Montreux

It's been a long 2 days in Montreux. I'm writing this in the
lobby of our hotel in Montreux. In an hour, I'll be taking a train to
Geneva and from there, a plane to Nice, where we'll spend 4 nights. I
shall now summarize the events of the past 3 days.

First thing in the morning two days ago, before leaving Zurich
for Montreux, we visited a Museum of Design. It was quite interesting,
but the feature was the robot exhibition. After the museum, we took a
train to Lausanne, and from there to Montreux.

When we arrived in Montreux, we had a late lunch, and then went
to one of the free venues of the festival to watch some bands and
other artists. At around 7PM, we started to wait in line for the big
concert with Steely Dan, Dave Matthews Band, and Chickenfoot. At
around 8:05, Steely Dan took the stage and performed for about an hour
and a half. I have to say, I didn't really enjoy their performance as
it was repetitive, and they didn't play their hit songs. Next was the
Dave Matthews Band. Before, I've never really listened to a Dave
Matthews Song, but now I'm a fan. At last, at around half past
midnight, Chickenfoot took the stage. Although the sound quality could
be improved, I had a ton of fun. As the concerts passed, I got closer
and closer to the front. By the time the Chickenfoot concert started,
I was literally in front, my hands on the stage, high-fiving a drunk
Sammy Hagar as he sung. 2 short hours passed, and we left the
Convention Center to go to the hotel. We were basically deaf after the
concert, and it wasn't fun falling asleep with loudly ringing ears but
nontheless, I slept till 1PM the next day.

The next day, we experienced the side aspect of the festival.
There were a few Jazz Bands and songwriters, but they could not
compare to the previous night. Halfway through the performances, we
decided to visit Château Chillon, or Chillon Castle. It was quite
interesting. It was built on a rock in Lake Geneva, and was the
capital of the nearby region. An iPod audio guide guided me through
the castle and it's nice areas with viewpoints of the whole region.

After the castle, we returned to the festival to eat dinner.
After, we wanted to watch another artist, but a thunderstorm brought
us inside the Convention Center. We got tickets to this slot machine
game. I instantly won a pen and a hat. On the ground by the machines,
there were hundreds of used tickets, but they can be reused every two
hours. For probably 2 periods of 2 hours, I checked every ticket,
organized them by time remaining, played tens of times and cashed in
countless prizes. By the time the rain had passed, I won pens, candy
boxes, VIP badge lanyards, a hat, around 10 useless Swiss iTunes
cards, countless 20% off cards for CDs, and 30 Francs in gift cards
which I used to get a Deep Purple in Montreux DVD for free. After
that, we went to see a last performer, and took a bus back to the hotel.

The next morning, or this morning, we packed, and then took a short
stroll through Montreux and noticed the unusual. How can a palm tree
grow in Switzerland. Anyways, after our stroll, we returned to the
hotel, and am now writing this before we depart for Nice.

I cannot upload the hundreds of pictures I have yet, but I will
try ASAP and will update this post or make a new one.

I will write again either tonight or tomorrow night.

Sent from my iPod

The Third Day in Zurich

This blog is sponsored by Carlsberg Beer, you probably wonder why... A can of it is laying on our laptop to cool it to usable temperature (Not An Ad) :)

Today was probably the most exciting day in Zurich so far.

First, after breakfast we went back to Uetliberg, and hiked from Kulm, the village with a TV tower and restaurant, to Felsenegg, with a cable car servie back to Zurich. One interesring part of the trail was the Planet Trail. The trail started at a model sun. A few meters after that, there was Mercury, then Venus, Earth, etc. What it actually is, is a scale model of our solar system. At the beginning of the trail, a semi-large sphere represents the sun. Along the trail to Felsenegg, aka the Planet Trail, small models represent the planets and their distance to scale. Pluto, a grain of sand, is at the end, in Felsenegg, after 5 km of hiking. If the trail was 1 billion times larger, it would be a copy of our solar system. In Felsenegg, a regular Cable Car service took us down to a train station that brought us back into the city. Looking at the map in the photo album will help.

After the hike, we visited Kulturama, a human history museum which displayed human evolution, a display on mummies, and a room full of human and animal biology exhibits. Although it was all in German, we were lucky to have a guide who wanted to practice her English, and gave us a free, private tour of the museum. What a treat it is to have a Zurich Card. On our way to lunch, we visited the church, the Grossmunster. For only 3 Swiss Francs, we climbed to the top, and took amazing pictures of Zurich for probably twenty minutes. After that, we found a little, relatively cheap place to lunch. We decided to go to the hotel after that, but we took another walk down Banhofstrasse and had some Italian Ice Cream. There, we observed the most ridiculous thing on the street. There was a blackberry, except the brand was Ferrari. It was priced at 10,500 Francs, or $10,000. From that point on, we just avoided walking Banhofstrasse again... :)

After resting at the hotel, we went to a Latino Music "Festival", but it was rather dissapointing as there was barely any live music, it was more like a street party, and a rainstorm broke up the crowds. Since we had some time, we went down to Lake Zurich for the last time, and took in the moment. Tomorrow, we will pack, visit a Museum of Design for about an hour, and then go on a train to Montreux and epxerience the Jazz Festival. I may not be able to blog for the next few days, so bye for now, and I hope you've enjoyed reading the blog thus far. After Montreux, we'll be going to the French Riviera, and Barcelona after that. I will surely miss Zurich as it was one of the best places in the world I've visited.

Notes:

Today's Picture Album is at http://picasaweb.google.com/GuitarGodAdamp/ZurichDay3

Be sure to check out the map as it gives you a sense of where the pictures were taken.

Day 2 In Zurich

10:20PM GMT+1 7/2/2009 Zurich, Switzerland

Today was another day in Switzerland, but it was longer and more interesting. I'll tell you about it in the best summary I can.

We woke up this morning, very tired and had breakfast at our restaurant, and I have to say, the food was not bad. After breakfast, we went to the train station and took a 20 minute metro ride to Uetliberg, the highest point in Zurich. After a short, 5 minute hike, we reached Kulm, a village featuring the highest hotel and restaurant in Zurich, a viewing tower that overlooked Zurich, Lake Zurich, and the Swiss Alps, and a TV Tower for Zurich. We didn't spend too much time there, but we plan to go again tomorrow and hike the full trail and take cable cars back into Zurich.

As we left the mountain, the rush of tourists arrived and we were lucky to not have to deal with them. After returning to the town center, we visited the swiss "Landesmuseum", or Swiss National Museum. It was small, but interesting. We followed the history of humans on earth, and saw artifacts from the Roman Age, Medieval Age, and some Swiss Army Arms. There was also a special exhibit on Swiss Humor (A lot about their punctuality, conservativeness, and neutrality). It was all in German though and we could not understand it, except for the picture only ones which were very understandable.

When we left the Museum, we decided to take the Riverboat Cruise down to the lake. It was comparable to Amsterdam's tour boats, except in Zurich, they are used for commute and transport rather than tourism. On the river, in turns out that the water extremely clean and people swim in it like they would in a pool. We arrived at the end of the river and decided to walk back to the station via Banhofstrasse. We walked down again, saw more extremely expensive watches and jewelry, and ate at was probably one of the most expensive McDonalds in the world. We paid 14 Swiss Francs (~13USD) for a typical meal. We also saw how much Michael Jackson is being remembered around the world with a big memorial on the side of the road with candles, flowers, pictures, signatures, and offerings.

At the train station, we left the Tourist Information Booth and took a walking tour through Zurich's Old Town. The tour was extremely interesting and we learned about Zurich's history, we saw its culture, and we strolled through its historical district. After this long tour, we took the guide's advice and ate at a local Swiss Restaurant. I had a Pork Snitchzel with fries and it was quite a good place to eat. On our way back to the hotel, we went to the top of a restaurant and had an amazing view of the City of Zurich, the main streets, the mountains, and the lake.

I am now at the hotel, and we are planning tomorrow's adventures. We plan to go to Uetliberg, do a long hike through the mountain and take a cable car down, then go to a Swiss Culture museum. Then we will go to a Latino Music Festival, and from there, we don't really have any solid plans. Today was a long day, and I will get pictures in as soon as possible. Be sure to check http://picasaweb.google.com/guitargodadamp.

Goodbye for now.

Update:

Pictures are at http://picasaweb.google.com/GuitarGodAdamp/ZurichDay2

Be sure to check out the map either online or Google Earth, it gives you a sense of where those pictures were taken.

Zurich In 5 Hours

9:30PM GMT+1 7/1/2009 in Zurich, Switzerland

I'm now going to talk about my day in Zurich today. After leaving the train from the airport we went straight to our hotel to rest from our 16-hour journey. After about half an hour we went out to go on a walking tour of the city scheduld for 3:00. We arrived at 3:02, but we were late. The Swiss are so punctual, that they say you can set your watch to their trains, buses, boats, etc. Because we missed the tour, we decided to guide ourselves down one of the main streets, Banhoftstrasse, which starts at the train station and goes down to Lake Zurich. It was a very "expensive" street, comparable to Champs-Uysesses in Paris, France. We passed by many stores to see the ridiculous prices. There was a watch store that sold Rolex watches for 20,400 Swiss Francs (Approx. 19,500 USD), and the restaurants sold a simple lunch for what was equal to around $30. At the end of the street by the lake, we got admission on a boat ride around the lake. Although the boats are used to commute between the many villages of Zurich, many tourists ride them to view the scenic lake by the alps. The ride was to start at 4:00 and return at 5:30. According to our watches, we left the main port at the second 4:00 started and the anchor was dropped on our return at precisely 5:30. No wonder the Swiss are obsessed with watches. After the boat ride, we walked through downtown Zurich and by the river. After about an hour of walking and eating, we took the tram back to our hotel by the train station and were there by about 7:00PM. We got the internet to work at the hotel for 4 hours so that's why I'm writing now. Tomorrow morning, I'll be going on a ride up a Swiss Mountain to have a view of the beautiful Swiss Landscape.

By the way, the way we can do so many things in Zurich for free such as the boats, trams, and tours is the Zurich Card and the Junior Card. The two things together let us do so much in Zurich, and they paid for themselves minutes after we bought them.

Today's Pictures at:

http://picasaweb.google.com/GuitarGodAdamp/ZurichDay1

Note about Pictures: I will try to upload the pictures of my travels at http://picasaweb.google.com/guitargodadamp

Delayed On The Plane

5:30PM EST 6/30/2009 in Providence, RI
I am now on the plane to Philly. Well actually on the ground waiting for a departure slot. Due to thunderstorms in Philly, all planes to and from there are grounded. Our plane was originally supposed to leave at 3:45, but now it's 5:30 and we're still stuck in Providence. Chances are, we'll have to take a plane from Philly to Munich, then Zurich. We may even need to stay overnight. I'm going to stop now and pray that we'll leave soon.

I don't have Internet at the time of writing this, but I will post it as soon as I have access.

Update 1:

5:50PM EST 6/30/09 in Providence, RI

Our captain has just issued another wait time. Now at 5:50, we'll be getting an "update" at 6:30. If we left on time, we'd be on our way to Zurich now. Maybe since all Philly flights were delayed, maybe ours to Zurich was too. I'll write again as soon as possible.

Update 2:

6:25PM EST 6/30/09 in Connecticut Airspace

We're finally in the air, and it's 6:25. The pilots say we'll be in Philly at around 7:05. I'll write then.

Update 3: 

8:00PM EST in Philadelphia, PA

It's 8:00PM now and it's been hectic. I am now in Philly, sitting in a plane bound for Frankfurt, Germany. From there we'll be able to catch a flight to Zurich. We rushed throuh the very large airport and a very nice guy was able to get us on a flight to Germany at the last minute.   

It'll now be a long, 8-hour flight across the Atlantic and I'll write if anything interesting happens.

Update 4: 

7:20 GMT+1 7/1/09 in Zurich, Switzerland

I am in a hotel bed in Zurich, and it's been a long day. When we landed in Frankfurt at around noon, I was too airsick go write. From Frankfurt, we took a half-hour flight to Zurich, and then took a train to our hotel. This ends my first entry. My second entry will be what I dId in Zurich today.

Sent from my iPod

A New Trip, A New Adventure

It's been almost a year since I last posted, but it's for good reason. I'm going on another trip!
This time I'll be spanning four countries: Switzerland, France, Monaco, and Spain.

First, I'll give you the schedule for the trip.

Tomorrow (June 30), I will leave from Providence, fly to Philly and from there, I'll land in Zurich, Switzerland.
We'll be spending 3 days in Zurich and on July 4, we'll take a train to Montreux. On that day, I'll be attending a concert as part of the Montreux Jazz Festival. The concert features Chickenfoot, Steely Dan, and The Dave Matthews Band. After 2 days in Montreux, we'll take a train to Geneva and from there, a plane to Nice, France. We'll be spending a few days in Nice, and due to its close proximity to Monaco and Cannes, we will visit them as well. After spending a few days in France, we will take a train ride through the Pyrenees, into Spain, and we'll be spending our last few days in Barcelona, Spain before flying back to the U.S. on July 14.

I won't have access to the internet the entire time, so posts might come late, but I'll try to get them in whenever I can. I have to go now, but I'll post back as soon as possible to update my progress,

4 Countries, 11 Days

This week and a half was probably the most exciting so far. On August 1st, we left Poland and flew to Dusseldorf, Germany. Well, not exactly Dusseldorf, but pretty close. We settled with our friends in Wesel, a suburb about 50 minutes from Dusseldorf Center. So, here goes:


Day 1 (August 1st, Friday) After arriving, we decided to take a short drive to the Netherlands (Holland), to go to huge hot tub, from a natural underground source. It was one of the most relaxing moments of my life, and enjoyed every minute of it.

Day 2 (August 2nd, Saturday)

Today, we visited the town of Xanten, outside of Wesel, famous for its 2 lakes and Roman City ruins. All we really did was visit more friends there, and checked out the lake, where there was a lot of interesting things going on.

Day 3 (August 3rd, Sunday)

Today, we first drove to the actual city of Dusseldorf, for about an hour. It's funny because we asked a guy at a tourist info center what we could do in one hour, and he gave us a booklet and said "Page 23, "Dusseldorf in one Hour", the trail is marked on the map". How interesting. We saw the basics, the rathaus (town hall), the old town, and riverside. After that, we went to the Dusseldorf International Airport (Less than 15 minutes away from where we were), to fly to Paris! When we landed, the first advertisement I saw was this: Luis Vuitonn Handbag: €2,700, Lafayette Jacket: €3,570, Courir Pants: €5,000, Keeping Up With Fashion: Priceless. Probably the best Master Card commercial yet. Today we didn't visit Paris, instead we visited our friends in the town of L'isle Adam, which in French means, The Island of Adam, or Adam's Island. We just walked around the small town, and learned the history of the city. At their house, we just rested, and got ready for the next day.

Day 4 (August 4th, Monday)

Today, after waking up and having breakfast, we went to straight to Paris, only about 30 minutes away, we drove through its many tunnels, and finally arrived near the Eiffel Tower, where we were fighting for parking spots for almost half an hour. After finally getting a spot, quite close to the Tower, we went to it. The next few moments were simply just looking at all of the people in line, there were 5 lines, 4 for the elevator, and 1 for the stairs. The lines for each elevator were about 3 or more hours long, and the line for the stairs up was about an hour and a half up. That was only for the second floor, there were still two more floors above where I don't even know (and don't want to know) how long the lines were. We just decided not to to go on the tower, it wouldn't be worth it. So next after lunch, we took a boat taxi through Paris's Seine River. After arriving at Notre Dame station, we got off, and saw the Notre Dame, but we didn't go up the tower since the lines were ridiculously long. After walking around the area of Paris we were in, we saw many various attractions such as the Hotel de Ville (Town Hall), Centre Pompidou, and the streets of Paris. After returning to the Eiffel Tower on the water taxi, we went to the car to go up the hill, Montmarte (427 feet tall), and saw an AMAZING view of Paris, and the church, Sacré Cœur (Meaning "Sacred Heart"). The inside of the church was just a large circular room with many side chapels. Before leaving Montmarte and Paris, we had dinner at a restaurant near the Sacré Cœur, with very fast service. At home we relaxed, for another exciting day to come.

Day 5 (August 5th, Tuesday)

Today, we first went to a small village called Auvers, where Van Gogh used to live and died, but the day we visited, the Museum was closed, so we visited Van Gogh's gravesite instead. After that, we went to Versailles, the Royal Palace of French Kings. Well, not anymore. Today it is a huge museum that you can visit, and see the rooms where French Royalty lived and worked. After the long line, we went in to see many of the various rooms, including the famed Hall Of Mirrors, and the King and Queen's Bedrooms. After the museum closed (We came late to avoid long lines), we decided to stop by the Gardens, which are larger than Central Park in New York City. They were HUGE, and you could see a long canal going right through the middle. What a backyard. I could just imagine living in Royalty in France. After Versailles, we drove to Paris, to see it by night. Before we did anything, we drove to Champs-Elysess (Paris's most famous street), and had dinner at a restaurant called George V. By the time we finished, it was already starting to get dark. We went to the Arc De Triomphe nearby, to take some pictures, and then took a stroll down Champs-Ulysess, passing by many big fashion stores, and seeing a €2,700 handbag (Almost $4,000). The coolest thing we saw, was in the Toyota store. There was a really nice prototype convertible car, which looked like this. After walking down far enough, and seeing enough stores (including 3 McDonalds'), we went back to the Arc De Triomphe, to get the view from the top. I have to say, it was incredible, and probably definetly better than the view from the Eiffel Tower. The half hour we were up there flew by quickly, and they pushed us out as the Arc De Triomphe began closing. One last thing before we left Paris, we drove through La Defense, Paris' Business District. It was quite interesting, with all of the highrises, and the whole district was on an elevated highway type road. It resembled downtown Boston at night. By the time we were back in L'isle Adam, it was almost Midnight, and we slept extra long to prepare for the next day in Paris.


Day 6 (August 6th, Wednesdays)

Today we slowly woke up, and stayed on L'isle Adam for a while, but later in the day, at around noon, we went to the Louvre. There is too much to talk about the Louvre, because there are thousands, of pieces of art there (a book said 130,000 pieces of art inside the Louvre, and 35,000 are displayed), and each and every one of them had their own stories. All I can say is that in the Mona Lisa room, looking at the people in the room was more interesng than the painting itself. If you wanted to take a picture, you have to push through the crowd, and you have 5 seconds to take pictures, which will generally be blurred, and you'll be quickly be pulled by more people so they can see it. After leaving the Louvre, we took a short driving tour around Paris, but when rush hour traffic kicked in, we just drove back to L'isle Adam, where we spent the rest of the day, exhausted from the day.

Day 7 (August 7th, Thursday)

Today was our last day in Paris, so we first visited Auvers today to visit the Van Gogh Museum. It wasn't too exciting, but it was still interesting to visit the room where Van Gogh died. The small museum didn't have any Van Gogh Paintings yet, and they were planning to buy one, but just didn't have the money. Back in L'isle Adam, after saying our goodbyes, we went to the Airport to fly back to Dusseldorf. By the time we were in Wesel, it was around 10PM, so we decided to sleep.

Day 8 (August 8th, Friday)

Today, we just decided to relax, by staying in Wesel. For lunch w went to a small German fast food restaurant, and in the afternoon, we visited the hot tub complex in Holland again, for more relaxation. And after that, we just went back to Wesel and relaxed. Today was just the perfect day to relax.

Day 9 (August 9th, Saturday)

Today was another exciting day, because we visited the city of Amsterdam, on a german tour bus, after the 3 hour drive, we were in Amsterdam. We first went on a boat tour through Amsterdam's canal complex, and after that, we were on our own. We walked through the streets of Amsterdam. We saw many interesting things, most notably cannabis "coffee shops". Since Marijuana isn't illegal to sell in Holland, people buy it at these coffee shops and can smoke it there and only there. The streets with the Coffee shops smelled horrible, but we had to deal with it. At about 6 o' clock, we returned to the bus, to go back to Wesel. Back at Wesel, it was 8, so we just had dinner had talked about the day adventures.

Day 10 (August 10th, Sunday)

Today we first went to a chinese buffet in Xanten, and then visited Xanten's Roman Ruins. It was a quick day since the Ruins were basically empty. Today was just another day of relaxation.

Day 11 (August 11th, Monday)

Today, we simply just drove to the Airport, and flew back to Poland, where we spent the rest of the day in relaxation.

August 12th - 17th

This week was spent in Bydgoszcz relaxing. The only thing we did was watch a movie on Wednesday, and visit Gniezno (Poland's first capital), and friends in the country of Poland on Friday.

August 18th (Today)

Today, I'm just finishing up this blog entry, and getting ready to go to Warsaw, where we'll be spending the last day in Poland in a hotel, and tomorrow, I'll be flying back to the USA.



Once Again, sorry for no pictures.

I hope you enjoyed these blog entries and learned something new from tracking my trip. For now, I'm on a break.