Thomas Bosboom

Small but a good vibe. And a good set off hostel guests to have fun with! Simon, Robin, Zoe and Emma are a friendly bunch, maybe the excessive amounts of gluhwein that we needed to keep our fingers defrosted also helped… Anyway, the whole city was …. to be continued!

Quite a culture shock again, Budapest is so much more touristy and modern than Bucharest that I’m sure i’ll never mix the two of them up in my head. Budapest is living, partying, shopping…  and they know it. Not as adventurous though. The hostel is really nice, The Loft Hostel, complete with christmas tree, gluhwein…

22 hours is a bit long for a train journey, even for the ipod owning traveller. The sights during the daytime while crossing Bulgaria where good though. Fresh snow, sunshine and a horse and cart every now and then on the deserted country roads. Bucharest felt almost like going back to the Ukraine in how…

What a culture shock to arrive in Istanbul after the Ukraine. Suddenly there is commerce everywhere, merchants screaming for attention in all languages and the spicy smell of the east is in the air…   I have found a very nice hostel in the Sultanahmet area, Istanbul Hostel. Very nice big beds, friendly personnel, a…

It was painfull saying goodbye to my sowjet style room in hotel Passage, you get attached to the 60’s decoration and smokey smells. But I packed up and left since a ferry to Istanbul was waiting for me! The ferry is a nice adventure in itself, so I’ll provide a few highlights: -The Ukrainian Border…

I’m now in Odesa, checking out the famous steps from Battleship Potemkin and the rest of the city offcourse. One of the top hits when googling for Odesa is this one, so to get  an impression have a look here Within a few day’s I’ll post my own photos to compare. Although, I’m seeing Odesa…

Sleeper trains could be a very good way of travel, but somehow it annoys me that a 600 km trip should take 12 hours, and the the lack of any ventilation combined with a heater on full blast makes sleeping nearly impossible. It does save a night in a hostel and you arrive early in…

I really like Lviv a lot. Maybe because of the great sights, but the hostel definitely helps as well. You know, most hostels tend to be friendly places but The Kosmonaut is an exceptionally good hostel. Ed and the rest of the staff have been so helpful, from aranging trips to helping with the booking…

The first day here was pretty much just sleeping and relaxing, listening to my iPod (lectures on Nietzsche, a good way to fall asleep). I met the other people staying here in the Kosmonaut hostel, Francios, a very nice french guy who is walking acros the mountainranges in eastern europe, Nick and Simon, two australians…

<p>I decided that travelling to Lviv via Krakow would be fun as well, even though I had already been there. So I got on the bus at 5 pm, had a few near death experiences on the two lane roads connecting Vilnius and northern Poland (Imagine a convoy of 100’s of trucks on your lane.…