Ramblings of the travelling nature

Touching down in Berlin after a short flight from London I needed to be in peak health as I had a solid week of partying in front of me, but far from peak health I was. After spending the last 3 weeks partying and drinking like there's no tomorrow, the consequences were starting to show. My whole body was feeling like a Raggy-Doll, a wickedly flemy throat infection had set in after the bout of diarrhea had gone and touching down sleep deprived and hungover after an absolutely disturbing night at the Walkabout i wasn't in the bestest condition for the greatest street parade on EARTH!

So after arriving it was straight to the hostel to get some well needed rest and try and shake the hangover as I was meeting up with Charlie who had moved to Berlin a month ago. Now you'd think that being in a city for a month you'd know all the hot spots, maybe it's just me, so after a bit of aimlessly wondering round and some helpful hints from local cafe workers we came across Adagio. It has to be said it look well swanky from the outside, red carpet and all and the inside being no different with the interior fitted out to look like a castle, chandeliers and all. Once inside and strolling round it clicked what was wrong with this place. It was packed and looking out onto the dance floor they all look like a pack of dead fish, just standing there wobbling and it wasn't until such hits as Peter Andre and the like where blasted out that the predominately old crowd started to loosen up and once the chandeliers started strobing the party was onnnnn. The whole experience left me feeling like I was in some kind of Adams Family music video.

Well after the waitress kindly pointed us to another establishment we where on our way...to a place that was closed
So after much walking we made our way to our final destination, the 24/7 bar, where Sambuca shots where to be had and dancing a plenty.

Having seen most of Berlin when I was here last year, the days pretty much consisted of lying in the park listening to my MP3 player trying to shake of the night before.

The next night was the official opening party for the Love Parade on Friday night...The Love From Above featuring Paul Van Dyke. Now as most of you probably know, I ain't a trance lover so the music was a bit well....yawnnnnnnnn, but fuck me the setup was insane. A massive rig full of screens and TVs and plenty of lights and strobes from all four sides, an absolutely well wicked setup and programmed extraordinarily well and with everyone amped for the parade the next day the vibe was awesome.

The day of the parade there was no rest to be had; up at 10am as I had to pick up the passesfor a place on the Ministry of Sound Germany float, that's right I was on a float in the Love Parade the day before my birthday, holly fucken shit is the big man looking after me or what. It must be said though that the passes where only secured at 4pm the day before, so much stressing and praying was done to get them.
Only 40 where issued per float and two bartenders from London who actually come from Australia who just happen to be at the Love Parade where there is a float by the company they work for HAPPEN TO GET PASSES, who the hell would have thought.

So up at 10 to pick em up and get ready for what is going to be a long and unforgettable day. The lucky other person who got a pass is Tara who was working at the club but left a month ago and she still got on. Anywho, enough about passes...let the parade begin.

For those of you that don't know, the Love Parade in Berlin is the largest street festival in the world celebrating dance music and having not been on for the last two years and this year having 40 something floats it was always going to be a big one + plus that World Cup and all the people on the come down from World cup fever the crowd ended up coming to an estimated 1.2 MILLION PEOPLE, of which I happily accepted where there celebrating my birthday as well, even if it was the day after :p

Well I’m not gonna tell you about every little nitty gritty experience, as there are way too many and I cant even remember half of them but the experience of riding on a lorry packed full of speakers, dancers and a DJ pushing through the crowd is one that I really will never forget. I can now on some kind of level understand the rush that DJs must get from the crowd, it's just awesome. You're like gods dancing down to everyone, getting looks of sexual intent and plan old booze sharing, raising your hand and the crowd in front doing the same is a absolutely intense feeling and one that I am so grateful to have had.
There are people at this parade from all over, some in outlandish costumes, some sporting and alarmly proud of there camel toes that are half eating there costumes and all there for the shear love of one thing...dance music. Where else in the world would a government let a parade run for 1 million plus people that celebrates this kind of music. Top stuff Berlin!!
I was planning on going out after the parade but my body had just about had enough, so off it was too bed to rest up and awake to a new day...with swallon ankles. Hmmmm never a good sign, so off I drag my sorry state of a body to the park where I proceeded to pass out for a good four hours and awake to all of my possessions still being with me. Upon getting vertical again and walking like a gimb for the first 100 meters it was time to gear up for another night out in Berlin town, this time it was off too Sage club where the party had being going on since 10am and wasn't about to stop any time soon. So here we are at a club with countless rooms, half indoors half out and down the back a POOL! For all those clubber that are getting too heated on the dance floor. What a nifty idea.
Well truth be told, I wasn't feeling the best when entering this establishment but once inside the music was extremely top notch. Have no idea what genre it was kind of hard German trance or something but was very tasty, that was until I hit the wall around 4am and couldn't move my feet no more, luckly the U-Bahn was on the roll again and wisked me reluctantly back home.

Monday was meant for a day of rest and re-generation before my flight in the afternoon but thanks to a midday checkout it was up and straight to the airport where the 5 hour wait for my flight started.
Before you start thinking, oh he's super keen getting to the airport 5 hours early. No, I’m normally the last one to check in, this time I was to experience my first cancelled flight as our plane was stolen, not by terrorist but by a plane full of Spaniards whose plane broke down and so of course ours was given to them.

Well I couldn’t have asked for a better group of people to be stranded in Berlin with, turns out half the plane where coming back from the Love Parade and with Easy Jet giving us a bar tab of 25 Euro each and putting us up in a swanky hotel, couldn’t have asked for a better flight really and the plane trip the next day was great and a bit surreal as we all knew each other and had been mates for years, very freaky experience.

It has to be said, more for my memory sake, that the taxi ride to the hotel less than 500 meters away was absolutely hilarious which really shouldn’t have been such an experience.
After queue after queue we were all waiting in another queue for one 8 seat mini bus to take a plane load of 200 people back to the hotel. Then out of the terminal building come two rather posh English girls from our flight who proclaim that they will get a taxi and put it on there company credit card, before even saying "card" I was waiting at the taxi, not been a skiver at all :p but for the simple fact by the time this mini van had got us all there is will be time to go back to the airport.
So off we go in the taxi before realising we don't have a bloody clue where this place is, how many Holiday Inn's are there...apparently 5 in Berlin! and the driver not knowing a single one.
So to our delight the mini van ferrying passengers to the hotel drives past and sounding rather like an ad I’ve seen somewhere we command the driver to "follow that blue van". Turns out he didn't have clue what we where saying and stops 10 meters away in front of a blue taxi Bahhhh. So with my trained eagle eyes I thought I had traced the blue van in the direction it was going and we began giving stern hand gestures to the driver who was already starting to frey with his load of already hysterically laughing passengers.
Turns out he was not the most speediest taxi driver in Germany and we aptly lost sight, so heading in the 'rough' direction we found ourselves in what has to be classed as rural Berlin and with no idea of where we needed to go. Anyways one of the posh girls can to the rescue ringing some kind of directory assistance and then the driver entering the info into his little GPS machine with a rather angry look, as he realised that it was just across the road from the airport and we had been driving for at least 10 minutes, not a happy chappy that’s for sure. Well after his little road rage stint trying to kill us all we made it and managed to check in all but last. Was literally across the road from the airport and with the accent of those posh English girls getting all flustered I just couldn’t stop laughing, which I think the driver was talking the wrong way. I was laughing at the situation…seriously!

Check out the pics here >>> http://redmonkey.smugmug.com/gallery/1683921