If you don’t follow me on twitter or we aren’t friends on facebook then you might not know I went for a little adventure over the Christmas holidays. I had a great time interailing and couchsurfing and met loads of lovely, funny people. I left Paris on 20th December; I got the train to Vienna in Austria. It was a long journey and I had a bit of trouble actually getting my first train. The thing with interailing is that some trains require a reservation as well as your standard ticket. Of course I didn’t realise this and faced having to buy a whole new ticket for that leg of the journey, a ticket costing around €200 for one way!!! I obviously was in no position to pay that so the woman at the desk said my last hope was to speak to the train manager who might be able to give me a last minute reservation. Luckily he was super friendly and gave me a reservation for €20 instead 🙂
I was in Vienna with mum, dad, G and my cousins Bo and Li and aunty and uncle. And their adorable dog Thomas 🙂 We had a lovely traditional Christmas and there were even real candles and sparklers on the tree. They’re not exactly safety conscious in Austria… We went to a Christmas market, baked cookies, played on the Wii, went out for a meal and did all the usual Christmassy stuff. My uncle Bernd took me for a ride on his motorbike (with heated seats, sat nav and a radio. very fancy) round the city and up the mountains.
I then went to Budapest, Hungary on Boxing Day. It’s such a beautiful city and I can’t wait to visit again when I have more time. I met up with 4 different couchsurfers and saw lots of the city. Next stop was Bratislava, Slovakia. There was heavy snow and lots of delayed trains and buses but my hosts apartment was so nice so I didn’t stress for long. We stayed in for a drink because we couldn’t face leaving the warmth. I learnt some Slovakian words and spent the day seeing the pretty buildings before giving up and going to the shopping centre because the light snow was literally turning into a blizzard. I then travelled to Amsterdam, The Netherlands. I’d planned to go to Prague or Krakow but I was running out of time. More train delays, cancellations and very nearly getting run over by a van before I reached Nina’s apartment. 4th country to see each other in less than a year; I’d say we’re pretty international buddies by now. I saw Georgie, her bf Chad, their friend Moniek and her bf Matthieu the next morning. We explored for a while; everything in Amsterdam is very in your face. The next day I saw Yasmin and 3 of her friends from uni. We had a long but fun day and welcomed in the new year. I’ll upload all of my photos from this trip so you can get more of an idea of what we got up to. 🙂
I made a little video of parts of my trip^^. Now planning my next trip (and also saving money as I am broke)
happy new year by the way!
Mary x
Mary Mandefield 