Bad to worse... now a little better...

The last couple of days have been really difficult for the Griffo's. It's easy for us to put all of the nice things on this blog, but we want it to be a true representation of what it going on and how we're feeling... So here goes.

We first got our quote from the mechanic of 533 euro which we were really happy with so we booked into the Mecure for the night for a treat. We went to a local pub to watch some world cup football and have a few pints when all of a sudden Andrew began feeling really ill. It seemed as though a sudden bout of gastro was upon him. We made our way to the hotel via a tram ride of approximately 20 minutes of hell. On arrival at the hotel we went straight to our room and fell asleep, there was nothing near the hotel to buy food from so we dined on two bottles of Fanta from the vending machine in the hall (Andrew couldn't take anything else). The next day after a very broken sleep, we went downstairs and had breakfast which was included for us, Jamie ate quite well, and Andrew had a couple of bits of dry toast. After getting back into town and planning our new route once we got Callum back we decided to make a phone call to the mechanic to confirm a pick up time. This is where things really turned to shit.... The mechanic said "Hi Andrew.... Things are not fine..." the rest of the discussion was not something I should put in text. Ends up, it's going to cost us 1726 euro!!!  Turns  out we need another clutch as it was incorrectly installed by the previous mechanic and we also require a new gear box.  This was the moment that we had to decide if we keep Callum or sell it to a scrap yard and catch the train.  After lengthy discussion, we decided to pay for the repairs and continue on with our journey.

The next day we went to the train station (While Cal was in getting repairs) and decided to either go to Paris or Berlin (depending on what was cheapest).  Berlin won and we were on the next train. While sitting and waiting for the train, we messaged John (Jamie's cousin who lives in Berlin) who said we have to come and stay with him while we're in Berlin! SWEET! Maybe our luck was changing.... It was right at this stage that Andrew was stung by a bee on the neck... Awesome.  We got on the train and found some great seats and started having a bit of a nap when we were woken by someone claiming that we were in their seat. Turns out we didn't actually book a seat.. Just a ticket. So paying 180 euro, one way won't actually secure you a seat!!  We had to sit on the floor dodging the opening doors for the 4 hour journey.

(the better part)
Once we got to Berlin, John met us at the train station and we went to his place for a few drinks and a fairly early night. His girlfriend Marta came around and then his house mates got back. We ended up getting to bed around 2am. The next day Marta was nice enough to show us around Berlin. We went to see the Brandenburg Gate, The Holocaust Memorial, Government House, The Berliner Dom, The Berlin  Wall and a really cool art gallery that was covered in graffiti and looked like a derelict building, but housed some amazing (and some really shocking) art. We also received a phone call from the mechanic advising that Cal was ready to go, but we could pick it up on Monday if required. We're going to hit them up for a discount because it didn't take them as long as they thought.

Today we're off to the Berlin Gay Pride festival which should be good times! They've closed down lots of the main streets in the city for the parade which should be a lot of fun.

Will report again soon,

A&J xo