Koln (Cologne)

So, we've been in amsterdam for a couple of days now, but I'm gonna throw up some photos from Cologne. First things First: Kolsch!

As many people know, this is my favorite beer style, and it originates from Cologne (Koln in german). This is Gaffel Kolsch, one of the biggest and best from the region.  It was light, and had a head for days, and was totally delicious.

This is the Cologne cathedral. It was built in the 1200s, and houses the relics of the 3 magi. It was amazingly huge. That is all.

Welp, i gotta run, so i can't post more, but i'll try to update when we get to Hamburg.

Amsterdam update

So, after staying a night in Frankfurt, we decided to head up north to Amsterdam. We took an hour and a half train to Köln, where we saw the biggest cathedral I've ever seen. The train station has a glass roof, and you can see this behemoth of intricate towers, parapets, and gargoyles rising up hundreds of feet (or, a couple less hundreds of meters) above. We enjoyed traditional Kölsch beer, and I bought this 6 Euro watch which stops working about every half hour. And holy shit, the shwarma is AMAZING. From Köln we took another train to Amsterdam, where we are staying in a huge hostel about 15min from the red light district (stories to follow). We almost got caught in a dance contest being filmed for a Dutch television show. Apparently the show also involved a shirtless dude riding around with hipster glasses and mustache courtesy of face sharpie. Yeah, I don't know; definitely a Vice Don't. The caption pretty much writes itself: "You really aren't doing Amsterdam right if you can draw legibly on your face". It's raining like crazy though, and apparently it won't let up until Wednesday. Currently we are sitting in an awesome coffee shop called Bagels and Beans enjoying some bangin coffee. The Netherlands is like a bizarro version of the US. The funny thing about Dutch is that you can pretty much understand it if you pronounce it. For example, our bus passes were "chipkaarts"; from an advertisement board: "zeker abot seks!"; and the convenience store is a "nachtkoop". Lots of people ride bikes, all of them cruiser commuter types, and they are ridden no matter the weather; an umbrella is all you need! Well, back to drying off; photographs and journal pages to follow!

First Big Update

So, we're here in Frankfurt, just woke up for the first full day of europa. I figured that since i'm a total noob, it would be a good time to share what i've learned so far.

1: There's a weirdly high percentage of live sex shops advertising themselves as "american". Don't know how i feel about that.

2: Somehow, little old ladies can take up as much or more space as tubby dudes on a plane. When you're sitting between both of them, the amount of space is *always* in the "too much" category.

3. Maybe it was because of the hunger, or the exhaustion, or the beautiful sunshine after 24 hours of travel, but the stereotype of german beer being the best in the world seemed true at dinner last night.

Frankfurt is kindof a banking/industry town, not a whole lot going on culturally. We're probably going to take off for Belgium or Amsterdam this afternoon, and continue acclimating as we keep moving around. I'll try to keep updating as i can.

Frankfurt Finally! Ausgezeignet!

After sitting on the runway for 3 or 4 hours in Newark, we finally took off and arrived in Frankfurt around 12:30. TLDR, we left on Wednesday and got to Germany on FRIDAY!! Hooray for inclement weather! Fuck you weather god! Despite all odds and supernatural bias, we're in motherloving Deutschland. Now the real fun begins! We're so tired and burned out, we're going to go grab a motherfucking beer and fag.

-SB

Germany!

We've arrived! almost exactly 24 hours late! Had to pay for both nights in the hostel, but at least there's soon to be a shower and beer. w00t.

Day 2 aka Day 1 2.0

So we're leaving the hotel in a little bit to head back to the
airport, all primped up with the toilertry supply kits they gave us.
We're all pretty impressed with the deodorant moist towelettes that
were in the kit, but we'll see how impressed we should be in about 6
hours, when we're in newark, waiting for our flight to Germany.

We got put into a surprisingly nice hotel on the cheap, thanks to the
airline. Thanks to everyone who tried to find us a spot to stay (the
samelsons especially), it was nice to have so many people at our
backs. I'll update when I can.

David

"You're a learner, not an arrogant bastard"

Overhead over cribbage. Still waiting for the damn Chicago plane. Morale is good, high and angry. Looking forward to discount hotel fare in the Windy City. Anybody know folks in Chicago?

Woohoo!

So.... weather. Our flight out of DIA to chicago has been delayed 35 minutes so far, due to a fucking tornado. In Colorado. The plane that we would be taking, in fact, hasn't even landed here in Denver, and the attendant didn't seem to know when it would be allowed to touch down. I didn't push too hard for info, b/c i don't particularly enjoy airport security cavity searches...

Scott's convinced that the tornado is a punishment from the engineering gods, due to the fact that he's abandoned the lab.

This rumspringa should be pretty fucking killer, if we don't get killed on our way there. I'll update when i get service.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Omq_OiveIA