European Vacation 2002 eXtreme!

Belfast, Ireland

We chilled in the airport for a while, got on an Air Transass flight to Belfast.  At the airport we remember to pick up an Oh Henry for Mikey.  They're banned in N. Ireland due to O Henry's sympathetic views towards the catholics. We check out the school where Mikey works and grab a requisite Guinness.

All the cars are really small.

We met Mikey's flatmates, Matt (pictured), as well as Adam and Rob.  We also met Dave, Adams brother.

Some random shots of Belfast.  Moss grows on every building.  We walk around a lot.  Expensive things are "dear", I wouldn't fancy paying for them.

Lookit them crazy roads!  The irishers are crazy!

We grab our last Guinness at the Belfast airport pub.  Bry tries to snap a blackmail photo of Mikey taking a drag.  He a big smokester-bear now, he even rolls his own.

Amsterdam, Netherlands

We get into the Netherregions and take a train to Amsterdam.  A lot of train rides will take place before the trip is over.  Rob passes the time by turning on the charm.

Hey!  We're in Amsterdam!

A couple of us take a boat tour through the canals of the city.  The city's basically organized in concentric U-shaped canals. All the buildings have hooks at the roofs because the Hollandaise are too lazy to carry things up the stairs.

This clock lets people know what time it is.  Much like Terminator X.

We did a lot of walking this day in Amsterdam.  It's basically the only thing I remember doing.  I'm told we checked out the Van Gogh and Anne Frank museums, though.

Berlin, Germany

More trainy goodness.  The loaf of bread, cheese and water lasted me for about 3 meals.  All for under 3 euro.

This is our apartement in Berlin, and the views from the balcony.  Pretty sweet digs, but all we did was sleep there.

Beer helps us think.

Beer helps us... do... stuff.  This is the first "beer garden" (biergarten) we visited.

My giant head is always cut off in the sides of the photos because I take the shot by holding it at arm's length with the LCD screen flipped backwards.  In the Berlin hostel, we met a girl who's dad works at RIM.  Small world.

Berlin at night, from the balcony of our apartment.

We did a walking tour of Berlin.  It took 11 hours. This is the largest synagoge in Berlin.  It survived the Night of Shattered Glass.

Torah-tastic!

Some anonymous courtyard.

This thing is called a Smart Car.  It folds up into your briefcase and has wheels made out of microchips.

The old Berlin post office.

A couple views of Museum Island.  I'm pretty sure it's haunted by aliens.

The commie side of Berlin was choc-full of these prefab buildings.  Our tour guide, Terry, called them Lego buildings.  I don't think he liked the Soviets very much.

A piece of the berlin wall outside of what used to be the very high security train station between the east and west sides.

Terry sheds a tear for the old British consulate on the east side.  Reprazent.

"Unter der linden", the street that leads down to the Brandenburg Gate.

Unfortunately the Gate is tarped in a massive advertisement right now, due to construction.  I could just barely get a shot of the statue of Nike on the top.

Just outside the Gate is this cool building done by Geairy.  Inside is one of the trademark organic shapes he's famous for.  Apparently made out of titanium.

Also outside the Gate is a circle of Bears and a view of all the development going on in Potsdamer Place.  Or something.

The Riechstag.

Soviet Memorial.  I'm pretty sure the statue is haunted by soviet alien babies.  And possibly zool.

The largest remaining section of the Berlin Wall.

Hey, heres us and our buddy Karl Marx.  Posin' proletariat style.

We witnessed a couple street demonstrations during our Europe tour.  This is one of them.

We went on a day trip to Potsdam.  It's this palacial estate where the sultan of Europe or something used to live.  He got buried with his dogs instead of his wife because apparently "they were more faithful".  He built a huge garden/park type dealy that was easily 4 square kilometers.  It's so big and opulent, there were even statues in the bathrooms.  Trees, too.

Digital cameras come in handy if you don't want to pay for a map.

Budapest, Hungary

A river runs between the Buda and Pest sides.  The bridges over it make good lanmarks because each one is done in a different style.

This is a cafe where a bunch of hot Hungarian girls tried to pick us up.  Either that, or they were luring us to some back alley for a Hungarian-style mugging. We spent another two days in Hungary, but I didn't bring my camera along because either it was raining, or we were hanging out with naked senior citizens.

Vienna, Austria

The weather was pretty ass in Vienna, so we stayed in most of the time and when we did go out, I left my camera behind.  It was fun hanging out with foreigners in the pub, though.  Probably one of the highlights of the trip.

Munich, Germany

We saw some of the famous European floods of 2002.  Good thing the train had an amphibious mode.

We visited the Dachow concentration camp, just outside of Munich.

The sights of Munich

Now with animated Glockenspiel-Action!

Another biergarten, where Bryan makes some new exotic friends.

TAKE! PHOTO!

TAKE! PHOTO! NOW!  NNNOOOOOWWWWW!

A beautiful garden.  But wait!  A closer look reveals a dying flower and a disgusting fly!  Metaphor!

Nuremberg, Germany

Our hostel was some kind of ancient castle.

Hey, is that a biergarten?  Maybe.  Why don't we take a closer look just to make sure...

Some photos of the Nuremburg skyline.  We were there.

Now we're gonna rock it National Socialist style. Here's Hitler's congress.  It never got completed, though.

Holy crimeny!  Hitler's come back to finish the job!

Nazi parade grounds.

The only thing in the world worse than Nazis.  Soon the time will come for a Final Solution.