Take only Pictures, Leave only Feces

22. June 2008 ben

The caption reads, ” A journey brings you face to face with yourself.” Pictured is Mikhail Gorbachev in the backseat of a taxi leaving a meeting in Berlin. The Berlin wall is in the background and to his side is a Louis Vitton bag. I thought seeing such a character with such a bag was just too funny, however, it is the tag line that has stuck with me these last days.

Leaving Geneva and my friend Jon en route to Paris I realized, with four days left to go, that the end was nigh. And it struck me that it is very possible that there will never be a trip like this ever again. On this trip I have now taken over 70 trains and two cruise ships, and stayed at dozens of different hostels in 21 different countries.  I have swam in the Atlantic Ocean, the Mediterranean Sea, an ancient bath house, the Arctic Ocean, Lake Geneva and the North Sea. I have been kicked off a bus, slept in a train station, a bus station, and gone without sleep entirely on several occasions. I have nearly lost my sunglasses in the ocean, my belt on a cruise ship, my camera on a hillside, my jacket on a train, and nearly everything else at a 7/11. I have watched the best sunsets of my life and marveled at the midnight sun. I have met up with old friends in Flensburg and Geneva, and made new ones in countless other locations. Everyday has brought something new.

After meeting up in the YVR airport, Nathan and I have journeyed together for a month, crossed paths in Sighisoara and Dubrovnik, rendezvoused in Helsinki, and arrived at our final spot here in Amsterdam ten minutes apart (what are the odds of that!). We’ve bunked together in trains and hostels half a dozen times. Just today I woke up with his face inches away from me (we got a double bed because we just that cheap). We have shared an experience to last until we’re too old to remember whether we put on underpants or not.

Others however have been a part of the journey for as short as a day. I’ve met Brits, Aussies, Fins, Russians, Colombians, and countless Canadians. Some I’ve shared a train ride with, a tour, a dinner, others a bonfire.  Having people come and go so quickly and still make an impact is one of the most amazing experiences of this trip.

Throughout this I’ve learned that the adventure that is Europe is different for everyone. There is no set timeline or path or for that matter any way to possibly take it all in. I’ve seen the Colosseum, the Eiffel Tower, the Acropolis, Venice, Transylvania, and the Berlin Wall. As a European citizen, all of Europe is open to me. I can come and go as I please and stay as long as I want. So, when I get sad about leaving Europe I know that it is the people along the way and the experiences shared that I will miss, not the fabled locations. A place is just a place, even if it does have old, pretty, famous crap.

On another note, I had to say goodbye to my godmother Kathy today, as I received news of her passing last night. I will miss her dearly. She, along with countless others have enriched the journey of my life beyond measure. I guess sometimes we have to wait a little longer to be reunited with some people we love. For the rest of my family, and the close friends who have been reading along, I can’t wait to see you again and give you a big hug.

I also want to say a few thank yous. First, to my sponsors Visa and RBC, without you I couldn’t have spent all the money that I didn’t have in the first place. Thank you Tony for helping me to communicate to everyone back home. Thank you Nathan, Jon, Woo (and Sue!) for making this trip what it is. Thank you Mum for reading everyone of my blogs. Thank you Miranda for marking the beginning and the ending of my trip with me (and also being a fan of the blogs). Thank you Chris for feeding and exercising my car while I’m away, and assuring me of a home when I get back. I can’t wait to get back home, with all of you, where my heart is.

I have, over the last two months, come face to face with myself. I know what I can and can’t live without and what makes me happy. My only souvenir of this trip, aside from a beer gut (this too shall pass), is the experience itself (and over 1000 photos). And so, school is out and the vacation is over, let the next phase of the journey begin. I know, with great confidence and anticipation, that the whole story has been written by the same hand.

See you all soon,

Benjamn Johnson

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The Geneva Convention

19. June 2008 ben

I met up with Jon Muir at the Geneva train station at 5pm on Monday. He, a former staff member at Camp Columbia in 2005, was joining me on this voyage for three short days. And Geneva was our meeting point and soon to be our playground. The rain was lightly  trickling as we made our way to the hostel, an International Youth Hostel that likened itself to a hospital. If I were travelling alone it would’ve been torture, but with Jon as company to watch the soccer matches it was a blast. The rain, which had gone from a sprinkle to a downpour, kept us inside.

The first day we made use of Geneva’s best features, the free bikes (if you can believe it!) and a visit to the United Nations.  We biked around one of the most beautiful cities in the world, toured around one of the world’s most revered institutions and capped it off with lunch in the park. That evening we, along with one of the hostellers, took in the France-Italy game at the Fan Zone. The weather as described by the lady at the info centre was “spring like”.

The next day we experienced Summer at its best. After taking a free boat to the other side of the lake and wandering through the garden that boasts 200 varieties of roses, roman ruins (two rocks), and home to the Geneva convention, we took on the lake itself. Jon and I, with a satchel full of beer, rented a pedal boat for two hours (only paying for one!!). With the courage only two cans of beer can provide us, we decided to dip into the water. That happened to be a fabulous idea. We jumped, dived, and dipped into the coldest most refreshing water imaginable. The sun was beating down on us hard and we were non the wiser. Unfortunately, after all was said and done, and the evening set in, we realised that we were as burnt as two lobsters on a bbq.

We are now about to enjoy our last few hours together before he heads back to the UK and I off towards Paris on the last leg of the journey.  Next time you hear from me I will be in Amsterdam chilling out ready to embrace life back in Canada. How quick this trip has gone!

Ciao for now,

Benjamin Johnson

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If you like Pina Coladas…

16. June 2008 ben

And getting caught in the rain. That was my experience of Zurich. I have experience so much in such a small time so I’ll try to be very pointed.

First off, I arrived in Stuttgart from Munich and found at there was no room for me in either there or Zurich. So I figured, hey I’ve done it before why not spend the night wandering around beautiful Zurich? Well, upon arrival I was inundated with Soccer fever. It was awesome. There were giant TVs everywhere and the crowds were enormous. Not to mention that the city was gorgeous! It couldn’t be better for walking around all night and passing out on a bench right? Nien! Late in the evening in hit me like a load of bricks. It felt like someone had started spraying me with a hose. As it turned out, that someone was God. Everyone was running for cover, but I for lack of anything to do, stood there getting drenched. I ended up running to the train station for cover, taking about 15 minutes. I, and my bag, were drenched. I’ve never been in rain like that before. And so, abandoning my plan to hang around Zurich I sought refuge in the last night train of the day- to Salzburg, and Vienna. This meant scrambling at 4:30am to get off at Salzburg, less I lose a day go to Vienna (which wouldntve been that bad considering). Fortunately it was a success.

On the train ride back to Zurich I met a guy about my age from Germany who was about to start University after spending a year travelling the world. We shared stories along the way, toured around Zurich together, and for lunch he bought me a donair. I was touched. Travelling is amazing if only to meet fellow travellers.

From Zurich, I went to Interlaken. Imagine BC’s Kootenay’s and add German-Swiss writing everywhere. Interlaken is home to Europe’s highest peaks. The highlight of the trip was a guy I roomed with who was an American business graduate. We gabbed endlessly about mutual interests. The next day I relaxed in town and at the hostel, which was more or less like a resort. The best part, at least if your me, was the evening bonfire. I LOVED it. Great place to meet people and get a flavour of home. And of course that flavour lives on in your clothes indefinitely…

Unfortunately I couldn’t stay saturday (but was due to return for Sunday) so I had to find other accommodation. Most of Europe seemed like it was booked up. Sutpid Eurocup (mutter mutter). So I set of for Basel, Switzerland and did the coolest thing. My activity for the day was walking from Switzerland into Germany, from Germany to France via a pedestrian bridge, and from France to Switzerland. It was wicked. After crossing the bridge from G to F, my ears were thrilled to hear the language change. That is why Europe is amazing.

Today i head to Geneva to meet a friend. Tune in next time to hear about it+

Ciao for now,

Benjamin Johnson

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More Photos!

15. June 2008 ben

I have just uploaded heaps of photos from the Scandanavian trek through to today.

Cheers,

Benjamin Johnson

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Munchen and Suisse

13. June 2008 ben

Hello From Switzerland! I have, after seven years of ownership, reunited my watch with its homeland. In doing so, I have managed to find myself in the last new country of my trip. It has come to the point where the end is so close it feels like I’m already there. It’s a weird moment realising I know where I’m staying every night until the 23rd. I’ve been used to booking and deciding my next home the day before I get there. No more. The Eurocup put an end to that. I am staying in Interlaken right tonight (and last night) travelling to Basel tomorrow night, and then I’m back here on Sunday. Booking has never been so crazy. Nut that aside, I will tell you about the best part of my trip, Munich.

The trip from Stockholm to Munich was rather uneventful(an afternoon in Copenhagen and another over night train) but, as you may remember from the last post, I was glad to at least be on my way. Munich wasn’t a planned destination for me, but when I met up with Nathan he insisted I go. I even booked the same 40 room hostel he had. That turned out to be the best advice he’s given me.

Munich is heaven for my steady diet of bread and water (the locals affectionately call it beer). Leaving Scandinavia’s outrageous taxes and pricing in general and ending up in the land of beer was an incredible change. From seeing beer for 10 dollars a pint in Norway (and so I abstained), to finding beer in the store for 50 cents was a big thrill for my small budget. And, after the drama in Stockholm and sleeping in a bed only two nights in seven, I felt like I needed to treat myself.

First night’s treat: in bed by 8:30pm. I had one of the longest sleeps of the trip in a room of 40 people. The world around me was rocking out and cheering on the Eurocup, but it was lost on me.  You may think that was a waste but it was needed. My health was taxed by the arctic trip and it hasn’t even now fully recovered. The second day was a different story altogether.  After wandering around aimlessly in the morning I met a German/American girl in the lobby and we set off together for the two famous breweries. It was a blast. I can now say that I’ve had beer at its best. One brewery lays claim to the birthplace of the Nazi party, while the other dates back to 1328. Did you know that beer can be made without yeast? I didn’t. I also discovered wheat beer, and I will miss it for the rest of my life. After touring around Munich Ari (the German/American) and I decided to join a beer tour/pub crawl. The slogan for the tour was, ‘The best night you will never remember’. Touche beer tour, touche. Do not, when intending on taking a beer tour, miss dinner or start tasting at noon. I hadn’t planned on staying three day but, I booked another night and broke my record of having only stayed one-two nights in any given place. That said, the next day was a repeat of day one, rest and recovery highlighted by a trip to Dachau to find a former concentration camp (that was closed when we got there).

Life after Munich sucked, A) because I had to part company with one of the best companions I’ve met on the trip (no not the beer…) and B) I had no place to stay, again. I’ll tell you about that and life in Switzerland next time.

Auf Wedersen!

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My Near Death Experience

8. June 2008 ben

Readers, this one is a cookie. On June 7th, 2008, I dodged a bullet. No, not like the sniper fire that former candidate Hilary Clinton endured (by the way to the best of my knowledge I wasn´t shot at in Bosnia).  No, this was much worse. I had hoped to spend this time talking about the cruise I took from Turku to Stockholm, about the all you can eat and drink buffet, the cheeses and caviar, about my discovery that Finnish girls love N. Americans, and about the joys of reading about Barrack Obama´s victory (of sorts). Alas, no. I must tell you a) of my idiocy and b) why Stockholm is the most wonderful city in the world.
 
It all started at 5:45am. I packed by bags and left my room (without a wink of sleep). 6:00am the cruise ship arrives at Stockholm and we debark.  6:20am I and about twenty others hop on the the bus to the train. I drift into a slight sleep on the bus, but wake up in time for the stop. 6:40am I check the timing for my train to Copenhagen. I  have 1hr 20mins (8:20am). Plenty of time to check my emails, buy a fresh copy of The Economist and drift off before the train arrives.  At 6:50am I check my emails across the street at an Internet terminal in the 7/11. I walk back to the train station and visit the news kiosk. At 7:20am with magazine in hand,  I opened up the zipper of the upper compartment of my bag, and my heart stopped. My essentials bag was nowhere to be found.
 
My essentials bag is called as such because of the contents it carries. The rule is, if it is important it must be kept there. It´s my system to keep from scattering (and thereby losing) my important stuff. The contents are as follows: All money (including my accumulated collection of several foreign currencies), one new digital camera, one pair of Oakley sunglasses, my prescription glasses, three passports, the gps tracker, my Eurail pass ($1100 value), my flight info, and some other random things. I´d put a value on it, but if there were a moment to ascribe a Mastercard like ‘pricless’ tag on something this would be it. One other thing it´s about 12 inches by 18, and open mesh on one side. Not much difference between it and say, a display case.
 
7:21am my heart restarts and the shaking begins. I can´t do anything without this, literary. My identity and freedom to travel about the continent are within the clutches of that bag. And so, I rush outside. I must have left it in my cabin! 7:22am I hail my first cab of the trip, and ask him the price to the harbour. I don´t know why I asked because a) it didn´t matter how much it cost and b) I couldn´t remember the conversion rate for Swedish Crowns. 7:35am we arrive at the harbour, and I watch as the cruise ship delicately makes its exit from the harbour. I give the driver the only thing I have of value left, my Visa. 150 crowns later, I´m at the front desk of the cruise ship company explaining that everything I have of value is on that boat. She calls the cruise ship. Ring, ring, ring. Eons pass. No answer, and so she says this, ‘Why don´t you come back in half an hour and try again’. Ah, okay, I suppose, I have no other plans, anymore. ‘Where will you be?’ she asks. Waiting right here, of course…. But as I walk with my bag to the bench, and exhume the remains of the wreckage (the useless sack of crap that is the rest of my stuff), it happened.  Mark it at 7:39am. My brain had shut off with my heart and finally woke. I realized that I pulled out my essentials bag in the 7/11 and to grab my Internet access code (a paper receipt I had from a week ago). There lay my bag!!! As I ran passed the front desk I shout that I´ve made a terrible mistake and the bag is not in the cabin. ‘Good news!’ she says. No, this is not good news.  
 
7:41am I am back in another cab giving the command for utmost speed to the station! At this point I´m resigned to the fact that I won´t be getting my bag back and I might as well ask the driver to take me straight to the morgue. 7:51am I sign away another 200 crowns. All the crowns in world couldn’t bring my precious jewels back; I left my bag at a downtown 7/11 for god’s sake. Nonetheless I walk in, well, run in. I look to the terminal, and where my bag was left is only dust. Figures. And so I ask the guy at the counter. ‘I don´t suppose anyone has turned in a black bag?’. What a stupid question, even if one person were to be so kind, surely he wouldn´t be. ‘Ah(pause, pause, pause OMG!!!), what did it look like?’ (Don´t screw with me buddy…) ‘mesh.’ At approximately 5:55am I saw grace like never before. There before me in the saintly hands of the 7/11 clerk was all of my life´s belongings. ‘I could kiss you!’ I exclaimed, nearly breaking into tears. I shook his hand instead and he smiled back at my glee. At 8:20 I was on my train, on time, reading my magazine and giggling at my good fortune every few minutes.
 
Moral of the story: Next winter I´m putting the strings back on my mittens.

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North of Sixty

6. June 2008 ben

I sit down to write this post in the company of my former companion, Nathan, and in the care of his sister Sarah’s family in Helsinki, Finland. Since my last post I have slept in a train station, a train, a very fine hostel, and a bus station. I’ve watched the sun not set, and I’ve swam in the Arctic Ocean.

I can now say I have journeyed to the land of the midnight sun. On this trip I have seen some of the most amazing sunsets of my life, but it is another thing altogether to watch the sun skip setting and go straight to rising. After leaving the company of Woo and Sue Sunday evening I travelled through Copenhagen to Malmo, Sweden and there I slept on the bench until the next train (Nathan slept on that same bench the next day). Then it was a day of sightseeing in Stockholm, and let me tell you this, Stockholm is one of the most beautiful cities I have seen and home to the most beautiful people I have ever seen. Not bad for a stop over. That same day I caught the never ending train to Narvik (almost 24hrs).

I arrived in Narvik with no map and no place to stay. Fortunately it was easy to find the hostel and, despite saying they were booked up online, there was room in the Inn (It was called the Victoria Hotel!). This was one of the best ´hostels´I’ve ever been to. All the hostel rooms were on the top floor, I had the room to myself, there was a balcony, and an enormous buffet breakfast to top it off. Luxury in the far north. To pass the day I did what I usually do and made for the nearest hilltop. This one was unique in that I was walking past snow, seemingly familiar, and yet so foreign. Back at the hostel for the evening I pulled a chair out of the room and on to the balcony to take in the show. There I met Max, a Russian. I was excited to find out he was Russian and he was excited to find out I was Canadian so we decided to share our food and drink and share in the experience. And let me tell you it was an experience. It wasn´t so much that the view was exciting, but that it was inspiring. We philosophised about how other parts of the world were viewing this same sun, where it was dawn, what it looked like in Vancouver and Siberia (Max´s home). Much the way the way this trip has affected me, the view made the world seem that much smaller.    

At about twenty minutes after midnight I said to Max, `Max, I want to go swim in that water (pointing to the Arctic Ocean)´ and he replies, ´Ben, you are a crazy man´ and so I say, ´Yup, but that´s what it takes to be Canadian.´ And so about ten minutes later I made the leap into the frigid waters. Within seconds I was back out. I slept like a baby that night.

The next day I was back on the train en route to Helsinki. Most people, (and myself included at first) Travel from Sweden to Finland via boat. I on the other handwalked. That´s right, I walked from one country to another.  The journey took one hour and ten minutes. Ten minutes for the walk, and an hour on the time changed. The weird thing about it was that after I got off the train (in Lulea) I hopped on the bus to Happaranda. Happaranda is the Swedish side and Tornio is the Finnish side of the same town, and yet, the bus doesn’t connect you to Tornio. You have to walk across yourself. And so, at 8 at night, I crossed the boarder alone, and with no resistance. The worst part was that upon arriving at the bus station I found out that I was an hour late for the last bus of the day. Ten minutes ago I was on time.  Go figure. And so I wandered and wandered, attempted hitch hiking and eventually found an Oasis in the desert. There was the sign of signs-fork, knife, spoon, and 24 - the unmistakable symbol for 24hr diner. This one even had a 24hr supermarket. I was in traveller heaven.  

And now, well rested and very well fed, I depart Helsinki for a night boat to Sweden and then south through Denmark and Germany onto my last stop Switzerland. Got to save the best for last right?

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Sweet Sixteen und de Haus of Woo

1. June 2008 ben

I sit down to write my post, on the first day of June, in paradise. It is not so much the good weather, the warm climate, nor the long days that make Flensburg paradise, but the hospitality of Woo and Sue. I met Woo in the BCom program and he and his wife (in 2006) treated me to a traditional Korean dinner in Victoria. Fast forward two years and I’m in Northern Germany visiting my South Korean friends again. And they are treating me like a king. In the time since I’ve arrived we’ve eaten out for dinner twice, gone to the beach, gone for walks in the park, taken naps, purchased several varieties of beer for my tasting pleasure. Germany represents my 16th country, and within a few days I’ll have visited Denmark, Sweden, Norway and Finland. I’m looking forward to the trek to Scandinavia and the potential for travelling farther north than I’ve ever gone in my life. It is a happy and sad feeling being closer to the end than the beginning. The feeling that there are so many days to go that it almost feels like the trip will continue forever, is now a memory. Life is good. And I’ll tell you this, time here is just what the doctor ordered.
 
Sometime tomorrow I will have boarded my fiftieth train. I say that again 50th. As it is June 1st today, I have now spent entire month in Europe (plus a couple of days in April) and now begin counting down the days till my departure. The physical exhaustion of so much travel, coupled with the lingering effects of hay fever, have left me worse for ware. That reminds me, I haven’t described my last days in Slovenia. I woke up in the morning to yet another sunny day, and after getting all my affairs in order, walked down to the nearest storefront declaring “free internet” and checked up on things. As it turned out, 20 minutes ago Ryan (the Canadian) had emailed me to say he was in town. Small world indeed. Unfortunately he had already headed out for the day and wouldn’t be back until the evening. Thus I was resigned to the train station to head off for Austria. Upon arrival, at 10:30am I was dismayed to find that the next train wasn’t due until 13:30. Hmm… three hours to kill. Lo and behold I decide that the bigger town (Lake Bled has only 5000 citizens) is only three inches away on the map, and the trip in (from another train station) was two. Heck, no problem right? Well, not exactly. The Boy Scout in me was happy to take on this trek from Bled to Jesenice, but as it turns out I was hiking not 6k like I had figured but 10k. It was also over 30 degrees, and my sunscreen lasted ten steps. Don’t forget the backpack either. The best part was that I was walking through their national park; the worst part was that the stupid map gave me no inclination of the hills I was to climb that day. Count that as the sweatiest day of the trip.
 
From Jesenice I hopped on the next train bound for Austria. I was so tired however, that I didn’t want to get off and made it all the way to Munich. Now, seeing as I had to be in Flensburg on Friday (and it was Wednesday) I thought, why not take a night train to Berlin to ensure I had a full day without travel. Sure enough within twenty minutes of arriving in Munich I was enroute to Berlin. Berlin was great; I had my first solo experience of figuring the city out and meeting everyone in the hostel. While at the hostel I had the good fortune of meeting several true Germans who told me many stories and shared much of life in Germany. I even had an offer to join them on the autobahn for their trip back to Hamburg. But it’s the train life for me.

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Ich bin ein Berliner

28. May 2008 ben

Guten Morgen!

I am alive and well and I´ll be touring around Berlin today. Wish me well as my hostel is on the East side!

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When two become one

27. May 2008 ben

As of last evening, Nathan and I are both solo travellers. Mark it at 28 days of being joined at the hip. Ans so today, while I relax for another sun filled summer soak at lake Bled, Nathan moves on to see more sights (switzerland and such).  We will be meeting up later of course, in  Finland  in a  week or so, and at the end of our journey, in Amsterdam for the final three days. Already it feels strange but both us are excited to see what it feels like to travel solo.  I’m due to be in Flensburg this Friday and have no clue what I’m going to be doing in the meantime (Austria and Southern Germany to be vague). On another note Lake Bled is great. I tried to upload pics, but to no success. I’ve taken suntanning to a new extreme as I climbed a castle covered hill and, purched on a precipace, decided to pull out The Economist and start bathing in the rays. When it started to get windy I felt a little timid and decided to climb down. Otherwise things are quiet here, catching up on sleep and enjoying the slow pace for a day.

Alas this is a short post, but I’m sure there will be plenty to say for the next few days.

All the best,

Benjamin Johnson

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