Some say I have Peter Pan Syndrome

Another European month is in the books. My responsibilities at work are winding down which is creating more time for me to travel and enjoy my remaining time in Western Europe. I’ve been hopping flights, catching trains, auto-bahn driving, pounding youth hostels, screaming through pub crawls, eating Euro, drinking Euro, not working out, not stressing out and not sitting still. I got a hair cut so I can spike my hair. I go into work late and leave earlier than my first 5 months. If it weren't so cold now I would start wearing a Hawaiian shirt.

So, lets start off with Venlo. I will certainly miss many of the great people but it is time to leave.  Nothing much changes. Bars are the same every week.  It took me a long time (4 months) to make some decent friends but I am no longer willing to spend my weekends drinking in the same pubs until 4am. I have gleaned a lot from the small town atmosphere and relationships but I want to see more.

First stop was a “non-work” related trip to the UK. I hopped a super cheap flight to Edinburgh packed in only a small “rucksack” as the brits would call it. Upon arrival, I was immediately struck by the architectural beauty of the city. Everything is old, substantial and imposing. Edinburg castle looms over the city with authority and majesty. I spent night 1 walking the streets and learning to take night snap shots with my point and shoot camera. The city is really nice at night. I hit pretty much every interesting scotch whisky bar topped off my scotch warmed belly with a nice serving of Haggis. I turned into my hostel around 2:30am and awoke around 8AM. Let me take a moment to tell you how much America is missing out on the whole hostel scene. They are truly a wonderful thing. If all you use a room for is to sleep and shower, a hostel is all you need. They usually have small dorms of 4-8 beds with a self contained bath and shower. You have a locker to stow your things and opportunities to meet lots of people. Ear plugs are all one needs to sleep like a baby. The staff are always informative and more helpful than your normal concierge. All of this for around $20-30 per night…that leaves a lot more cash for whisky!

Back to Scotland. Day two I booked a northern Scotland tour to see the country, tour a distillery and catch some of the smaller towns. It was a 9 hour round trip for $60 on a 12 person mini-bus. It was well worth it. Lots of nice pics and the guide pointed me towards one of the best bacon sandwiches in the world. The tour concluded around 7PM and I was prepared to find a night time Edinburgh Ghost Tour on the Royal Mile which is the main old town drag leading up to the castle. I was wandering up to the mile looking for the tours when I see a youngish girl holding a sign outside of a pub. I check her out and then her sign. It says, “Pub Crawl Starts Here…..NOW!”. I said to myself….”Self, are you a mouse or a man?” Self replied “Fuck off, of course I am doing this pub crawl.” So It began with me quickly chatting up the group of girls loitering around the sign girl. 12 pounds bought me into the crawl, a drink at each bar and entrance into the club at the end of the tour. I was soon enveloped in a diverse crowd of mostly younger folks from Spain, Lithuania, France, England, Poland, Norway and Ireland. We did beers, shooters, bombs and test tubes. The night was going well. By bar number 4, things were getting saucy. It was called Frankensteins and with Halloween so close there were lots of costumes and people getting silly. It became harder to keep the group together wandering the narrow streets, steep alleys and many turns. We finally end at the “club” of the night. I am immediately met by a distinctive aroma at the entrance. Yes, that’s right…the aroma that tells you this is a place young people come to make mistakes…the unmistakable scent of vomit. We are all now dancing, drinking more and the girls are starting to get frisky. I had been hanging out with the couple from Lithuania. The guy was like 6’-10” who I called Lindo and the girl was named Ramona. They were fun. He was pretty entertaining and was doing a nice job dancing up with the group but leaving his girl looking a little lonely. So, I took her in hand…a friendly hand of course and tried to get her into the scene. Chemistry is a strange thing. It is hard to explain it until you are in the equation. We had some pretty nice dance floor chemistry because things were getting “hot” and fast…the Jager bombs helped as well. Eventually she realized she had a boyfriend at which point she went back to get him involved and next thing I know they are fighting..ahhahahhahah…yeah, that’s how it goes. So, I said good night to my other 19 year old friends and hit the road on the lookout for another late night Whisky bar for a final night cap.

The following day I rolled out of the bunk at 10AM, found my way to a café called the Elephant House where J.K. Rowling developed most of the Harry Potter series. I had another bacon sandwich, some fresh squeezed OJ and a nice coffee. I still had to wander the residential streets, see the castle, tour the royal yact and do the ghost tour that night, the next day I was to catch the train to London.

All of that worked out great. Learning the busses is a must while travelling. Super cheap way to get around and a good way to see the city as well. I took lots of great pics..you know touristy things you have to do. I got a nice picture with a braveheart Mel Gibson look alike. Ghost tour was awesome. Found some local pubs. I negotiated the terms of my next promotion from a heavy metal whisky bar called the “Black Bull”. I kept track of my Whisky and the total was 261 years of whisky down the hatch. My favorite is the Glen Morangie Original 10 year. That wrapped up Scotland.

The train was 5 hours to Kings Cross station. I had a dinner date with two girls I knew from my previous trip to South America two years ago. I checked into another classy hostel full up with people half my age…fine by me, it was cheap. We had a nice dinner and Annabel arranged to give me a private tour of the houses of parliament where she works….score. I spent the rest of the night wandering the city, seeing almost all of the famous sights with no traffic and the city illuminated by very nice Euro lighting. I enjoyed a nice Shepherd pie but the worst part was that I was looking forward to a nice English pub around 1AM near my hostel. It was a Sunday. I walked and walked and all of the pubs that earlier were lively now seemed to be closed. So, I resigned my self to finding a to go store and grabbing some brews to share back at the hostel. The store keep informed me that there are no booze sales after 11PM in the Borough of Westminster….bummer of a borough. Nighty night for me. My final day was spent up early, into a café for an English Breakfast, walking along the Thames, doing the tour of parliament and seeing lots of old shit. London was nice. I could live there. Girls were decent looking. City was pretty and not too chaotic. They have some nice art too.

So that was the UK trip….pretty sweet. I am running out of steam tonight so I am going to wrap this up. Last weekend was spent in Cologne which is just a 1 hour drive from me. It was a fantastic German city. I have come to really respect the Germans. Both from my work and social experiences they are good people with good work ethics, smart ideas and live cleanly. On my drive home I documented with my iPhone camera the speedometer of my Renalut doing 181 Km/hr on the auto-bahn (112 mph)..which is about all she had…and that was downhill. Yes, I had one hand on the wheel, AC/DC playing on the radio and I think I yelled a yeeehaaaaw.

This weekend, I am going to do a road trip through Holland, down the coast to France and circle through Belgium to check out some WWII historical sights. The following weekend is Copenhagen, then I am off to Norway for a week for Work which takes me into my final weekend. My boss has some big surprise planned for my last Saturday for which he said I need to be available from 4PM Saturday and shouldn’t plan on doing anything on Sunday as well….this has me curious and I can’t get anyone at work to spill the beans.

I am looking forward to getting home. I have picked up a few vices that I may bring along. Including a new found love of scotch Whisky, Chocolate and Cheese….yeah…its that’s good. I will be departing Holland on November 17, heading to DC where I am doing this: www.startupweekend.com the 18-20, then its family week till the 25 or 26 when I will fly back to Tahoe. It is going to be ski season and I am looking forward to snowshoes, skis, snowboards and après ski.