well yeah

bit slow on the updates, but eh, these things happens.

Anyway, my last post was just before I went to maastricht. Maastricht was a pretty cool place, a very old town so it had lots of cobbled streets and suchlike - as a sidenote, cobbled streets are a pain to ride on, you bounce around like crazy. Anyway, I stayed the night there, didn't really get up to anything interesting.

Day after that I cycled off into belgium. This was my first day of cycling in the hills proper, and I got pretty ruined. I also discovered belgium is crap to cycle in - the roads are poorly maintained and there's hardly any signs pointing to other villages, and the bikes paths are either filled with shit or don't really go anywhere. Belgium also has a lot more of a rural feel to it than the netherlands, the villages are proper little farming places, not really a bad thing, it just felt weird. Anyway, I found some campsite in a place called Moha which I decided to head for that night, turns out it was full, so I had to crawl another 5 or 10k to another campsite in a place called oteppe. Can't really say much good about it, except that the campsite was a big place which had its own shop, so I was able to buy some crap to munch on.

Anyway, day after I headed off in the direction of charleroi. On the way I went through Namur, which seemed like a bit of a craphole so I didn't stop. I made it to charleroi at about 5pm, and was somewhat put out to discover there was no hostel in town, so I had the option of either finding a hotel, or cycling another 10 or 20 km to the nearest campsite. I opted for the nice dry hotel room, I spent too much money on it, but I appreciated being dry. I also had dinner in the restaurent there, had the most awesome steak, the soup of the day was good and cheap too.

Anyhoo, day after I cycled down towards chimay. Highlights of the cycling that day include people taking part in a triathlon flying past me, which was really quite depressing. I made it to chimay and found the cheapest campsite of the trip, 4.50 euros, it wasn't even that dodgy. I went into town and had an awful dinner, it was really quite shocking.

Anyway, On leaving chimay the next day I was heartened to see a road sign saying 215km to Paris. I got a bit of a boost from seeing this sign, and managed to push on to Laon, which seemed like a kinda interesting place. Wasn't really in the mood to check it out by the time I got there, so oh well. The campsite in town was pretty good and cheap. Highlights of the cycling on this day include the worlds biggest hill, this is only a highlight as I was going down in. It must have been a good kilometre of dead straight road at about 10% grade, was fun.

After Laon I pushed on down to Soisson, and found an internet cafe to look for a campsite that night, and to book some manner of accomodation in Paris. I managed to find a budget hotel in paris, and found out there was a campsite in a place called acy en multien, about 50 or 60km from paris. The internet cafe was pretty cool, 5 euro got me a massive sandwich, a drink and internet. Anyway, I headed down to the campsite, and was horrified to find it was 18.50 for the night. Ridiculous for a campsite in the middle of nowhere. Anyway, I didn't really have any other option, so I payed it. I then went to the local epicerie and bought myself some pasta in a can for dinner, and a 1.5L bottle of Sangria. The sangria drowned my troubles nicely, and the pasta wasn't too bad.

Anyway, next day I headed off to paris. I kept to the little rural roads on the way in, cycled pretty close to Charles de Gaulle airport, which is miles away from paris. Anyway, I managed to get lost nearish to paris, and decided to try my luck on the N3 into the city. This was a bad idea, as there was a fair bit of traffic, and it was all going rather fast. I bailed on that plan pretty quickly, and managed to find a quieter route in shortly after. After cycling for miles through the outer suburbs, I finally got to one of the Portes into paris. Once in paris proper, I then proceeded to get ridiculously lost for a couple of hours, until I got some directions from some nice french guy who spoke english. Anyway, I eventually found the budget hotel where I was staying, and budget was definately the right word. Still, it was more or less clean so I can't complain too much. There was a net cafe and a laundrette next door too, which was handy. Anyway, I didn't really do that much for the rest of the evening, not really being in the mood for it.

Next day I headed off to a hostel, which turned out to be in an interesting part of town. The metro stop is surrounded by dudes selling marlboro cigarettes imported from spain, among other things. Anyway, the hostel itself was an absolutely bizarre place. There was this old woman who stood at the side of the desk who seemed to be the manager, and she had this crazy schedule thing for all the rooms. I was apparently going to have to move every night I was in the place. Turns out I only had to move once, but still. Anyway, I headed off to the Louvre and looked at stuff for a while, and came back to the hostel for a tasty dinner of bread and vegetables and cheese from the supermarket. Anyway, I met half a dozen irish people while I was eating dinner, they were heading off on a pub crawl that night and invited me to come along. Despite not really being able to afford it, I agreed to come along. The pub crawl itself was a bit of a ripoff (essentially it was 11 euro to have someone direct you in between pubs and give you a bit of vodka and orange juice) but it was still an awesome time. I managed to get absolutely blotto (as an indication I was blind enough to call some random french woman "monseuir") and had an awesome time. Catching a taxi back was a challenge, I ended up having to hide behind a bus stop while a Canadian girl who was also staying at the hostel flagged down a cab. I then managed to pass out in her hostel room on an empty bed in there.

anyway, day after I visited a few more museums and whatnot, same ole. There's a whole lot of museums in paris, and they're all pretty cool, but they're all sorta blurring into one giant museum filled with arty stuff in my mind. This is probably bad, and indicative of how uncultured I am, but whatever. Anyway, I met a few random kiwis at the hostel, and spent the night drinking a bottle of wine in their room.

Next day I I wandered over to sacre coeur with a couple of randoms from the hostel, it is a pretty impressive place. The view of paris from up there is pretty awesome as well. I then went over to the pantheon, and had a bit of a gawk at the graves of dead famous people. Spent the evening talking in the hostel courtyard to some canadians and a few aussies, while drinking a bottle of wine. My evening entertainment is somewhat limited by my budget, talking to people while drinking a bottle of wine only costs me a euro or so, so it's not bad.

Anyway, I moved hostel yesterday, to a less dodgy place in a less dodgy area. It's kinda cool, but doesn't really have the backpacker vibe of the other place. I also managed to lose my towel and my toothbrush at my other hostel, which is a pain in the arse. I also left my bike there, for lack of anything better to do with it. I might go back in a couple of days and see if it is still there, i'm not too hopeful though. I visited the musee rodin which was cool, as well as the museum of arms and armaments at les invalides. They had an awful lot of suits of armour there, enough for a small army. I was boring and ended up falling asleep early in the evening.

So that brings me to now, it's stupidly early and I have no real idea of what to do today, so I'm thinking about wandering over the jim morrison's grave, which I have heard is pretty cool.

so yeah, if you made it to the end of this, congratulations, you win a prize! Well you would, if i could afford one.