Jul 17, 06 | Nice to London

Alright, so it has been awhile since I have updated anything, but I have been very busy.

Once I arrived in Nice, I took the bus to the where the hostel’s website said to go. From there I wasn’t sure what to do, so I just started walking, but was quickly stopped by a van full of people with backpacks who all yelled at me to get in. They seemed like trustworthy people, so I did. This hostel was probably my favorite. It had several things going for it. First, Nice was well, nice (I’m sorry). It is very beautiful there with steep hills meeting the sea and lovely beaches. The hostel also had a very large common room where you could meet tons of people. They also had cheap food on hand which was freshly cooked by an in-house chef. The first night I met three canadians, on top of several other internationals, who I invited me to go to the beach with them the next day. So that is what I did. We went to a great beach about 15 minutes away and spent most the day there. At night we walked to the city center to watch the final on the big screen. This was a lot of fun, and the streets were very crowded. However, after the game was over, I have never seen so many people dissappointed all at once. It was very sad. Luckily there were enough Italians vacationing there to still have a good time. The next day we slept in and made an entirely too long trip to the Matisse Museum. It was pretty nice, though it only had a couple actually famous works (Nu Blue and A large paper cutout). Most of it was older works and sculpture.

That night one of the Canadians and I were supposed to take the night train to Barcelona at 9pm, so we headed for the station around 8pm. Once at the bus stop, he realized he forgot his ticket, so he had to run back up to the hostel, and I had to get on without him. On the bus there I met a couple British girls who told me they were also heading to the station. So, since I wasn’t sure where to get off (my friend was going to be in charge of this), I stayed on until they also got off. Unfortunately, they meant the bus station, not the train station, so I had to quickly march to the train station (about 2 km away) and made it just in time. At first I thought a night train was a good idea. I quickly realized that I was not going to get any sleep. I only had a reclining chair, not a couchette. And they must have turned the temperature down to 55 degrees. It was a long night.

We arrived in Barcelona around 930am. At that point the guy I was traveling with and myself parted ways. He was going to stay there for a few days, and I was going to head on to Alicante. So I walked around for several hours, seeing the olympic part, national museum, and some gaude works. I then got back on the train that afternoon for Alicante.

I was met at the station by Kristin and Kelly, who walked me to the apartment where they were living. They said it was ok for me to stay the night on the couch. Unfortunately, they apparently they had not made this clear to their housemother who freaked out in the morning after she saw a random tall blonde hanging off her couch. This was very awkward. However, after they explained she fed me breakfast. I talked to her for a little while (in broken spanish) after the two girls went to class, and the madre agreed to let me stay another night.

Alicante is a nice, quiet beach Spanish beach community. The beach there was very sandy, much more so than Nice, and the water was warm. I spent most of the days on the beach and met up with the two girls and other OU people in the same program in the evenings. While I was there I realized that the trek back up to the Netherlands was going to be about 24 hours by train. On top of that, the insurance covering my lost pass only covers it up to the price of the pass. I was pretty sure I had already hit this point. So, I decided the best course of action was to get a cheap flight to London and continue from there. And that is what I did.

The third day I was there, I flew to London directly from Alicante for only 60 euro.