of all the things I planned for this trip

[aryanhwy]

Scrambling to find a hotel in Berlin at 11:00pm wasn't one of them.

I got a direct train from Munich, a nice 6 hour shot, scheduled to get me in around 21:15. Not too bad. But we hadn't even made it to Nurnberg when the delays started, and kept growing, until it was 22:30 when we arrived at the hauptbahnhof, at which point (esp. since it was raining) I was NOT interested in the 20 min. walk to the university guest house where I was being put up. So, yes -- ANOTHER taxi (my third of this trip!). Only to find that...reception for the uni guest house closed at 22:00, and while I have internet access to look up the phone number....I don't actually have a working phone connection overseas; I can't register on any of the networks.

I found a hostel (a nice posh one) three blocks away and have a bed there for the night, so I've got a place to sleep (and boy, do I need it!), but I didn't expect to be doing this tonight!

Comments

[kareina.livejournal.com]

Do you have Skype on your phone? I have used Skype on my computer to call land lines, and it looks like the phone version will do it too. One needs to purchase skype credit, but I think it would be well in your budget to have some for just such situations.

[aryanhwy.livejournal.com]

Not on my phone; I do have a small amount of credit on my computer, but I avoid phones as much as possible so that hadn't even occurred to me!

[kareina.livejournal.com]

And with luck you will never need to think of it again.

Though, given how much you travel, I am kind of surprised that you don't have skype on the phone, so you can do video calls to family while traveling without the bother of turning on the computer.

[aryanhwy.livejournal.com]

I detest making phone calls and avoid them as much as I can. This is how I could go for more than a year w/o realizing my mobile couldn't make calls from abroad!