here i come paris!

well, after 8 weeks of europe i'm finally on the very last travel leg before i reach paris. it's been a tumultuous experience, filled with incredible places, people and shenanigans! 

the final stop on my journey was not really a touristy stop, i came here simply to hang out with issy. after a relaxing 4 days of movies and shopping - with the exception of 5am wake ups - i'm ready and raring to hit the ground running in the most romantic city in the world! (don't worry dad, that was completely unrelated to boys). thank you issy and titus for a really nice ending to my adventures.

this trip has most definitely been one of the most challenging experiences of my life. i spent 5 weeks in total travelling alone, a seriously daunting prospect when i set off. now i'm very happy that i braved it, as over this time i have constantly been thrust far beyond my comfort zone. never before would i have invited random people to eat dinner with me (let alone been comfortable eating at a restaurant solo), approached strangers for directions, navigated my way through cities without a map, and most of all, i would never have planned my trip as i went. my initial idea to follow croatia with italy and spain went out the window, and i'm glad it did! instead i have been to places in eastern europe i never would have gone alone and met some absolutely incredible people at each stop along the way. i'm so glad i've had such an incredible opportunity!

in the mother country to visit the queen

yesterday i flew from brussels to london to stay with issy for a few nights. she met me at heathrow and then we went home for a great evening catching up in her grandfather's very impressive house in kew gardens. 

today we took the tube into london proper to go shopping in oxford street. so surreal! red buses everywhere, black cabs, historic buildings and thousands of people! 

don't worry, i didn't even buy much! off to a house party tonight and then tomorrow i'm seeing sarah and david!

sorry for the delay in posts... i'm in belgium!

so after my wonderful travels through eastern europe, i have finally hit the west. the cheapest flight out of montenegro was to brussels, so here i am! 

after arriving at brussels charleroi airport i caught a shuttle bus into the city proper - hate it how they trap you into paying a fortune for airport transportation, in this case 17€ for an hour bus! the bus dropped us at the central station, from which i had a 25 minute walk to my hostel. the first kilometre or so i wandered through a giant fair, it was incredible, so many more rides and stalls than anything we have back home! immediately beyond the fair was a seedier patch of town, which i was incredibly uncomfortable walking through at 9pm with men jeering constantly at me. anyhow, thankfully made it to my hostel alive - and it was unlike anything i've stayed in before! the hostel has 700 beds!!! 

yesterday i booked myself onto an old people tour of ghent and bruges. the tour was conducted in 4 languages - english, spanish, german and french - suffice to say when the elderly gentleman beside me suggested ditching the group at each stop i eagerly agreed!

armed with alan's guidebook and its mapped routes of each city, we had a wonderful time exploring flanders. could most definitely have spent the whole day in bruges, or possibly more, but we packed our time and managed to see all the main sites in each city. just for you mum - had an amazing lunch, the most delicate scallops i've ever had with tomato salsa, serrano ham and mozzarella, accompanied by a bottle of french white wine - yum!!

last night there were two lovely new people staying in my dorm room, sam and her boyfriend chris from toronto. after chris stole my bed (totally the hostel's mistake, but caused a lot of confusion) we buddied up and went out to a famous beer chain, delirium. tried the best beer in the world, a cherry beer, a cactus beer and lots of others. we also went across the road to do shots of absinthe, so much fun!!

the whole evening sam and i were on the hunt for a signature pink elephant glass, which we finally found and smuggled out of the bar! a highly amusing way to end our night! 

this morning i once again met up with alan to explore brussels.

saw all of the main attractions including the underwhelming mannekin pis, the gorgeous town hall and went on a tour of the royal palace. one thing i'd forgotten about the elderly is their love for museums and art galleries - we spent the most tedious hour and a half admiring religious paintings from the 14th-17th centuries. kill me!!

yep, my head covers the famous penis

anyhow, now off to buy some famous belgian chocolate to give issy's grandpa as a thanks for letting me stay - so excited, i'm going to london tomorrow to spend 4 nights with issy before i start uni in paris. cannot wait!!!

obese men can do handsprings!

as the title of this post would suggest, my source of amazement for the day was witnessing a man with an extremely large belly casually handspring off the dock into the ocean. a totally unexpected and surprisingly graceful event to end my trip to st. nicolo island.

spent a wonderful day sunbaking, swimming and people watching at this gorgeous island. arrived at 11am after being adopted by the ferrymen who insisted i didn't pay after tge failure of yesterday. so instead when i got to the island i paid an exorbitant price for a lounge (they were all 10€) but thankfully managed to snare one in the best spot on the island for the day! 

      my spot was the leftmost lounge

so of course had to stay until at least 4 to get my money's worth and my tan has definitely been revitalised as a result! so after a really nice and relaxing day i have no idea what's on for the night and don't really care!

just a little rain!

this afternoon's summer storm had a rather spectacular resurgence at 4pm. within 15 minutes the streets were ankle deep with water as the biggest raindrops i've ever seen bucketed down - it was awesome!!!

had a great time trying to get home with three guys from the uk, all of us struggling to keep our valuables dry over the 3km walk. so much fun sprinting between every tree and leaky umbrella! suffice to say, the tophill superclub is closed tonight as the open-air arena is flooded. fingers crossed it will be open tomorrow night for a sticky beak, but for now a quiet night is in order for me! 

the new monaco

budva is definitely my sort of place! beautiful beaches, lots of restaurants, great people watching, parties and plenty of shops! despite being incredibly touristy it has a really nice atmosphere and there is plenty to do.

yesterday as soon as i arrived i befriended an american girl, laura, who i then spent the day with. she definitely knew more about this place than me, so was more than happy for her to take the lead. so we caught a bus to trsteno beach, frequented predominantly by locals and boasting the best sand in the budva riviera. it was awesome and totally not what we expected!

the beach itself was only 100m long, so to accommodate more people massive pontoon platforms had been built on either side of the bay. the water was crystal clear, not a single person spoke english and music pumped all afternoon. managed to order fries and fruit salad for lunch... well fries and whipped cream with some fruit. still yum though! 

the big shock of the day came when one of the cocktail bars turned into a foam party - the amount of foam spilling into the water was insane!!

from the beach we came back to the hostel and went to a seafood place for dinner recommended by the guy on reception. was kinda average, but expected in such a touristy place when paying minimal prices. didn't go out last night as had a big day planned for today...

this morning laura and i were on our way to sveti stefan at 9am. an island resort frequented by the rich and famous, we were unable to cross to sveti stefan itself. instead we took photos and contented ourselves lying on the beach next to the exclusive hotel sun lounges. it was pretty gorgeous and i was so excited to have seen it! 

this afternoon we planned to go to st. nicola island, but unfortunately the weather was against us! we had just boarded our boat when a thunderstorm rolled in, so instead we made a round trip to the island huddled next to the captain and i'm going to go back tomorrow free of charge!

laura is leaving tonight, but have already promised some irish guys in my room to go to the famed tophill nightclub with them tonight... we'll see how it goes!!! 

dubrovnik's unkempt little sister

i don't know whether it was the nostalgia of passing through dubrovnik yesterday, but kotor in montenegro seems pretty similar.

it's gorgeous but really badly maintained, despite being a unesco world heritage site. the difference can probably be attributed to less tourist money coming in, but in a way the absence of dubrovnik's crushing crowds makes kotor the nicer of the two medieval towns. plus it's free to walk the towering walls here! had a really nice time exploring for the afternoon. on a side note - i've been really shocked by the number of abandoned and derelict buildings here, it was expected in bosnia but i thought montenegro had broken away from yugoslavia relatively easily. odd. 

was staying in such a cool hostel too, and everyone in my dorm was really lovely. it looked like something out of harry potter - complete with broomsticks! 

nonetheless onto budva today, the party destination of montenegro!