Prague reminds me of Bratislava, unsurprisingly as they were once part of the same country.  Even those who speak Czech and Slavic can mostly understand each other.

As with most of the cities I've been to since Barcelona, the Old Town is once again the main tourist attraction.  I tried biking through it, but the cobblestone pathways made that quite cumbersome.  I also had a huge blister from playing capoeira in Munich and Vienna, so walking was not much easier at the time.

On the first night, I went to a Reggae bar with some people from the hostel, and while that itself is not noteworthy, the atmosphere of a bar that felt like a small cave is definitely pretty cool.

The Czech Republic's most defining piece of recent history is being controlled by the Soviets as Czechoslovakia.  The museum of communism isn't quite in the city square, but it's worth checking out.  Compiled by an American historian, the museum includes a lot of documentation of post-WW2 Soviet Union as well as some aspects of other communist regimes, i.e. North Korea.

The first night was spent in the hostel, drinking with my new roommates.  They were definitely a wild bunch to say the least.

Vienna, I felt, wasn't exactly the most beautiful place I've been.  The vibe I got from it wasn't too different from Munich's.  

Bratislava, which is right over the border, did at least have its own food culture.  I took a daytrip to Bratislava, one hour by bus, on recommendation from a number of other travellers.

Through Atlas Obscura, I found one particular highlight of my trip through Vienna, the Esperanto museum.  It's the most wildly spoken manmade language in the world, and as far back as a hundred years ago was intended to be the universal language.  It's also one of the simplest to learn (and sounds like Italian).  Sadly for the speakers now, English is here to stay for quite some time.

Salzburg is an absolutely beautiful city right near the German border, and second biggest city in Austria.  The old town is where most of the tourism happens, and mostly where I stayed.  There are tons of small streets with little shops, churches, graveyards, memorials, and the like.  I only stayed for one night in Salzburg, so I didn't have time to see everything outside of this area.

Mozart was born in Salzburg, so there's a ton of homage to him.  Concerts of his music can usually be found somewhere in old town, plus tons of souvenirs.  Additionally, the Sound of Music was recorded in the mountains nearby.

Salzburg (salt mountain) is also a big salt producer.  I kinda sorta bought some.

I got a stomach bug from something I ate in Zurich, so my first two days in Munich were quite painful.  I at least got to learn the pharmacy system in Germany!  You tell your symptoms to the pharmacist, and they bring you a recommended medication.  None of this self-selection in the US.

There's a big marketplace in the city center where people sell foods from all over.  Plus a lot of international produce (Thai fruit!).  To the north of the city, I saw the location of the Olympic games in the 70s.

The city is pretty small, and I couldn't find much more to do outside of the city center, so I went to the Deutsches Museum, housing a lot of human's technological progress throughout the ages.  Sailing, flight, astronomy, mathematics, etc. were all well-represented (environmentalism not so much, but it's a more recent scientific focus).  I'm honestly pretty jealous of a lot of the scientists who were working on these projects.

Geneva, Lausanne, St Gallen, and Zurich.  Four cities in four days.  This four-day weekend was hectic.

My friend Alex, who lives now in St Gallen, informed me that landing in Zurich would be far too expensive, so instead it was decided I'd land in Geneva, drop my things off in a locker, and that night meet him in Lausanne, where his parents live.

My first impression of Switzerland: holy shit everything is so overpriced.  The Franc to USD is about 1:1, and with that in mind here's some the prices I saw: $3.50+ for a cup of tea, $20+ for nearly any entree (including just a plate of spaghetti), $47 for a night at the cheapest hostel in Zurich.

I knew I couldn't stay here long, as my budget would not allow it.  Luckily I was crashing with Alex for most of the time.

I walked around Geneva, which is a nice city, including a lake clean enough that locals regularly swim in it.  A jet shoots water up a hundred meters, there's a wall portraying the Reformation, and of course the UN building.  I went to Lausanne that night, walked around with Alex for a bit, and went to meet his family.  Very nice and welcoming people, plus his mom's from California!

On Saturday, we drove to go hiking on a mountain about an hour away.  Not quite the Alps, but a beautiful set of scenery nonetheless.  On the way we saw some people rock climbing (there's a more specific word for it, but I forget; it involves ladders and specifically placed foodholds)  Toward the top, there's a lot of mountain bikers practicing going down a set rocky course.  And cows.  Lots and lots of cows.

That night, we hung out with his friends from childhood.  Sometimes it would be nice to speak French, I suppose.

Sunday, we went to Alex's current town of St Gallen.  Early.  When we got there, his roommates came back, handed me some beer, and we head to watch a soccer match (football/futbol?).  The environment, even for a small-time game, was intense.  There are closed off sections for fans of a specific team to go wild.  And they chant the entire time.  Anyway, St Gallen lost 0-2 so that was sad.

St Gallen is also known for a brotwurst they say is so good they don't need mustard.  It's the town's pride.

Monday, wake up early again.  Alex went to work, and I headed to Zurich.  Nothing much to say here, just walked around and saw some buildings, but none too different from the rest of Switzerland.  Played capoeira with a group Vivarte in the city, with some crazy skilled capoeiristas.

And, met a lot of cool people in the hostel.  I'd say I'm sad to leave for Munich tomorrow, but my wallet is glad.

Nice is nice.  The old town is close to the sea, and as per other European cities has a number of outdoor bar-restaurants.  The old town itself felt like Barcelona's in a way.

While the sea here is beautiful, the beaches really aren't.  There's no sand, at all.  Just rocks.  And it's not a really big beach at all.

I went with someone in the hostel to Monaco, which is holy sweet jesus the nicest looking town I have (ever?) seen.  Beautiful ocean on one side, mountains on the other, spotless (Singapore pales in comparison), some amazing lofts, houses, and cars. 

Now, I wouldn't want to ever live here long-term.  The people there are extremely wealthy, usually coming to Monaco for tax evasion.  They all own yachts, expensive cars, etc. and have no qualms showing off to tourists.  I was stopped for police randomly at some point once my hostel friend went back because I was a lone male who wandered outside of Monte Carlo (where all the casinos and government are) and was wearing khakis.  And I look Romanian, so I highly doubt the "random check" was so random.

I've been back in France for a few days, but the hostel's wifi has been really shoddy.  I finally decided to just sit in a nearby cafe to write this.

Barcelona has the imagery of multicolored buildings in small streets with laundry hanging out the windows.  And it did not disappoint.

An interesting thing I found is that, like most South American cities I visited, there's one main square and street in Barcelona, with most of the rest of the city being much more toned down.  So, that is definitely a result of Spanish influence (and of course colonialism), and not something they themselves designed.  I doubt any large traditional South American civilization still exist, but it would've been interesting to see.

I met up with a friend of mine from Kansai Gaidai, Victor, who brought me to a hedge maze outside the city center (as I was hoping to see things outside the beaten path) and to find some more traditional Catalan food (unfortunately most of the places we tried were closed, it being a holiday) i.e. coca, a pizza-like pastry - and not the western South American tea.  Part of Spanish tradition is the Falcons, groups who build human pyramids and other structures.  There's always a little kid on top who makes a falcon pose before going back down.

I also learned a lot about the Catalonia/Spain conflicts.  Catalonia historically was its own kingdom, and eventually taken by Spain.  For various periods of time, the Catalan language was completely banned, forcing Catalans to speak Spanish (not too unlike Kurds in Turkey). Today, Catalonia has a lot of issues in regards to laws it favors (including tax law) that the main Spanish government always vetoes.  Spain cannot afford to lose Catalan, as it represents over a third of the country's GDP.

The next day I went to a market on Victor's recommendation to finally find something to hold my coin collection.  The market itself was pretty small, not to mention unpictured, but finally after years of collecting I have something.  I found something that was almost the same in England... but 18 euros vs 30 pounds for the same thing is a no-brainer.

My last day was spent in Montserrat, a monastery high in the mountains an hour out from Barcelona.  Certainly a tourist attraction, but I felt it wasn't as overcrowded as downtown Barcelona.  One thing I particularly miss from Quito and Cusco are the grand mountains everywhere.  Montserrat did not disappoint.  The main building, from the outside, is not as spectacular as the hike surrounding it.

That night, I visited the Cordao De Ouro (an international Capoeira group) practicing in a park for the summer.  Sadly the mestre who teaches there and most of the students were out of town, but I still met some cool capoeiristas.

There's a lot of tourists in Paris this time of the year, everywhere.  And it's not too hard to see why; between the Eiffel Tower, Louvre, Notre Dame, and plenty of other museums and famous buildings, you can spend days just seeing tourist attractions.  Even as someone not particularly into museums, I spent the entire day at the Louvre.  Protip: There are ways to buy a ticket without waiting on the hour-long line.

On the first night there, I had wine and cheese at the hostel, and went with a group of around a dozen people to drink wine near the Eiffel Tower.  The tower is brightly lit at night, and will flash periodically.

With a group of people I met that night, I went to the Louvre, the grandest museum in the world, the following day.  The photos of the Louvre's art is on the bottom.  It has artwork mostly from Rome, Europe, and Egypt, as well as artifacts (this was my first time seeing real Egyptian hieroglyphics).  It also houses the Mona Lisa, which in person is surprisingly nicer and more vivid than I expected - I genuinely was impressed, despite seeing depictions of it for my entire life.

The last day was spent seeing the actual city.  While it's true that Paris isn't fully the wonderous city shown in movies, it's certainly not half-bad.  Naturally, I only saw the downtown areas - which themselves often contained tourist attractions, such as the Palace of Luxembourg and Notre Dame.  The Montmartre district, known for its art, is pretty nice too, but overrun with tourists.