Why you should go - Post grad life: Month 6

This past month, the world was shaken by the tragedy of the attacks in Paris, a rapidly growing refugee crisis, and even more violence on the streets of our own hometowns, among other issues. Seeing these events on the news is scary, and can make it difficult to even leave our house in the morning. They can also make us think twice about booking trips to those amazing places that our heart yearns for: dream vacations, numbered points on our bucket lists, ancestral roots, cities filled with history, etc.

Tragedies like the terrorist attacks in Paris can happen anywhere at any time, and there is no way to ensure that we avoid them completely, even if we never leave our hometown again. Events like this are meant to scare us; They're meant to make us think twice about being in crowded places and big cities... but we cannot afford to live our lives in fear. We must continue to live fully and boldly. The only things we can do are to stay vigilant, be smart, and enjoy the time we have been given to explore, learn, and grow. I believe that the best way to do this is to see as much of the world as we can and take in every new experience with an open mind.

If you have followed along with my blog, you will know that I am a huge proponent of travel, whether it be a daytrip to a new town, a hike to new heights, a trip across the country, or a move to a new hemisphere. You will never regret or forget the things that you learned about the world or about yourself while traveling. 

Travel empowers us. It has the power to take us out of our element, show us another perspective, and gives us the opportunity to adapt and grow. Whether we crumble or thrive in this new environment and new experience is up to us, but I promise that you will come out of every trip with greater knowledge and appreciation of the world we live in. Go see it for yourself. 

Post-grad, real life, impromptu travel: Requesting time off

If you have kept up with my blog or know me at all, you would realize that I quite like to go on adventures. One of the best things that I got out of my college experience was the opportunity to study abroad (twice!), which allowed me to challenge myself, find my independence and access who I truly am! I also came out of studying abroad with new friends, one of which is crazy enough to go on a whirlwind adventure with me to Paris and London! See the background of our insanity here.

Vanessa and I went to the same college, but we did not meet until we both studied abroad in London together during the spring of our sophomore year.

Beautiful Budapest

Although time has gotten away from me for the past week, the impression that the city of Budapest made on me has not faded. 

Though much of our tour of Central Europe blurs together, Budapest stands out as a gem; a city divided by a wide, sprawling river. A lush and green side, Buda, and an urban side, Pest. 

Just passing through Slovakia

So I would like to consider myself well-traveled and worldly, but when I heard that we would be driving through Slovakia for an afternoon to get from Krakow to Budapest, I realized that I really did not know anything about the country. 

Well in one afternoon, I fell in love and was able to add a name to my ever-growing list of adventures to have (check out my Pinterest board with the same title).

100 Km under in Krakow, Poland

We had our first actual warm day while in Krakow, Poland! It was a gorgeous city, especially on a gorgeous, sunny day. 

Warsaw, Poland

Today, according to my FitBit Flex, I walked 8 miles along the sidewalks of Warsaw and I was lucky to be able to cover nearly everything that I had wanted to see in the city. I had such a wonderful day, but now I am exhausted...but before I turn in, here is a little bit about Warsaw and what I saw there:

With fresh bouquets of flowers for sale on every corner, how can you not love this place?

This morning, my tour group went on a bus tour through the city, and then we had the afternoon to explore on our own. We stopped in a famous park with a monument to Chopin, the famous composer. Apparently the rest of the park is gorgeous and a great place to relaz, but we didn't get a chance to explore it further.  

We spent a lot of time in Old Town Square, and we saw the statue of the mermaid, which, according to folklore, helped found the city. 

I did not realize that Marie Curie was born in Warsaw, so I was surprised when we walked by her house and museum, which was decorated with her accomplishments, as can be seen above. She is so highly looked up to in the science community. 

My family and I love pierogis, so we stopped at a restaurant which had a huge selection of them. We ended up eating spinach and cheese pierogis and then blueberry pierogis for lunch. They were delicious! And the restaurant that we were at had the menu translated adorably into English, complete with a pierogi poem. 

The Memorial to the Warsaw Uprising, above, is definitely something to see on a trip to Warsaw. It is very powerful and the figures are larger than life. 

We also visited the tomb of the Unknown Soldier and watched the changing of the guard, which happens every hour on the hour. 

For the rest of our day, we just explored the city on foot and we happened upon a nice open air market, complete with delicious bread and crafts! 

A definite highlight of my time in Warsaw was my stop in A. Blikle, which was Charles de Gaulle's favorite bakery and coffee shop. They are known for their rose donuts, seen above. The donuts were sooooo good. 

And the dark chocolate mocha tasted even better than it looks! What a fantastic stop. 

I would definitly put Warsaw on my list of places to visit again. It had the perfect mix of old and new, and it is full of history and hope.

Berlin's Best

Since my family and I are on a fast-paced bus tour of Central Europe, we get to see a lot of different cities and places in two weeks, but at the price of never having quite enough time in each of the places that we visit. It is a trade off, but I think it is worth it. It just means that I am going to have to visit some of these great places again in the future to see everything! 

The symbol for Berlin is a little bear, so there are all these bear statues all over the city. Here is one of them which was in front of an artsy hotel. 

I have found that I actually really like Berlin. There is a whole lot of history packed in one city, and it also has a lot of culture and nature, which I thought was surprising.There are parks and forests all over the city and (as I saw in Frankfurt) everyone rides their bikes. I love it. I love the pace of the city and seeing people in business clothes and helmets, riding to work along the bike routes alongside cars. If only the US could make bike-culture normal. 

Above is a photo of me with a painted section of the Berlin Wall, found at the Allies Museum. I cannot imagine being separated from family and friends by a wall which just showed up in my home city, basically overnight. The other side of the wall faced East Berlin, and was unpainted and had bullet holes. People in East Berlin could not be anywhere near the wall, or they would be shot at. 

We could see the stark contrast not only on the Wall itself, but also in the styles and histories of the different sides of Berlin. 

Above is another, larger section of the Wall. I had learned about the second World War in school, of course, as well as the division of Berlin afterwards, but never in such detail. The city itself just exudes history, and I have absorbed so much in my short time here. 

Now, not many parts of the Wall remain, but there is a cobblestone line drawn through the entire city which shows the divide. This part of the line was near the tourist spot, Checkpoint Charlie, which was where the main checkpoint along the divide was. 

Our bus tour brought us to Wannsee, where we visited the place where the Nazis had their meeting about the "final solution." It was scary to think that they decided the fates of hundreds of thousands of people in one 90-minute meeting. 

Another humbling experience was walking through the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe, which can be seen above, as well as the mini Holocaust Museum which is housed beneath it. The memorial is made up of hundreds of stone blocks of varying heights, which are meant to look like coffins. They symbolize those who were killed during the Holocaust, a part of Germany's past. You can walk through the memorial, between the blocks, and sink beneath their surfaces. It becomes kind of like a maze and may make you feel a bit claustrophobic. This memorial was so powerful, and has become one of the best that I have ever seen.  

Our tour also made a stop at the Brandenburg Gate, which is a gorgeous arch in the middle of the city. It made for a great photo opportunity. 

Another great part about Berlin, in addition to it's abundance of history, is the abundance of coffee shops and bakeries. Our tour guide called Berlin the coffee shop of Europe. Above is some dessert that we had with lunch. We also tried Schnitzel.  

The best dessert that we had in Berlin, by far, came from Berliner Kaffeerosteri, which is a gorgeous gourmet coffeeshop and bakery. Their specialty is a blueberry cake, which I will dream about for the next few years. 

Just an hour in Weimar, Germany

Since we are on a bus tour of Eastern Europe, there are some days when we are on the road for long periods of time. Like today, for example, when we drove from Frankfurt, all the way to Berlin. I guess I had not realized just how far the cities are from each other. We passed through a lot of green fields and some small towns. 

The highlight of the trip was definitely the hour we spent in Weimar, which is a small but very famous city in Germany. 

It is Geothe's hometown, as well as a center for music and culture. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe and Friedrich Schiller are pictured below:

Although we only had an hour for lunching and touring this wonderful city, we were able to see a lot and I took a lot of photos (mostly of buildings). Unfortunately, I know very little about the sights that are in my photos. 

It is the perfect German town, with cobblestone streets, a gorgous river, little cafes and many bratwurst stands. 

There were cute little buildings around every corner as well as SO many bikes. 

All I know is that I could live in this house. 

Stay tuned for my next post on Berlin!

Frankfurt, Germany

I have stayed in the city of Frankfurt for the past two days and have finally gotten over the jet-lag. I flew through the night and got to the airport around noon, German time. Although the rest of my first day here was rough because of how tired I was, we made the best of it!

When my family and I checked into our hotel, we realized that we were a little farther outside the city center than we thought we were, but we ended up finding dinner at a great authentic German restaurant called Sachsenhauser Warte, pictured below. 

I think it looks like Rapunzel's tower. It is also a guest house. 

Inside, there were beautiful flowers and places to sit for dinner or drinks. We tried a local cider-like drink called apfelwein (like "apple wine"). When the waitress brought it to us, she brought a pitcher for us to share as well as a huge glass bottle of seltzer water. She had to explain to us that we fill our glasses for the most part with the apfelwein in the pitcher, and then dilute it a bit with the seltzer. Although it was not very sweet (like other ciders I have had), I enjoyed it and I really liked trying something local. 

During our second day in the city, we decided to visit the Botanical Gardens, which were about a 15 minute bus ride away from center city. Although it cost about 7 euros per person to go into the Conservatory, the outdoor gardens were free. 

They were mostly made up of wildflowers, and there was also a huge pond with loud frogs. 

I have no idea what this sign says.

We traveled by subway back into the center city and explored on foot. The Cathedral was super tall and towered over the entire city.

We stopped for lunch along the Main, which is one of two rivers that run through Frankfurt. The other is the Rhine. People have started putting love locks on the bridge that we crossed, and I have found that this now happens with just about any old bridge in Europe. The original love lock bridge is in Paris and it is a complete tourist trap. 

Anyways, this bridge had a lot of locks and even more pigeons, and it also offered a great view of the river, which was very active. We saw all kinds of boats and barges along the river and there are also many museums nearby.   

My experience in Germany so far has been very different from other trips to Europe, especially because of the langauge barrier. I speak both English and Spanish, and although English is very widely spoken in just about any country, I have noticed that I have had a harder time here than in places like Spain, Portugal, France and Italy. The languages in these countries at least have similar roots and sounds as Spanish, which always make getting around easier. 

Having absolutely no background in the language makes even ordering at a restaurant a lot more difficult. 

At least we have the basics down: Hallo, Nein, Bitte, and Danka.

Tomorrow we will be making our way to Berlin! 

Places to relax in Madrid

Parque del Buen Retiro: 

Retiro Park is the most well-known park in all of Madrid, and it offers fountains, shade, and even a man-made lake to row boats on.

 

Above is the Crystal Palace, which is located inside the park and is free to enter. I did not go in, because I heard that it gets brutally hot in there on summer days, but it looked like an interesting place to visit.

You can see a surprising amount of wildlife in the middle of Madrid... In just a short time in the park, I saw more turtles in one pond than I have ever seen before, ducks, fish, and frogs... also, all sorts of dogs. It was like a mini safari or something.

 

 In the middle of the park, there is a statue of a fallen angel; presumably Lucifer... Now, some people find it disrespectful to keep a statue of Lucifer in a public park in a very Catholic country, but I do not really think it is meant to be taken as devil worship.

 

The Palace Gardens:

 

After visiting the Palace on a nice hot Saturday afternoon, my friend and I decided to venture to the Palace Gardens, which are open to the public. The manicured hedges and trees offered us the shade that we so desperately needed in order to hide from the sun, and it also provided cover for canoodling Spanish lovers...Beware.

Plaza de España:

 

Although not my favorite spot to sit and rest, Plaza de España is a nice place to pass through. There are places for photo ops, as well as nice shady spots to walk through.

 I often passed through the plaza on my way to the main shopping street, Gran Via. My friends and I also found a little market that was set up in the plaza on a Thursday afternoon, which sold handmade goods and clothing. I bought a pair of "Jasmine" pants, which look a lot like the pants that Jasmine wears in Disney's movie, Aladdin.

Parque del Oeste:

 

This group of photos is from one of the nights where my friends and I went to Templo de Debod to watch the sunset, along with half of Madrid. Apparently, this is a very popular place to hang out after dark, and people bring picnic blankets and romantic bottles of wine.

 

It gave us a beautiful view of a city as well as a stunning sunset. During the daytime, Parque del Oeste is a massive patch of land with lots of paths for running, a rose garden, and a cable car that can bring you all the way to the other side of the park, on the outskirts of Madrid (I covered this in a previous post).