Tough times in Zermany and good times in Austria

Hello my dear friends,

Here comes my first real entry to this awesome and internationally appreciated blog. I am now in Salzburg, the lovely city of Austria, almost drunk writing my experiences so far. I'll write ibn bullets to make it easy to folow. This way, even Ender can understand what I write. Here we go:

Zermany and ze Zermans:
- I flew to Frankfurt-Hahn (dont believe if someone says the airport is in Frankfurt. Takes 1.5 hours to get there) with Ryanair
- I "tried" to go to Köln (Kölün in Turkish) by flygbuss but the fate stroke upon me the first time: The airport shuttle was involved in an accident. A motorbike (with the rider on) got under the bus. He merely survived with serious injurues: A scratched leather jacket! On the other hand, his bike blew out our tire and we had to wait for almost 2 hours for the repair guys to come and replace it. Luckz strike!
- I barely caught the last train from Kölün to Düsseldorf (düüüzillldooof in turkish) where my friend lives. The train stopped for 1/2 hour in the middle because the railway has been slightly flooded.
- My chain of good luck ended when I put my head in rest safe and sound and got a good sleep.
- There is a german keyborad with z and y switched places.

The next day I walked around in Düsseldorf and Köln:
Kölün:
- First of all, believe it or not; the Germans in this area speak English and dont get angry at you when you ask questions. They even have announcements in English in trains!
- The bullet train ICE (makes 260 kmh regularly) was totally included in my railway pass so I rode it 4 times in 2 days happilly. Nice trains...
- Köln has a nice old town and a huge cathedral "Dom". 1-2 hours of walk ius enough to see the old town and more is unnecessary - of course I walked for 4 hours to see everything that has been ever built in the city
- Don't ever climb up the 1750 stairs of the Dom. You have to pay 1.5 euros and even athletically build, wonderfully conditioned, strong men (like me :P ) can get exhausted on the way up. And it's not worth it.

Düsseldorf:
- Very lovely city, looked and felt a lot like Göteborg to me
- There are smiling and happy Germans in the town (not kidding)
- Cool local beer, but they offer them in RAKI glasses (narrow and long and thin) so I had to drink 10 glasses to get tipsy
- Bener and Ipek, my friends living there, are great
- 1 day at least is needed to see what the city has to offer

Then I rode another pre-paid-thus-free fast train to Munchen and without staying there (my basic travel plan was to stay as little as possible in Germany) Salzburg:
- This might be the most beautiful city I have ever seen! Wonderful scenery, great architecture, amazing nature...
- Mozart was born and lived here, everything has to do something with him.
- There is an open air music festival running here today and tomorrow. Great bands are playing on the stages set up in the streets. Imagine the musicianship when I say a fusion band was playing in fornt of one of Mozart's former residencies. Chick Corea Band minus Corea himself played for free in the street for 1 hour. I could not move!
- I think I'll spend at least 2-3 days here just to see what the city has to offer and to visit the nearby wonrderful Alpine area
- The highlight of my day was the Beatles band that played in one of the streets wher Mozart lived. There were at least 500 people on the street singng along my favorite songs. They even played the less knoiwsn songs like My Bonnie, Lucy In the Sky With Diamonds, You've Got to Hide Your Love Away and even one of my personal favorites Happiness Is a Warm Gun. They were wearing wigs and suits and spkeaking in Liverpool bad-ass accent! Perfect!

I'll get back to writing in a couple of days!

Take care and keep on commenting :)

Cagdas