East side of Europe. Memories of Lisbon.

On the other side of this picture is America.






We found this cat, it would just hop into our balcony and come into our room and just run around the hostel, it was a few days actually when we learned this cat wasnt supposed to be in the hostel...everyone liked it though and it wasnt a stray cat, so it was clean and safe, and really nice actually.



This picture is taken looking out from our balcony outside of our room at the Hostel we stayed at. At this particular moment we see a woman defying death and also trying to clean her windows.



Here we are playing cards in Neds hostel appartment. Ned has been staying in this hostel for a while now and he has been able to upgrade to this apartment deal. His appartment was the next balcony over so we would hop balconies a bit and hang out. Here i am, talking about something big. Something real big...

So there is a huge statue of Jesus in Lisbon that was given to them as a gift from Brazil to celebrate their independance. The statue is located on the other side of Lisbon. Well Lisbon is devided by a really wide river, so the only way to get to the other side is to take a ferry. Well one day, Rainer, Morganne, and I decided to go see Jesus. This here was actually on our walk to the ferry station. At the bottom of the stairs is Rainer. After this picture was taken, we lost Rainer. We got to the bottom of the steps, we looked both ways, and he was gone. Apperently he thought we were right behind him. So that was it for Ranier, we met back up with him later at the Hostel, apperently he did make it to Jesus.


This is the waiting room for the ferry. For some reason with the sun coming through the windows and the people standing there looking out the window, this particular shot reminded me alot of my favorite scene in the movie Sunshine, where a crew of scientist are sent into outer to save the world by detonating the largest nuclear bomb ever in the sun. Well on their journey to the sun they have a room kind of similar to this but instead of looking out to a ferry port in Lisbon Portugal it is an observatory room of the sun, so they can obseve the sun. There is a scene in the movie where the crew is in the room to watch Mercury eclipse the sun right infront of them. That is my favorite scene in the movie and thats what this reminded me of.


This was our walk up the hill to see Jesus.


Morganne took pictures of Jesus


I slept.
C'mon, how often to come around a park that has this thing in it that is MADE to lay on! Its not like I DIDNT look at Jesus. I looked at him before and after the nap...


This is another way to get across to the other side of Lisbon. But we dont have cars.
Yes, i think it looks alot like the golden gate bridge also.



The next day we went on this road trip with this guy from the hostel, Bruno, he gathers a bunch of people together, throws them in his big red van and then drives them around the surrounding cities of Lisbon. This palace was the first stop.


This was right next to the palace. Its a cafe, and apperently a movie was filmed at the palace. I cant remember what movie it was, but Johnny Depp was it in, and after every shoot the crew would go here to this cafe. BUT, thats not the reason why i took this picture. I took it because of the tree. Starting from the bottom it looks like a norma tree, but then the branches just shoot straight up. It was crazy. And it was Awesome.


A view of the surrounding areas of Lisbon and also the ocean.



Taking a nature hike with the boys! Imron, Rainer, Me, and Jordan (From Australia, but lives in London...no suprise there!) Jordan also has a tattoo on his back of a hand...he was really suprised to find out i have tattoos of my parents hands on my back...we took pictures together with our shirts off...and thats how i met Jordan....


This is a path leading up to a castle. The ONLY path leading up to the castle.



This is the castle. I forget the name of it, but it has something to do with rocks. Because the King who lived here and built this castle had to import trees and soil from all around the world to plant in the mountain that this castle was built on. The trees and soil we re to stop corrosion. Im sure the King could have just taken trees from portugal, at least, to transplant on the mountain, but either way, if he hadnt transplant trees the castle would have fallen over by now, so, he was knew what he was doing.

This is another castle. The nextdoor neighbor, if you will, to the rock castle. This castle was built by the arabs when they ruled in Portugal.




A great deal of this castle had tiles covering it, id say about 90% of the castle was coverd by little small tiles maybe two inches by two inches. Hundreds of thousands of tiles just covering this castle. It was crazy. And at first i thought the story of the trees was great, then i saw these little tiles.




This guy is pretty mean looking.





This is the edge of Europe. The most western point of Europe. This is the closest im getting to America in 2 and a half months.


This is looking down from where i was sitting....


Here they are, them dirty ol' shoes have made it long enough to see the edge of Europe right here.

This is the coast line of a small city outside of Lisbon named Cais Cias. I think thats how you spell it, its pronounced Cash Kaish.


"This is where everything started" Bruno told us. This here is the Lighthouse where all the boats and ships came to inorder to get to europe. This was the first port of Europe.

This is a statue dedicated to all the great navigators and discoverers of Portugal.


The sunset in Lisbon.





Walking around Lisbon.


Graffiti in Lisbon. One thing that is consistent through every city in europe is the graffiti. There is SOOO much graffiti, everywhere! But i noticed though in Lisbon the graffiti is a bit more colorful. This piece is pretty obvious to what it is refering to.




A night out on the town: Me, Keegan (peeking in there, he is from Australia), Imron (offering something, i dont know...he is from Tazmania), Corey (He has actually been to Traverse City before, he is from Buffalo), then there is Annia (pronounced like onion, thats how i remembered it. She worked at the hostel we were staying at, i forget where she is from, i think Slovenia.)


Playing cards with Olly (He is from Australia), Imron and Corey.



Not as big as this though.






Here we are saying our final goodbyes to Ned, this was our last day in Lisbon.


More Graffiti.





This is Lisbon at dusk. You can see a castel there. Pretty big castel, yeah, never went inside of it though, this was the closest we got.

So there you have it, pictures of Lisbon.

I also lied to you, i told you that the next time you'd hear from me i would be in Salzburg, Austria. Well, im not. Due to a mix up in train scheduals or something...i dont know, i was too late to buying tickets to the connection train that would take me to salzburg from a small city in france. But i could have gotten tickets to that small city in France from Paris. So i just didnt want to deal with it. Im in Berlin now. I dont think i will be able to make it down to Austria either. Oh well, that just gives me more time to explore Germany.

So, after two days of travelling, one short day in Paris and one crew member less now, i find myself sitting in a pretty nice hostel in central Berlin. Lastnight Morganne saw me off as waved good bye to me while my train was leaving the station. Morganne stayed in Paris for one night to catch a train to London this morning. She is flying back home tomarrow. Her two and a half month journey has come to a complete and now she gets to head back home with over two months of european memories behind her, and i enter into my last leg. Starting in Berlin i will just head back to the western side of europe, eventually ending with picking up my bike in Paris and then taking a train to London and spending my last 5 days there. Im thinking maybe every 3 days i will go to a new city. Maybe staying a bit longer in Amsterdam. But here in Berlin, i plan on going around and taking a walking tour tomarrow and seeing some museums. Then on saturday morning i check out and head down to Rosswien for the Verse/Ceremony show. I will probably just stay a night there and then head to Frankfort or Dusseldorf or...you know, somewhere more central germany for a couple days, then to west germany for a few days, then to Amsterdam. Then Brussels, then to Paris....

Alright, im going to say it publicly now. I dont like Paris. I didnt have much fun there and everytime i leave Paris the only thing im thinking about is "YES!!! Im leaving Paris!" The first time in Paris I had to leave my bike, the second time i left Paris i had to leave Morganne. So whats it going to be the third time, Paris? There are some cool things to look at in Paris, like the Eiffel Tower and Notre Dame.....a some other things i guess, but, if you've never been to Paris, im just going to warn you now, its not what you think it is. There are better cities out there. Trust me, iv been to them! Rome, Barcelona, Nice ( all souther France, really), Lisbon, London...i can keep going.

Alright, thats enough. Im in Berlin now.