Touching Down in the Fatherland

The main train station in Frankfurt. A German fellow desperately wanting to take a picture with a Canadian traveller.

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Vancouver, Canada to Frankfurt, Germany.

Chester: We decided to take the comfy route to the Vancouver International Airport via Greyhound.  After saying our goodbyes to our friends, families and loved ones, we were off to spend the night with my brother at the UBC Vancouver campus.

Our bus driver was completing his farewell tour soon, as he constantly remined us that his last ride was coming at the end of the month.  He mangaged to "find a few tricks up his sleeve" and beat the long weekend traffic to get us there reasonably on time. 

Sam met Derek and I at the main Vancouver terminal and took the Skytrain to UBC.  We proceeded to enjoy an evening at the soon to be world famous "Cafe Crepe."  A 5:15am wake-up call led us to our taxi service to YVR. 

Luke becoming one with the European Union. A large euro (€) symbol in the heart of Frankfurt´s financial district, erected to commemorate Germany´s participation in the EU.

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We decided to cristen our Tim Hortons travel mugs graciously given to us by Mrs. Mahoney before we left.  Our travel companion on our flight was a lovely, elderly Austrian lady named Astrid.  She had been living in Canada for quite sometime, and frequently travelled back to Europe to visit friends.  As Derek soon found out, she was a bit of a Chatty Cathy as well.  After being crammed in to the charter plane seating for over 10 hours, including a stop over in Edmonton (unfortuntely we couldn´t go see Steve) we eventually arrived in Frankfurt just past 5:00am local time.

The train station in Frankfurt is underneath the airport, which is quite a feat in itself.  With a few quick inquiries we were off to the centre of the city, with our hostel close to the main station.  The main station in the city - Frankfurt Hauptbahnhof - is beautiful.  We can see it through the window right now from our internet cafe at the hostel.  This is the extent of our voyage so far, as checked into our hostel a mere 200m from the station.

Frankfurter Dom. The coronation site of Holy roman emperors during the Sixteenth through the Eighteenth centuries, which was a rare survivor of the World Wars.

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The fact that we are in Europe and embarking on trip of a lifetime is slowly starting to sink in.  I´m sure it will take some getting used to.  We have already checked-in, had some free breakfast, and made some friends at the hostel from Portland.  They should do nicely until we can find some real friends (Canadians).

Titus: The friendship with the eager Portlanders may not have panned out during our stay in Frankfurt.  But a new one with an informative and amusing Austrailan did.  He went by James, and the three of us joined together initially by our mutual distain for Phil, the socially inepted middle aged american in our shared room, and a common bond of British humour (it was refreshing to hear Monty Python quoted so far from home).  That evening we hit downtown Frankfurt as a threesome and ran into a couple of young "overly enthusiastic" german girls who where in search of a party they weren`t invited to.  They did, however, teach us a few meaningful phrases in german such as: "Dis mitten eis getrunken" (This girl is drunk).  We were also exposed to a version of "hiking" we had not been exposed to in North America; it involved running into and hopefully through the bushes found near sidewalks.  It can be assumed that this practice originated during the volitial years of the German Reformation when disgrunted and imaginative youth grew tired of excessive religious bickering and rebelled in their urban environments.  I smell a potential Master`s thesis here.  Although James declined, Luke and I attempted hiking ourselves but were clearly amatures as we went over the bushes in a style that is frowned upon.  But hey: When in Rome.  Well, at least Frankfurt.