Toulouse

So what's the city like? The French call it "La Ville Rose". But to me, it seemed always more orange, than pink. The buildings are built of a reddish stone or bricks and even the new business buildings keep onto that style. With its bricks, it reminds of the industrial British cities like Manchester.

What to see there? Is it very touristic?

The most important monument is undoubtedly the town hall built in the 1750's—"Le Capitol". If you walk on the Stree of Alsace-Lorraine, you notice a clock with a clock face divided in 24 instead of the classic 12 segments. Garonne, on of the four big French rivers flows through the city and shapes its form and character. Unlike in many other European cities, where the riverfront is the most touristic area, the riverside in Toulouse is quite calm. It's not as shiny and reconstructed as in Bordeaux, for example. In Toulouse, this is the place of picnics, talking, eating and drinking on a grass in front of the river. Especially in the late spring, it is full of students. Toulouse is not a city for tourists, it is a city of student parties. And of course, as a student city, it is relatively empty during the summer.

The Capitol

A special clock. Still not as special as the one in Brno ;)

Garonne riverside with Pont Neuf in the background.
If you need to know something about France: The oldest bridge
in the city is always called "The New Bridge"

Canal du Midi, an artificial waterway connecting the Atlantic Ocean with the Mediterranean sea, built in the 17th century, is another significant element of the city. It is used everyday by lots of runners and bikers. It's pretty, but walking there during a summer night is a bit scary, because of the big amount of rats that live on the slopes and eat out of the garbage cans. And for some reason, you can always find lots of hookers around there after dark, half of which are male transvestites.

The size of the city and its future

Even though Toulouse is the fourth biggest city in France, you don't have that feeling when you are in the center. The buildings of the historic core are rather small. On the other hand, the city with its suburbs spans over a big area. The city is the fastest growing city in France and in several decades, in can overtake Marseilles and Lyon and become the second biggest after Paris, if the rates of growth remain constant. It's a French and European center of aeronautics. If you want to piss off a Toulousain, you just tell him that if you took away Airbus and the universities, there would be about 10 inhabitants left in the city. But you cannot make them angry with that, because they would agree, laughing. Airbus creates a lot of jobs here. Toulouse is the only construction site of Airbus, where they produce the giant A380.

Canal du Midi

The Bridge "St. Pierre"

The surroundings

You can go to "Cité d'Espace"—an amusement park dedicated to space. Just after an hour and half of driving, you get to Carcassonne—an amazing castle-town that inspired the famous board game. Its towers are impressive. On the top of that, everything is close. You want to surf? There is Biarritz at the Atlantic coast. You want to swim in a warm sea without big waves? Narbonne and Perpignan on the Mediterranean await you. You want to ski? Pyrenees are two hours from there. You are into wine and beautiful villages? Go for a trip to Périgord for a weekend.

There are some places that are good to visit. Like Paris. And then cities, which don't lie on the top of your "to see" lists, but might be better places to live or study.

1. My first appartement. It looked like a house of the Addams Family (its inhabitants were equally creepy, but less nice), I left after a week

2. My second apprtement—a studio. Was cool, but expensive

3. The third and final appartement. Cool flatmates.

C. The Capitol
S. Escalier de St. Pierre—place where the beer is cheep and drinking people below the age of 19 abundant

P. Prarier des Filtres—cool for picnics. Lots of concerts in the summer
L. Huge, beautiful library
N. Jean Jaurès—main night life zone, bars, clubs... 

Image sources:
http://www.ensiacet.fr/fr/vie-etudiante/vie-a-toulouse.html
http://www.isae.fr/en/node/1641
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Toulouse_Horloge_24_heures_pour_Wikimedia_Commons.jpg

Iberian Roadtrip—Part 5: Madrid

End of the Journey: Madrid

Evelyn stayed in Granada, so we continued to Madrid with Jura.

The first thing about Madrid: It's dirty. There is always trash in the streets. Once, I was in a pub eating and dropped a piece on the table. The waiter came and when he was changing my paper tablecloth, he took that piece and threw it on the ground. In his own restaurant. Interesting...

The royal palace is certainly worth a visit, the art museums are the one of the best in the world, many of them for free. Prado competes with Louvre. But somehow, when it comes to architecture, it's not that fancy. I probably had big expectations from a city with five million inhabitants, especially after Granada. In Madrid it is hard to find a building that looks older than three hundred years.

Madrid, huh?

The "prettier Buckingham palace"

And it was more packed than New York. We came on Saturday and there was a river of countless heads. So, because Jura had to leave next morning, we just had one evening to discover the heart of Spain. We had a good, exhausting walk. The hostel was horrible, there was a some guy in our room from Ethiopia or Somalia who lived there for longer time. And just because of that, he behaved as if the room belonged to him and was being a dick. In the morning, I drove Jura to the airport and then my relationship with Madrid began, since I had the city only for myself.

Soo many people

Cibeles. Here is where the Real Madrid fans celebrate

Plaza de Callao. It has a cinema where there
are many movie premieres. It was half closed
because some Hollywood stars had come.

Atocha—a train station with its own jungle

The boulevards of Madrid

View from the Palacio de Cibeles

Don Quijote, Sancho Panda, Miguel de Cervantes
and an annoying tourist touching Sancho's ass

-------------------------------------

It's already six months since those events. Six months since I came to Spain and it all passed really quickly. I feel here like home. I am now confident in Spanish and strive to polish it to C2. The exam date is November, so until then, I will keep exploring this place. :)

Iberian Roadtrip—Part 4: Granada and Hiking in Sierra Nevada

Stop #4: Granada

We arrived to Granada the same day we left Gibraltar. First complication—we could not drive to our hostel, because the road looked blocked by a retractable pylon, as if it were private. So we drove around, failed to find another entrance, but instead found a spot for parking on the hill with a beautiful view of Granada. It turned out it was good we had decided not to stay and instead try talk to the intercom next to the pylon. They let us in. The thing is, there are still nomad gypsies living in that area and they keep their carriages in the old center. The Cordobans want them out, that is why the entrance is blocked during the night.

I was also told it was good we did not park on the hill, because I might have been robbed :)

So the first day, we did a trek in Sierra Nevada. The 4 days of travelling were taking their toll and we woke up quite late. Hence, we chose only a short route. Still, it was the first time I saw cherry trees blossom in March. And behind them, there were mountains covered with snow.

Mountain village, where we started the trek

Foothills of Sierra Nevada

Cherry flowers in March

To the victory!

In the evening we got to explore Granada itself. From our hostel, there was a beautiful view of the palace complex Alhambra. But there was not much time to visit it, so we plunged into the (really) narrow streets of the old town. Btw, I still fail to understand, how could the bus drivers manage in that part of the town. In some streets, they had like 10 cm on each side, between the car and the wall.

The old town felt Arabic. There were many places where you could sit down to smoke shisha. A bit lower, we came to a more Spanish-looking part and our mouths got to taste what the real tapas are like. With every bought beer, you receive something small to eat. Three beer rounds and you don't have to have dinner.

Alhambra at night

The old Arabic city

Fancy a smoke?

It was damn cold in the morning!

Tapasitas :P The best goodbye kiss from Granada. The most beautiful Spanish city I have seen.

Iberian Roadtrip—Part 3: Gibraltar

Stop #3: Gibraltar

On the fourth day we wanted to get from Sevilla to Granada, with a stop in Gibraltar. So what's so interesting about this rock that Spain and England are quarreling for even nowadays? As we agreed with Jura, the moment Gibraltar is transferred from England to Spain, it will stop being interesting for tourists altogether. There are not many sightseeings, save for the rock itself. But I have to admit the way the city grew from within a military fortress resulted in an interesting street layout.

"Jura, stand there for a picture."
"Nope, I don't like that flag in front of it."

Crossing the airport like a boss

There is British police with their funny hats and supermarkets that are full of employees who don't speak a word in English. So just like England.

OK, not completely. They pay with Gibraltar pound, the value of which is pegged to the British pound at the rate 1:1. Their car IDs have GBZ as the identification of the country, not GB.

We passed through the border and also the famous crossing of a road and an airport. After a walk through the historical core, we took a cable car to the Upper Rock National Reserve, the home of the Gibraltar Macaques. At the lower station there was a sign, warning that the monkeys associate plastic bags with food and snatch them. The steward in the cable car warned us that the monkeys associate plastic bags with food and snatch them. And Evelyn did have a visible plastic bag with her and did not hide it. The monkeys, upon seeing it, associated it with food and snatched it. Within a fraction of a second. So one big macaque had a lunch and did not even want to share it with youngsters that were around, begging for a piece. Well, Evelyn had a lesson.

Among other things on the rock to see, there is a cave and also some old military fortresses from the beginning of the 20^th century.

This way!

Upper Rock

The City of Gibraltar, the Airport
and Línea de la Concepción in the background

The visitors

The locals

Don't fuck with me human.
Where are the biscuits?

Nothing is better than a siesta

Abandoned military installations on the Rock

Europa Point—the southernmost tip.
A lighthouse, a mosque and a playground.

Europa Point lighthouse

If you look closely (and magnify the picture)
you will see Africa

In the end we sat at the Europa Point—the southernmost tip of the peninsula, ate things from the backpacks, while observing Africa, and watching big cargo ships crossing the Pillars of Hercules. Gibraltar—check!

Iberian Roadtrip—Part 2: Sevilla

Stop #2: Sevilla

From Lisbon we went directly to Sevilla. We slept in a building built in a typical Moorish style. Quite a cute, cheap hostel. It was cool, except that the toilette was directly in the room, divided only by a plastic wall that did not reach up to the ceiling and thus your pals could hear and enjoy all your "activities" there.

So what is in Sevilla to see? The most searched places are Torre del Oro at the riverside, the Sevilla's cathedral, which is the biggest gothic cathedral in the world, the gardens of Alcázar palace complex and the grave of Christoph Columbus. But the thing, due to which Sevilla was special for me, was the Metropol Parasol structure. It takes courage to place tens of meters high wooden mushrooms in one of the squares of the old city. But the result is very interesting and the complex fits in well. You can have a stroll on top of the mushrooms and there is one beer included in the price of the ticket. :)

Oh, did I mention that I found a mini-version of the European rocket Ariane 4 there? It has been there since the Expo '92 in Sevilla. The main topic of the exposition was "Time of the discoveries", because it took place at the 500th anniversary of the discovery of the Americas.

Our hostel

The river Guadalquivir and Torre del Oro at the dusk

The Sevilla's cathedral

Maahgic Mushrooms

And the view from the top

There she is, Ariane 4, tiny between the trees

Too bad we had only one evening for this city. It has a space rocket goddammit!

Iberian Roadtrip—Part 1: Lisbon, Sintra, Cabo da Roca

On the way from Porto to Madrid, I teamed up with Jura, my ex-colleague and friend from Brno and Evelyn, a friend from Hamburg and we did an epic roadtrip. How was it? You'll find out here. I'll split it in several parts, so that each post stays short and internet-friendly.

Part 1: Lisbon, Sintra, Cabo da Roca

First stop: Lisbon

The first two days we spent in Lisbon and its surroundings. That city was the biggest positive surprise from the Iberian Peninsula so far. I expected a small capital, but the opposite was true. On the other hand, it has this feeling of a "student city". Not so crowded, not too industrial nor gets one claustrophobic feelings. They say it has been built on 7 hills, just like Rome. And it's true that the views from the hills on the mouth of Tejo river are breathtaking. They got their own "Golden Gate" bridge (Ponte de 25 de Abril) and their "Jesus Statue from Rio" (Santuário Nacional de Cristo Rei). The city is famous because of its yellow trams. The ones in San Francisco were inspired by them. If I were to pick two things that you certainly must visit, then it would be: Torré de Belém, the symbol of Lisbon and the steampunk-like public elevator, Elevador de Santa Justa.

Monument to the Discoveries
(the bridge of 25th April in the background)

Lisbon view

View on the Atlantic from the Torré de Belém

National Pantheon—the tomb
of Portuguese heroes

Alfama—the medieval town

Santa Justa Elevator

Torré de Belém

Mosteiro dos Jerónimos—beautiful monastery,
where Vasca da Gama is burried

That's him, the big discoverer

Parque de Nações—The place where Expo 98 took place

Lisbon at night, Castello de São Jorge in the background

Close to Lisbon lies Cabo da Roca, the westernmost point of continental Europe. Another surprise. I expected just a boring beach with a pole stuck in it, but the cliffs are high above the ocean and you can just sit on the rocks and listen to the waves breaking on the rocks. "Onde a terra acaba e o mar começa..."

And Sintra? Sintra is a fairy tale village between Cabo da Roca and Lisbon. It was one of the seats of the portuguese royal family. Too bad every time I visited it, it was already evening, so almost everything was closed. But the place is magical, even in the evening and is certainly worth a visit.

Jura, me and Evelyn, chillin "in da west"

Looking for the Statue of Liberty

Lisbon felt good. It was fresh and young and it did not feel like a stressful city. I got to return there one day.