Newcastle

I spent the day Saturday in Newcastle, England...home to the brown ale. We took an early train and arrived there at about 9:30. In Gateshead, an adjacent town, is the Angle of the North. This is a massive steel sculpture the height of 4 double-deck-er buses, and with a wing span of a jumbo jet. The best thing I can compare it to is the statue of liberty. When you see it, you know its big, but your mind just cannot process the immense size.
After visiting the statue we just spent time wandering around the city and looking at shops, until time for the Newcastle United vs. Chelsea football (soccer) match. This was my first European football match and it was crazy, something I will never forget. The atmosphere is similar to that of an American football game...on steroids. Everyone in the stadium knew about 10-15 different chants, don't ask me what any of them were I have no clue what they were saying. The only words I could make out were the cuss words. Chelsea won 2-0.
We ended up sitting in a pub for a few hours after the game waiting for our train home, where we met some very interesting characters. Football hooligans! These guys were Chelsea fans, and they were steamin (drunk). One of them was chanting the entire ride home, and the others were slurring their words so much I had a hard time understanding what they were saying. They talked to us for a bit about America and argued with us over which country is better.

Newcastle was an awesome time, and I will never forget my first football match in Europe.