Weekend IV: Of the Eiffel, Louvre and Little India

So, this weekend began with a train journey to (Yes ... you guessed it!) Paris. A lot of people were joining me in Paris, including 2 Rohits, Chiraag, Amol, Pranjal, Nishanth, Neal and many more.

We decided to start with a guided walking tour of Paris. There's a group of people who volunteer every now and then to show people around the city. So, after reaching Paris, we reached the St. Michel fountain, where the tour was supposed to start.

St. Michel

We got in a line and soon we were ready to go. Our guide was Jake, who happened to be British. The guided tour began with a view of Notre Dame, the main church in Paris. After a brief session on its history and seeing the Nazi occupation in Paris (I forget its name but its one with visible bullet holes), we went on to see the first stone bridge of Paris, on top of which was a statue of Henry the IVth, the beloved king of France in 16th.

Who handed him the Light Saber?

A small glimpse of the French academy from there and then off to the Louvre! You remember I remarked that Jake was British, I did so for a reason. Jake kept on remarking on the French, their bureaucracy, how they love to torture those who anger them (e.g. the guy who murdered Henry IV) , their hatred of sky scrapers, and not to mention their hatred for the Louvre pyramid. Though the remarks were pretty funny, he often gave a pretty twisted view of the French.

We finally finished the walking tour after having visited the Concorde (an obelisk) and glimpsed the Eiffel. The tour ended at the Grand Palace, from where we decided to head for the Eiffel. At the Eiffel, we got in the long queue to get tickets for evening entrance, only to find that you don't get timed tickets, you just get in line when you need to enter.

Rose Line Marker

Concorde (Obelisk)

A small detour here (from the trip that is). Paris has a lot of illegal immigrants. I know they were illegal staying because they were always afraid that the police might come. So, under the Eiffel tower you will find many Punjabi(not necessarily Sikh) people selling Eiffel key-chains/replicas and other such souvenirs. Thanks to this something funny happens from time to time. Unlike other places, where Indian immigrants are greeted with a "Namaste" from people who don't know much Hindi, here you instead hear a "Satsrikal" not only from Indians, but also from Africans. They'll come to you to sell those souvenirs and say "Changa Hai, Chahiye?"("Its good, want it?").

So, after wasting an hour or so in the long line, we moved on to walk along the Champs-Elysée street, the most popular and luxurious shopping street in Paris. The street ends at Arc de Triomphe. At the Arc, there was a parade in progress as a tribute to the unknown soldier of World War I.

It was now getting late, so we decided to turn towards the Eiffel. We got in the line for Eiffel at around 7:45 pm and were on the second floor by 8:15 pm, far earlier than we expected. But, unfortunately, the third floor was full and we could get tickets to second floor only. We had to buy tickets for third floor once we get there (2nd floor), where we were greeted by a huge line of people desperate to get to the third floor.


Our timing at Eiffel could not have been better. We reached 2nd floor an hr before sunset, giving a nice panoramic view of the city(thanks to the lack of sky scrapers in central Paris) and we got to third floor to get a great night view.

Night View of Paris

After a few hours on the 3rd floor, we decided its time to get back down. We rested for quite a while at the Eiffel's base, and waited for Rohit Singh, Nishanth and Manan, who surprisingly had chosen to go up the Eiffel twice! (and if that was not enough, they also spent two euros for using the crappy telescope on Eiffel's top for 2 minutes) [:P].

Sparkling Eiffel at night

So, now it was time to find our resting place for the night. So, all of us went to look around for a good place to sleep around the Eiffel. Believe it or not, we did spend the night in a garden just across the bridge facing Eiffel. I fortunately had chosen to get my sleeping bag. Also, as an extra precaution in case of theft, I had chosen to keep all my precious things, including my cam and all cash with me in my sleeping bag and lock the rest of the bag, and tie it to my hand.

After about five ours of sleep, we did our "essential morning tasks", and started moving towards the Louvre, which was going to have a free line, as it was free for everyone on that Sunday. So, after reaching half an hour before the Louvre was to open, we were behind about 60-70 people. There, we also met Harsh and gang from EPFL, who were at the start of line.
(And yes, the line for entering the Louvre does get as long as they show in the movie Eurotrip.)

Paris in the morning

I'll skip the Louvre, as it was a pretty boring experience, thanks to some French stupidity. They are well aware that people from all over the world visit the Louvre, yet they refuse to write English descriptions of art works, which leaves engineering students like me with no tools to appreciate the beauty of the art[:-(].

Louvre Pyramid

Disappointing Mona Lisa

So after about 3 hours roaming around in the Louvre, we decided to rest outside and wait for Mehul and Pranjal to complete their tour inside. Another interesting thing happened that morning though. Rohit Singh and others from Austria decided to try and shift their reservation for trains for late evening, so they could get more time in Paris and waste one less Eurail day, but to no avail. Instead of getting more time, they ended up losing the last few hours they had in Paris. So in about 30 or so hours at Paris, Rohit Singh and gang only did the walking tour, went over Eiffel and glimpsed the Louvre.

Once Mehul and Pranjal arrived, we decided to go and give a try to Roland Garros ... Nadal was playing the final and we were hoping if we could get a glimpse on some big screen somewhere around (or possibly inside? [:D]) Roland Garros. But alas, they were only false hopes. Me and Amol did manage to fool the outer security (by accident of course) into believing that we had tickets, only to see that their was ticket checking inside as well [:-/]. So, we took a few pics of Roland Garros and left from there to watch the match on a big screen somewhere.

We watched the first set on the big screen and decided it was time to go. I was very keen on visiting the Pantheon, so I convinced everyone to come along and we started walking. We reached the Pantheon after about a 20 minute walk. It was a beautiful and magnificent Roman structure.

The Pantheon

Next up was a visit to Little India. A fairly big community of Indians have settled in Paris in the area of Gare du Nord and hence, there are a lot of shops in that area by Indians, for Indians (as a result of which, the place is also slightly more dirtier and unorganized than the main city [:P]).

Little India

We went to an Indian restaurant there, to have some Indian food. The food was not as good as we'd like, but it was a taste of Indian food after a long long time. We also did some shopping there, and I bough something to make what I was dearly missing, Rassam [:D].

After this trip to Little India, Pranjal, Amol and Neal had to catch a train, so we dropped them at the station. From there, me, Mehul and Rohit Dhumane took a ride to Sacré-Coeur Basilica, Paris. Located at the highest point in Paris, it gives a nice view of the city and the Basilica itself is really pretty. We spent an hour or so there.

Next, we departed towards Moulin Rogue. On the way, we passed the red light district of Paris, where a lady caught hold of Rohit Dhumane and said "Come my Shah Rukh Khan" (or something like that ... you get the point).

Later we went to the Louvre, which looks charming in the night. Mehul left for his house from there, and we were back to the same garden to spend the night.

The Louvre at night

Where we slept

Next morning was pretty uneventful. We went to Notre Dame, saw it from the inside. This cathedral is nowhere close to the big cathedrals I've seen by now. We also glimpsed St. Michel fountain once again, this time with lesser tourists.

A little shopping for souvenirs and we were on our way home.

Weekend III: Of beautiful bridges and castles

This weekend it was Prague and Vienna. After a hard day of planning, we finally came up with a plan to visit Salzburg, Vienna and Prague. Due to the ease of travel, we decided to go straight to Vienna and from there, we would take a bus to Prague at night, return after a day and next morning to Salzburg. As is pretty usual in my travels, this tour wasn't without its hiccups. The plan was pretty packed and so there were possibilities for problems, only that this time it wasn't because of me.

I took a night train to Munich after reaching Mannheim first (a one hour break here), where I had to wait 2 hrs for the next train (aargh!! ... it was so boring). And then Amol and Chiraag got late, which meant we were gonna be an hr late at Vienna. We finally reached where Heiligenstadt, where Rohit Singh and Archana Raje were to meet us, only to find that he had called us in the middle of nowhere, not a single landmark was close to it. As if that was not enough, they were more than an hour late, only to add to the frustration. In the meanwhile, we bought food for the rest of the trip at a supermarket and trust me thats a major cash saver especially for vegetarians for whom choices here are limited.

Planning the unplanned trip

So at 14:40, we started our tour of Vienna. We visited a few historic buildings there. At this point, I must mention, Vienna is indeed a very beautiful and very well organized city. It is pretty walkable and the metro system is pretty well maintained and connected. We visited quite a few places, but the first day was pretty disappointing. We were under the impression that a certain individual, RoSi (name changed :P), was planning our trip and had all decided. But alas, we were wrong and the trip was not at all planned. We ended up visiting half the places we could have been to. The only part of the day that was truly worth was the cathedral in Vienna, which is huge and one of the most brilliant cathedrals I've seen.

Cathedral

Pink and RoSi! :D

In the evening at around 20:20 was our bus to Prague, where we were to spend the next day. The bus was a luxury. It had a TV every few seats, with audio in a few languages including English apart from other radio channels. We were offered hot drinks (the hot chocolate was awesome!). In the night there was a 4 hour break at Brno, where we roamed around a little ... saw a nice cathedral from the outside, and had some food.

The Bus
RoSi Nights!

Next stop ... Prague. We got down and did the morning essential tasks [:P] and we were off to enjoy Prague. First impressions: Prague looked to be something close to getting down in Old Delhi, roadside markets and nothing spectacular. But from when did first impressions turn out the be the right ones. We asked a couple of police officers some directions and within 15 minutes the way I was seeing the city had changed. Prague has an archaic feel to it. Seems as if you've gone back a couple of centuries.

Started looking for breakfast first. But as usual, veg food is tough to find. We gave McDs a try and they said they'll make the non veg burgers without non veg for the same price, however what they didn't tell us was that they'd just remove the non veg and add nothing in return [:P]. And then we remembered the food we bought in Vienna and it came to our rescue.

Main stops in Prague were the Astronomical Clock, Charles Bridge and Prague castle. The "Astronomical Clock" was first on our itinerary. It has an astrolabe on it, which was an old astronomical device, essentially a sky calendar. A huge number of people waited there for the clock to complete an hour. Why? Thats what got us curious. But all the hopes were drowned when we actually saw what happened. The musical clock at Salarjung museum was better than this. We decided to go up the tower and take a good look at the city. From the top, the city looks beautiful. But, unlike Vienna and other cities that I have seen in Europe, Prague is pretty congested and unordered.

Astro Clock

The next stop was the Charles bridge. We reached there by 1:00 pm in the afternoon. Every bit of the bridge has the same feel to it like the rest of Prague, and hence blends very well with it, and also gives a beautiful view in the night, thanks to the well done lighting.

Charles Bridge

View from Charles Bridge

From the Charles bridge, after a small lunch break at McDs, we went up to our next stop, the Prague castle. The castle was huge and beautifully decorated. A well maintained courtyard on the outside, with a beautiful cathedral on the inside.

Another thing I almost forgot to mention. In the morning, when we were looking to change currency (Euros are not accepted here), Archana kept pushing everyone to go into the castle, which was 350 Crowns, about 14 Euros and was off most people's budget for travels. So, even though everyone did get a little more Crowns just in case, and said we'll see what to do at the castle, nobody except Archana had even half a heard to get a 14 Euro ticket. Though, as it turned out, I ended up spending enough money on food and other items.

However, as it turned out, the ticket was required to go inside the main castle building and nobody went inside. We just visited the cathedral and as you might have guessed it was free [:-)]. Once we got out of the cathedral, we just took a small detour to visit the synagogue, that was a small walk up the hill. From there, we split. Rohit, Chiraag and others wanted to go up to the mini Eiffel Tower, which seemed pretty uninteresting to me. So me, Manas and Nisarg started descending, and on the way picked up a few souvenirs. I bought a beautiful painting for about 4 Euros.

The Courtyard
The Cathedral

Now the fun starts, fun that wasted most of the remaining evening. RoSi and Chiraag had constantly been reminding us of some free concert in "Opera House", which they had pointed out more than just a couple of times on the map. We were supposed to meet there at about 7 pm. We got a little late and after Chiraag called, we reached there at around 7:45 pm, where these people had apparently already reached. So me, Nisarg, Manas and Archana (whom we met at the Charles Bridge after she had visited Kafka museum) waited there a little while only to find out that the building is not the much sought after Opera House, but National Theater and had plays that cost quite a few bucks. So we found out where operas are actually played, and reached Municipal house (close to the bus stop), where we did find the Opera only to know it cost 800 - 1000 Crowns a ticket.

Then we decided to rest out and meet them at the bus stop at about 11 pm. Me and Nisarg were interested in seeing the Dancing House, and decided to meet Manas and Archana at Charles bridge. This tour turned out to be quite fruitful and we got a beautiful night view of the Prague castle and Charles bridge.

Prague Castle

Charles Bridge

At Charles bridge, everybody had already been waiting and we got to know what actually happened. Actually, when we arrived at National Theatre, they decided that they could use their time better by having drinks (smart weren't they? :P), and these people tried Absinthe and Vodka. And they had no cell range either there.

Done with Prague, we reached Vienna next morning, everybody exhausted with the lack of sleep. We reached IST, Austria, where Rohit and others are interning. We took a small nap there. I made us some pasta for breakfast and then we were off to have a glance at Vienna before we left.

Parliament at Vienna

And then we were on our return journey, which was really long for me and took more than 12 hrs for me, thanks to the waits at 2 station summing to more than 4 hours. I finally reached my room at 6 am on Monday morning.

So that was how we spent weekend 3. A long tiring and pretty satisfying trip over all.

P.S.: Sorry for the late entry on the blog. Had been a little caught up.

Weekend II: Of Canceled Plans, Huge Cathedrals and Chocolates

It was Friday and our plan for the weekend was still undecided. "Sigh" I thought to myself "This weekend is gonna be so boring!". So I sat down to think on how I could make it a little interesting. I already knew that people from Swiss and Austria were coming to Munich.

So I started looking for ways to reach Munich and things to do there. And obviously I wanted to keep it as cheap as possible, so Happy Weekend Ticket was the way. The weekend ticket means I need upto 5 people, at least 3 to keep it affordable (since I was low on cash). I pinged Vivek to decide plans and they both (Vivek and Vinay) wanted to join in on the trip. They came to my lab and we sketched out rough travel plan. In the afternoon, I asked Om and he too agreed. After spending some time to finalize the fine details of the trip, we had a travel plan ready. I went to Treff to do some shopping, got back home and got ready for the trip, for which we were to leave early morning.

Then I get a call from Vivek saying that they'd decided not to go. My plan went to ruins in an instant. I tried to talk them into going again, but their excuses were unsurmountable :P. With just 2 people, we could not go on the weekend, so me and Om decided may be it'd be best to leave this trip and go somewhere on Sunday instead. On Saturday, Om sketched out a plan for Köln or Cologne.

So early morning on Sunday, we (Me, Om and Ankita, who is another intern student) were off on a train to Cologne via Saarbrücken, where Manpreet and his friend Abhinav were to join us. The route from Saarbrücken to Koblenz was pretty scenic and went parallel to the Rhine river. The weather too had cleared out, setting stage for a nice weekend trip. We reached Cologne by 11:30, where Ankita's friend Sonam joined in.
And so began our tour of Cologne. We started with Kölner Dom or Cologne Cathedral. It is a pretty big church with its towers rising as high as 157 meters.



We first visited the cathedral treasury. I clicked a few pictures there, until I realized that photography was strictly prohibited [:P]. (Yes, I know its common sense in a Museum but getting a few shots is good, aint it? [;)] )


We finished that in about 45 minutes and went inside the cathedral. The church was really beautiful from the inside (and too big to be captured in camera shots), with beautiful artwork on glass and the 3 giant halls. When we entered, prayer ceremonies were in progress and hence, we were not to enter inside the main hall, not for photography at least.

We had planned to climb the cathedral's south tower, which has a total of 509 stairs to the top. After looking for some time, we finally found the entrance and started climbing. It was quite a long climb and slightly tiring, but the view from the top (even though spoiled by the grill out up all around) was worth it.


Once we were done with the tower, it was time to check out the city. The major attractions of the city were the museums, at least according to wiki travels. And we found out from the tourist information center that it was Museum Fest that day in Cologne, so quite a few museums were free of cost (Sounds cool, right? Not so cool though :P). We first entered this design museum named Museum für Angewandte Kunst or Museum of Applied Art, it was free and boring, to say the least. They have a collection of what they call "popular" design items, including infi types of chairs, capsule style TVs, pen drives with wooden covers, different radios over the years (which reminds me, there is an old radio in my department here, and by old I mean it has vacuum tubes and not transistors [:D] ), you get the idea. We got bored of it way too fast and finished it in about 15 minutes.

Next target was a place named Kolumba, which was an art museum. There we found out that not all museums were free and there was an entry fee of 5 euros for entry (and we happily ditched it [:)]). There was still a lot of time, so we decided to give a last art museum a try. It was Wallraf-Richartz Museum, which has a fine collection of art since medieval times. There was one exhibition open for free, so we a tour it. I am a fan of renaissance art, but there was hardly anything worth appreciating in that exhibition at least and plus nobody else was in a mood for touring art museums, so we decided we'll take a break and have a snack at McDs.

Done with art museums, there was one main attraction for visit, the Schokoladenmuseum or the Chocolate Museum by Lindt. A small walk and we were there. By far the best museum I ever visited (Obviously, its chocolate after all! [:)]).

Infinite types of chocolate to choose from in their store, a free trial of liquid Lindt chocolate from their chocolate fountain and a view of how your chocolate is made. A quick tour and we were down in the store to choose from infinitely awesome chocolates. There were chocolates I have never seen in any store. Eg. Extra butter 99% Cocoa chocolate, Chilli flavored chocolate, Dark chocolate with Chocolate Mousse and the list goes on. Unfortunately I had little money to spend, so I bought 6 bars in all. I might go down to Cologne once more for just this shopping [:)].

The view of the Rhine from the Museum's rooftop was pretty beautiful, so we took a few minutes to appreciate it, and we were off to catch our train. On reaching back to Kaiserslautern, I was greeted by a site I had been longing for since I got here, clear skies and the crescent Moon, its beauty magnified by Venus (which was also crescent, as I later found out).

And so, another adventurous weekend trip came to an end.

PS: For anyone planning to go to Cologne, I would suggest you take about 5 hours and visit the Cathedral and the chocolate museum and, in case you still find time, maybe you can go to one of the churches, which are a little distance from the station.

PPS: Find the complete album here

Weekend I: Of delayed trains, Old Castles and Bridges

On Saturday, we decided to leave for Heidelberg on Sunday morning. The plan was as follows. We were 5 people. Me, Om, Vivek, Vinay (Vivek and Vinay are sophomores from IITB) and Manpreet. We chose to travel using the weekend pass which is 37 euros for 5 people. I was to leave from the 7 pm train to Saarbrucken with the pass from where Manpreet would join me with my bag as well and we would go towards Heidelberg and on the way the other 3 would join us.

Fortunately I did get up on time and I was on the train station by 6:45 pm but since when did things work well for me the first time itself :P. The train that I planned to take was canceled. I later got to know that the track had broken and they needed to fix it. I tried to find another way to get there through Homburg, to which there was a train at 7:32 am, but by the time I got to the platform to catch it, they announced that this train was also canceled until further notice. So I tried to inquire what had happened and to find a way to Saarbrucken, but to no avail thanx to the lack of German skills.

I came across a couple of Indians who were also going to Saarbrucken. I told them about the situation and I now had 2 more companions worrying with me :P By now, the next train to Saarbrucken had also been canceled. We waited there with no plans at all on what to do when all of a sudden the train to Saarbrucken opens up. We rushed to the train which left on time but due got delayed on the way. It poured all this time, so the weather was not helping the situation either.



After reaching Saarbrucken, I met Manpreet and I was finally reunited with my bag (Yay!!). We had to wait another half an hour for the next train to Kaiserslautern. There was a group of anime characters (:P) boarding the train.



Once on the train, we sat down and hoped that this train would not be delayed. On the way, huge crowds got on the train at every station.


We found out that there was a football match in Kaiserslautern between Kaiserslautern and Oxburg, so supporters of Kaiserslautern were flowing in from everywhere.

We reached Kaiserslautern late and consequently had already missed 2 trains as per our plan. There is a train every half an hour from Kaiserslautern to Heidelberg so we could board one right after half an hour. We reached Heidelberg at around 1:30 pm.

There we met Shashikant, another fellow from IITG, doing an intern at university of Heidelberg. We all boarded a bus, and then a little walk uphill and we were at the castle.


Frankly speaking, compared to Indian forts the castle was tiny. But it was well maintained.

Also, I noticed that they had renovated the castle (and more renovation was taking place)


The view from the courtyard was pretty beautiful.


There were big wine barrels in the museum which were the main attraction according to the guard there :P I wonder if they ever made wine in them.

Once the castle was done, we went to the garden took a stroll there. There was a beautiful tree there.


After that we started descending to the bridge. We ended up traveling further away from the bridge. We had to take a bus to the bridge.


By this time most people were pretty tired and we decided we should leave early. There was a good chance that we could have some party at Kaiserslautern, since Kaiserslautern were most likely to have won the match. We ate a bit at McDs and caught the train to Kaiserslautern. We were at the train station at 7:30 pm. The football match had been drawn but KL had made it from tier II to tier I (I have absolutely no idea what that means except that its supposed to be a good thing for the team :P)

Back at my room I was greeted with a beautiful sunset view.


I made pasta and soup (readymade obv) for food. By now my pasta has started to taste pretty good. Though I still am not sure how close to the actual pasta it is, but who cares ... it tastes awesome :D

Do check out the pics in my picasa web album.

So until my next adventure ...