So Fairies DO Exist?? And Travel Disappointments

I just gots me mah scholarship moneyz!! Woop woop! Is it wrong that the first thing I'm going to do is buy this gorgeous pair of shoes that I saw last week and was desperate to have? Yes. Actually, first I'm putting a tonne of money on my credit card. Well, I don't think I've put the amount on there of what I've actually spent on my card in the last few weeks (travel expenses, presents for people, castle souvenirs...), but I don't want to not be able to travel towards the end. A girl's gotta save her money.

Plus, Rachel's coming this weekend and on Monday we're going to go to Oberhausen, home of Centro, the biggest shopping mall in Europe. :) Naughty.

Plus I'm planning a bunch of trips:
Friday 11th to Monday 14th December - Amsterdam
Monday 14th to Thursday 17th December - Belgium (pretty much so I can go to Bruges and say, "It's a fucking fairytale. It's a shame it's in Belgium...")
Sunday 20th to 23rd December - Prague
Sunday 26th/27th (not sure which yet) to 4th January - Italy (Venice, Trieste, and somewhere else, not sure yet)

That's what I've got so far. Lara and I are planning a day trip to Hamburg in January sometime, and Lara's coming with me for the weekend when I go to London at the end of this trip.

BUT, for all the things that have gone well, there have been some big travel disappointments. The main one is Ukraine. I have wanted to go to Ukraine since I first met my friend Natalia in the US. Natalia lives in Stuttgart but grew up in Ukraine and told me how wonderful it is and I was hooked. This was only intensified when I watched Long Way Round:



Doesn't it seem AWESOME??!!! I think the guy bringing out the machine gun solidified my desperate need to go. "Usually people bring a coffee, he brought a fucking machine gun!"

So imagine Rachel's and my elation when we discovered I could fly from Dortmund to Kiev for about AU$60 return. We almost booked straight away. Luckily Rachel checked her Lonely Planet guide and discovered we'd need visas to go there. What? Basically the only countries in the world that need a visa are Australia and New Zealand, the two countries we just happen to be from. Racism, much? I mean, they even let Mongolians in visa free. MONGOLIANS??? You'd prefer Mongolians to Australians?? What, is my dollar not good enough for you? Or you know, I could get a visa but I'd have to forfeit my passport for however many days it takes to process, and I'd have to pay to have it done, and I may not even be able to do it because I may or may not need a letter of invitation from a travel agent over there. Is Ukraine worth it? Once upon a time I would have said yes, now I think it's too much hassle.

So here's the plan: AUSTRALIANS, we must BOYCOTT UKRAINE!!! This is a call to arms and it will be easily enough done, what with us not being able to go there anyway. Seriously, I feel so hard done by. Now I know how the _[insert some maligned people here]_ felt.

My other travel disappointment: possible not being able to go to the Nuremburg Kristkindlmarkt. We had found this bus doing a day trip there but it won't be possible for us to get to this bus. We could take a train, but that would cost about, oh, 180 euros. Yeah, no. So I don't think it's going to happen which is so bad because I was hoping to meet up with Judith and Natalia there. But we'll just have to find some other time to meet up.

My other travel disappointment really stems from the fact that I realised I only have 3 more free weekends in which to actually travel, and these are all in January. I'm thinking of going to Budapest on one of the weekends because I found some cheap flights there. One place I really wanted to go while I was here was Mont St. Michele in France but I just don't see how I'll be able to get there, or once I get to the area, how I'd get around without a car. It's just not going to happen.

But I'm also not sure where else I want to go while I'm here. There are so many places I want to see that I'm struggling to decide on any. So make me a suggestion!