Day 15 was our earliest morning so far. I got up at 5 am to
get ready, pack up, and finish up any last chores in the apartment. It was
rough, but we wanted to get back to Berlin as early as possible. The only way
to do that was to take an 8 am train out of Zurich.
Luckily, we were successful in getting to the train station
via the tram, even with our semi-obnoxious suitcases. At the train station, we
stopped to get breakfast. Well, it was a little early for me to eat, so I just
had hot chocolate…but at least it was something. Once our platform was finally
posted, we headed there and figured out where our car was going to be.
For the first time all trip, the train was FLIPPED AROUND.
It really wasn’t a huge deal, since we were the first stop, meaning we had a
good amount of time to get on board, but still. Walking the length of half the
train with suitcases amidst a bunch of other confused people isn’t exactly my
favorite thing. At least we had a good place to put our luggage on the train,
reserved seats, and a pretty chill atmosphere. The whole time we were on that
first train (about 3.5 hours to Mannheim) it was nice like that: not too many
people. Our train from Mannheim to Berlin, though (5.5 hours) was a different
story.
It was unbelievably overbooked.
There were people standing in the aisles, little kids sitting in the sections
between cars, and luggage everywhere. It would’ve really been a nightmare had
we not reserved seats. Eesh! I don’t know how all those people managed.
On the trains, I listened to music, wrote blog posts, began
reading Persuasion by Jane Austen,
and watched half of Forrest Gump with Kayla. (Once Forrest and Bubba arrive in
Vietnam—when Fortunate Son is playing—the lady next to me got up to go to the
restaurant car, so we paused it, but Kayla said her neck hurt so we just
stopped. Not like I’ve never seen it before, though...clearly).
Overall, the trains were fine. I didn’t get bored or feel
uncomfortable or anything. It was chill.
Once we got to Berlin, though, we took a few Ls (for my
older readers, that means that we ran into some bad luck). For one, both of the
ticket machines at the U-bahn platform weren’t working. One wasn’t accepting
any form of payment, and the other was only taking coins. Kayla and I put in
all the change we had, but we were 15 cents short. Thankfully, two British
girls lent us the coins. We felt terrible, though, because they didn’t have
enough coins to get their tickets, and so they had to go to a different
platform or something. Stupid ticket machines!
I’m pretty sure the only other problems we had
were a broken escalator and ridiculously, absurdly long lines at the grocery
store. We had no problems getting the AirBNB key from Sophia, the host, and
found the things we needed to buy at the drug store and the grocery store.
Aubrey's special request
We had dinner at a cute place called The Winery down the
street from the apartment and really enjoyed it. Of course we had to get wine,
since they had such a good selection. To eat, we shared a bruschetta with
pecorino cheese and eggplant, and also each got pasta. We needed the
nourishment after that long day!
As you can probably imagine, we went to bed on the earlier
side. We stayed in the same AirBNB as we did in the beginning of our trip, but
this time we were in a different room. Our bed in this room was a loft bed. I’d
never seen a double bed loft bed! It was neat, and very comfortable, but kind
of obnoxious, of course. But I guess it saves a lot of space.
So once again, we were going to sleep in Germany. And I must
say, it was very nice not having to set an alarm—especially one for 5 am!
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