do, and where to go. Cruising around Hopfgarten is really easy, all you need to do is grab a map from the mountain bike rental company and you’ll be fine!

After biking some people were going on the Contiki optional: Paragliding experience over Hopfgarten. I opted out on this one too due to the fact that I’ve been skydiving twice and all paragliding really is, is a parachute ride. It definitely wasn’t worth the 110 Euro, for me at least. Yes, the scenery would be nice, but I’d rather spend my 110 Euro on another adventure sport, or something later on this summer.

For the rest of the day we pretty much sat around and hung out. Again, you don’t have much of an option when you don’t do some of the optionals. Especially in Hopfgarten! Everything closes here at 1:30PM on Saturdays. And when I say everything, I mean the 5 stores that exist in town. There is nothing here! We hung out for a bit and then went to the supermarket to grab some food for our late lunch. The one good thing about Hopfgarten is that it’s fairly cheap compared to the other cities I’ve been to on this trip so far. You can buy a 2 liter bottle of Diet Pepsi or a 2 liter bottle of Evian Water for 1 Euro. The fruit is great and also CHEAP! Your best bet is to hit the supermarkets instead of going out to a restaurant. Unfortunately you can’t really buy anything that needs to be heated up because there are no such thing as microwaves, stoves, etc at Haus Lukas. But, cold food, snacks, drinks, etc always work!

Tonight dinner was Goulash Soup, Salad, Turkey Schnitzel, and Apple Strudel for dessert. It was very good. I thought the Goulash soup was okay, nothing too exciting, and the turkey schnitzel was really tasty. After dinner everyone hung out at the hotel bar and had a few drinks. Bruno, Julieana and I headed over to the Silver Bullet Pub to shoot some pool for a bit. When we got back everyone was heading out to the Silver Bullet so we turned around and went back for a beer. I promised myself that I would have one beer and that I’d get home to get some sleep because we had a somewhat long travel day tomorrow morning. And that’s exactly what I did…

Swarvoski Factory first thing tomorrow morning, then off to Munich!

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Contiki: Day 13 – Venice to Hopfgarten

| May 23rd, 2008 | No Comments » | Austria, Contiki, Italy, Travel

This morning we left Venice to head to Hopfgarten, Austria. Austria is a country that I’ve been really looking forward to seeing. Like Switzerland, it is supposed to be very relaxing, peaceful, and scenic.

We boarded the coach early and headed off on what we thought would be a somewhat short travel day. When I say short, I mean shorter than our normal full day traveling days. The bus rides are LONG! There are days that you are on the bus from 8:30AM til 5:00PM, just like our ride from Venice to Austria! Yes, you do make a few service stops along the way, but you still spend most of your day on the bus.

Once we got into Austria we stopped to drop off everyone that was going on the Contiki “White Water Rafting” optional. As I said in the last blog, I decided to opt out of this excursion due to finding out that it wasn’t full out white water rafting, it was supposed to be more relaxed, cruising down the river and paddling here and there. I would personally rather do white water rafting later this summer on my own and spend the extra few euro for the experience of some real hardcore rafting in Switzerland or something.

Everyone hopped off of the bus and were instructed about all of the rules and all that. They all jumped into their wetsuits, and safety equipment and headed down to the rivers edge. We all followed them down to take photos, some pointed fingers and made fun of each other due to how funny some of them looked in their suits.

Everyone that wasn’t rafting headed back to the bus for a 20 minute ride to the destination of the rafters. We arrived and there was a cafe, volleyball, and restrooms, and internet available that costs 1 Euro for 10 minutes, which I thought was pretty outrageous. Unfortunately for the people who chose not to raft, we had to sit there at this cafe and burn 2 hours of our day waiting for the rafters to get back and for everyone to eat afterwards. Another downfall of Contiki. If you choose not to do some of the optionals, you really have nothing else to do. Doesn’t sound like too much of an “optional” to me. Instead you have to sit there and do nothing when you could be out exploring the city.

After everyone was back and ready to go we headed off to the hotel in Hopfgarten, Haus Lukas. Haus Lukas is a contiki run hotel located in the heart of Hopfgarten, if there is a “heart” of Hopfgarten. You can walk across the town in 10 minutes. It’s a very small ski village with absolutely nothing to do in the summer. If you don’t want to participate in the Contiki Optionals, the only thing that I would really recommend is to rent a mountain bike on your own, like I did. Other than that, there is one bar, one small beer hall, one pizza shop, one salon, one church, one post office, 3 small supermarkets, 3 Tabac’s (convenience stores), one train station and a trout farm.

Our room was okay, very basic as usual. Not that I expect much more than what we received. We had to ask for an extra towel due to there only being one left in the room. The shower and toilet were separate like our hotel in London. Quite odd if you ask me. The room with the toilet had a door on it. The room with a shower in it did NOT! Literally, it was an open arch way with clear shower doors inside (see below). It’s not like I have a girlfriend along on the trip with me, if that was the case it would be somewhat acceptable. The fact that I have a male room mate and we both need to shower makes the situation a little weird. Anyways, we worked around it and got our showers in. Awkwardly enough…

We had an included dinner tonight that was pretty good actually. There was a free shot of Apple Schnapps before dinner. I’m not a big fan of green apple tasting things so my tour manager went behind the bar and cooked me up something different I guess you could say. He came back with this dark brown looking shot but wouldn’t tell me what it was. I took it down and yelled what in the hell was that? He replied, Devil’s Brew. It’s the type of liquor that you light on fire. 100 Proof…

We also celebrated Lucyanne’s birthday during dinner and it got pretty loud at a few different points through out the night. After dinner we headed off to one of the only bars in town called the Silver Bullet. The beers were fairly cheap at around 3.40 for a tall local beer called Fohrenburger. It was really good, surprisingly. Bruno, Vanessa, Ryan, and I shot some pool and had a great time. We went home a little after midnight and got some good sleep for tomorrows adventures, or lack of.

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Contiki European Vista Trip

| April 3rd, 2008 | 1 Comment » | Austria, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Netherlands, Switzerland, Travel

As most of you know that after I booked my plane ticket to Ireland back in September of 2007, I wasn’t exactly planning on turning this “vacation” into a full fledged trip of a lifetime. Once I realized that my dreams of traveling Europe were actually viable, I started to do some research on a few different companies that offer tours throughout Europe. Not just day tours, not through one country, but I was looking for more of an extended tour through multiple countries.

After researching for a few weeks I came across a company that really interested me. This company is called Contiki. They were the only tour company that I found to offer specialized tours designed strictly for 18-35 year olds. I found this to be great considering I will be traveling on my own and would prefer if possible to hang out with a few people my age. I had been reading some travel forums about a few other tour companies and many people said that the tours were filled with tourists from the age of 3 to 60, senior citizens, the whole lot. Not that I have anything against children or the elderly in any way, but if I’m going to drop a couple thousand dollars on a tour through Europe, I would simply rather travel with people my age. Pretty understandable, right? (more…)

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