Well, we had a rocky start today. Not sure exactly what happened but at breakfast, we found out that we had to move hotels today at 09:00. Either Samirr fucked up and failed to tell us, or Intrepid fucked up and hadn’t booked properly for all of us… we haven’t been able to figure it out. But our plan had been to head down the Palais Royal this morning and instead, we were packing and moving our stuff to a different hotel just four doors down the street, and putting things into storage there as rooms wouldn’t be ready until well after midday…? We weren’t overly happy, but there were some of our group who had breakfasted stupid early and head out to do things to miss the crowds, so they came back to the hotel late in the afternoon only to be told we had all moved?! I haven’t done an organised tour like this in years, so I can’t say if this is ‘normal’ but a communication breakdown like this does not lead to good reviews nor does it lead to good tips at the end of the tour.
We eventually made it to the medina around 11:30 to do a bit of shopping before Zita and I had to meet up for a cooking class we had booked. When we arrived at the Square it was even more madhouse than yesterday – if that is at all humanly possible. Still plenty of noisy monkeys, snakes, watermen and whatnot, but the winding narrow alleys were CROWDED beyond belief. Way too much humanity if you ask me!
Undeterred, we did manage to dive in and get some shopping done.
Grinding spices for the tourists… or rather tourists rather inelegantly and ineptly grinding spices for shits and giggles.
Cones of ‘spices’ for display… this is literally a timber or cardboard cone with spice coloured cement over it to lure tourists into the shop to look for things – this is not the bright coloured piles of spice you are looking for!
At the main entrance to the medina are two walls lined with a homage to the current king – lots of photos, trinkets and mementos. The populace seems to really love him and his modern ideas for improving Morocco and its infrastructure and social programs.
Shopping, shopping, shopping. So many lovely things; so much of it so hard to bring home.
At least this stall had piles of spices that were actually made of spice.
I’m in love with this silk rug – it’s probably made in Turkey though, based on the design and the knot count. We managed to find the store again, so now I have a week or so to think about whether I really want it when we get back to Marrakech.
More knitted beanies in every size and colour…
Rug stores. Everywhere.
Cane and wicker baskets and handbags.
More leather goods – some of it fantastic, some of it tacky as all shit. The poofes aren’t as nice as the ones we saw in Fez, which is a shame.
Carved timber – all I can see is having to get in the ‘something to declare’, line when coming back into Australia. :/ 
After nearly three hours and four kilometres of wandering around the medina, we found ourselves back out in the Square where we needed to meet our cooking class guide/teacher. This is a very popular spot for tourists to sit and watch the world go by.
Zita and I met up with Hannan, our mentor for the afternoon, and she set us off at a brisk pace through the medina to buy ingredients for our meals. Turns out that it was just the two of us, so we had a private little group which was lovely. We marched past about a kilometre of touristy handicraft shops before popping out in a slightly slower-paced area of food shops more populated by locals.
I had a look at the map and we were well off the tourist track this deep into the medina (the Mhamid Marrakech site is the main Square). First stop was the chicken shop, whereupon Hannan chose a live chicken.
The poor thing was quickly weighed, and before Zita could say, ‘Are we going to have to pluck it?’, it was swiftly slaughtered and skinned. Yep, that’s right, skinned. I saw, just after the poor chicken lost its head and feet, the butcher de-feather and deskin the bird in a very swift very smooth and obviously practised motion – much like how one skins a rabbit. I was actually quite surprised, I didn’t know you could clean a chicken that quickly – the whole transaction barely took two minutes. Buying live chickens is no doubt the result of there being very poor (if any) refrigeration in the medina.
Next stop was to buy some fresh produce, some of which bounced off the ground a few times and yet still ended up in the basket to come back to the Riad.
We bought tomatoes, onions, garlic, capsicum, sweet potato, beans and other various items that I probably would walk right past at home.
After this, we stopped to buy some preserved lemons and some olives at a different little store… preserving lemons is not difficult, but takes months, so the locals tend to buy them already preserved.
The final stop was to buy some spices – you’ll note that this deep in the medina, there are no fancy cones of pretty spices to attract the tourists, just dump bins of spices for the locals to buy.
Here, we bought some ground ginger, cumin, ground coriander, mixed spice and sweet paprika.. not all of which ended up in our dishes?
Another 600m or so of winding streets and we found ourselves at the Riad where we would be doing our cooking. It was amazing how it was so chaotic out in the alleyways (full of women marching with purpose, motorbikes zooming around the alleys, bicycles pinging their bells, touts yelling for your attention, and under-employed men seemingly just loitering about everywhere), yet as soon as you stepped into the Riad, it was quiet and peaceful. You couldn’t hear a single two-stroke motorcycle going past and the sounds of the touts and tourists seemed miles away.
Hannan laid out all the ingredients we were going to need for our dish, while we made mint tea.
Making the mint tea is quite a process, and now I understand why it seems to take so long to prepare when you order it at a cafe.
Then it was onto the cooking! We had our fresh chicken, produce and spices, and Hannan led us, step by step, through making a chicken tagine with preserved lemons and olives. It was a lot of fun and we learned a lot about Moroccan everyday life as well.
Zita wrangling the garlic press into submission.
Eventually, all the onions had been sliced, the garlic all pressed, the chili finely chopped, fresh coriander and parsley minced, and spices added. Then the mixing. By hand…which I was somewhat reluctant to jump into…
… And which, naturally resulted in this: ‘Don’t worry, don’t worry, I have lotion to get it off later.’ Hmmm… sure.
Our tagine went onto the gas while we prepared a Moroccan salad comprising of peeled and seeded tomatoes, red onion, and grilled green bell pepper, plus lemon, herbs, spices, and a tiny bit of olive oil.
After the salad was set aside to soak in its own juices, we set to making the third course, a fruit dish of sliced orange, prunes, sultanas, honey, cinnamon and orange blossom water.
Which was perfectly timed to then check on the tagine and add some olives and the preserved lemon peel.
While the tagine was finishing cooking, we were encouraged to have a look around the Riad and found ourselves up on the roof. Most Moroccan homes have a rooftop space to recreate on hot summer evenings. A lot of people will sleep on the roof if the nights are really hot. 
This Riad has created some particularly lovely spaces for their guests to relax and enjoy in a really nice rooftop patio. You could hear the noises of the medina up here, but it still felt distant being four floors down.
I was keen to see across the rooftops to see how crammed it all looked. All the buildings are definitely packed in tight. Medieval town design, clashing with modern living.
Unfortunately, when I looked down over the side of the patio, I saw this… on two sides of the Riad, were two enormous holes in the ground that are basically being used as rubbish dumps. No one lives in these spaces, and no one is looking after these spaces. It seems mad that there could be hundreds of these dilapidated spaces that were once buildings sprinkled throughout the medina when space is at such a premium. I honestly can’t understand it. Who owns the space? Why did they fall into disrepair?. 
In stark contrast, by the time we came back downstairs, the table had been set with the good flatware, and our bread warmed under the fancy bread warmer, and the dinner we had prepared was served to us.
The Moroccan salad was really quite tasty, and I am not normally a fan of bell peppers at all. Skinning and seeding the tomatoes made them extraordinarily sweet compared to how we usually serve tomatoes in salads at home. 
A little spice pot shaped like tiny joined tagines was on the table with salt, pepper and cumin to add to our dish if we so desired. I have seen these little pots everywhere in the medina for sale and had no desire or plan to bring one home, but now it seems almost essential. 
And, finally, ‘la piece de resistance’, our chicken tagine with preserved lemons and olives – and OMG was it delicious. It was literally the best chicken tagine I’ve tried since we arrived in Morocco – and we’ve shared about five at various restaurants so far. Just a really fabulous combination of fresh ingredients and a nice balance of spices resulted in spectacular flavours.
Admittedly, Zita and I couldn’t come anywhere near finishing the chicken dish, so I hope the family’s children enjoyed their dinner (no doubt they are sick to death of this dish!), but we had to leave some space to try the honied orange slices we had prepared. This was a truly simple and refreshing finish to a lovely meal.
It was after eating, however, that I asked for the ‘lotion’ to try and remove some of the stains from my hands… only to be given a bottle of bleach. Yeurck! And now my hands are sort of burning, still a little bit yellow and well, they still stink of bleach five hours later. Live and learn, I guess… not that they would have had any disposable gloves for me to use to rub the spice into the chicken anyway. *shrug*
After this, it was time to dive back into the chaos of the medina – and holy shit! I thought it was chaotic earlier in the day, now it was just beyond hectic. As part of the end of year celebrations that were going on – there was a concert happening in the Square, some famous French performer who we had never heard of, but who was attracting a crown of some 40,000 people. There were roads blocked off, traffic being re-routed, and a huge area covered in security for paid ticket holders and thousands of more people lining the outer areas of the Square and the surrounding rooftops.
Hannan power walked us through the medina and, to be honest, I’m surprised that neither of us either tripped or was run down by a motorbike. People, just everywhere! The locals on their motorbikes tear around the tiny streets – as soon as you hear one behind you or see on in front of you, you have to dive to flatten yourself against the walls or risk being run over. Seriously, they don’t slow down and they won’t stop for anything other than a larger vehicle or maybe a donkey or a large handcart – it sure gave us an appreciation for Fez’s vehicle-free medina. We damn nearly ran the 1.9kms back to the Square where we grabbed onto our belongings for dear life and dodged and pummeled our way through the crowds to try and find a taxi. It was an assault on the eyes and the ears, so noisy and dangerous and I have rarely been so glad to be out of a place. Note to anyone thinking of coming to Marrakech – check the ‘What’s On’ calendar before choosing your dates! I honestly can’t describe how crazy this was, and I really wish I had video’d part of our mad dash out of there – but I honestly could not keep my person safe, keep an eye on the uneven ground, another eye on Hannan who was weaving in and out of the people like a pro, as well as try to operate a camera that would be a target for an opportunistic thief! It was totally nuts!
And now, I’m well-fed, have yellow hands and am fucking exhausted.
We wandered through the shops and while there is plenty of high-end shopping in this complex (Bvlgari, Louis Vuitton, etc), I particularly love the Kintetsu department stores for their kimono sections. Most upscale department stores will have an area that sells traditional yakuta and kimono and of course all the accessories – obis, ties, geta and zori sandals, Kinchaku Bags, traditional Tsumami Kanzashi hair ornaments, etc. They’re so delicate and have such a very particular design aesthetic. 
There’s still a long way up in this tower – it’s 70 something stories high, mostly hotel and office space.
And that there, is some dudes cleaning the windows!
We toyed with the idea of going all the way to the top of the tower to check it out, but of course, Golden Week strikes again and the place is pretty packed. Between the queue and the JP¥1500 per person to use the elevator (?!?) we decided not to.
There’s also more than a slight obsession with takoyaki here… stalls of takoyaki everwhere, squid and takoyaki souvenirs all over the place. As a general rule, it is poor etiquette to be eating in public in Japan – seemingly the only ‘proper’ exclusion to that seems to be the standing around takoyaki street vendors eating your little balls of squidly goodness on a toothpick. 
The narrow alleyways of shops and restaurants go off in every direction for miles. 
I can’t imagine how many thousands of gyoza these ladies made today… the place was filled to the brim and it was about 3pm.
After the gyoza cravings had been quelled, we continued to wander the streets of Dontonburi, checking out the shops, looking in particular for liquor stores (how unlike us?!) and hunting for cool One Piece gifts to take home for #1 Son.
There seems to be no such thing as ‘overkill’ when it comes to creating signage for your shop or restaurant around here… there’s a definite, ‘more and bigger is better’ feel to all the street signage.
After a couple more hours of wandering around, I was keen to find a bar and chill out until the sun went down. Managed to find a cute little izakaya bar tucked away down a small alleyway that had a cheap and cheerful menu and we got ourselves some sake, beer and a sashimi snack. The izakaya bars are similar to tapas bars in Spain – informal, people tend to order small amounts of food and drink, and then just keep ordering bits and pieces for as long as you want to stay there.
The canals look very cool all lit up at night.
And the rabbit warren of little alleyway bars feels like something out of a movie. 
All up we had a pretty chill day which was much needed. We were back at the hotel at a reasonable hour in time for another soak and some more sake in the hot tub… which is starting to feel like a habit at this point!
So we had popped down there yesterday afternoon and bought some tickets using an online ticket machine that wasn’t in English. As we walked away Y5400 lighter, I found myself wondering if they were indeed tickets to see ‘Avengers, End Game’ or could we have found ourselves going to see some other random crap instead! I’m always apprehensive about going to see movies in foreign countries, especially non-English speaking ones – I think it’s some sort of delayed reaction to the Munich Forest Gump Incident of ’95…
But fortunately, when we arrived this morning for our 0845 session *insert eye rolling here over the hour*, we discovered that our tickets were indeed for the correct film – in IMAX 3D… because many of the 2D sessions looked like they were dubbed. 
A couple of curiosities I noted at Japanese cinemas – there’s film merchandise for sale in the foyer…
And your candy bar selections come in a convenient little plastic tray that fits neatly into your seat drinker holder and becomes a little moveable table, like a student desk.
The facility here for visitors is an interesting blend of old and modern – photographs and displays of the history of the brewery within a large modern visitor centre, complete with restaurant, tasting rooms and sales floor.
With so much really good saké on offer, we decided we had better restrict ourselves to small bottles that we could consume during the week only. 🙂 
Rice grains all polished down to about 50%.
Fugu saké cups! Yoink!
So much good saké, and so many locally made delicacies on display… Why? Oh why, have the Luggage Allowance Gods deserted me on this trip?
The museum exhibited items that have been designated as important tangible cultural property by the national government under the name of “Nada-based Sake Brewery’s Equipment,” policy, and as a museum, it demonstrates the history of sake brewing for contemporary audiences. About 50,000 people visit the museum each year.
In January 1995, this brewery museum was also destroyed by the Great Hanshin Earthquake, but thankfully almost every single piece of sake brewery equipment and all the small tools were retrieved carefully by hand and found to be mostly undamaged or restorable-so the objects in the museum are all extant items in their original condition.
There are ‘Culturally Important Objects’ housed upstairs – but gorgeous as these little sake cups are, I couldn’t read any of the descriptions accompanying them, nor could I understand the little video that was nearby. So I feel like I missed something here… 
Downstairs, the tastings continued, as did the shopping!
This is one of my favourite sakes to drink back home, it’s light and crisp, and a little on the dry side. I found a supplier (Fuji-Mart in Buranda), and we keep a bottle in the fridge. I’d like to say ‘for special occasions’, but that only works if Tuesday night sushi counts as a special occasion. 
I don’t even mind that it’s half the price here that it is at home – I’m just glad we can get it. 
Not sure if this is a fat happy otter or what?
The next brewery was about 600m away and we were perambulating somewhat slower now! 😛 The Hakutsuru Saké Brewery Museum is *the* saké museum that visitors will come to if they are only seeing one or are on an organised tour. It is the largest of the brewery museums and has an extensive and well laid out tour.
Founded in1743, the Hakutsuru Saké Brewing Co takes their obligation to continue to contribute to the culture and diets of the Japanese people very seriously. Their toji master brewers continue to carry forward traditional brewing processes while continuing to experiment to meet the needs of a diverse population’s desire for novelty. 
The museum has a very well laid out tour showing traditional brewing processes.
This place is seriously cool – and had many displays that could be seen/heard in English as well. It is obviously set up for the international visitors that tend to come in tour groups…complete with bus parking outside.
An advertising poster for the Hakutsuru Sake from the 1950s…it’s subtle, but the crane motif associated with their product is evident on the maiko’s kimono.
Their famous cellar door Junmai… only available on site.
This little robot will assist you in pairing the right saké to your food preferences.
Then it was back to the hotel for a well-earned soak in the tub and some more saké to round out the day. My poor little feets were very much complaining about the 12kms of pavement we walked today but all that was forgotten as we caught the latest GoT before crashing for the night.
Some cute churches, and everything all sweet and fabulous… 
Until we encountered kilometres and kilometres of trucks all lined up in a dead stand still. For a while we thought it might be some sort of rolling blockade protest – people around here seem to be constantly protesting something. Or perhaps they were all lined up waiting for a weighbridge station, given how politely they were all lined up on the right and letting the cars pass them. We then came across this – the lane we had been travelling also at a dead stop of cars. Bugger, we thought – it was obviously the queue for the Polish/Lithuania border. So we pulled up behind the blue car in the photo below… 
At this point, one of the truck drivers (most of whom were not in their vehicles) came over and told us to drive around. He pointed to the licence plate of the blue car, Belarussian, and he gestured for us to go around (our vehicle obviously had Polish plates on it). So we dutifully went around and ended up at the top of the queue:
Whereupon it became obvious that we were in the middle of the military checkpoint to enter Belarus! Which meant we were miles from where we were supposed to be, and well and truly inside the borders of Belarus! Fark!
Now we knew when we set out that there were two routes to get us to Vilnius, one of which was slightly shorter and chopped through the corner of what is effectively the dictatorial presidential state of Belarus and the other which went only through the border between Poland and Lituania. Now, guess which route yale somehow programmed into Wayz…?
The countryside was simply stunning though – there is a beautiful quality to the light here (once you get out of the cities).
Honestly, I grabbed these shots out the car window as we sped past and they have not been altered or had filters added or anything.
Stopped at a servo for a fortifying something something after our little run in with the Belarus Border Force guys.
WWII memorial in a little town on the way.
Oddly, the Polish/Lithuanian border was far more like what we had been expecting – almost non-existent. Being both part of the Schengen Agreement, there is pretty much borderless exchange between the two countries. We did see some guards in a jeep on the side of the road, but they weren’t doing anything at all.
The delay set up back a little arriving into Vilnius, but we arrived found our B&B and got settled pretty quickly.
The B&B is in an old building with massive oak beams, exposed brick and stuccoed walls and old chunky furniture, right in the middle of the city. 
After our adventure just driving here today, we decided to try and find some local food for dinner. yale scoped out this place on Trip Advisor and it had the two most desireable elements we could have asked for, 1) great reviews and 2) mega close proximity. Because it had been a long day already.
We walked in and there was a wait for a table. The restaurant didn’t appear to be very big so we were a bit disheartened and I was considering looking for other options, when it became apparent that there must be more space off to the side of the entrance and perhaps downstairs as well. We didn’t have to wait too long for a table and were led downstairs through a veritable rabbit warren on cosy dining spaces.
First things first – a drink! This place does paddles of brandy tasting so we thought we’d give that a go.
From the left, very drinkable with cherry flavours, quite sweet with honey overtones, something akin to metho, disgustingly strong liquorice shit, and slightly less strong but equally disgusting liquorice shit! Still, most of it went down just fine.
For entrees, everything looked really good on what is an extensive menu. We ordered a few plates to try – fried cheese with bell peppers (effectively jalapeno poppers – which seemed odd for Lithuanian cuisine, but my knowledge there is quite limited).
Next we tried the ‘thick and creamy wild mushroom soup’… which I tried and exclaimed “I hate this place! Best mushroom soup I have ever had, and it’s in bloody Lithuania!”
yale also ordered a second entree of meat dumplings served with sour cream and some sort of nutty soupy broth stuff. It was very tasty – somehow just the right amount of salty.
We had finished the brandy tasting paddle and the beers etc, so yale ordered a couple of meads and a homemade vodka. On the left honey mead, the vodka (average, but we may have been spoiled of late) and some god awful herbal mead shit that was 75% alcohol! Man that stuff is strong.
Dinner consisted of venison meatballs served with spinach mashed potato, loads of beetroot and a cranberry/blueberry sauce. Delicious.
And yale had some enormous dumpling things filled with mean and drowning in a thick mushroom sauce.
After dinner (and all those strong drinks) we barely managed to find our way out of the hidden tunnels of amazing foody goodness.
We want to get a full day to check out Vilnius tomorrow and both of us have laundry that needed attending to so we head back to the B&B for what was supposed to be an early night but it is already getting close to midnight. Again.
The Wieliczka salt mine reaches a total depth of 327 meters and is over 287 kilometres long. Since the mined ceased commercial operations it has become a major tourist attraction – there are underground chapels and an enormous reception room that is used for private functions, including weddings, loads of statues and some underground brine lakes. The tourist route goes only 135m underground (which is plenty, trust me!) and follows a 3 km guided tour. To initially get down to the first levels of the tours, visitors need to go down 64m via a timber spiral staircase of some 380 steps – which, given the low ceilings and tight space is a bit like walking down a 40 storey building fire escape stairwell. There are many more sets of wooden steps so that visitors end up on the third level down at 135m and a total of approximately 800 steps down to get to that level.
Everywhere we look is salt. Salt walls, salt floors, salt ledges, nooks and crannies. The rock salt naturally occurs in various shades of grey and looks more like unpolished granite.
There are many pully systems and horse treadmills throughout the mine to assist miners in moving large amounts of the heavy product to the surface.
Throughout the mine, there are many statues carved out of salt. Some, more contemporary artworks have been carved by modern sculptors, but many have been carved by amateurs – gifted miners who worked on these sculptures during their own time.
And the scene depicted is a diorama carved of salt.
The St Anthony’s Chapel.
Secondary crystalised salt forms on the walls and ceiling of the mine as water seeps through the rock above.
One of the most dangerous things about mining salt (indeed about mining anything this far underground) is the risk of fire. The salt mines were particularly prone to fires from gas escaping as new veins of salt were mine. Therefore one of the most dangerous jobs down the mine was to crawl down the newly created tunnels with a long flaming torch literally burning out pockets of colourless gas, which could cause explosions if the gas deposits were large enough. It was a very dangerous job but apparetly very well paid work.
The visible patterns and designs have been hand cut into the walls and floors.
There were many workhorses used in the salt mines – once down the mine, they spent their entire lives down there as it was difficult to get them in or out. So naturally, they needed stables, with feed storage and all sorts. Hay stocks would bring mice, which meant they eventually brought down cats and the whole place sounded like a bit of a menagerie. 
An old winch system:
This photo is unfortunately not very clear, but these were 14th century stairs that miners would use to descend the mine, carved into the salt.
Looking down to the second level:
Gnomes start to appear dotted around the place, carved out of very clear white rock salt.
Where we just came from:
A brine creek directed to a bowl. Our guide kept telling us to lick the walls or taste the water – it’s so salty that no bacteria can survive on the surface, and even though the mine has over 1.2 million visitors a year, she assures us that no one ever gets sick from licking the walls. I kinda believe her, but didn’t feel the need to try it. The water however was extremely salty.
A recreated foreman’s office off a mine tunnel:
A vignette of many gnomes doing various mine jobs:
Another small chapel space to the virgin Mary:
Some of the chambers have been reinforced with timber, which miners kept painted white. They had no electric lighting down here and had small tallow lamps or torches only. The white allowed for the light to be reflected around more easily and create better lit conditions.
Another small chapel. Mining is serious business that needs a lot of praying.
So then we enter the King’s Chapel – a chamber which has the world’s largest underground church. 
Lit by five enormous rock salt chandeliers, a huge wooden staircase bring visitors to the salt floor which is 64m underground now.
Lining the walls are carvings of various artistic execution done by miners:
I love the floor!
The salt rock crystal chandeliers are over two meters in drop:
The King’s Chapel.
Salt rock statues, salt rock columns, salt rock candlesticks, salt rock altar, salt rock kneelers, pews, salt rock tabernacle…
Even the bollards to keep the tourists in line are carved out of salt.
Further down the mine there are some enormous salt water lakes. 
Goethe:
Looking down towars the third level of the tourist route:
Apparently tourists used to be moved about using ferry boat rides here through some of the smaller tunnels of the mine until a tragic drowning incident occurred in the Jozef Pilsudski Chamber.
A ferry boat capsized and five people were trapped underneath it. In theory it should be impossible to drown in water this salty as everyone is so bouyant, but the boat was so heavy that the people couldn’t get out from under it, so they suffocated. That is why there is now a statue of St. John Nepomuk, the patron saint of the drowning.
This is the tallest chamber in the tourist route – at 36m high. It is also the location of the World Record Deepest Underground Bungee jump. 
Reception centre for weddings etc.
There are multiple gift shops mostly selling gifts made from – you guessed it – salt. None of which would last very long in a humid tropical environment like Brisbane. 
Another small chapel on the way out of the mine.
All up it was a very slick tourist operation that takes you on a visit through the mine. Our guide was interesting and informative and she only made one joke about us being nice to her because she was the only person in the group who knew the way out. It is a veritable labyrinth of tunnels and chambers and you could see how easily you could get lost.
Amazingly dodgy servo lunch:
High speed landscape photography of the Polish countryside.
Beautiful though 🙂 
We arrived in Warsaw and went to the place that Booking.com said our accommodation was booked at – only to be met in a carpark by a woman who led us to a different location about two blocks away, and to what appeared to be a private apartment. I was seriously unimpressed to discover the apartment (while having all the amenities of what we had booked) was nothing like what we had actually booked… for a start, we could not get our luggage all the way to the apartment without taking a very dodgy old lift up 15 stories and then going up through a maze of not very well kept corridors and two flights of stairs.
I was not actually sure the owner/designer had ever been to Brooklyn or to a bar in Brooklyn in the last decade – but the food was mostly edible, the loud hip-hop was totally dreadful, but the cheap shots of vodka made the whole thing bearable.
Back to the apartment and yale carried everything up the flights of stairs after taking the scary antique lift to the 15ht floor. 
Back in the apartment – bedroom is up a flight of narrow twisty stairs to a low ceilinged loft, that I was going to have to navigate coming down first thing in the morning when my back is at it’s absolute worst and walking is sometimes problematic let alone weird odd height staircases. I mean, it was a nice enough space, but I would not have booked it had these been the pictures on the booking website.
Oh well, we are supposed to be staying here again in a few days time – but have decided to cancel and find something that 1) has no stairs to bed and 2) has a decent chance of a shower that yale can fit it! Another interesting review coming up for these guys too!