Leaving Sweden

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Trip Start Sep 19, 2007 Previous
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  Vaxjo, Sweden
Saturday, November 17, 2007

Hello Gang, Wassup?

Well as promised we are going to send a bit more of an update today. If you thought we had a lot to say before imagine what we have to say now that we´ve taken such a long break from updates. AHHH! So if you have only a little time here's a pointform version (Poland: thief, Prague: women, beer and hockey, Berlin: Rain, gay bar, Copenhagen: hash, Sweden: couch surfing).

But if you're at work and looking to waste time read on:

Last time Tim wrote we had just arrived in Krakow, Poland. We spent 5 days there. Had a great time, ate perogies and vegan food, checked out a castle, walked around, drank coffee and found an english bookstore. We really enjoyed it. We had a private room in the hostel (which we always have) but this one was equipped with bunk beds so we spent 5 nights sleeping with our matttesses on the floor because it's really hard to share a single bed with anyone even if it is the baby (who still likes to sleep perpendicular to us or on our heads). The biggest news from Krakow was that a teenage boy walk into our room one night while we were playing with the baby, said something and walked out. We thought he'd just mixed up where his room was and I was more embarrassed by the state of our room than anything else. Later when I went downstairs to use the phone I couldn't because a young girl was using it to cancel her travellers cheques. Apparently that teenage boy had taken her wallet and another girl's cellphone. So I suppose we narrowly avoided being robbed though unlike those girls we never leave our room unlocked so I suppose we didn't really narrowly avoid anything. I just wanted to seem dangerous.

Then we moved onto Wroclaw, Poland which isn't pronounced the way you'd think, the W's sound like v's, the l actually has a slash though it so it sounds like an f and don't forget to roll your r. Icompletely gave up trying and began calling it 'this city' while I was there. Anyways we went there to get ourselves closer to Prague but we soon found out that the train running from Poland to Prague through Wroclaw had been cancelled. Wroclaw began to be a disappointment. We were there on All Saints Day (Nov 1) so everything we wanted to see was closed. Wroclaw continued to be a disappointment. I tried to buy pastries using my regular tourist hand gestures and the store keeper mocked me to the point where I left feeling shamed and without a sugary treat. We HATED Wroclaw. Well maybe hate is too strong a word. But we were defintitely feeling trapped there without too much to occupy our time so we decided to treat ourselves to a nice dinner. We went out to a place with a coat check, candles and waiters in tuxedos. This didn't change Mirabel's messy eating behaviour. We even saw a picture proving that the late Pope and other 'celebrities' had eaten in this exact restaurant. Maybe not the best place to take a baby but we felt Wroclaw owed us. After a great 3 course meal we started warming up to Wroclaw. The next day our bus to Prague left more than an hour after it was suppose to - we hated Wroclaw again.

Prague rocked. Museums, castles, good, cheap beer and beautiful women. You are all getting 'I love Czech women' t-shirts' (ha ha). Tim fulfilled a dream of taking in a European hockey game though I'm not sure in his dream his wife and baby made him miss 2 goals and most of the first period. Ooops. Mirabel was scared at first but when she realised that you could screech and clap as loud and as much as you wanted she became a real fan. And I got a good, cheap beer served by a beautiful Czech woman so Tim's dream come true soon became a family dream come true.

Berlin was cold and rainy. If you woke up on a Sunday to weather like we had in Berlin you would most likely grab the paper and a coffee and jump back in bed. But since we only had a few days there I put plastic bags on my feet and snowpants on the baby and we headed out. When we couldn't find the musuem we were looking for and we were completely drenched we ran into a department store restaurant (as Tim says 'it's not exactly the Sistine Chapel but it'll do). We drank coffee and came up with a new plan. The weather let up enough that we were able to see some sights including the East side Gallery which is the longest, still standing section of the Berlin wall. Oh and I should say that every single meal we ate in Berlin was AWESOME! Especially the one in a gay bar where we met a couple of 'bears' who were early for their weekly meeting. We know this because I asked what their group was - I thought it was a scrabble night, still naive after all this travelling.

From Berlin we went to Copenhagen. Took Mitabel to the free state Christiana but didn't let her buy a brick of hash as a souvenir. The weather continued to be pretty miserable. But we found an amazing museum that was free, had changetables, a lunch room where we could eat our packed lunch (very importnat to the budget travellers) and an interactive children's area that Mirabel loved except for the life like looking horse that we tried to put her on in order to take a photo. She screeched and clung to us - my little animal rights activist.

Finally we began mooching our way through Sweden and have been treated so well that we are wondering why we didn't do this the whole time. It's cold here but not rainy so we've been able to really enjoy it. We went skating on an outdoor rink and I went to a spinning class with one set of hosts. It's amazing how much easier those are when you don't understand 'crank up the resistance'. Despite the fact that we haven't had to pay for accomodations we are still spending our daily budget as everything here is quite expensive. We leave tomorrow and if you want to know where we're going you'll just have to stay tuned...

We have 2 weeks left, only 2 weeks. And I think just like the rest of the trip we have mixed feelings about it. We are looking forward to being home and sad to be leaving, it's really hard for us to remember that people work but in a short time we'll be working joes again ourselves.

Please place your souvenir orders asap.

See you soon

Much love from all of us to all of you.

Rachel, Tim & Mirabel

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