Let's go to Maastricht – arrival

Saturday, 20^th August 2011 – Travelling – permalink

Time's up, packing finished and I am ready to leave my home town and go the Maastricht in Netherlands, where I will spent at least 5 following months at Maastricht University as Erasmus master student.

Maastricht, Source: www.sxc.hu

I started to pack my thing quite late (on Wednesday) if we take the fact, that I leave for several months. I do not know exactly why I postponed the packing again and again, maybe because I didn't feel like I am leaving for a long time. The most important things were arranged – meeting with the girl who will subrent me her room, paper work about Erasmus and that I will drive there by our car with my brother and his friend. We have quite a small car – Hyundai i10, so it will be challenge for me, to pack my stuff, as I cannot use all back-sets. I definitely need my PC, but I cannot take both of my LCD panels, so I take the bigger one. New laptop arrived yesterday, hopefully I will have no problem with it. I will not pack any of my books, actually, I have the important parts of materials from my bachelor studies in my PC.

Náchod (CZE) – Maastricht (NL)

According to the Google Maps, my journey is almost 950km. On the other hand, except a few kilometres, we will travel on highways, so about 8 to 9 hours of driving. I set up a meeting for taking over my room at 6 o'clock and I wanted to leave my home town at 5 a.m. But We were slow, so we left almost one hour later, so it already started to dawn. Car was really full, so I left my printer at home.

I printed out the itinerary for our journey, but also used GPS navigation on my smartphone. Cool thing. Smiley :) I picked up Saturday, because trucks are not allowed to drive and therefore I expected less of traffic. Weather was great, maybe a bit too hot for driving whole day in a car without air-conditioner, but opened windows were enough as this small car cannot ride super fast. After the noon, I made a stop every hour and after 800 km, so about 150km to the final destination, I let my brother drive as I felt tired and I really was, because I dozed off soon and woke up after an hour, so just before Aachen. Only a few kilometres and I will see my new home.

We reached our destination at 5 p.m., so one hour sooner, than expected. It was mainly because we had almost no problems, except a few kilometres before Bonn because of the constructions there. After a few minutes the tenant showed up, a bit surprised, that I am already there. She needed to pack her stuff, so we left to explore the Maastricht a bit. So we just drove to the south on the right shore of river Maas. Than we turned back and with small detour came back so I can get my room and unpack my things.

My new room and housing in Maastricht

The apartment seems to be really nice, there are also two other guys who are not there at the moment. I have my own room about 18 m², window to the south, but unfortunately the trees were cut down, so there is nothing between the building and quite busy road. At least windows decrease the noise from the traffic to low level. There is problem with the internet connection Smiley :( , so I have to solve it as soon as possible, because internet it essential. This will be my first time, when I will cook on the gas. Actually also water is heated by gas not by electricity as I am used to.

I only had a room only for myself 4 years ago, when I was in Germany for a year (August 2006 – July 2007). It's actually quite nice, but on the other hand not cheap at all. Here it's not common that student's share rooms. Everybody here has a room for himself and almost everybody has rent contract with landlord. In the Czech republic, most students live in dormitory or guest house, but here life only exchange students in the guest house. The reason is simple – lower price and higher comfort if you live in a private.

And the last note is about food. I will most probably cook more by myself, as I have school only 2 times a week and the prices of the food in mensa ar quite high.