A Kayaking Adventure

This past Saturday, my friend Maeve (thanks Maeve!) organized a bunch of us to go kayaking down in the Ardennes. I was a bit skeptical as to how cool this kayaking trip would be, I mean, come on, we are in Belgium - not exactly the outdoorsmans dream of a country. So I thought. We took an early train to Dinant - the city that I had visited before - and then hopped on a short connecting train to a town called Gendron - Celles, which consisted of....well....a hotel and a fry stand - and a few kayaking places. The weather was absolutely gorgeous, about 75 degrees and not a cloud in the sky.

After we successfully navigated our way to the Kayak place that we had made the reservation at, we assembled into teams, tucked our stuff into every nook and cranny on the kayak, and set off for a 12 kilometer kayak trip down the Lesse River in Southern Belgium. There were twelve of us in total, so we were given 6 double kayaks. These things weren't exactly top quality, but they would make do. One group swapped their kayak for a more luxury edition (for a few extra bucks) but little did they know that further down the line, their luxury kayak would be an upside down kayak...muahahahaha.

Ryan and I were in the same kayak, as he had very little kayaking experience and I kind of know what im doing. We were the only two guys on the trip, with ten other girls, so we were showing off our machoness by ripping by everyone in our kayak and creating as big of a scene as possible. The scenery at first was mediocre, reminded me of kayaking back home. But then we got into some pretty gnarly areas with some huge cliffs and big open fields. The water had quite a strong current, and even some rapids at some points. We came around one corner and BAM, there was a humongous castle just resting on a cliff ahead. WOW. Now it didn't feel like home. This was amazing.

A little further on and we encountered our first obstacle. A dam. Yep, no warning signs or anything, just a 10 foot dam in our way. Seeing a group of Belgian boyscouts ride over it with little problems gave me the courage to do so myself...no problem. Too bad some of the girls got stuck...



We continued on and pulled off at a beach to have some lunch and chill out for a bit. That was fun. And then continued on. By this time, our kayak was carrying about an inch of water in it, and all of our spare clothes were soaked....as well as my wallet and cell phone...whoops. And there it was again, another dam. This one was slightly more intimidating than the first, and there was no one in front of us to show us how it was supposed to be done. There was however, a restaurant at the shore with a bunch of people outside watching the kayakers go by. They all seemed to be shouting "Wrong WAYYY" to Ryan and I, but we didn't know why. Until we were flying off a dam and nearly capsizing. Apparently the one spot we decided to go down was the one spot you aren't supposed to go down, because this was a straight up drop off, not a gradual bump. Needless to say I almost bailed out of the kayak and lost my paddle at the bottom of the river.....

We continued on our way, when our friends in the luxury kayak collided with a rock and flipped over....HILARIOUS. Probably the funniest scene of my life.

We finished up the trip and dropped our kayaks at the rendevous point, which conveniently had a nice cafe where we enjoyed some frys and some beers to celebrate our victory of the Belgian river dams. As for the paddle, I played a smooth move and grabbed everyone we were withs paddles and threw them all on the truck..they didnt even notice :).

Hope you enjoy the pictures!

Trier

This past weekend was our final class trip - to Trier, Germany - which is the oldest city in Germany and was once the capital of the Roman empire. Unlike our other trips, we took a bus to this one, which was awesome. We first made a stop in Luxembourg to visit an WWII American Military cemetery and monument. It was truly one of the most beautiful things I have seen. The weather was amazing, about 75 degrees and sunny, so that certainly added to it. But it was amazing to see such a great monument and cemetery recognizing the support of the U.S. military, way out here in Luxembourg. We explored it for about an hour, and then had a picnic and got back on the bus to continue to Germany.

Luxembourg is a beautiful country. Who would have thought. The countryside is all rolling hills with vineyards and valleys and lots of windmills. It was really cool. When we pulled into Trier I was equally excited, because this place looked really cool. We visited many different things in Trier, the highlights include the ruins of an ancient Roman Bath, Karl Marx's house, the Porta Nigra - the old city gate, an old Amphitheater where gladiators used to duel, and a huge hill overlooking the city where our teacher let us get out of the bus and chill for a while. I actually got a sunburn! It was so beautiful out.

For dinner we went out to a real Roman restaurant, and had a more or less preset meal - interesting. When you think of Roman food, you probably immediately think pasta and pizza. Wrong. Romans ate some weird stuff. For an apertif (a "starting drink") we had some strange liquour mixed with honey and anise. No lie, it tasted like crap. I was able to finish it though, in time for our appetizer. Two sausages and some green beans. Sausages = delicious. Green Beans = Not. I have never eaten green beans prepared in a way that I didn't like until I had these. Grosssssss. We got to choose from a few things for our main meal, so I had the lamb steak in some sort of prune sauce. That was pretty good. Then dessert came, and I think one person actually was able to finish. It was literally pears covered in lard. NASTY! I asked the waitress to bring me the best German beer they had, and was disappointed as to what came back. Being in Belgium has certainly turned me into a beer snob. I mean yeah, it tasted okay, but come on, I thought Germans knew how to make beer.

For the night a group of us tried to go out, as it was the night before my birthday and we wanted to celebrate. Well, lets just say nightlife isn't the most important thing in Trier, in fact, there was none. So we went back to the hostel and went to bed, which was probably a good thing because we had to wake up at 8:30am the next day for breakfast.

Slept well, breakfast was good, then we set off for our final day in Trier. This is when we saw the inside of the Porta Nigra and Karl Marx's house. Interesting places. We had chinese for lunch, it was ok. Then we finally got to the part of the trip we were all looking forward to, Wine Tasting!

We took the bus a little outside of the main city, to a huge vineyard with very steep fields. We met this crazy German man who ran the vineyard (9th generation) and he insisted on taking group pictures every five minutes and would just steal your camera and do it. We learned about the process of wine making, and the different grapes and wines that this particular vineyard produced. The steep hills were used to grow Reisling grapes, which produce a sweet white wine. The hills are steep so that there is maximum sunshine on the grapes throughout the day. Under the ground there are rock slabs which break in the heat and release important minerals into the soil. We toured his vineyard, and saw his wine cellars and fermentation tanks. It actually was really interesting.

Then came the fun part - the tasting. Now how many people can say that on their birthday they got to go Wine Tasting in Germany, with perfect weather and a great group of people....this guy can. We first learned how to properly taste wine, hold it up to the sun, swish it, smell it, slurp it, swish it, drink it. We started with their dryest wine, a chardonnay, and then went up in sweetness to their dessert wine, and ended with their red wine. They supplied us with fresh baked rolls to eat between tastings. It was AWESOME. Matt and I purchased a bottle each for ourselves, and one for our host mom whose birthday is today. Great times.

The ride home was long, and the toilet tank was filled so we all had to hold in all the wine we just drank for a few hours - slightly uncomfortable. We watched Spartacus on the way home and all just chilled after a great weekend.

This was by far the best trip of my semester here. And who would have thought, this was the one I knew least about and didn't expect much from.

Kristina visits soon!

Home in less than three weeks - crazy!

Check the pics out.

Spring Break

Four train rides, two flights, four countries, and four different hostels. Spring Break is over. What a great time.


Our trip started off with 5 days in Paris for our Art class. This was the part of my spring break that I was least looking forward to (because we had to follow around our teacher all day) but it turned out to be one of my favorites. Paris is an amazing city, and I now understand what all the hype is about. True, the prices are absolutely ridiculous, I don't understand how anyone could ever live there, but around every corner is a post-card worthy picture or something that belongs in a museum. We spent most of our time looking at art in different museums, the Louvre and the D'Orsay museum most of all, and learning about the history of Paris etc. The Louvre was absolutely insane. We spent over 6 hours exploring it and only got to see about one tenth of the thing. I saw the Mona Lisa - which was probably the dumbest thing I have ever seen but apparently people like it or it wouldn't be so famous.
From Paris we took a day trip to Versaille, which was my favorite part of the Paris trip. The palace at Versaille was nice, but the thing that was most amazing to me were the acres and acres of gardens with hidden statues and ponds and even a small petting zoo. Versaille was an amazing place and thankfully we visited it on our only sunny day in France. We also visited the famous Pere-Lachaise cemetery which was beautiful - we saw Jim Morrisons grave!
One night a few of us with a Bentley Alumn who also studied abroad in Brussels but now works in Paris and learned about his job as a financial consultant for a MIS company. We got taken out to a nice pub after dinner and thankfully it was paid for by my class because my meal was over $45 U.S. dollars. Whoops!
Our hostel was pretty crappy in Paris, but it was alright. We were shoved into an 8 person room in the attic of this hostel - which just so happened to be filled with a bunch of punk ass younger school groups. There were seven of us from class in the 8 person room, but the 8th person just so happened to be an Alumn from Holy Cross in Worcester, Ma (the same school my girlfriend goes to). Small world huh? He was pretty cool and on our last night, before heading to the airport for Krakow with Matt and Caitlin, we ate dinner with him and had a few drinks.
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Krakow, Poland - After Paris was finished we were free to go and continue on with our own spring break plans. Matt, Caitlin, and I were heading out to Krakow, Poland, and had a very early flight so we spent the night at the CDG Airport in Paris. Needless to say we got no sleep and were all pretty cranky by the time the 5:00 am check in came around. But everything went smoothly and by 10am we were in Krakow. We had to take a train from the airport to Krakow, and the minute I stepped out of the train I immediately fell in love with Poland. This was my first true taste of Eastern Europe and it was a good one. You really got the feel that you were someplace foreign (more-so than western europe at least) and everything just seemed a bit grimy and mysterious (which I like). We checked into our hostel (which was absolutely amazing) and sat down with one of the hostel workers to figure out the city. She showed us how to get to the good sights, restaurants, clubs and bars, and shopping areas, and we set off for our first day in Krakow. We ate some traditional Polish perogies (sp) at a pretty upscale restaurant, and spent only about 9 us dollars for the meal. The transition from one of the most expensive cities in the World (Paris) to one of the cheapest cities in Europe (Poland) was awesome. We bought some souvenirs at this cool clothhall which had really nice handmade stuff for cheap prices. We explored the castle and the downtown area then called it an early night because we were exhausted.
The following day Matt and I hopped on a sketchy little shuttle to go visit the Auschwitz museum, which was very interesting but pretty depressing. We took a bus on the way home that seemed to stop in every little Polish village, which was nice because we got to see some of the countryside and rural areas of Poland. After we got back we hung out with some of the people we met at the hostel, a few American girls, three cool scottish guys, and an insane Australian. We went to a grimy club and hung out for the evening.
The next day it was a bit rainy so we spent the day just hanging around the hostel and ended up watching a movie...we all needed to relax at this point. Plus, that evening we were taking a night train from Krakow to Budapest so we figured we wouldnt get much sleep.
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Budapest, Hungary - One of the scottish guys decided to join Matt, Caitlin, and I on our trip to Budapest, so the four of us bought tickets for the night train from Krakow to Budapest. This was my first night train experience and lets just say it was pretty interesting. We were wedged into a tiny room with two three-level bunk beds on each side and a place where only about one person could stand. Our two other roomates were two american girls who were studying at Cambridge and were on spring break. Lets just say that it was a little bit cramped haha. I managed to get a few ours of sleep but was awoken at about 1 in the morning to the sound of people talking out the window. We must have been somewhere between Poland and the Czech Republic literally in the middle of no where. Outside the window all I could see were army men and some army vehicles. I had no idea what was going on it was pretty scary, but after about a half our the train continued on. We arrived in Budapest after about 9 hours of being on the train, and the time was about 10am.
Luckily we found our hostel very easily. We checked in with Olga - the owner of the hostel - who was really nice and definetely a hippy haha. She was playing some Ben Harper and made us feel right at home. Matt and I had gotten a two person room which was pretty sweet because we didnt need to lock up our stuff. We immediately headed to the thermal spas because we were all exhausted from not getting enough sleep on the train and decided that a day soaking in hotubs and sitting in steam rooms was in order. We went to the Gellert Baths which were absolutely amazing, and cheap too! We killed about 3 hours just getting good and relaxed and then went to dinner. I had goulash soup, a traditional hungarian meal, and Unicum, a traditional liqour. It was a great meal but during it I noticed that I was starting to get a sore throat and head ache. Uh oh. I went to bed early that night in hopes to kick the cold before it came but unfortunately I became pretty sick and didnt venture out too much the next day. We did see some really nice sights and climbed up a hill for a view over the whole city. Budapest is a beautiful place! We spent three nights in Budapest, and then took a day train to Vienna for the last stop on our trip.
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Vienna, Austria - Caitlin decided to stay an extra night in Budapest with her new scottish friend ;), so Matt and I headed to Vienna alone. One of the most memorable parts of my spring break was this train ride as I got to see the rural side of Hungary. It was interesting to see all of the old soviet communist block houses and really poor villages with dirt roads and self sustaining farmhouses. It was really neat. But as we approached Vienna, things became more modern and I felt as though I was back home in Boston.
Once again we found our hostel with ease, I guess I am just a great navigator haha. This hostel had a much different feel but was very nice as well. We had our own 5 person room with a kitchen and shower (as we were meeting up with Elena and Steph). The beds were unbelieveably comfortable, which might have actually been a bad thing because it made me not want to get out of it. We spent our days in Vienna visiting museums and palaces, and one afternoon we went to the Vienna Zoo! I was pumped to do something different than just sightseeing. One of the evenings we went to a Mozart concert and had a nice night watching the orchestra play while sipping on champagne! A cool place we went to was the Belvedere, which is like a smaller version of Versaille. We saw some cool paintings and gardens there. I also tried some weiner schnitzel which was pretty decent, and of course some austrian beers, which have nothing on Belgian beers at all.
I was amazed at how clean and efficient Vienna was. I didn't see any trash anywhere at all, and the metros and trains were spotless. It was quite a contrast with the grimy eastern europe cities we had just come from.
By the final day of our trip I was tired and ready to head back to Brussels. Our flight was quick and painless, and we got home around 10 oclock at night. All in all, a good trip!

Many people probably wonder what my favorite cities were so here ya go:
1) Krakow
2) Paris/Versaille
3) Budapest/Vienna

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Tommorow my mom comes to visit! I am not sure what we will do but it should be fun!

I will upload pictures ASAP!

Day Trip - Dinant

Matt and I had the idea to visit Dinant - a small town in southeast Brussels, located on the outskirts of the Ardennes mountains - so we woke up this morning and headed to the train station at around 11:00am. We took the train to Dinant, took about an hour and a half.

The train ride was sweet. It was my first time heading in this direction and it was real pretty. We first passed through some woods, which I haven't seen since I have been here. Then came the pastures and rolling green hills with horses and lambds roaming about. There were windmills all over the place, and at one point we saw about fourteen parachuters in the sky doing god knows what. It was a pretty cool sight. Once we approached the city of Namur (the biggest city in southeast Belgium), we began to see the Meuse river - the same river that splits Dinant in half. The views were starting to get prettier and prettier, and a little more down the track and we came to Dinant. We had to wait for our friend Chase who took a later train then us, so Matt and I sat down and had a bite to eat at a small restaurant. I had some chicken wings and frites - it really hit the spot. When Chase got into town we walked across the bridge into the main city area. The views were absolutley insane. Dinant is a small town that lies next to a fairly large river. The city is looked over by a huge fort at the top of a pretty jagged cliff. Underneath the fort is the famous citadel with a crazy onion-shaped top. We wanted to go to the fort, so we took a crazy old cable car up. When we got to the top (about 1 minute later) we had an incredible view over the town. It was a little bit hazy out so my pictures weren't as great as I hoped, but they are still pretty sweet. We took a guided tour of the inside of the fortress, and it was really cool. We got to see where they would shoot guns from and the dungeons etc. After our tour we took some more pictures and then went to this playground that was also at the top of the cliff and messed around for a little bit on the jungle gym. I felt like a ten year old. About two hours after we first made it to the top of the cliff we decided to head back down to the town. We decided to take the stairs this time, all 500 of them. It was a good idea at first until my legs felt like they were goin' to fall off. When we reached the bottom we were hungry again so we found a cool little restaurant to eat at with tables outside along the river. I had a nice meal consisting of an omelette with ham from the Ardennes (so damn good), and a nice cold trappist beer. Not a bad cap to a good day. For dessert we went across the street and got waffles with icecream and hot fudge. I think I don't have to eat for a while now.

Chase took off and me and Matt stayed for another hour and walked around the city for a bit. Aside from the church and the fortress, there isn't much to Dinant. But I had a great time taking pictures because the city was so damn sweet looking. The train ride home was nice and relaxing and I zoned out to some music for the majority of it. I noticed a lot of motorcyclists in this city - everywhere you turned people were out on their bikes. I'm not sure if it was just because the weather was nice, or if there is a large population of bikers in this town. I also saw alot of roadbikers, and it finally began to show that Belgium actually does have a large population of roadbikers - something that I always here about. In Brussels it isn't so "biker friendly" so I never see too many. Matt and I decided that we are going to make another trip back down to the Ardennes when it gets a little warmer out to do some kayaking or hiking. It is a really cool place!

One week till spring break! I have to start preparing myself for a crazy trip. Hopefully I will update again by then. Make sure to check out my pictures from Dinant!

Been a while....

Well sorry for taking long between my last post and this one - I have been super busy with midterms/papers/trip planning etc.

Matt and I finally are almost done planning our spring break - should be ridiculous. Our first five days will be spent in Paris, France with our class. We will fly from Paris to Krakow, Poland and stay there for a few nights, take a train to Budapest, Hungary, stay there for a few days, and then take a train to Vienna, Austria and spend the rest of our break there and then fly home.
In Krakow we are planning on visiting the Auschwitz Nazi Camp for a day, and Budapest we are definetely hitting up their famous thermal spas and massage places. May take a day trip to Bratislava, Slovakia when we are in Vienna - not sure yet.

Midterms went alright. I am still kind of pissed that this school feels alot more like school than I expected. Most kids go away to study abroad and barely have to focus on their schoolwork but Vesalius isn't too much different than Bentley. Oh well, I am here to study anyways I guess.

I never actually made it to Barcelona, I came down with some weird virus and ended up being in the doctors instead of the airport. Hopefully I can get down there sometime in April or something.

My mom is coming to visit me in the middle of April, right after spring break, so I will be excited to show her around Brussels etc.

I am sure I am going to have some crazy stories to share after my Spring Break trip, so bear with me if I don't post for a few more days.

Later.
Tom