This is probably the best picture that I've taken on my whole trip, I love it. Good old "Camera on the Ground" works every time. I'm getting ahead of myself though, that was near the end of Paris. You've got to suffer through the rest first, and don't just scroll down to the Eiffel tower either, thats not cool. haha
I spent Two days and two nights in Paris. Paris is huge, and quite expensive so i didn't eat much. I spent the first day exploring most of the sites around the outer parts of the city, did a lot of walking, but actually saw a lot. This is the Bastile in the early morning.
I walked through a few of the beautiful gardens on the way to and from the other sites. People seem to hang out in these park areas at all times of the day. I guess there are a lot of artists in Paris that have this kind of time, also people have such small appartments that they treat public parks like their backyard. There are large fountains in most of these gardens where there is always a guy renting toy boats. Little kids push the boats away from the edge with a long stick and it actually catches the wind and sails across the pond, or fountain. This particular park use to be the herb garden of Louis XV. Thousands of different species of flowers and plants. My dad (and avid gardener) could have spent hours here probably.
I saw one chruch that apparently hosted a few scenes in the Davinci code. Nerds from all around were taking pictures of it. I don't think it was very popular before the movie though, so they can't be complaining. The Louvre also had a special tour that you could take that went to all the nerdy Davinci code sites. I didn't take it because I have a life. haha. These are actually human skulls resting on thousands of bones. The catacombs were actually not as creepy as I imagined. It would help if they didn't have as many lights. My favourite part was the sign at the start which had the "rules" of the tour which included "please, do not steal the bones"
Notre Dame, The real one, with the hunchback. I didn't go in because there was a huge line up and I don't like waiting around in lineups. They really need to Lop down some of the trees close to it too. One could easily be standing right beside it and not see it, not very good for the tourists.
My Civil classmates would find this building both amazing and a headache at the same time. The Centre Pompino sp? is a relatively new hang-out square for portrait artists and buskers. The building is so cool though. Its a maze or trusses and rarely used connections. Also the corners have chords that pull down on levers that hold up the rest of the building. Really interesting. Wouldn't want to design it though. Oh, and the vents, electrical, and plumbing is on the outside of the structure too.
This is the Champ-Elysees. Where over a million people pooped themselves when France won the world cup. This is where all the best stores in Paris are. You could probably break a 1000 euro bill pretty easily here. Unfortunately I didn't have much money at the time, so none fo you are getting gifts from anywehre near this place. I beleive I was on the Arch de Triomphe at this time.
Yeah, pretty great view of the Arch from the other end of the Champs Elysees as well. Interesting little fact: the reason that Paris has such wide streets in places is apparently the work of Napoleon. He tore down houses to make roads wider after he came to power so that Rebels could not baracade the streets. Wide boulevards are harder for small forces to defend and this significantly decreased the effectiveness of smaller resistances.
While we're on the topic of Napoleon, Guess who is in this MASSIVE tomb. Correct, its Napoleon. Housed in the Hotel Invalides a massive complex that was build to house all of the veteran soliders "Invalids" from the revolution. Now its the Military Museum and collection of medival armour as well as the tomb of the little fella. One neat thing in this complex was their collection of flags hanging in the Soldier's chapel. Apparently France saved the flags from every place that they've ever invaded or conquered. Neat idea, I thought.
The Louvre at night, a lot more peaceful than the louvre during the day. The world's largst museum is always packed. Its an absolute maze too, quite hard for most to navigate without a tour.
I didn't have much trouble finding my way around after a bit. but they could make it easier i think. Most of the art is by people that I've never heard of, I'm not sure that it is the best quality gallery in the world, but it does have some very famous pieces, The mona lisa was getting lots of love, and there are a few statues that are pretty busy as well. If you only go to see the mona lisa though, you should really just stay home and look at it on the internet: you can't get very close to it, and it is small. Also, there are so many flashes going off around it you can't get a good look at it. 
The louvre, the building is actualy quite impressive. The new entrance with the pyramid is swell. This spiral stairway without any supporting columns was really neato. The center silver tube isn't actually attached to the stairs. Its a Pnematic elevator, so it just rises from the floor, they wouldn't let me go on it though. It was because I wasn't in a wheelchair, thats like Reverse-Handicap-ism.
The weather: not so good on the second day. This is the tourist scene in the Jardin de Tullinaries, just before I got to that egyptian spire at the end of the park I got owned by a thunder storm. I hid under a medium sized tree until it ended.
This is the Church of the Sacred Heart, quite far north of the city center. It is on Montmartre hill looking over paris and it has an amazing panoramic view. Also a big enough stair/hill area in front of it to warrent a lift. All the old and fat people took the lift to the top which wasn't even 150m long. Quite funny. Inside the church they had about 10000 candles burning, I beleive that one of their beloved ministers recently died. However this did not stop sony from holding a downhill bicycling competition on the hill right in front. hehe
I took a big detour out to a district on the west side of the city. La Defence is where all the modern and tall buildings are located in Paris. In the middle of all these tall buildings is a massive open area. Crowning this open area is the Grande Arch. A 100m tall building with a huge hole in it. Probably the coolest modern building that I've seen in Europe.
Alas, on sunday night I went up the Eiffel tower. Basically you line up to get to the second deck, then you line up on the second deck to get to the third, and highest deck. I started this great adventure at about 9:30pm and by the time I got to the second deck the sun was just going down. At the top it was just past 11pm and it was completely dark. The best thing about it was you could still see all the sights because they are so heavily lit at night. It was hard to take good pictures from the top, but I was really glad that I went up at night.I sat around on the Champs de Mars in front of the Eiffer tower for the remainder of the night watching the lights sparkle at midnight. It took rock climbers 2 months to install thousands of leds on the outside of the Eiffer tower and every hour during the night they are set off randomly. It looks amazing. I also learnt that the Eiffer tower shrinks up to 12cm every winter when the rivettes contract.
If there is one thing that is better than the Colussium during the day, it is the colussium at night. Its almost like they paid a bunch of artists to place the lights perfectly so that tourist could take great pictures. It was really impressive at night, I have numerous shots very similar to this one. I sat around in front of the colussium most of the evening on Sunday. I met a bunch of young American girls that made me take a bunch of pictures of them and I watched the people try to sell Fake gucci bags and little touristy trinkets all night. I felt really bad for them though, every once in a while the Police would drive by and they would have to pick up all their stuff and scramble. A few times the cops would sneak up on them and drive all around the sidewalks and pathways chasing them. Try to run from the cops with 30 Gucci bags in a bed sheet over your shoulder.
Rome: The Capital of the World. It all started out with a quick little train ride (11hrs) through Munich, Innsbruck, Bologne, and Florence. I slept most of the time, which worked out really well even though I was scared that I was going to sleep though the stop and end up in Naples. One the night train I took to Vienna, the conductor had to wake me up because it was the last stop. Opps. Everything worked out ok though.
It was almost 9 by the time I got to the Vatican City. I was really groggy so I basically hung out in St. Peter's Square for a couple hours. The line to get inside was way too long and the place didn't even open til ten. While I waited for the initial surge of people to go in I drank water from the fountains, which I'm hoping wasn't holy water. One of the things that I'm going to miss about europe is the satisfaction that I get when I find a place to take a leak for free. Take that Vatican City, I owe you 40-80 cents depending on how clean your washroom is, haha. 
I saw the Vatican Museum (which is ritzy, why do they still need collection) and the Sistine Chapel. No picutes allowed in there though, although that doesn't stop Americans. It is pretty amazing though. I scaled St. Peter's Bresilica, which has some of the most clostrophobic passageways I've ever been in. Sick view of Rome from the top though.
I think I spent about 6 hours in or near the Vatican. I sent a postcard from inside. I didn't expect it to be so fort-like though. But It has been constantly under threats from different groups. The Sistine Chapel was specifically placed in the center of this insane group of buildings to protect it. There was also a Castle nearby with secret passageways leading to it so that the religeous dudes could escape if needed.
By mid-afternoon I was Vatican-ed out and strolled around to some of the famous squares. (or Piazzas) The following is a typical strole along one of Rome's streets:
Yeah, Rome has got to be one of the most densely packed group of Churches in the world. I was actually a fan of the little streets though, some you probably couldn't even fit a Hummer down, and thats not counting the two rows of parked cars. Rome's streets are Dangerous too. It only took me about two life threatening experiences to get a feel for the insane drivers. But still, I really don't think they use lanes, and apparently scooters don't have to stop at red lights, which really makes it fun when they're electric and you can't hear them.
This is what I would look like if I were in the Simpsons. Made at 
One of the most interesting things that I've learned is that Stuttgart has Germany's 2nd highest cost of living. But guess who is first? Berlin would be the easy answer, but as i mentioned before, Berlin's amazing buildings and attractions are all a result of Foreign and Government money being pumped into the city to revitalize Germany's capitol city. Munich is the most expensive place to live in Germany. Above is one of the music stages at summerfest in front of the state opera.
The Reichstag, now the German Parliament. It was the last stand at the end of WW2 in Europe. 2000 Germans delayed the end of the war by two days here. Where in Canada would be the last stand if we were invaded? the Parliament in Ottawa? probably not. I bet it would be the Labatt Brewery or something like that, or maybe the Hockey hall of fame. Please comment (at the bottom of the post) with suggestions.
I bought a Museum pass, Museums are usually around 8 euro each to get into and I never spend very long in them ( I have a short attention span) but it was raining a lot all weekend, so I thought of it more as a shelter pass than a museum pass. I got a sweet student discount too. I think I visited 6 or 7 museums. Above is the Pergamon alter. I also saw the bust of Nefertiti in the museum next door. I'm a fan of museums that offer half hour "highlights" tours or audio guides.
Potsdamer Platz is the new center of Berlin. before and after every war Berlin has had a different "cool place" to open stores and sell stuff. This means that the "city center" has shifted about 6 times in the past century. During the Wall years, east and west Berlin also competed by building shopping areas with bigger and better stores to show that their economic system was more prosperous. Potsdamer Platz was cut by the wall so it was a huge open area for 28 years with guard towers and such. After reunification it was a perfect place to build tons of huge buildings. The result is in the next picture. Potsdamer Platz: also the site where the first piece of the wall fell in that famous video.
Yeah, I almost messed myself when I saw it too, And yes that huge tent-like roof is standing on a pole, and yes that pole is hanging from the surrounding buildings. The Sony center just off Potsdamer platz is where many huge companies moved in after the wall fell. Its weird because Berlin itself is very cheap, food, hostels, everything: Yet all the buildings are amazing and I'm sure super expensive. I assume this is all Corporate money and probably a lot of Government funding. Munich and Stuttgart are considered to be "richer" cities than Berlin.
Now, If you were Prussia and you just received a bunch of money in war reparations from France after you beat Napoleon, what would you do with it? .... "Hey lets build a big monument to celebrate our victory!" The Victory Column, or Siegessaule was paid for with French Francs to rub it in their faces. I thought that this was Hilarious, you should too.
For 28 years the cold war raged, sort of. Berlin was possibly one of the most tense places, and Checkpoint Charlie (at the border between the American sector and the Russian Sector) was probably the tensest. It was the only place where East Berliners were allowed to enter West Berlin. There is a whole museum devoted to the wall which mostly focuses on the ways that people escaped from West Berlin. Some pretty interesting stories.
The Berlin wall is really only 13 ft tall, the reason that it was so hard to cross: guards shooting at you while you try to climb it. The most successful methods of crossing the wall: Swimming the river at night or becoming a guard and making a break for it.