Tallinn, Estonia - cool but shitty. Literally.

We got up super early - like 4 or 4:30 so that we could get on the bus and get to the airport. Everyone said we only needed to be there like an hour before because the airport is so small. We headed out to where the bus stop is supposed to be and it's not there. It's not down the block either. Nor is it a little further down the block.

Finally, around a corner and about a quarter mile down the road, we find the stop. The 22 is there - and though it says 22a is the bus, the 22 has a plane next to it and we decide to get on.

We hop on and as we're walking to our seats, I say to Jess, "Shit - it's the lady from the way here!" It's the same bus matron. She's still not smiling. At all. We sit down and enjoy the ride as much as we can with 20 lbs backs on our laps and a bus load full of non-smiling Latvians.

We're a little late getting to the airport but not bad. The line is HUGE. We find out that our check in is on a different line and hop over there but it's still moving slow, like something is wrong. After a few minutes and watching our line slowly merging into another we realize there is something wrong. The guy shuts off the monitor above the check in and we're both like shit!

Jess walks up to the front to find out what's going on. I see the frazzled airline guy open the front of his desk and start to mess with the machine inside.

Jess has on her puppydog face. I'm sweating and wondering what he's doing and shy she's got that face on. It doesn't work on me, so how the hell is it going to work on someone else.

Son-of-a-bitch! We have a winner. The guy closes the front of th desk, Jess calls me up to the front and we're through! Turns out the machine wasn't printing boarding passes so they moved people over a line and then people (like Jess) we're going up there asking him questions as he was trying to help one lady and her baby. Jess gave him the puppydog eyes and said "Can you please help me, our plane leaves in like 45 minutes?" I get up there and he's printing our passes and telling some other lady to back away from the desk. Sweeet!

We get through security and hop on the small prop plane. It was a short flight. So short in fact, that I fell asleep holding my book. I didn't even read a word of it. The owner of the place we're staying at (the lady with the broken pipes) picks us up. Apparently we're staying at one of her freind's apartments. We're driving through Tallinn and she's talking to Jess, Jess is asking her a question and she's stopping at a green light and people are beeping. We make it safely to the apartment and the woman is pointing to a really cool looking building and says, "That's where you'll be staying." We get out and it's really the crummy regular building across the street - Jess was bummed. The apartment was very cool looking inside - I could kick myself for not taking pictures. It was painted all white but made to look like stone - almost like a cave. There were huge beams in the ceiling and framing the windows and the floor was all wood. It was cool. Not sure if it was authentic or just made to look old but new.

Tallinn is a VERY cool city. There is a walled section that houses all the medieval buildings. It has a very different feel than most cities but it is VERY touristy. There were tons of people everywhere. We decided that we would just walk around and check it out and find some caches. The first spot we stop in with a cache, we both step in shit. Literally not figuratively. Jess spent the next half an hour stomping the ground, using twigs and dancing to get the shit out of her shoes. This didn't work so well. I was able to get the fast majority out of mine. Of course, we didn't find the cache. We continued to walk around with little luck in caching but a lot in sightseeing. It took a while for us to find some place that would have food for Jess and in the end, they really didn't because they brought out her food with cheese on it even though she asked for it without. We ended up heading to the grocery store after I finished eating and then headed back to the apartment to watch TV and hangout.

The next morning, Jess continued to clean the shit out of her shoes while we waited for the woman to come and get the key. We headed over to the St. Olaf's Church so that we could check out the view of the city from the tower. Jess decided that she had enough of climbing towers and so she sat outside with our packs while I headed up. Thank God because there is no way we would have made it with our packs. It was tight and steep and it took a while to get up there as it was. It was worth it though. The views were amazing. The city inside the walls looks very different than most cities do from above. I was even able to see Jess and zoom in on her doing SoDuKu - the pictures are pretty crazy. We decided to grab some food and head over to the port so that we could get our ferry to Helsinki. It was a nice ride, I think, because we both slept.

Should we run when we get off the plane?

This is the question Jess asks as we pull into the airport in Riga, Latvia. I say I don't think so, but who knows.

We get through passport control pretty easily and head over to the bus. We get on and Jess goes up to the woman and pays. She doesn't smile. At all.

Everyone smiles at Jess because she's cute and small and she smiles at people and that usually eases the initial tension. She didn't smile. At all.

We get to the hostel after walking past it and realize that it is on top of a booby bar. Nice! Well, aparently not really in Latvia. Not the women. We both agreed that Latvia had the best looking women so far but the booby bars are run by REAL shady elements - former KGB types and Russian mob. Tons of British people come here for batchelor parties (why, I have no idea) and they run tons of scams on them. First there are hot girls that call you into a bar fro "free" drinks, then you get a bill for like 1000 pounds (2000 bucks) and if you don't pay, they cut you off from your buddies and get you into a room and beat the shit out of you and still extract the money. One guy got pummeled, had cigaretts put out on him and left for dead.

Apparently, the police are worse than they are in Belgium. I'm sure they get paid off and look the other way.

There were tons of weird people in our hostel. These are the people I imagined we would run into on these trips - real dorks, who because they are on the road, try to reinvent themselves as someone else. It doesn't matter what country I'm in, I'm an asshole.We walked around and looked for some caches but had no luck. We saw most of the main sights, including the 3 brothers - these medieval buildings which are supposed to be the epitome of medieval architecture in Riga. They were cool. We got food and decided to cook that night. We also went and got some drinks at this liquor store place and when we paid the woman didn't smile. At all.

They're fairly fucking miserable here.

I guess I would be too if it rained as much as it did when we were there. Because it was so shitty we took it easy the next day and headed to the Museum of Latvian Occupation. It documented the occupations by both the Nazi's and the Communists. It was very interesting and had tons of information. It was cool to hear other perspectives - even how they felt the US and GB allowed the Baltics to be kept by the Communists after the war, despite Churchill saying, this is not what we fought for. We again tried to find some of the local caches but to no avail. We were stumped and decided to email some people for help. I had an idea where at least one was but because the building was like possibly falling down and it was a church, I said nah, but I was right.

The next day we went to Cesis - it is a medieval castlel, town and the castles' ruins. If, on the odd chance you find yourself in Riga, Latvia, you can skip Cesis. It was a two hour bus ride there - which wasn't bad because we both crashed and got some sleep. The castle was cool - when you get there, some girl in costume gives you a lantern to use as you walk around the towers. It definitely helped a lot in certain parts. They're doing a lot of work to restore the castle and do excavations - so in 20 years, when it's cool to go to Riga and people say, "I saw this amazingly restored castle in this town called Cesis", we can say, Yeah, we saw it when it was a dump.

We got on the bus back and it was packed. And it was hot. And the bus was from like '79. The only thing to make it worse would be if someone had a chicken or something like you see when people are on buses in Mexico or Guatemala or something. We made it home, alive, hot and probably smelly but we couldn't tell since the rest of the bus smelled like shit. Checked our email and ran out armed with some hints and found two caches. Thank God, because I really don't know if I plan on going back here again. Definitely not for three days. Oh yeah, did I mention no AC?

Whadd'ya mean NY is No Sexy?

We were staying at the Circus Hostel in Berlin. The subway or the U stopped right across the street from the hostel which was really nice. Our hostel was in East Berlin - which as I am sure you all know, was the Communist side. After taking the subway so much we got on first name basis with the chick and her dog who were beggin right at the top of the platform. She being Helga and the dog, Foo-foo. Just kidding - but if it wasn't her there, it was this other dude. So we got in and decided to start walking around. We figured that we could bang out a lot of the things that we wanted to see. We headed down to the Reichstag, the German Parliament and the place that "mysteriously" burned down. Hitler used it as an excuse to grab temporary power and he blamed the burning on the Communists (tsk, tsk, Adolf). The building is very cool and I got some sweet shots of it for all you Germanophiles/Duetschophiles. We then headed over to find a cache at a VERY imposing Communist monument to the Russian soldiers that died "liberating" Germany. The cache of course, was not there. This would repeat for about 10 different ones in Berlin. Next we headed over to the Brandenburgh Tor which basically became the symbol between the east and west. It must have been pretty crazy to only see one side of the gate for your entire life. The wall, which was really two, split the city and went around the Brandenburgh Tor. From there you could see the "Chick on a Stick" - which is a cool monument because the Prussians, after defeating the French, took some of their cannons, melted them and made the monument out of them. That's a pretty cool F U, you're our bitch now! Who knew it would be repeated again and again. Jess took a picture with the Berlin Bear - we made him do the peace sign. He held Jess pretty close - then wouldn't let her go, he asked for a tip and got it.

Like I said, geocaching here sucked. There were a ton that could not have been there - looking over logs, two that people HAD while we were there. Why they didn't say something to us is beyond me. Assholes.

We also went to Checkpoint Charlie - which is totally commercial now. It was cool to see the spot where we stared down the Russians for 40 years. There are big pictures of a soldier watching the others' area - the US guardhouse is there and on the east side is a timeline of how the whole wall and Communism fell. That night we went to some shitty Mexican place - owned by Indians. Afterwards we went to the hostel bar to listen to some Scottish folk kinda music. It wasn't so great but they guy bought everyone a shot of JD, which I choked down. I hate piss warm shots. The next morning, Jess gave in and accompanied me to Sachsenhausen Concentration Camp. It was the first concentration camp. It was very different than the death camps because it was used for other things. Its primary purpose was not to exterminate people. The ride there was a mess! We took a tour - but there was work on the tracks, so we had to get off, take a bus for a stop, then hop back on a regional train, get to the town and then walk to the camp. It wasn't as bad as I though that it would be. Don't get me wrong, it is very humbling and very depressing to be in a place where thousands of people were murdered. The camp was first used to round up the political enemies of the Nazi's. This included, very few Jews but included Communists (who got red stars), homosexuals (purple stars), Roma and other undesireables, union leaders, etc. There was a courtyard where everyone had to stand and were stripped down before they went inside. Anyone who showed any kind of leadership on the way to the camp were singled out and tortured within earshot of the other prisoners. They shaved your head for lice but also because it was not "normal" for people to have that kind of haircut in the 30s and 40s. The camp was set up in a triangle because they felt that this was the most efficient set up to monitor the whole camp. The main gate is guarded by Tower A - it is where you enter. It eventually continued to expand. It was used as a work camp - to make bricks for the massive buildings Hitler planned to build when he remodled Germany after conquering the world. Inside, there was a prison within the prison, where the worst of the worst were kept. Sometimes people went there because they just wanted a break from being in the overcrowded bunkers where everyone was.You were woken up at either 4 or 5 am and were given 40 minutes to eat, use the can and wash. There were hundreds of people per barrack and like 8 toilets. You do the math.



You were then called outside in the triangle for roll call. If they messed up the count they started over. I think she said the longest roll call ever was 17 hours - it was in the middle of February. Many didn't make it out. We then headed out to where the Communist monument was standing. After they took over, the camp was still in use, this time housing political enemies of the Communists. The monument shows only red stars and a few people standing aside, the Communists who were persecuted by the Nazi. There was no mention of the Jewish or any other prisoners. The Communists were masters of spin.



The next stop was station Z (zed), it was your last stop. You went there if you were already dead or if they were going to kill you en mass. There was a small barrack area where they would shoo you in and shoot you. There was an outline of a barrack that no longer stands and that was also a place where they would put in a ton of people and shoot them. We also went over to another place where there were pretty much only the foundations of buildings - they were crumbling but you could get the basic layout or the place. You could also see what was left of some of the ovens. Outside of the buildings there were mounds where they used to dump the ashes. They have marked the areas. Also in the buildings, there was aspot where she explained how they used to carry out executions. They put you in a room and let you see the "doctor" who was really an SS guard. He gave you a brief "examination", checking in your mouth for fillings and then marking you if you had some. You then went into another room and they asked you to stand against the wall where the old school thing was so they could chek your height. As it came down to your head, a slot opened at your neck and the SS guard shot you. Quick and clean. The walls were double thick so the other prisoners who were sitting in a room with loud music coudln't hear the others get shot. It was done in part to make it more efficient and less personal for SS soldiers who were having difficulty carrying out their duties.
That being said, it was still a very amazing experience to have gone. Being a history major and actually getting to see these places is pretty unbelieveable. It's understandable why people didn't speak up and you have to wonder if under similar circumstances you would. It is still going on today in numerous places in Africa and Asia and yet for a number of reasons governments remain quiet and do not monitor the actions of others.

That night after eating, we decided to do some laundry. We went to check out the place and find out the prices. This crazy guy is telling us what the prices are in German. We tell him we don't speak it and he giggles this crazy laugh like a derranged leprauchan. He looks like one too. He's dressed in a pinstripe black suit with a white bucket hat/fedora which has black stripes on it. He's either really gay or a drunk because he has a lesion on his upper lip and if he's gay it's herpes and if not, he just fell and shmashed his face on the concrete. I don't know and I don't want to find out either. We say thank you and head back to the hostel. Despite our better judgement, we head back to the derranged leprauchan and put in our laundry, I have a beer with me because you can walk all over the city and drink - which everyone does do and they're all fucking hammered by 9 pm. We put in the laundry and he's giggling again - almost like the Joker on the old Batman TV shows (BAM!) He's telling me something about my beer and I'm like you want some, get a cup. But he says no good, points at the beer and giggles again. We get outside and talk to some guy who speaks English, agree that this dude is bonkers and sit down. Only we don't realize that the beer I have is different than the one he serves in his cafe - which is attached to the laundromat and apparently that's what he's barking about. So the guy who speaks English comes over and says that it is against the leprechaun's policy to let you bring alcohol from other places and drink them infront of the cafe. We can go inside and drink our own booze and continue to play Rummy. So I tell the leprechaun no problem, next one I'll get from you and he's cool with that, because as the English speaking guy tells us, we're friendly. I don't want him getting too friendly.

So we get another round and he comes out and starts to talk to us and we're all making due, us in English, he in German and we find some kind of happy medium between until he whips out, "NY is no sexy". And I go, What? "Yeah, is no really sexy." Now, not for nothing, but the hottest chicks in every gene pool from around the world come to NY to be models and NY is no sexy. Dude, you're crazy. Eventually we get to some understanding that NY buildings are really high and it's cold and there are a lot of young people in the city and he's like close to 55 or 60, so NY is no sexy.

Miami is sexy. We now know the answer to the million dollar question.

Now we're both laughing and I'm saying the phrase in my head to the Right Said Fred song "I'm too sexy". We tell him that NY is the best and he needs to get over it. We tell him maybe he needs to head down to the Village next time he goes to NY but he doesn't know what we're talking about. We finish up our drinks head inside and fold our laundry.

Folding laundry is no sexy, I tell Jess. The first of about 800 things I would say is no sexy befroe we leave Berlin the next morning. Everything is no sexy, the soap, the giant Communist TV tower we can see from our window, packing our packs, my smelly Keen sandals (are definitely not sexy) and the 5 euro all you can eat breakfast.

We're off again to the former Soviet satellites - Latvia and Estonia.

Even they are no sexy!

Switzerland in under 24 hours!

This should be a quickie. Yep, Geneva in under 24 hours. Basically, we went there to do a geocache and get that country off our list. We got in late at night and headed right down to the main area to do a webcam geocache. We called Jess' family and they watched us and talked to us while we were on the webcam. Then we called my parents who were on their way out but stopped to watch us on the webcam. Pretty cool - it was in real time so it was kinda like a video conference except that we couldn't see them.

We headed back and went to sleep. Got up and walked down to the same area and it was pretty sweet. There's a fountain in the middle of the lake that shoot like 143 m high - behind it, are one set of snow capped mountains. They were awesome and made me want to stay and explore the countryside. We went to a cathedral that had an archeological site which was pretty sweet because they had stone from the first century. All of the stone was marked so that you know which century it was from. I went up in the tower and took some cool shots of the city. There was a Lutheran cathedral where Martin Luther used to preach but we didn't go see that. Saw where they held the Geneva Convention and then grabbed a steak sandwich - of course some cracked out lady has to try to get some dough from me, telling me a story about how she was out with her friends and she thinks someone either stole her money or she lost it and she needs to get a train to somehwere...bitch, I'm from NY, do I look stupid? Even better - do I look like I care?

We ate lunch - banged out our postcards and headed to the train station to get to the airport. Off to the Fatherland!

So this lady is walking her dog...

We got in to Brussels just fine. Got out of the train station and headed the wrong way. Got to the hostel but they wouldn't let us check in until 10. We put our bags in lockers and headed out for internet - of which no place was open and to walk around and find caches. There wasn't too much going on here.

In Europe there are plazas everywhere. Here they are called places. They are basically open spaces with buildings on all four sides - some important, more now touristy spots with restaurants. The Grand Place in Brussels is easily the coolest we have seen. The architecture is very cool and some of the buildings have gold plating or some other gold looking metal on them. This place was a definite must see here. It was awesome. As soon as we walked in it I was like - what is this!

We then walked around a little more and saw Manekin Pis. Yes, pis, you have it correct. It's this little statue that looks like a little boy peeing. People love it. I took few pictures but didn't see that big of a deal.

We then went to what was supposed to be one of the best places to get Belgian waffles - so I got one, with ice-cream and whipped cream, it was nothing that great. What did annoy me were the two fucking Roma women who asked us for money. For those of you who don't know, the Roma are these lost people who are all over Europe. The gypsies. They've been wandering for so long that no one knows where they are from. The women spend all day begging for money, often taking their kids with them. I have no idea what the men do because you never see them. First a younger one comes over and asks me for money in French - cause that's what they speak here. Sad if you're the French's bitch. I waive her away. Jess is getting food and comes back and two more show up. They regroup and decide who is going where - and the older more season one comes to us. She bumps into my arm and then starts talking we say no, and she's still talking. I'm checking my pocket just to be sure. We tell her no again and she begins walking away and being nasty. Oh, I'm sorry, I should give you money because you're fucking lazy and do nothing but beg. Get a fucking job. There's nothing wrong with you, you're not crippled - you're just ugly. I give enough money to people who don't work at home - I'm not doing it on vacation.

We ate at the hostel - they had a BBQ for fairly cheap. They even made veggie burgers for Jess. We then decided to head to a parking garage. Yeah, it sounds weird but if you go to P58 you can go to the 10th floor and get a FREE 360 panorama view of the city. So this lady is walking her dog and it stops and is taking a dump. The woman bends over and starts wiping the dogs ass. We think - wow, that's good for the first time in Europe, someone is going to pick up their dogs shit. Mind you, there is a ton of dog shit in every city - no one cleans up after their dog. Europe is so sophisticated. So the lady finishes wiping the dogs ass and throws the tissue paper in the street. Right in the street right in front of us. What the fuck is wrong with these people - she wipes the dogs ass and then tosses the paper. We walked around and stopped for a drink - I got some Belgian kreike beer - which is sweet and has something to do with the river that flows under the city. It's the only place that makes some kind of bacteria they use to male the stuff. It kinda tasted like a cherry tootsie roll lollypop - they serve it in a gay glass, which makes sense because the stuff is almost pink.

We continue on to P58 it's about sundown. There was another hostel up there doing some kind of weird drinking relay - it was kinda funny. The views were awesome and I was able to bag some nice shots. We went back to the bar at the hostel and had a few more drinks.

The next morning we got up to find internet and finally did. We found out two hostels canceled on us. One had broken pipes and the other fucked up the dates. They sent a confirmation with the wrong dates - but Jess didn't notice that the month was wrong. So we were leaving for Switzerland with no place to stay in Berlin the next day. Some quick research and calls and we got a spot at the Circus in Berlin. We've been at the internet place for 2 hours - there's no can and we both have to pee really bad. We basically make our way over to where we plan on eating - some macrobiotic place Jess wants to try. We both pee like mad and go eat. So there's only one plate - and its got a ton of healthy stuff. Some sea veggie shit (if it's underwater, we're not supposed to have access to it and eat it), beets and Japanese noodle stuff. It was ok. By ok I mean edible.

The hostel problems set us off schedule and we head over to the EU section of the city to tour the parliament - we go like 3 buildings and they say sorry, you've missed the tour. Fuck the EU.

We then went to the Weirtz museum - some maniac who wanted to be the national painter of Belgium. He painted some crazy stuff and had some nutty plan to take over Paris and make Brussles the center of the world or something. I dunno. Interesting - but, kinda wacky if you can't even defeat the French. We went back, grabbed our stuff and headed to the airport and on to Switzerland.

Vilnius - slightly shittier than Bratislava but shittier nonetheless

We got off the bus from the plane to head into the area where they check your passport and stuff and everyone is running. Running like there's a bear chasing them. Running like maybe when it was a Soviet satellite, they would shoot at you when you got off the plane or something, just for fun.

We didn't run. It was like 11 pm it was our second flight and we were pretty tired. Jess is panicking a little but not bad - just wondering why the hell everyone is running - is there only one cab? Are the communists coming back?

We get to the cabbie and he wants 45 Lits - about, for the cab to the hostel. That's not a tremendous amount and we figure it's the night rate and he says he'll throw on the meter, so we're ok with it. We hop in and head on the most treacherous cab ride in the history of the world. This guy is flying on these roads - fast as hell. I'm like - holy shit - and this coming from someone who's puked out of cabs doing 80 on the LIE, commandered CBs on Poughkeepsie cabs and told Atlanta cabbies what they can do to themselves. He must have gotten his driving skills from Speed Racer - which judging from Lithuanian TV must have just hit the airwaves.

We're zipping through the streets and even at 60 and dark, this place is fucked up. There's some really shoddy buildings - stuff falling down and shit's crumbling. Jess said she thought Bratislava (Slovakia - which we went to last year) had the lowest quality of life of all the countries in the EU - I said no way, it had to have the lowest of western european nations and highest of eastern.

We've reached a new low.

It's pretty beat up - but I guess that's all you can expect after years of abuse by the communist regime - or any regime for that matter. I dare the people in Lisbon to elect the communists!

The buildings on our block are MAD bummy. Crazy shitty looking. We get in and our room is way small. Possibly smaller than Paris - we can barely keep our packs on the table. I imagine that this is what prison cells look like in Siberia. There are a bunch of annoying young Spaniards there. This one bitch keeps clapping and talking really loudly - like she thinks she's a flamenco dancer in training and needs a lot of attention. We finally shower - which wasn't bad. Well at least mine wasn't - Jess had one of the button pushing ones - mine was regular and nice and hot.

We get up in the morning and head to the kitchen and there's a ton of food everywhere. So Jess goes to ask how much for breakfast and one woman (with another behind her) tells Jess that it is for a group that is staying there. So she says ok - and we go and get our cereal from our room to eat it. We're sitting and eating and the other woman - who heard Jess talking to the lady says to us - "The breakfast is for the group" - so I make a face and hold up my cereal bag and Jess says "We brought our own". The lady was there when Jess was told the info - what are we thieves or something?

OK - maybe I am since I stole some of their milk but fuck them - no one cleaned up and there was no place to sit!

We finished and headed out to walk around the town and find some caches. Which we did and didn't do. We found a bunch but there were a bunch we couldn't find. Some appear to be missing - which sucks because we spent some time there. Turns out there are about a million churches and not a lot of people there. There used to be 105 synagogues but then the occupations and the Jews were driven out and now there is only one. There is another spot in the city that tried to break away from the rest - it's more bummy than regular Vilnius. We headed back after walking around all day. We didn't do much in the way of tourist stuff - because there wasn't anything. We hit a church - which had been destroyed every century - except the last two. There were a bunch of smelly Hungarian men there - the common room stank. I just don't get this aversion to deodorant. We ended up eating at some Baltic chain restaurant - it had ethnic food - it was pretty tasty.

We had to get up MAD early. Jess spoke to the girl at the desk and she told her to tell her about 1/2 an hour before we needed the cab. Jess woke up in the morning and woke the girl up (4:15) and told her we needed the cab. She calls and says "It will be here in 8 minutes" and Jess is like, uh, you said half an hour before we need it. And the girl says "No, half an hour before you need to be at the airport, it's impossible to get cabs now". (because Vilnius is super busy at 4:15 am?) Now Jess is pissed, the girls is pissed and I'm pissed because we're rushing and there's no way we are going to be outside for the cab. Jess thinks the girls didn't understand her. I think Jess' Lithuanian isn't that good and she should practice more.

We're outside waiting - 10 minutes later than we're supposed to be. I head back in and make the girl call again - she does - two cab companies. As I'm leaving she says, "Make sure you're out there." I say, we've been for 20 minutes already - the cab never came. It may have but who knows. Cab comes and we get there - quickly - not as quickly as we got to the hostel. It's like 16 Lits - nice and cheap! There's nothing in the airport - well at least nothing is open, not really anyway so we just sit and wait for the plane to come.

Norway on a budget. A really expanded budget

Olso, Norway - the most expensive city in the world.

It was so expensive, we didn't do shit there. I'm pretty sure we just walked around and found geocaches. We grabbed some hobo lunch from the grocery store - I got some lame sandwich that they put corn on. Yes, corn. apparently this is nornal here. It must have cost about 5 Kroners per kernel thus justifying the price of the sandwich. Jess of course had some veggies from a can and some other stuff. Can't remember what.

I took a picture of Jess with the guard at the lame looking royal palace. She threw up the peace sign. From there we proceeded to walk around the city. That cost nothing. We walked around and then headed back to the hostel to hop on the internet. That cost about 1 buck for 5 minutes (we're in Belgium and it's back to that fucking annoying French keyboard). We ended up buying flights to Bergen where the Fjords are, rather than taking the train, which would have cost us each 130 bucks one way.

I think we napped then headed out to the grocery store for more hobo food to eat in our room while playing cards. We walked around at night and hit the sack because we had an early flight to Bergen.

We got to Bergen, which they call Baggin but it sounds like Bag End, Bilbo Baggins' house. I know I have a Brooklyn/LI accent but even I know there's an R in Bergen. But Baggin, uh, Bergen is a cute little town. It's definitely an old school fishing town and it reminded Jess of Oyster Bay, which is interesting since she also saw some guy who looked like Billy Joel on our Fjord tour. We walked down to the fish market and I got some overpriced sandwhich with smoked salmon and Jess got fish. I think we went back to the hostel and napped - then got up to buy food to make for dinner. I again got some smoked salmon - already cooked with some other stuff on it. It was pretty damn tasty, I have to admit.

At around 3 pm we hopped on the boat to tour the Fjord. The boat was packed and people crammed in the upper part so they could be on the outside and see. It was a small Fjord - not the huge one and it had only one small snow capped mountain off in the distance. It was still pretty cool though. I took a ton of pictures of course. There were people who were on the side having a BBQ and just enjoying the weather - which was getting cold. Not the Fjord and scenery I hoped to see but still pretty nice.

We got up and hung out in a park and slept on benches after pleying cards and then got the plane to Oslo and then on to Lithuania. We saw some woman collapse in the airport - not sure what happened but figured we shouldn't stay and watch. On to Vilnius, Lithuania.