Cyprus, Greek Side, Take One:

I woke up in time to get a few shots of the apartment I was staying in. Alexia's is so nice!



The view was also very pretty! Seemed a bit of a shame to be leaving now that the weather was improving here...



... but I did. I arrived at Jon and Josh's hotel right on time since there was no more bus strike :p They told me that they were actually unable to book flights for today since Jon's credit card was having problems. They were looking at just going to the airport and trying standby. The tickets had raised in price and Josh was freaking about that. He was saying that actually he would try to change the date of his flight to Amsterdam and just stay in a hostel there until he had to go home to Vancouver. I didn't want him to stay behind!

We all had to go to the airport regardless though, so off we went. Jon bought last minute tickets for the both of us (he convinced me by saying I only should have to pay him what the price was from last night) and Josh tried to talk to people about changing his flight. I tried to convince him that he should come too, but he said it was just too expensive. He had to wait till 2pm to talk to someone about changing the flight time, and Jon and my flight was at one so we had to run!

I have never been so late for a flight. We got on the place around 12:45 or something, it was soooo close. Next thing I knew I was in Cyprus! I didn't even know it was it's own country until they stamped me out in Greece.

Jon travels a LOT differently than I. I wanted to look for bus schedules, he wanted to look for taxi's. He said we can stay in a hotel the first night his treat, then we can go online and look for something more affordable (my idea). So we hopped in the taxi and ended up in Agia Napa at some place called Adam's Beach Hotel. I hadn't been in a hotel since last year with my parents. It was nice, but they wanted to charge for laundry so I started putting shampoo in the bathtub and washing my clothes...

This is the view from the room!





So I put the laundry up on the balcony to dry since it was so warm. It was 30 degrees at least! I was so happy with the weather :D



The hotel had a bunch of pools, but also it's own beach cove thing. It was quite pretty, and it was still warm enough to go check out the water:



For some reason my toe started itching like nuts. It wasn't bleeding or anything, so I don't know why. Maybe it was the pina colada... I made a face:



Jon posed too



I was able to go into the water at night it was so hot! I was trying to wrap my head around the fact that it was mid-late October and I was swimming in the ocean! The water was clean looking too, which was a plus.



Jon tried to get one of me with the full moon in the background, although it is blurry. You get the idea though...



After that I went to take the LED hula out for a spin. TONS of photos were taken, so it's impossible to post them all on here.... I'll just post four and if you like these types then you should click on one and it will take you to the album where you can look at all the photos. I should be organizing them into a hula hoop/night shot album as well to see the past ones too :)









I was pretty stoked about using the hoop, but I got hungry so we went to eat something. I was pretty pleased with my day of warmth and swimming and hooping, and I think you can tell:



After this we had some wine, but after wine and traveling I got sleepy and fell asleep on the corner of the bed. I was way to the side so I didn't give my buddy the wrong impression. That is of course after I rolled around on the stuffed animals (he won those while bored with Josh on their cruise) hahahahaha:



Then it was Law and Order then sleeeeep.

One Rainy Day in Athens.

I woke up to sunshine, which was very welcome! It was supposed to rain all day, even thunderstorm, but it was nice so far :)

I got ready slowly, while talking to Josh. He and Jon were already in Athens, so that was cool. They were going to take off and see some sights, then take a ferry to Mykonos the next morning. I was to text them whenever I went into the city.

I had no phone to do that, so I'd have to get a phone number first. I went out the door and made my way to the bus stop. I still had that one Euro to take the bus in. When I got to the bus stop however, I was told by a nice woman that the buses were on strike today until 5pm, so there was no bus!

I was pretty far away from the metro. Even for my standards. I didn't feel like sitting around the house until 5pm though, so I had little else to do but start following the bus stops mapless into the city.

It had started to rain. Turns out living on a hill in Athens when it's raining means that the streets are insanely flooded and there is no way to cross the street except to jump across in water up to your ankles (I am not exaggerating!). I was soaked in no time. I had left my umbrella in the cab the night before, so I was borrowing Alexia's!

I walked and walked and walked. I stopped into a phone store, but they wanted my passport to get a SIM card, so I couldn't get a phone. That worried me, since I had no way of getting a hold of Jon and Josh now. They had a Canadian phone so I couldn't harass people to let me send a text or call local.

I continued to walk. The phone people thought I was nuts to try and walk to the metro. It was another 5k there or something. I did it though, and made it into the city center!

I walked around trying to remember the name of the hotel they were staying at. I took a photo of this church while I was acquiring a map and such:



I wasn't going to remember so I figured best to just explore and go to some sights myself! The most obvious one is the Acropolis. I wandered some streets in the old town making my way towards the mountain. I walked near some charming white houses on the way up:





The view from the top was spectacular, but it looks rather dreary in the picture. The rain was making it dark and misty. There was a Chinese tour group there, but not many other people. It was kind of cool to run around in the rain:



The clouds actually made for a cool intense look for the Pantheon I thought!



here is another angle:



I tried a couple shots doing the "hold the camera out" thing... I think it worked!



Now here I was walking back down, and you see the pink umbrella? I went over to her and started talking to her:



I asked her if I could borrow her phone if I gave her 50 cent for an international text. Turns out she had no phone to use, so that sucked. We did keep chatting though, and since she was also traveling alone, we decided to walk around together.



Turns out the girl was from Argentina! She was working in Rome, so she learned Italian and worked in an ice cream shop :)



We walked to a rocky thing and it had some nice views as well:



Too bad the weather disrupted the picture:



I tried to edit the photo to make it clearer:



Next we walked to the ancient Agora. There was a museum there with these lion heads on the roof. They were spouting out water off the roof - even thousands of years old this still worked! It was so amazing to see; I was even a little happy it was raining!

It was hard to get a shot of it though:



Sofie, the Argentinian girl, was super impressed with all the old statues. I was as well of course! She would look at all the names though, and exclaim how old they were and took more photos than me:



We continued to wander. Being around her was forcing me to appreciate where I was more, which was good. Normally the weather would be coercing me to gun through the place taking photos and walking super fast. I slowed down, enjoyed, and absorbed:





There was a mini pantheon thing here!



Here I am! I could get a photo in!



So after the Agora it was time to check the internet to see if there was any news from my friends from Vancouver. There was a free internet spot in a store in the center of town, so we walked there to check it out. We found these computers in a little nook! We finally got it to work, and it turns out that my friends were at the hard rock cafe very close to our computer nook. I ran out but they weren't there! I checked their hotel next since I had looked up where it was, but they were not there either...

I had no idea what to do next. I went back to the computer nook but the girl was gone and the computers were in use. I stood around and tried to use my phone again. Somehow the Hungarian number sent a message (it hadn't the last 4 times I tried to use it) and I got a response saying they were in the lobby! I went to meet them and we went for food and beer.

I hadn't eaten all day, so one beer got to me while I ate my sandwich. They were going to Mykonos by ferry at 730am, so I had to get back to see if I could even get there in time... The timing would be perfect for Theresa and Lucien's arrival, but would I make it?

I went back to the house and got online. Law and Order was on TV, so I watched that and Sex and the City with Alexia and Dimitris while I talked to Jon online figuring out what to do.

The dog was being so cute with it's favourite pillow:



So the weather was looking iffy for our potential locations. There was, however, a flight to a different island named Cyprus for almost the same price as a ferry! It was only ten euros different, but the weather was ten degrees warmer. It also left at 1pm, so nobody had to wake up early. I was told to meet them at the hotel at 10am to go to the airport. I went to bed with a new island to go to tomorrow.

Nikola Tesla, Belgrade Nightlife, and 30 hours of Traveling...

After sleeping in, I typed away and decided to try to get into the Nikola Tesla museum again. Hopefully there would be no crowds of children. It wasn't the best weather, so I took my umbrella and went down to the city center with Indre.

As I was walking, I noticed a large group of children walking towards the museum again.... I walked faster in hopes that I would make it in time and they were really going somewhere else. I arrived in the museum right as they were supposed to give a tour, but once again the damn children were first. Luckily it wasn't the last tour this time, so I was able to come back in an hour or two and take one later. I decided that this was okay since I had brought my laptop to putter in a cafe.

I found one with wifi right down the street. It had nice atmosphere, and the waiters were very dressed up in suits. They poured my afternoon beer very daintily and I enjoyed some Greek salad, bread, and beer while I updated this very blog for almost two hours or something. These things take time!

I went for the 4 o clock tour, and I was surprised how fast it went! The guy just walked around to a couple demonstrations and turned on switches so we could see what his different inventions did. The models were actually cool, and you could see lightning! I learned more about his life than I had already known, so I was happy despite the smallness of the museum and the quickness of the tour. They claim to have his cremated ashes after his body was exhumed, and I looked at his apparent ashes and urn. I have no idea if it was real though.

The museum didn't take up as much time as expected, so I made it to the train station a little earlier than expected! I was happy to find an international travel desk open, but there was a line. I ended up waiting in line for over 20 minutes I think. I wanted to know about train prices, and once I found out I couldn't even buy it because I didn't have my passport on me!

At least I knew though. I came back after stopping by the mall to look for Indre. The mall was massive! Hogar was home and we chilled and got ready for the party. I changed my mind and thought about going to Nis in the day tomorrow, then taking a train late at night? I wasn't sure. I went to get some food and beer and then people started showing up! Soon enough the house was full of people and music and good times. I attempted at Foosball, which ended up being tons of fun! The party continued but then it was time to check out some other Belgrade nightlife. At some point apparently I took a photo of his wall:



The first place we went to wanted cover charge even so late, so we went to another one that was full and smokey and lively. It was a good taste of Belgrade, and a fitting way to spend my last night. By the time Filip Indre and I were leaving, the buses were running again so we made it back okay. Hogar had been cleaning and my bed was already back down in the living room which was awesome! I was able to drink as much water as possible and go to sleep.

We all woke up very late though. I had a headache but no stomach issues, so I assumed it was from the smoke in the bar more than the alcohol since I had lots of water before bed. I ate some food, and decided to not go to Nis on the way, but just rest and watch Law and Order then take the night train after all.

Indre was going to go to a movie festival with international movies, and I wasn't sure if she would be back in time, so I packed my stuff quickly and hopped out the door with her. It was still raining, so we hid under an umbrella and ate before watching a quiet movie about migrant workers in China. I wanted to stay for more, but it was time to go to the train station!

I managed to buy a ticket in time, then went to a store to get food for the ride. I found the train no problem, but when I got on I decided I wouldn't eat on it really. It was very old, and a little smelly, and dirty. I found what I thought was an empty spot and laid down my scarf to lie on and tried to sleep. There was one other person in my compartment after all, some old guy that I guessed didn't speak English and he just sat there then lay down on the opposite chairs and went to sleep as well. Further on an old lady with a headscarf and everything came and slept while he sat there and eventually left.

Before I knew it, it was morning. It went by surprisingly fast. The Serbian border people came and the old lady left. They didn't even stamp me on exit! They just looked at my passport, bored, and gave it back. Next was the Macedonian border which thankfully stamped me in so it didn't look like I stayed in Serbia too long. I woke up a couple hours later and I was amazed at what I saw!

It was so beautiful! It totally made the oldness and slight smell okay. Now that it was daylight, the train actually didn't look aaaas shabby:













The train stopped at a random station and everyone was told to get off. I wasn't sure what was going on until someone explained that there was flooding on the tracks near the border, so we had to go by bus the rest of the way to Thessaloniki.

While everyone was getting off, I noticed a guy lugging around a serious backpack. He looked to be a fellow dirty traveler, so I walked up to him and started talking. He was Aussie, and was going to Thessaloniki from Skopje where he had worked for a few months. He was going to start school in Munich! We sat together on the bus and enjoyed the lovely border crossing delays, and a flooded squat toilet thing at said border. Finally, we arrived in Thessaloniki.

I was 15 minutes late for the train I wanted. It would have taken 4 hours, but the next one was in an hour and a half and would take 6! I would arrive in Athens at 10:46pm. I was not impressed. The Aussie was catching a flight to Munich, so he had to go to the airport. I waited around and took a MUCH NICER TRAIN. I was feeling like I was back in Europe.

I arrived in the night, but it was easy to find the metro. I had instructions written on how to get to Alexia's house, so I found the subsequent bus stop easily too. It was raining, so I stood there figuring out the bus schedule with my umbrella and pack. One out of three buses were still running, and the very last one for that was coming in 20 minutes.

I was almost there! After over 24 hours straight of traveling!

The bus was starting to annoy me after it was over 10 minutes late. I had been standing there over half an hour, and it was past midnight on a Sunday. I didn't want Alexia to have to stay awake waiting much longer! People at the bus stop had been very helpful though. One girl assured me I was going the right way, and looked up the schedule to make sure. A second girl was waiting there ages as well, and asked me where I was going. Turns out we were impatiently waiting for the same nonexistent bus, and getting out at almost the same place!

At this point I had literally one euro to my name. I hadn't had a chance to take out Euros, and I had run out of Dinars in Serbia too. I had found a 2 Euro coin, and used one of it to buy a ticket for the metro. She was going to take a cab and offered to take me with her. I told her I had no money at all, but she said she was going the same way anyway so it didn't matter.

We chatted in the cab, and it turns out the girl had some family in Whales as well, so she had an accent when she spoke English. She was really nice, and together with the cabbie we found the address where I was staying. I was soooo grateful since it was pouring and I was very tired at this point. I was looking forward to a shower and a bed, and of course to see me friends!

They were happy to see I'd made it okay! I also had no functional phone while waiting at the bus, so I had no way to reassure them I was alright. Dimitris made me a snack, then Alexia, Dimitris and I talked a while before I hopped in the shower. There was a nice guy from Taiwan staying with them as well that had gone to bed earlier too. I was SO HAPPY to be clean, and in a bed instead of on a train!

Novi Sad!

While enjoying beers on a terrace the previous night, Dominic and I had made a plan to go to Novi Sad the next day. I had checked train times when home the night before and agreed on the ten o clock train... that meant getting up with the rest of the house so it working out well.

I woke up at 8:30 AGAIN! I was even okay! I don't know how I am doing this. I think the warmth of the daytime vs. nighttime is making my body happy with being awake during the day instead of night. I really don't know though. Either way, I made it out the door in time and arrived at the train station exactly when I said I would be there (9:45am). We bought tickets and hopped on the train with time to spare. The train miraculously left on time, and we were off! Dominic had a lot less sleep than me, but told me about his schedule back in Vienna and how much he worked... so it made this seem like nothing.

Dom is in the service industry back in Vienna, working at 5 star hotels in the mountains doing bar work and other service stuff. He works the dreaded split shift often (I remember those) and has worked 40 hours consecutively (wtf). At the verrry young age of 20, he might become a fine-dining bar manager already. Basically he works his ass off so getting 4 hours sleep is okay. It was interesting talking on the train :)

We got out of the train station and found our way towards the city center by guessing. There is a big street right in front of the train station so we just started going down that assuming it would take us where we need to go. We found a market, and some cute side streets with hidden gems like this ex-coffee place:



The apartments we could see from the train were more brightly coloured than the bland grey in Belgrade, but there were still communist looking buildings. Not sure if this looks communist really, but certainly grey:



We randomly ended up finding the center! There was a big pedestrian street right in the middle, with a cute trolley cafe in the beginning:



As you can see, the buildings were painted different pastel colours on this entire street. A big church came into view which really helped with our mapless navigation:



Here is the main street, which was very nice! I was expecting a cute city center, but this was even nicer than what I was expecting. After the rough and smooth of Belgrade this was a totally different Serbia:



Still found some street art! I am thinking of putting together an album of just graffiti art I've photographed after I am home:



Dom and I were just taking random streets around that looked cool. Alleys, streets, hidden things and obvious things. He didn't like to walk with maps and after looking at one on display somewhere I decided it was too small to get lost in anyhow, so we just wandered. It was great! I love this style of aimless traveling. We found a street full of cafe's with silly things like pots hanging and this one with big fake lamps outside (which I am pretending to turn on in case you were wondering):



There were some lovely buildings hanging out everywhere. Don't forget to check out the random people that get in the pictures haha:



This is quite possibly the most intriguing painting on a building I have ever seen. I have no idea what it means, what it's for, what it is, or why it's there. WTF. It reminds me of a frog, but I don't know. Someone please tell me because I really like it! I should have asked someone!!!



I wanted to go through the park (I always go through city parks if I can) but Dom was not seeming too interested. We went through anyway mwahaha. I explained my opinion that if you see lots of people using the parks then I feel like a city is more alive and engaged. If nobody are in the parks, then they are probably just going to work, going home, and sitting in front of the TV or the like. Not alive. So I go through the parks.



With no guidance, we found the bridge to take us to the fortress. Dom hadn't heard of EXIT festival before, so I told him about it and that it's in this fortress thing:



The other side of the bridge looked like stepping back in time. It was shabby, old, peeling, and awesome! Dom described it as an open air museum:



You can see the roofs caving in on themselves a little



Since I was with another person I was able to get a photo! Woo!



This is the first time I've seen a graffiti drawing of the city it's in! I thought it was a cool and original idea. Someone should paint a street art version of Vancouver somewhere in Vancouver. It's very clever :)



We walked down this street towards the big yellow bridge building and saw this funny sign. Translation error I assume?



We found the way up some stairs to the fortress. On the way up there was a view point with a single bench sitting facing the city. The view was spectacular! You could see all the roofs of the old part we had just walked through:



It was cloudy so the sky didn't turn out so well, but oh well:



Here is the bench. I sat on this and looked around for a while. It was really peaceful:



On the top of the hill, you could walk next to the clock tower:



I enjoyed these glasses:



We walked around the entire place. I could see all the old walls and stone, and there were broken down guns and cannons from wars strewn about:



The view from the other side was also quite nice. You could see the river and what I assume is a park. I was trying to imagine a big festival taking place around me with sunshine and chaos. It was still very nice without the insanity too of course. We practically had the place to ourselves!



After the fortress it was time to eat. I was starving, but we had passed some place that looked pretty cool when we were walking around. It had bookshelf wallpaper. We walked by the tourist center by accident and went in to get a little map (my idea - I like maps!) and ask about lunch in case there was somewhere better unknown to me.

The bookshelf place still seemed best, so we went on a little hunt. It actually took a while to find, but surprisingly it was my orientation that led us back. I must be getting better at this since I had this weird feeling about the general direction and it was right. Could I be developing a sense of direction!?!?!!?!?!?!

So we ate. Ate and ate and ate. We had a big lunch, desert, and two pops and the bill was still less than 12 euros for both of us! I ate like a king and it was still less than a normal meal in Vancouver. It wasn't even fast food - the place looked swanky and nice:



Here is Dom, the super-waiter:



Here I am:



I waddled out of that place. I had this huge chocolate/vanilla ice cream crepe for desert and that was eaten out of yummyness not hunger haha. We had already walked the entire city (the tourist store guy confirmed this) so we wandered a bit then sat our asses right back down somewhere different for after lunch/dinner coffee.

Eventually it was time for a FOX photoshoot on the way to the train station! Here he is hiding, can you spot the FOX?



Dom approached these girls to get a photo with FOX. It seems FOX is a very good way to meet girls! They liked him. Dominic now wants to get a traveling buddy hehe:



FOX posed near this church too:



We went in a second hand store on the way, since Dom admitted that he had never bought second hand clothing before. I was shocked! He was newer to couchsurfing, and had stayed a hostel once but before that was always nice hotels. He felt that now he was going to be a traveler, he should buy second hand clothing to fit the role lol. He was blown away about prices being so cheap in there, it was funny to see. I don't know how much he thought second hand clothing costed, maybe he never thought about it.

Meanwhile, FOX was enjoying some time out and about! I zipped him into my jacket for a while, until it started unzipping on it's own and I deemed it unsafe. Then I held him.



We made it to the train station and the ticket was even cheaper on the way back!

The train, however, was late. It was more ghetto, which explained the discount, but the seats were more squishy. I was getting tired and fell asleep on the train for a few minutes while I listened to my German lesson thing. Most of the time I was learning though :)

We arrived in Belgrade and it was raining there. Ugh. It wasn't raining hard though, so that was okay. It was a shorter walk to the bus stops where Dom and I parted ways. A dog with a collar had followed us half the way, and now followed me across the street. I was wondering where he belonged since there are so many strays in Belgrade and he was not. I heard barking.

Eight fucking strays came running through the park. Many of them were really big dogs too. The smaller collared one barked back but there were four against one while the others stood back and barked. It was a fur frenzy with biting, barking, and growling. I thought for a minute that smaller dog was about to get torn apart literally. They were biting it all over and it was running in circles biting back and growling. It seemed to be holding it's own though, since all of them would back off occasionally while it bared teeth at them.

Once it would turn though they would attack again. It was a busy street beside them too, with a fence in between the two directions except at the designated crossing. I waited until the dog was backed off and growling again then I ran and yelled at the strays. They backed away more, but then they started barking at me. That's when I realized maybe eight big dogs might be able to take me out too. I didn't want to leave the other dog though. I started slowly walking away monitoring the situation, and I saw the collared one run across the street without getting hit until the fence. It stood there and the strays didn't dare cross the street. I figured he knew the way back from there so he was okay. I got on the bus and went to the house.

Nobody was back yet though, since Hogar wasn't supposed to be back for another hour or two. I talked to his neighbor who let me try to use his phone, then I headed to a cafe down the street to hang out at for an hour or so. They had a magazine in English and the bartender was cute so I was fine. I was writing my postcards when I got a text from Hogar saying he was home. I took off and watched Law and Order till 3am. Indre came in later so I knew I could sleep in the next day too!