Our European Holiday

La Pedrera - Barcelona

2007-07-03T20:53:00.000-07:00

This is a shot of the front of La Pedrera, an apartment building that Gaudi was asked to design, which showed the growing consumerism of Barcelona in the 1920s.

One apartment is on display and is decorated with genuine 1920s furniture, although it is not the exact furniture used at the time. This is a light fitting in the hallway.

And of course there is the roof, which is very famous, and which captivates everyone who sees it. You can tell that Gaudi is fascinated by creatures of the sea, which are reflected in the shapes of the water cooling towers, smoke stacks and other functional constructs. If you ask me, some one them look like a cross between medieval knights and futuristic spacemen, while others look slightly phalic. You decide for yourself.

Sagrada Familia

2007-07-02T15:01:00.000-07:00

The carnival is over

2007-07-02T08:46:00.000-07:00

We are back in Australia and reinstalled in our Woollahra apartment, but packing up to move to sunny Randwick. Might I say it's more than a tad depressing! It would be very nice to still be wandering the streets of London, although we are very sorry to hear about the attempted car bombings. While must people be so cruel?

We have about 1000 photos in total from the trip. I will attempt to resize the files and put a few selections up on the blog. Especially the ones from Barcelona, which is basically a Gaudi fest!

Thanks all that have been reading and writing while we were away. Receiving messages from home definitely helped stave off the home sickness!

A brief review of holiday liquor

2007-06-28T21:26:00.000-07:00

In Thailand, I recommend drinking Singha beer. Pet didn't like it that much but I thought it was grand. Cool and crisp and thailicious.

In England, Carling's been my beer of choice. I've opted for pints, which have served me quite nicely.

The first beer I ordered in France was a Leffe Blonde. "Une Leffe!" I said to the girl. She said something in return in French then gave me a beer. We were quite the team. The Leffe was quite sweet. Pet preferred this one. I also tried to regional beers around Brest, neither of which I can remember the name of. One was cloudy and like home brew. The other was less so.

I have no idea what I drank in Spain. But it was good. But that's probably because Barcelona's the greatest city on Earth. Ever.

The big kiss off

2007-06-28T21:24:00.000-07:00

Well, we've had a top day in London. Contrary to popular belief, it was not dreary and raining today. Instead, we had a fairly constant blue sky, some warm sun at some points, and not a drop of rain.

We spent the day fossicking around at Harrods - again, which amuses me to no end. Who would ever have thought my husband would be BEGGING ME to go shopping? I sure married the right guy! For me, the highlight was the Ladulee room, which apparently originates from France. It is a patisserie of the highest order, where cakes are not cakes - they are art.

The counter was filled with macaroons, which I so enjoyed in Paris. But having just had icecream, I couldn't possibly indulge. Never the less, the macaroons were every colour of the rainbow. I am sure I have a recipe for these in a Jill Dupleix cookbook at home, so I will be experimenting with colours and flavours.

Incidentally, I found 25ml bottles of banana flavouring in Sainsbury's. I can only buy this by the litre at home, so I'm delighted to have collected a couple of bottles here. Of course what ever is created with them will have a limited life, owing to lack of ongoing supply!

For me, this trip is ending on a great note. I found it really difficult to get into London when we first got here (Thailand is a pale memory). I was glad to get to Windsor, but surprisingly happy to return to London from the countryside, and even happier to return again from Spain (thanks to the stinking hot weather over there, which doesn't suit me at all). London is restored in my eyes - but I won't feel the need to come back here for a long time. If anything, I might whip over to Harrods on a discount day trip whilst enjoying an extended stay in Paris, on the way to Rome, some time in the most likely distant future. Afterall, the last trip I had like this was seven years ago.

But I'm truly happy to come home. I want my bed! My bathroom! My kitchen!

Tonight we pack up and tomorrow we hit the road at 8.30am London time (add nine hours if in Australia). We don't touch down until 8.00pm Aussie time on Saturday night. Blah!!! It's about 26 hours transit time including the two hour stop over in Bangkok. Can you imagine 26hrs without getting horizontal??? Not to mention the controlled food... Well, that's the price we pay for the crimes of our forefathers who were so silly as to get transported to Botany Bay. Eh?

Bye bye and see you in the southern hemisphere!

Soho so long

2007-06-28T21:18:00.000-07:00

Well, here we are. It's our last night in London. We just got back from an evening checking out Soho, where we had some tasty Japanese for dinner.

Today we went shopping in Harrod's (again). Let me just say that Harrod's could quite possibly be my favourite place in London. Whilst there, we sat ourselves down at the ice cream counter and had this amazing feast of ice cream. Called a Baci, it included a scoop of chocolate icecream, a scoop of panacotta icecream, and a big swirl of soft vanilla icecream. It was topped with chantilly (that's whipped cream for us Aussies) and roasted hazelnuts, and drizzled with hot chocolate which solidified as it chilled to the temperature of the icecream. On the side was a litte chocolate cup filled with soft chocolate sauce that had crispy something in it - all served in an extra big, extra tall kind of martini glass. Of course we got two spoons and cleaned the plate. The waiter told us it was the number one seller on their menu, and it's easy to see why! It cost us £10.50. Multipy that by 2.6 and you've got the price in AUD$. Having found £5.00 on the footpath this morning (actually dropped by a silly biddy wouldn't stop for me to give it back to her) I feel justifed in such a big splurge.

Then, after some hardcore shopping, we took ourselves off to see Fantastic 4: Rise of the Silver Surfer, which was pretty darn good. We actually took the bus for a change, thanks to the help of a friendly old man at the bus stop who said the C1 would get us to High Street Kensington. And what do you know, it dropped us right at the front of the cinema. And even more amazingly, we arrive the minute the film was starting (well the ads at least). Talk about synchronicity!

So, all in all, an enjoyable last day of our holiday. It's hard to believe that it's come to an end. It's really been an absolutely amazing experience.

Last day in London

2007-06-28T10:13:00.000-07:00

Last night we went out to dinner and we asked the waiter what he would do on his last day in London. He was utterly stumped! Being from Kosovo, he said he was really happy to get out of that place, but now he's been in London so long, he just wants to get out of this place... but what to do on his last day? He had no idea.

We caught up with Mark's friends who have been living here for two years now and we asked them the same thing - what would you do on your last day in London? Again, they had no idea. Sarah's boyfriend came close to a good suggestion - walk about the South Bank, get a bottle of wine, and enjoy the atmosphere. Sounds kind of good... but we've got to save our booze credits for a visit to SoHo tonight.

So what WILL we do in London on our last day? We'll go back to Harrods because Mark wants something else from the Thierry Mugler counter. Dammit - I do too, but I'm not williing to part with the cash. I am going to get myself to Spiral Guide to Paris though. I've decided that's essential and I'm not going home without it. Even though it took me 11 years to get back to Paris after my first visit, I'm convinced it won't take so long next time round.

A wrap up on yesterday - we went to Buckingham Palace and it was covered with people waiting to see the changing of the guard. Too many people, in fact, so we decided to skip the spectacle (because we saw it in Windsor) and got straight to the State Rooms. Only they weren't open, and won't be until August! Blast it. The Queen is still in residence so they don't do tours until she goes on holidays.

We walked down the long Mall and headed for Downing Street. We passed the horse guards and I stood next to one of them to have my picture taken. A sign behind me said the horses bite and kick so I wasn't too keen to stand there for too long. And the horse kept looking me in the eye! We checked the photo later - he's actually poking his tongue out at me!

At Downing Street there were more hoardes. Mr Blair and Gordon Brown were scheduled to go visit the Queen at 12.30pm. We didn't stick around, again, because of the crowds. We have been astounded at the disrespect for Mr Blair. People call him Tony or Tony Blair. Not the Prime Minister or Mr Blair. It's really rude.

Finally, last night we were on our way to dinner when some cops on motor bikes came down the street and stopped a woman crossing the road because a cavalcade was coming. As the black car came by I spotted Prince Charles - Mark got a good gander at Camilla. So there you go! We've seen royalty!

Well that's it for today. Hopefully the weather will hold and make a trip to the London Eye appealing. Yes we have seen all the reports of the flooding in the north here. One poor young bloke got his foot caught in a grate as the waters were rising. The rescuers held him up while they worked out what to do. They finally decided to amputate his foot when he drowned. It's tragic. The locals tell us because England is so flat the flood waters won't clear for about three weeks. I guess the drought is over.

Happy little Vegemites

2007-06-27T09:55:00.000-07:00

Yesterday:

We found a little jar of Vegemite in Sainsbury's. Being good Aussies, we bought it.

Today:

We got to have Vegemite on our toast at breakfast. Damn it was good!!!

My baby takes the morning train

2007-06-27T09:50:00.000-07:00

So what's a grey Wednesday morning like in London, you ask? It's grey.

So today we're off to Buckingham Palace, which will be the last palace we see for quite some time. It's actually become one long blur of all the places we've been and things we've seen this past month. Thank god we've taken so many photos! Although I must admit, I'm sick of lugging camera gear around and being a tourist. Yesterday we just hung out and went shopping in Harrods and Kensington again and had a ball. It was good to just relax and be somewhere for a change. But, if it weren't for all the camera gear there are so many things we wouldn't have a record of.

And blogging like this has been good for us, too. I'm looking forward to reading through it all when we get home and looking at all the pictures and saying "That's right - we did that!" Hopefully it's been an interesting read for you as well.

So now we've got two days left in London. I'm not counting Friday as we'll be checking out early and heading for the airport so that's going to be a bit of a lost day. It's going to be a downer to go home and not be in Phuket or England or Paris or Spain any more, but it'll also be good to be home. And to see Derek! We both miss that hairy little guy!

And, as soon as we get home, we pack up to move. For those who don't know, we're moving from Woollahra to Randwick the weekend after we return, so the chaos will continue a little bit longer.

So, now to Buckingham Palace.

I'll give the queen your regards.

Blogger gone mad

2007-06-27T09:46:00.000-07:00

Well we've been trying to get into Blogger this morning and it's been flashing enough to give the average person an epileptic fit! But it's OK! Technical glitch over!

We had a great day in London yesterday - we left the camera "at home" and went off acting like locals. And what do the locals do round here? They shop of course!

We took a Tube to Knightsbridge and messed around in H&M on the High Street of Kensington for quite some time. H&M is kind of like Sportsgirl, Just Jeans, Portmans and Jeans West all rolled into one, but with a strong hint of SES - that Chinese shop that sells t-shirts and stuff for $10. They had loads of nifty accessories which were on sale. I got a cool satin hat for 99p! And a shiny scarf plus a few other trinkets. Mark got a nice shirt. We left there feeling like happy little consumers!

Then we headed to Harrods and made a date with the Thierry Mugler counter - right after we went to Watersons book shop. Annoyingly, we found a really brilliant pocket guide to Barcelona, which we could have seriously done with last week! If you're heading to Europe, might I suggest you look for the AA Spiral Guides on cities, which include city maps and maps of the trains/Metro/Subway, which are extremely helpful.

Back at the Thierry Mugler counter, we had the girls getting out all and sundry for us to try. I bought my first bottle of Angel from Harrods 11 years ago, and I always point that out when ever I buy more Angel stuff. Why - I do not know! But yesterday, it opened a great yak session with the staff and by the time we left, we had a bevvy of extra little samples in our bags, which made us feel very well looked after!

We are on the wind down now in many ways. However, we are still to check out Buckingham Palace, and that's where we're heading today. We'll be viewing the State Rooms, which should be fun. On the whole Palaces tour topic - I haven't seen as much as I wanted to see, but you know what? Being a tourist is HARD WORK. You can't just go! go! go! and expect that you'll be alright. Sooner or later the feet give out and the brain goes into over load. And lord knows one palace starts to look like the next one. Same thing with Cathedrals.

On a sour note - we have heard from our real estate that they intend to open our apartment to the public for a viewing in our absence this Saturday. Can you believe that? No matter how outrageous we told them doing that was, they wouldn't back down. We feel utterly violated.

Jolly long journey

2007-06-25T23:28:00.000-07:00

Having returned to London from Barcelona today, I am delighted to say we have finally experienced all the joys of travelling on European discount airlines.

Our experience began last Friday with Ryanair, which leaves for France from Luton. Luton is a stinking long way from London, but other than that, it's a relatively accessible airport. The flight to Brest was relatively uneventful apart from the flight attendent spilling beer on the trousers of the passenger sleeping next to us. She looked horrified, but did nothing. When he woke I'm sure he thought Mark did it!

We took Easyjet from Paris to Barcelona, and thanks to our friend Sophie, this was a no brainer. For all those taking Easyjet from Paris to anywhere in Europe, Easyjet leaves from Paris Orly, which is a 20 minute ride on the shuttle bus if traffic is good. What few people know is that the shuttle bus is operated by Air France and leaves from Montparnasse train station. It's not on the side where the bus terminal is, but it's totally worth finding because it gets to the airport much faster than the train (which would have involved a few changes to boot). And it only costs €9.00 one way.

The only hitch for us was that Orly Sud - the south terminal - was blocked. So we had to leg it from the west terminal, which really wasn't a problem. What was a problem was the hords of people trying to check in. There are no orderly lines at these airports - just desperate people jockeying for position. Which is pointless, because the seats aren't numbered, so being the first to check in makes not one iota of difference to where you sit!

Easyjet comes into Barcelona airport, which is just perfect. You walk out the door and take a shuttle bus to Placa Catalunya for about €1.70. Cheap as chips. They leave every 10 minutes and drop you right opposite the taxi rank (on the right side of the street, my Aussie friends!).

When it came time to leave we were back with Ryanair and we'd already been warned that Ryanair left from Reus Aeroport, which is about 100km from Barcelona. Imagine putting an airport in Katoomba and calling that Sydney Airport. That's what this was like.

We were advised by some people to take a train, but Ana, our friendly host at the Cassanova Guest House told us we could get a specific shuttle bus from Estacio Sants - which happened to be just down the road from where we were staying.

So, taking a leaf out of Sophie's "How to travel like a Pro" book, we decided to head down to Estacio Sants yesterday and scope out the shuttle. Well, what a poop of an experience! First we couldn't work out the Metro and ended up taking a cab. Which worked out great because we discovered it only cost €5.00 to get to Estacio Sants.

Once inside the train station we set about trying to find this mystical Ryanir shuttle bus. We were pushed from pillar to post, dealing mostly in sign language because few people spoke English. In the end we were advised to take the train. We managed to get the timetable, and planned our day around that.

But on arriving at Estacio Sants this morning, we found we had plenty of time to spare and so we decided to give the shuttle bus another go - we knew it was cheaper and faster and didn't require a taxi ride at the other end. So I ask the guy at the Red Desk, which we were directed to yesterday, but which was closed. Today, the man tells us in clear English to go out the door and turn right. I was familiar with these instructions because several people gave them to me yesterday and they yielded no result. Today, we went out the door and turned right and this time, I decided to CROSS THE ROAD!!! What do you know? The blasted shuttle is sitting there waiting.

So we get on the shuttle and head to Reus, 100km away. The check in had been open for a half hour when we got there so we joined the thronging hordes who were crowding out the door. Again, the lines were all over the place and people were vying for position when there is no numbered seating! After one hour we were finally second in line. Yay!!! Then the electricity went out, the conveyor belt stopped, and the computers went down. I asked the girls what they were doing to fix it, and they said they'd called the engineer. Big deal! They said the plane wouldn't leave without us.

Marky and I were quite agitated so he went off in search of Coke. He came back with two big cups full of coke and ice so I fished our half empty bottle of Jack Daniels out of our suitcase. That's when things got a lot more enjoyable! After waiting another 45 minutes we were told to head to the old terminal to check in there. The was no electricty there either, but this worked to our advantage because they couldn't weigh our bags, determine they were over weight an charge us £27 for being naughty.

We rushed through security check and found all the other passengers still waiting in the departure lounge. We'd expected they'd be on the plane and thus had taken all the good seats. Not so! So we hustled through the crowd and once we got out the door, I bolted to get in front of as many people as I could. Thank you Jetstar for teaching us how to board a plane with no allocated seating! I was planning to go for the back door, but a bunch of pink fluffy cowboy hat bedecked hens party girls had the same idea. So I took the front door instead and saw that there were two empty seats in the front row. I asked the attendant were they taken and she said no. SO!!!! We sat in the front row!

Ha ha to everybody who paid £10 for priority boarding. They sat BEHIND us! If not for our seats, we would have written Ryanair off. As it turned out, the flight attendants told us the plane had been delayed by weather! Not by the debacle at check in. England had a storm this afternoon with 40mph winds.

The moral to this story is: if you use discount airlines in Europe make sure you know where the stinking airports are. And if you're okay about them leaving from the desert, make sure you're happy to take the long and winding road to get there!

How I love thee, Barcelona! Let me count the ways...

2007-06-25T22:53:00.000-07:00

16, 17, 18...

We're now back in chilly London. But before I get to that...

Yesterday afternoon, Pet and I took a long stroll through the streets of Barcelona to take a look at Sagrada Familiar, a cathedral which was designed by my good pal Gaudi. Amazing! Interestingly enough, the building has never been finished and work is still continuing on it to this very day, funded by charities and donations. Pet took a plethora of photos, so watch this space.

This morning we went for another wander through the Barcelonian streets, heading into the main tourist street of La Ramblas. We noticed that in the centre of the city many of the streets are narrow little laneways, just big enough for one car to pass through, with rows of tall buildings on either side. Basically, the sun never hits the street, which in a city this hot is a very good idea. Out in the residential areas, where we were staying, the streets are three or four lanes wide and one way so the sun just bakes everything.

But now we're in London again, with Barcelona just a fond memory. I can't wait to go back. I'd happily live there.

Flashback: The little sparrow

2007-06-24T16:00:00.000-07:00

No, not Edith Piaf.

Our second night in Brest, I think it was a Wednesday, we decided to head out for some karaoke after dinner. So we wandered across the road to this karaoke bar, full of young French people, singing, for the most part, French songs. So, Petrina, as is her wont, boldly steps forward, selects a song and puts her name down. before too long, it was her turn and she got up and sang "Knock On Wood", so the delight of the French boys and girls who started to sing along with the chorus. I never thought I´d say this, but my wife really knows how to please a room full of French girls.

After that we had some more French beer and Pet sang another song before the smoke just got too much for us and, like squares, we left for the clean air of out hotel, never to return again...

Smoker´s Paradise

2007-06-24T15:52:00.000-07:00

And not wanting to only blog about the bad things, but here is another shocking fact about Europe : THE SMOKER IS KING.

Everywhere we´ve been, we´ve had to battle against inhaling secondary smoke, thanks to the totally riddiculous laws that allow smokers to partake anywhere, anytime, any how. Cafes often have an inside and out side seating area - you´d think it´s smokers outside, non-smokers inside. But no! Smokers can sit anywhere they like and to hell with the people that want fresh air.

In France a maitre D tried to seat us at a table with two smokers and was not impressed when I refused and went elsewhere. In Spain, there was a big no smoking sign in the airport - and a guy smoking right next to it. And in England, well, the pubs are filled with smoke. It´s not possible to enjoy a pint without secondary smoke inhalation.

Again, our Government has looked after us. For healths sake? I´m not sure. Maybe it was more to avoid litigation. But the benefit for us non-smokers is the ability to enjoy a fine meal without someone blowing filthy smoke all over it.

In Europe anti-smoking laws kick in on July 1. There will be no smoking in enclosed areas. Brilliant. I suspect they will have a bloody hard time enforcing that law. They should focus instead on getting people to not smoke in the first place.

El hombre from Atlantis

2007-06-24T15:42:00.000-07:00

Today we went to Casa Mila "La Pedrera", which is this amzing building designed by a guy by the name of Antoni Gaudi between 1906 and 1912. This was the most fantastic place I´ve ever seen. It looked like some insane child´s sandcastle come to life, like somewhere Aquaman would live. Words simply cannot do it justice so keep an eye out for when the pics are posted. The building´s design is based on things like conch shells, palm trunks, a cobra´s spine and ribcage... Absolutely, utterly amazing.

We then went and had lunch down by the beach and the Olympic village. Madre dios, I´m loving the Spanish food!

My opinion, if you go to Europe or the UK, make sure you come to Barcelona. It´s fantastic.

Barcelona on fire

2007-06-24T15:41:00.000-07:00

Last night was the Night of St John - a wonderful night for the very religious Barcelonans, who celebrated by hitting the streets armed with crackers, bungers and throwndowns.

The festivities began around 5.00pm when we rolled into town. We thought it would hit a peak around 10pm and then everybody would go home and we could get some sleep. But no! The bungers got louder and louder and more frequent as the night wore on, finally reaching a crescendo in the park outside the hositpal across the road from where we are staying. And is seemed to be specifically about the noise - not the pretty sparkles.

There were plenty of times my heart lept into my mouth the noise was so sudden and loud - dare I say it was like living in a war zone. Imagine what is was like for the poor patients lying sick in bed in the hospital. Every now and then we´d hear the sound of a police siren or a fire truck and we´d think that was going to be the end of it, but no such luck.

We switched the light out at half past midnight. I chose to consciously not hear the carcophony, but Marky couldn´t block it out. He said he could see families with children aged three to five gathering to watch the madness. I am not surprised - I had seen a boy of about eight walking down the street earlier, a box of throwdowns tucked under his arm, his hand reaching in and grabbing them to throw on the footpath, all as he walked along casually with his parents.

Suddenly I see why the Australian Government made it illegal to posess fireworks in Australia. They are downright dangerous and what´s more, if their use is uncontrolled, they are a total nuisance. Never mind the blowing off of hands, eyeballs, and people´s letter boxes. At least with Sydney´s regular fireworks it is limited to one area, it has a predetermined start and finish, and everybody can then get some sleep.

Not so for us last night - another burst went off at 4.00am, then again at 6.00am. I think this can´t be a Christian celebration because it´s too violent. Maybe it´s a cover up for some long lost ancient paegan ritual that required people to make loud noises to scare away the bad spirits before harvest... or something like that. Whatever. Muchos gracias Spain!

Catulunya architecture

2007-06-24T08:53:00.000-07:00

Barcelona is the home of some of the most brilliant architecture in the world, thanks to Gaudi. Today we've seen what his inspiration was : creatures from the sea amongst other things. In the attic of La Pedrera is an exhibition of python skeletons, goat skulls, nautilus shells, sea sponges which are the key to the shapes he uses throughout his designs.

We heard that Gaudi could not draw that well, architecturally speaking, so he used objects to de,onstrate what forms he wanted to create. We saw what appeared to be a chandalier made out of chain with great loops connecting to make a three dimensional downward sloping castle. Underneath it was a mirror, and when you look inte Pedrerq ry shape of the python skeletong and you have a stunning attempted at a natural insulation system.

Despite being a miracle of design, the attic in La Pedrera was converted to aparlents at one point. Thankfully when the building was bought by La Caixa Catalunya in 1986 they realised the apartments were hiding a national treasure.

Those Spanish eyes...

2007-06-23T19:22:00.001-07:00

Hola senors and senoritas! Why am I speaking in fluent Spanish, you ask? Because we´re now in Barcelona!

The good people of EasyJet brought us here and I must take this moment to say that EasyJet are superior to Ryan Air. There´s just that little bit more space between you and the seat in front of you, you see, and when you´re 6´1", like myself, that sort of thing really helps.

Speaking of being impressively tall, I´ve been whacking my head a lot lately. And, quite frankly, I´m a little sick of it. All through England I felt as if I´d hit my head. I hit my head on the bedhead in Brest. I hit my head in Paris. And I hit my head on a ceiling beam at dinner here in Barcelona. Thank God it hasn´t affected my matinee idol good looks.

So. Barcelona. Thankfully, we seem to have left the rain in France (or maybe it´s just that here in Spain the rain falls mainly on the plain) and the weather here is hot hot hot! Like a tamale. Sophie and Fred will be joining us here tomorrow morning, after taking a twelve hour train trip from Paris, so when they arrive we´ll probably board one of the tourist buses and take a tour of Barcelona. What we´ve seen of the city so far looks great. It must´ve been crazy here during the Olympics.

So, until my next posting... adios!

The Dogs Of Thailand

2007-06-23T19:22:00.000-07:00

Being the dog lovers that we are, we have been carefully observing the antics of the dogs of Thailand. We got a great shot of a splendid black dog in Patong yesterday, who was flaked out on the sidewalk, and didn't stir once as I snapped his photo. Then there was a mother dog - who looked like a big Jack Russell - who ambled across the road like she wasn't taking her life in her paws while cars, tuks tuks and motorbikes were whizzing up and down the street in both directions.

Today on the way to our Elephant Safari in the jungle somewhere past Karon Beach, I noted DOGS DO WHAT THEY LIKE. They are sometimes near people, but they're not involved with people. They trot up and down the streets, cross the roads, kind of hang out together, sunbake like they are in a coma and basically run their own lives. None of them are fat - none look like their Nanny has jammed a chunk of cake in their mouths. They are everywhere, and yet they are no one.

They definitely lack the joyousness I accredit Australian dogs with. There's no happiness, no jumping, no excitement, no barking. They are here, they are living, and they are getting on with whatever the heck they fancy. I haven't stopped to talk to any of the dogs, or pat them, and I guess they don't speak English anyway. But if I did, I wonder if they'd even respond? It's like they are ghosts here. Or something.

Living here would be bad for me. I'd be running a dog holiday camp where they come to have fun. I'd have chew toys and big lounges and snackies. I'd give them baths and wrastle the towel with them to get them dry. Maybe that would cheer them up a bit.

I once heard someone say all dogs have a collective soul. These dogs, they don't share the same soul as Derek. He's got an Aussie soul. These dogs clearly have a foreign one. Thai, no doubt.

So much to say and so little time

2007-06-23T19:15:00.001-07:00

We are quite behind with blogging, owing to having left London and wandered into a mostly internet free regional area.

I'm sure Mark is giving an extensive update. For me, the highlight of the last few days has been Westminster Abbey. We attended a service, which was incredibly moving. We were even blessed by the priest, which felt wonderful, despite us having no affiliation with the church at home. I lit candles for Dad and my grandfather, mainly because they were very top of mind as I sat through the service.

We were in Windsor yesterday and I was delighted to GET MY HAIR WASHED. I paid for it with a credit card and today have received an email from my bank telling me someone is using my card in Windsor. Good on them!

Windsor was so lovely we both agreed we could easily live there. I could open The Cupcake Cafe. Mark could run an internet cafe, because there isn't one. And then I could go off to work in London doing my usual thing.

In Salisbury today - a beautiful town. Much bigger than I realised when I first came here in 1996. We've been to Stonehenge this morning, which was much smaller than I remembered. And we've been to Old Sarum, which was really cool. It overlooks Salisbury, which was originally established by the Cathedral as a market town to raise money to pay for a new Cathedral. Which we've also visited today.

This afternoon we head for Avebury, and I hope the weather holds. It's certainly threatening to rain, though the heavens haven't opened up quite yet.

On another note, we have caught a couple of episodes of Big Brother here. Can I say that ours looks like a meeting of Mensa members in comparison. The house is dominated by twenty something girls who are NASTY pieces of work. One in particular, Charlie, looks entirely unhinged. She speaks like a gattling gun and is clearly suffering from an inferiority complex which makes her extremely aggressive. I think she's unfit to be in the house - she's seems quite dangerous and overly confrontational.

Back on the cupcake topic - there simply are none around here. I could make a killing with my cupcakes here. But you know what - I'm thrilled not to be baking. I may never bake again when I get back. I don't think people have to bake here anyway - the quality of special cakes in Marks & Spencer is absolutely amazing. Princess cakes, teddy bear cakes - they're all available off the shelf for about £4.99. Very impressive.

Last but not least - I hear the power is back on in NSW. Thank goodness. We've been watching the news and worrying about the storms and the damage. Hopefully nothing untoward has happened at our place. You never can tell with Oakwood Apartments.

Thanks everybody who's been emailing. It's wonderful to hear from home!

Tuk tuk

2007-06-23T19:15:00.000-07:00

More tales of cheekiness in the effort to turn a buck (or baht)...

So to get in to Patong we booked a taxi from the hotel lobby, expecting quite a wait and for some ricketty old thing to arrive. Within the blink of an eye this sleek black car arrives and to our surprise it's our cab, and let me tell you it's the nicest taxi I've ever been in. The driver took us into Patong for only 300 baht and we agreed for him to come and get us at 1pm, 3 hours later.

So after doing our Patong thing, we head back through the monsoon to our meeting point. 1:10 comes and we're getting a little bored with waiting so we approached a cabbie and asked how much to get to our resort. He said "400 baht." We said no way and walked off. He came chasing after us, callling out "Wait! Wait!" We said, "No, we paid 300 baht to get here in a luxury car with air con." (Tuk tuks, the taxis here, are little vans with no back door and a bench seat on either side on the back) Another cabbie comes rushing up to join the first one and offers to take us there for 280 baht. We're still not interested and these guys are desperate. Fortunately, just at that time our personal driver turns up and we get into his excellent car. He's so excellent he even stops off at 7-11 on the way back so I can buy beer and doesn't charge us any extra! To him I say - "Excelsior!"

Aquaman

2007-06-23T18:24:00.000-07:00

I was originally going to write today's post in 2 parts, the first of which was going to be subtitled "How hard is it to be ready on time?", which would have been a rant about a German couple and their almost-two-year-old son who caused us to wait ten minutes for them to arrive and then have their pancakes delivered to the minivan on our way to go snorkelling. But they turned out to be nice people so forget I said anything.

O, Thailand! A many-jewelled tiara sticking up out of the Andaman Sea! A veritable treasure trove of wondrous beauty and unforgettable experiences (apart from those involving too much liquor in Patong and Thai ladyboys on motorbikes). Today was spent with the crew of some boat whose name eludes me and a tour guide called Indy who went far above the call of duty to provide us with super-exceptional service. Indy and his band of merry men, under the employ of "Phuket Adventures", took us out on a snorkelling and swimming excursion to Phi Phi Don and Phi Phi Lay, two small islands off to the southeast of Phuket. We snorkelled and swam in the most beautiful seawater we've ever been in - warm and absolutely crystal clear. I managed to get right in amongst a huge school of fish who were being fed from the boat and to feel them swimming into my body and face was, in a word, cool.

We also went to Maya Beach (or is it Maya Bay) on Phi Phi Lay, which is where they filmed the movie "The Beach". Pristine white sands, aquamarine water and sheer, tree-studded cliff faces - stunning place. Below is a very naughty photo, taken from under a rock cliff on Maya Bay beach by Indy, our cheeky guide, who then denied he figured it out himself... a sad attempt at preserving some decorum!

Lunch was served to us on a small island in the middle of the sea - some traditional Thai fare and french fries. We then lazed about in deck chairs in the sand, going for the occasional swim. Well, I didn't really laze so much, as my deck chair was torn at the top and even though I fixed it twice I spent my time lying in it waiting for it to collapse. We had a beer. We had an ice cream. Life was good.

And tomorrow night we leave! As excited as I am about England, I'm really going to miss Phuket. I've loved it here - the hot, steamy air; the amazing green; swimming every day; the wonderful, friendly people... paradise.

Parisienne Heaven

2007-06-23T10:57:00.000-07:00

I have died and gone to heaven.

This morning there was a fresh food market down the road from our hotel in Paris and it was WONDERFUL! Lots and lots of fresh food of every kind : fruit, vegetables, cheese, bread, meat and a whole bunch of other stuff. I sent Mark back to the hotel to get the camera and I snapped a bundle of shots. Which is bad because three days ago we discovered we had taken 499 photos up until that point. After the Eiffel Tower and Le Louvre we must have more than 600.

After the market we headed towards this internet cafe which I am writing in now and passed a patisserie full of fresh bread and cakes. OH MY GOD! A visual feast! Le Gerbe D'Or eat your heart out! I bought four mini macaroons for the flight to Barcelona. But God, I could have eaten myself into oblivion in that shop.

I conclude that to live in France I would need to become a marathon runner to burn off all the goodies I would be bound to eat. God help me!

About photos

2007-06-22T22:35:00.001-07:00

Im now adding to to posts, so please use the previous posts listing on the left sidebar to find posts with pictures. Only four or five posts are kept current, and I've got about 20 posts to upload...

And yes, Mark is in more pix than me because I'm the photographer. And YES we are both getting quite portly!

Bonjour!

2007-06-22T22:35:00.000-07:00

Here we are in Paris, or gay Paree, if you prefer. It isn't actually particularly gay, although I have noticed a number of gay guys and saw some trannies earlier this evening and there were these two young French girls pashing outside the crepe shop last night...

In any case, we flew into France two days ago on Ryan Air, the budget airline of the UK. Ryan Air is so low brow that they won't even let it in the same terminal as British Air and so we had to travel all the way to Luton, north of London, to get to the airport. The airport itself was one big smoking zone inside, which was an introduction to Europe proper as everybody seems to smoke here. Except for our friends and guides Sophie and Fred, who, as well as not smoking, have been excellent tour guides, great company and very handy translators.

Mind you, my French really is coming along a treat. I can walk into anywhere and order a glass of Leffe beer and a ham, cheese and mushroom crepe. With a flawless accent. I really am quite impressive.

We caught the TGV (train) from Brest to Paris yesterday and last night ventured out for a crepe and a beer in the midst of a massive music festival. The atmosphere was wonderful.

Today we went to the Eiffel Tower. After climbing to the second level the rain came howling in and hung around on and off for the rest of the day. Sophie, Fred and I then caught the elevator up higher whilst Pet hung around on the ground. We then went to Le Louvre, which is ENORMOUS and used to be the old palace. The interior was stunning - gold and opulent and majestic and everything you'd expect a palace to be.

Tomorrow we fly over to Barcelona for a couple of days, which should prove interesting as neither Pet nor myself speak Spanish.

A few tidbits about France before I go:

- In France, the car is king. Pedestrian strips do not mean a car will stop for you.
- Nearly everybody smokes. Cigarettes, cigars, pipes... If you're a non-smoker, try to choose a table outside and always prepare to go home reeking of smoke.
- Creperies are everywhere. This is a very good thing as they're delicious!
- Never come here with us. We seem to bring rain with us wherever we go.

Back online

2007-06-22T22:22:00.000-07:00

We found another internet cafe down the road thats open 24/7 so Im back. Unfortunately they dont have qwerty keyboards so if you see some whacky letters, use your imagination to devine the meaning...

Yesterday we left Brest to drive towards St Brieuc, the town where we were to pick up the TGV train to Paris. On the way we stopped in a fantastic little port for lunch at a gorgeous cafe. Unfortunately because my stomach was quite upset I ate nothing but fries. I apologised to the waitress for being so boring and she laughed.

We set off up the coast and stopped in a town which is rich in pink granite. I'll have to ask Sophie later the name of that town. But they have so much pink granite that everything is made out of it : the houses, the sidewalks, the fences, the bridges... everything. We were delighted today to find some Egyption stone sculptures in the Louvre and thanks to yesterday, we knew straight away that they were made of pink granite.

We then headed further along the coast to look at the Cairn of Barnenez. A cairn is a neolithic burial mound. In France they have monoliths, a single stone like the menhir in the picture earlier. They also have megaliths, and these are big piles of little stones. Barnenez was only discovered around 40 years ago when a local company was quarrying stone in the area. Because the stones were so neat they called in the archeaologists and what do you know : a neolithic burial site was discovered, which is over 4,500 years old.

We finally got to St Brieuc, got on the train and voila : we arrived in Paris three hours later. It was a special night across the whole of France called Fete De La Musique. Everyone comes onto the street to play music. In Montparnasse where we are staying, it was like New Years Eve or Mardi Gras. We stayed up until midnight. Whoo hoo!

The revelation in France has been crepes, creperies; and the crepe makers. Never was there a food that is so right. Except chocolate. But I'm sure Mark will say more about the crepes.

When In France...

2007-06-22T21:51:00.000-07:00

Hiya! We are here in Paris and it's great. This internet cafe is closing in 10 minutes so I won't say much other than that we are having a great time and we're dead tired. Will try to write again tomorrow if the guy opens early enough. We leave at 12.15pm for Barcelona... love to all...

The long and winding road

2007-06-22T19:51:00.000-07:00

Well, we are here in Phuket, hooray! Would you believe it actually took us 19 hours to get here? For everyone that was looking at their watch at bedtime on Friday night thinking we were halfway to Thailand at that point, thank you for your optimism.

We were, in fact, sitting at a bar at the Brisbane international airport downing alcohol to try and make us forget that we'd been travelling for six hours at that point, and hadn't even left the country!

But Mark is going to blog on this, I think, so I'll leave him to fill in the balnks while I attempt to upload pictures to photo bucket.

Welcome to the jungle

2007-06-22T19:15:00.000-07:00

REPOSTED WITH PIC

Today we headed off to spend some time with the lovely folk at Siam Safari. After a seemingly endless minibus ride to their departure point, made more painful by the two Aussie bogans we picked up along the way (they'd slept in and hadn't had time for breakfast but he still found time for a cigarette - what a champ), our delightful guide Brani loaded us into the back of an army green four wheel drive safari truck, thankfully sans bogans, and we set off into the jungle.

First off was a baby elephant show, which was okay. We then wandered down and got to ride elephants through the jungle for half an hour. They sat us two to an elephant plus a mahout - the elephant's keeper and "driver". Mahouts are from the Karon tribe and seemed to have a really beautiful symbiotic relationship with their elephants, steering them by nudging them behind the ears with their bare feet.

[Very fat people please note: you get to ride the elephant alone... for obvious reasons. -Pet]

After the elephant ride we saw a brief display of how they extract rubber from rubber trees and press it into rubber sheets using a couple of old rollers. Brani, being the super tour guide she was, even managed to toss in an elephant condom joke while she was at it. What a gal!

We then wandered down to the coconut hut, where we were shown how to grate a coconut, squeeze it for its milk, then boil the mil to separate it for its oil. Pet bought her self a bottle of the oil for medicinal purposes, only to discover later it solidified in the cool aircon of our resort room!

Next up was a display of Thai curry cooking, by a woman Brani made a point of announcing was 40 years old. She showed us all the fresh herbs used in the curry cooked when courting - kaffir lime leaves, shallots, fresh tumeric, galangal, lemon grass root, garlic, sea salt, black peper and one other thing which we can't remember the name of. She tossed it all into a mortar and pestle, then began mashing it all up while a five year old Japanese boy danced to the beat. She then cut to the chase and handed us a sample of the completed curry with rice. The smells were amazing and the food delicious.

We then heard about the buffalo and their role in Thai farming. Pet took a picture of me sitting on a big bull buffalo - I felt about ten years old! This was followed by a monkey show, where we got to watch a monkey at work picking coconuts. The monkeys live and work with their human families - kind of like Thai farm dogs. Not! Pet was lucky enough to take an amazing close up picture of the monkey! Oh, and Brani also made a point of introducing the monkey's trainer as being 45 years old. No secrets when Brani's around!

Then it was lunch - a Thai buffet which was delicious. We've really eaten some fantastic food since we've been here!

After that they bundled us back onto the trucks, sent us back to what passes for civilisation and then onto our minibus back to the resort to find our pal Ting working hard as always. Keep up the good work, Ting!

Roman Ruins Part I

2007-06-22T12:55:00.001-07:00

We finally found ourselves some Roman Ruins today, in the form of the Roman Fortress located at Caerleon in Wales. That's pronounced "Kayleen" for those who aren't local. We actually had trouble finding Caerleon, bypassing it entirely and ending up in Raglan, thanks to a fantastic motorway with virtually no exits.

We travelled down picturesque backroads to get to Caerleon by 4.30pm yesterday and decided a snooze was the order of the day. Alan, our host, booked us into The Red Lion (not the same pub as The Red Lion in Avebury) for dinner, and we were treated to a delicious roast chicken dinner. It's arguably the best meal we've had in England.

Mark will probably say more about the ruins, but I'll say something about the Roman candles, used by the Romans to light life in general, nearly two thouand years ago. The candles were made with tallow - animal fat - and the volunteers who run the Fortress Museum in Caerleon had a go at making tallow candles themselves. The said it was very smelly business. Imagine what it was like sitting in a room totally lit by tallow candles? Pee-yew!

Which brings me to the smell of Caerleon itself. It was a mixture of farm animal poo and spew - we heard lots of young lads out on the piss last night, singing their heads off in Welsh, and by the smell of things this morning, spews their guts up too. Even more odd was the smell of the area around the Roman Ampitheatre, which is the only one of its kind in Britain. The smell was pungent, and dare I say putrid. But I couldn't see any reason for this. There was no sheep poo, no piles of fresh spew - that's just how the ground smelled.

Now we are in Glastonbury, and the pervading smell is incense - it's hippie town. We are sitting in a falaffel bar typing - that's how hippish it is here. The Halays would be totally at home in this place. Crystal shops abound, the clothes shops are selling purple crushed velvet full length dresses, and I see there is an aura soma shop down a laneway, which I may just have to check out... toodles!

The Tor is not far from here. We'll walk there this afternoon, I think. It looks steep, maybe so steep as to make one delerious, at which point the mists will part and the way to Avalon will be clear. That would be good. I'd like to go there.

The Old Post House

2007-06-22T12:55:00.000-07:00

REPOSTED WITH PIC

England is literally covered in bed and breakfast guest houses. You can easily drive into any town, stop at the door of a B&B and ask if there's a vacancy. But being a Virgo, I really couldn't allow that - I needed to know where I was staying and when, so I booked all our B&Bs on the internet. In FEBRUARY.

So when we arrived in Salisbury, we proceeded to head to the otherside of the town. Our B&B, The Old Post House, was meant to be seven miles past Salisbury and five miles before Stone Henge (an asupicious location). This was true - but it took driving down a few country lanes to find where we were staying.

The Old Post House is, in fact, in a village called Great Wishford. Not a village like Double Bay Village - I'm talking a real village with a few streets, flint and lime houses, a pub, a Post Office and a telephone box. The Old Post House B&B is literally the old post house - 350 years old. It was off the beaten track, and that was good. Paulene and Barry, our hosts were incredibly welcoming. As were their two doggies, their cat, and every bird in the vacinity.

Our room was super quiet. Our shower was the best we've had in Britain - perfect water temperature and excellent water pressure. Paulene cooked us a super English breakfast, complete with scrambled eggs laid by her friend's pet hen. We're sorry to have to move on from there. If you want to know more about the Old Post House B&B, go here:
http://www.theoldposthouse.co.uk/

Blur. Not the band.

2007-06-22T12:45:00.000-07:00

It's funny. You have a few days where you don't have any internet access and suddenly you can't remember what you did three or four days ago.

So here we are today in Bath. Apparently it's Friday. I think. We've just come from the Roman Baths site, which was quite interesting and only marred by noisy schoolkids who should learn to shut the hell up. More smacks, that's what's needed.

Bath is quite an amazing place. It's like the whole town's one big massive fortress. Hopefully the rain will stop and we can take some photos to show what I mean.

I'm now going to endeavour to backtrack to where we were a few days ago and try to fill in the gaps. Expect this post to be editted quite a lot as my memory gets rejogged and rejigged...

Diamonds are forever

2007-06-22T10:35:00.000-07:00

I had wanted to go to London Tower to see and feel what it was like for Anne Boleyn to be there when she was imprisioned by Henry VIII for adultery. I had forgotten that the Crown Jewels were housed there, and as it turned out, seeing them was the highlight of the tour for me!

As you know when I got engaged I became obsessed with diamonds. What girl doesn't? While I'm far from an expert on diamonds, I had done a little research on famous diamonds, the Koh-i-noor being one. So imagine my surprise when viewing the Crown Jewels, I discovered the koh-i-noor is actually mounted into the Queen Mother's crown?

The Koh-i-noor diamond is an ancient diamond which originates from the the Kings of Persia, the Shahs of Iran and finally from India. It is rumoured to be more than 5000 years old and was once the largest known diamond in the world. It was presented by Duleep Singh, the last Punjabi Maharaja (and he's got a story all of his own) to Queen Victoria in 1851. At the time it was 186 and a half carats in size. HUUUGGGGEEEE! But Prince Albert had it re cut to 106 carats to increase its brillance. It was reduced in size by 42%. And that really makes me want to cry.

Legend tells that it is bad luck for a male to wear the Koh-i-noor, which is why it is in the Queen Mother's crown. When I realised I was seeing the Koh-i-noor, I raced back around to view all the crowns again. In the crown jewels vault, all the crowns are in a special long glass cabinet and there's a moving walk way on either side so that people are forced to move along. On my first pass I was on the side of the Koh-i-noor. On my second pass I was on the other side and got very confused about what I was looking at. So I asked the Yeoman to show me exactly where the Koh-i-noor was and he showed me: it sits on the front of the Queen Mother's crown, above her forehead (when she's wearing it which is never because she's dead, of course).

But then he said "What about the Cullinan? Don't tell me you didn't see that?" and he ever so politely pushed me back towards the front of the case where the Royal Sceptre is on display. And there it was - the biggest freaking diamond I have seen in my life!!! One BIG bead!

The Cullinan I is a whopping 530 carats and is bigger than a golf ball. And that's just one piece of it! It was discovered in 1905 in an above ground mine and was over 3000 carats in the rough! It is known as The Great Star of Africa and was cut into nine different diamonds, another of which is in the crown of Queen Elizabeth II.

To see this diamond was to be spell bound. To say the least! I think I rode the jewel case pass four or five times to take in the spectacular brillance of all the jewels. Go here for more information on the Cullinan. You can find the Koh-i-noor on Wikioedia too.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cullinan_Diamond

Stone circles

2007-06-20T19:25:00.000-07:00

As you know, England is famous for a big stone circle, Stone Henge. And what you probably don't know is that there are loads of other stones circles all over the country side as well.

One of them being Avebury. Unlike Stone Henge, the stones at Avebury aren't behind ropes - they're situated in the middle of real farmland which is being grazed (and shat all over) by sheep. You can walk right up to the stones and touch them - if you don't mind getting manure all over your shoes and on the inside hems of your jeans and God knows where else that you didn't even notice.

The Avebury stones pre-date the ones at Stone Henge. In fact, they predate the Parthenon and the Great Wall of China. They are 6,000 years old. This means, if you are a creationist, that they were around at the time of Adam & Eve (since Creationists have pegged the planet's age at no more than 6,000 years old. And as an aside, we saw a show the other night about a Creationist Amusement Park in America where the Creationists have conveniently rearranged facts and placed kids playing with dinosaurs which are no longer man eaters, but friendly pets like Dino on the Flintstones. What a bunch of monumental jackasses!).

Avebury itself is a heritage protected village. And if you're a smarty pants like us, you will have bought your British Heritage membership over the internet, and gained access to the place for nothing. In fact, our membership got us into Stone Henge and Old Sarum for nothing too. Membership DOES have privileges.

The thing about Avebury, and any other stone circle for that matter, is that its true use is completely lost in time. We do know that the stones were used consistently for about 1,500 years. Amazingly, memory of that use is lost with time. They've since been unused for three times as long. So in viewing the stones, I found it really hard to relate to them. Not knowing what they were used for means they are absent of meaning. And without meaning, I was at a loss to know how to feel about what I was seeing. Gorgeous village. Cute sheep. Fantastic monoliths. But what does it all mean?

We pondered this as we sat in the Red Lion Free House - a pub which is supposed to be THE most haunted in England. The most famous ghost, Florrie, failed to make an appearance (although if my sister had been there, I'm sure she would have showed up). So we played darts - a very unhistoric thing to do in one of the most ancient places in the world.

I think you call that irony. I know I do.

Additional Note: Alan, our host at Camelot B&B last night, tells us that Avebury is the place where seven ley lines intersect. According to Wikipedia, ley lines and their intersection points resonate a special psychic or magical energy. Hence, Alan says, his hair stands on end when he is in Avebury, owing to the powerful magentic forces of the earth, which the ley lines bring to the surface. So there's some meaning we can add to the site... all that geographic magenetism probably explains why Marks was able to hit the bullseye n the dart board at the Red Lion...

When in France

2007-06-20T10:19:00.000-07:00

Well, we are in France and having a very relaxing time in Brittany. Im writing this at Sophie and Freds place, who have kindly lets us use their competers to upload some photos to Photobucket. I wont get them all up today, but Ill begin republishing old posts with photos each time we stop at an internet cafe, so if you see a story youve read before, its probably got a photo in it.

Brest (in Brittany) is sunny but windy. Its 20 degrees, but the wind chill factor is making it seem colder. I sent all my warm clothes home yesterday, so too bad for me, Ive got one jacket and thats it.

Today weve seen a menhir - the kind that Obelix carries around on his back. The legend goes that a male who rubs his belly on the menhir will have male offspring. So Mark lifted his t-shirt and rubbed his belly on it! If a female rubs her belly on it, she gain full control of her household. I already have that so I didnt lift my shirt...

Something new

2007-06-20T10:06:00.000-07:00

REPOSTED WITH PIC!

Firstly, the blog is coming up in Thai, not English, so if things are in the wrong place or seem weird, we'll have to fix it when we land in the Queen's home country.

Meanwhile, we are finding the Thai people to be extraordinarily friendly. They are very encouraging when it comes to learning their language. Despite our pathetic attempts to remember simple niceties like "thankyou", (kop koon kah if you're a girl), they persevere with us, always smiling, always friendly.

At breakfast this morning we were served by Ting, who brought us our room service lunch yesterday, shortly before we passed out. Today he came straight up to our table with what looked like two figs in his hand. "It's a fig!" I said and he said yes. Did we want to try? I don't like fresh figs but I said "Sure". So he took the fruit knife from Mark's setting and deftly cut the 'fig' around the girth. He twisted it, pulled the top half away, and revealed a nest of white, fleshy segments!

"Wow!", I said, surprised that it wasn't a fig. "I'll try that!". I plucked a single segment out with my fork and put it in my mouth - it was juicey, sweet and tangey, all at the same time. "What's the name of this?" I asked Ting. He said the name, knew we didn't get it, so went over to the buffet where there were dozens of the fruit sitting in a bowl, and brought the little sign with the name on it back to our table.

MANGOSTEENS. That's what they are. DELICIOUS!!! That's how they taste. Ting said there's a huge tree full of them growing just outside his family's farm. He said they only fruit for two months of the year - June and July. He said by next month, the tree will be "fat" with fruit, it's branches drooping with their weight.

Those little white segments nestled inside pink flesh. Yet the outside of the fruit is so deceptively like a fig. I guess God ran short of designs on the day he made figs and mangosteens. Maybe he thought the fig lovers of the world would never make it to Thailand in order to get confused...

Killing time

2007-06-19T09:05:00.000-07:00

Yep, it's killing time, so if anybody so much as looks at me sideways...

Actually, we're killing time before we head off to Luton airport to fly over to France for four days. This should prove interesting as the extent of my French is "oui", "Je mapelle Mark" (thankyou Miss Powell, our hot year seven French teacher) and humming the chorus to "Voulez Vous".

After our four days in France, we're flying over to Barcelona. Thankfully I'm fluent in Spanish (esta muoy bella senorita) so Pet's got nothing to worry about!

Speaking of Pet, there aren't many wives who would travel to another country and procede to tell the local constabulary how to do their job. But my wife would. And did.

We were in the laundromat yesterday afternoon, when this young girl came in and demanded her sweater. An argument ensued, with her shouting "You don't know who I ****ing am! You don't know who you're ****ing with! I'll kill you! I'll burn your shop down!" Our washing done, we put our smalls in the dryer and I took the rest back to hang out in our room. When I returned, both her boyfriend and the police had arrived, with the latter trying to sort it out. Apparently she came in regularly, and had been doing so for the last four months, over the same issue. The police instructed the laundormat guy to provide her with the sweater tomorrow (which is now today) and sent her and her boyfriend on their way. Pet, believing an injustice had been done to the shopkeeper by the girl being able to walk away feeling vindicated after being verbally abusive and threatening, strode up to the police and told them so. The cop explained that she was known to them, although not for any criminal matters, and that he didn't want to get confrontational with her in the shop with needles and bystanders around. If it had been a US tv cop show, a shootout would've ensued and I would've copped one in the shoulder: only a flesh wound, nothing to worry about, but man it would've impressed the girls.

B&B Low Down

2007-06-18T19:33:00.000-07:00

Well, we have mostly relied on B&Bs for accommodation in England - that's bed and breakfasts to the folks at home who might not be in the know (not many of you, I should think). In London, this amounts to a fairly scuzzy room, sometimes with a shared bathroom, but in our case we always get an ensuite. You're also meant to get breaky with the price of your room, and in The Chelsea, this is cereal and toast. But only if they decide to serve it during the set times, or if you can get a seat when they do. We decided sometime ago the value of said meal couldn't be more than £1.50 so, compared to the irritation which was worth about £10, so we no longer bother.

But out in the countrside the average B&B host takes their offerings very seriously. At The Old Post House in Great Wishford, the accommodation was top notch, as was the breaky, which I've previously meantioned. We didn't realise how good it was until we arrived at...

Camelot in Caerleon. While Paulene at The Old Post House was mostly interested in providing the service but leaving us to ourselves, Alan at Camelot seemed to be keen on company and input. God bless him, he'd recently had an artheroscope on his knee so wasn't too mobile. And his wife was off with a new hip replacement... could be something to do with the hearty English Breakfasts, but you can't be too sure. As Alan said, "perfection is pear shaped..." what a guy.

In Glastonbury, Kylemore Manor was difficult to get into, but super comfortable once we were in. As Marky said, the breaky was top notch (note - he eats the cooked breakfast. I just have toast). After my reading, Tim, our host, told me that the room we'd stayed in was haunted by three little girls, who appear in photos, lined up along the window, dressed in white outfits. He didn't show me any of these photos, but he said it's the spookiest thing he's ever seen. And I think that's saying something. The building itself is about three hundred years old - with the original building clearly visible and extensions added on either side. Oddly, the back of it was demolished a long time ago, so it is only one room deep...

Down in Worthing, we stayed at Park House with Martyn and Rebecca hosting. Mark broke the handle on the bathroom door about five minutes after we'd got into the room, which wasn't a good start. Rebecca admitted she'd have to get the builders to fix it because Martyn certainly couldn't. Again, breaky was cooked for Mark - he's become well trained in asking for no tomatoes and mushrooms. Which isn't working out that well for me anymore, since I was eating them on his behalf!

As we left we found Martyn and Rebecca in next door clearing out the bottom unit of an old Victorian duplex. Rebecca's mother used to live there, and they sold it when she passed away. The property was being settled today! However, smart cookies that they are, they rezoned the yard so that they got to keep most of it for Park House. Clever indeed. They told us Park House had been on the market for three years when they bought it, so they couldn't get a commercial loan - there was absolutely no trading record. So they managed to get a normal home loan for it. When the bank noticed the house had 10 bathrooms they raised an eyebrow - Rebecca said they might ask some friends to stay... again, very clever.

All in all accommodation has been very good. We are sleeping very well every night - no, I'm not having any sleeping walking or talking episodes for those who are wondering. I'm just to darned tired for that kind of hijinx. I think the final word on B&Bs is this: people open up their homes and invite you in. They don't ask you to fill anything out and they don't take your money until you leave, and I find this incredibly trusting. I am honoured to be trusted in this way of course. It's a wonderful example of the good things about humanity which can be lost in big cities these days.

Television

2007-06-18T19:24:00.000-07:00

One thing we've found truly fascinating during out holiday is tv. From the insane confusion of the Chinese version of Channel V, through to the mostly excellent, yet sometimes fascinatingly atrocious antics of British tv, watching television has been an interesting way to gain some insight into different "cultures".

We became quite addicted to "Britain's Got Talent", a show where pretty much every citizen of Britain auditioned to show off their particular "talent" in the hopes of appearing in front of the Queen at the Royal variety Performance.

The majority of these were unsurprisingly disgraceful. In the end it was won by an opera-singing Welshman with bad teeth who pipped the favourite - a cute-as-a-button six year old girl who sang "Somewhere Over The Rainbow". Thank God the guy with the dancing Michael Jackson monkey puppet (who was one of nine finalists) or the off-the-scale annoying little tyke who subjected us to caterwauling through old Broadway show songs didn't win.

Pet's already mentioned British Big Brother. The first evictee, Shabnam, made an absolute fool of herself when she left the house (which has a smoking area in the backyard) and entered the studio to a rousing chorus of boos. She seemed oblivious to the boos, acting like they were cheers, carrying on with crap like "S to the H to the A to the B..." You get the picture. What's with that anyway? Why is it that young people suck nowadays? Why, in my day...

Another thing we've found is that BBC1 radio is far superior to the radio stations in Sydney. Virgin radio, which we thought would be cool and cutting edge, is lame and like 2WS. Is Richard Branson getting too old?

You be the judge. I don't need that sort of responsibility.

Glastonbury Tor

2007-06-18T19:10:00.000-07:00

Well, we have been everywhere, man, over the past few days. We've covered an awesome amount of distance, the highlight of which, was Glastonbury Tor.

As I said in a previous post, the cheese-factor in Glastobury itself is really high. But it's worth putting up with for the sake of the Tor. I've mentioned that the Tor is supposed to be the gateway to Avalon. In fact the area around the Tor, where the town is, used to be covered with water. Those who have read The Mists Of Avalon will be familiar with the Priestesses having to ride out in a boat and part the mists to emerge from the other world... or to admit visitors.

In any case, the waters have long receded and now there is the town. We had booked into Kylemore House B&B and were hosted by Tim & Tiana. As it turned out, Tim is a card reader (there are many in the town) and the thing that makes him different is that he uses a Glastonbury set of cards. So I took the plunge and asked him to read for me.

The reading was quite weird to start with and really didn't click into place for me until Tim had turned over about the eighth card. Suffice to say I'm not telling you any of what the reading was about, but it really struck a chord with me. In particular, it reminded me of a dream I'd had the previous night in which Rhonda Byrne, the writer of The Secret, had appeared with Oprah Winfrey. I took their appearance as being a symbolic reminder that you can create anything that you can imagine, and that I should use my time in Glastonbury to do just that.

So immediately after the reading, Marky and I took a walk up the Tor. This was no mean feat. Apart from the fact that there is some cow manure to negotiate, there is also a very steep hill up the side of the Tor. I hear there is a less steep climb, but we chose the side that is most obvious when you look at the Tor from the town. This whole trip I've been saying that as long as I'm fit enough to climb the Tor, I'll be satisfied. My little heart was beating wildly in my chest, and I had to stop and enjoy the view a couple of times to calm it down, but we made it up to the top in about 35 minutes, which is pretty standard I hear.

From the top of the Tor you have 360 degree sweeping views of Somerset. And it is a stunning view to say the least. Also at the top is the tower of St Michael's church, most of which is gone. We have a great photo of us at the top and hopefully we'll get to upload it at some point. We sat overlooking Glastonbury for about 15 minutes, and took the time to reaffirm our vows with a re-exchange of rings. It was a wonderful moment. Very healing, very inspiring and just very reassuring, given the card reading.

Hit the road, Jack(ass)

2007-06-18T18:55:00.000-07:00

We're now back in London after an extremely LOOOONNNG day of driving. But I'll get to that. First things first.

Yesterday morning we awoke in our b&b in Glastonbury and had one of the best breakfasts we've had in the UK. We then went up the Tor, which Pet will blog about. After that, we visited the ruins of Glastonbury Abbey, which were quite interesting, despite the fact that the ambience was marred by people setting up PA equipment and some old British biddies having a picnic next to the Abbey entrance. I tell you, the Brits are mad about their damn picnics. There's tv shows about them and supermarkets are full of picnic supplies and accessories. Nuts to picnics.

So after the abbey we hit the road again and drove down to the south coast of England to Portchester, where we stopped to check out Portchester castle. Portchester castle was built by the Romans around 2000 years ago. Once completed, the Roman in charge of building it declared himself emporer of Britain, thereby ticking off his chums back in Rome. This was a really interesting place - it had been a fortress, a prison and a royal residence. And, best of all, it was a British Heritage property so we got free entry!

We left there without incident and headed to Worthing, a seaside town where we spent the night. I believe Pet is blogging about this.

We left Worthing this morning with the intention of checking out a Roman villa on our way back to London (Hammersmith to be precise) to drop the car off. When we finally got to the villa the stinking rain set in. We sat in the car for about ten minutes before deciding it was a no go and driving off.

Then began the odyssey of getting back to Hammersmith. We eventually got onto a motorway which encircles London, with the intent of taking it to the south western side and then getting off and driving to Hammersmith. So we drove in the pouring rain, through bleak and foggy conditions, along this damn thing which didn't have any exits to where we needed to be! There was a massive traffic jam going the other way which lasted for several kilometres (not that they have those over here), so we definitely didn't want to get stuck in that. We ended up pulling off to a place called Crackle Lane or something like that that wasn't even listed in the index of the map. After speaking to some locals and finding out just how far afar we were, we then decided to backstreet our way to Hammersmith.

Thus began several hours of tense confusion, erratic lane changes and u-turns down one way streets. Yet no matter how insanely I drove, nothing can compare to the way many of the Brits seem to drive. It's like a sport for them. A sport like deer hunting or pigeon shooting.

Finally, four hours later, thanks to Pet's excellent navigation, my driving daring-do and a little bit of guesswork, we arrived back at the car hire place in Hammersmith.

Thank crap for that.

So here we are in Glastonbury...

2007-06-16T13:05:00.000-07:00

...and to my huge annoyance, all the additions I made to my "blur..." post weren't saved. So here it is again.

Tuesday we checked out of the Chelsea House Hotel and made our way over to Hammersmith, where we hired a car - a wee little silver bubble. The guy at the car hire place offered us a road map and street directory, but because I have a penis I need neither of those so we said "no thanks!" and off we drove to Windsor.

A short drive later, my uncanny sense of direction (coupled with the map we were given before we left Australia) brought us unerringly to Windsor. To our surprise, we found that the castle was actually part of the town (we were expecting it to be a short drive away from the town centre) - you can walk down the street with shops on one side of you and the outer castle walls on the other.

We checked into the Christopher Wren hotel, which was very swanky, then went out for a wander. Windsor is beautiful. We both decided that it's our favourite place in all England and that if we were to live in the UK, we'd live in Windsor.

After dinner (Chinese) we returned to our room. Pet had a lie down and I went out on a search for an off licence to buy some beer. Crossing over the short bridge and into Eton, I was accosted by two girls and a film crew. The girls asked if I was single. I said no, watching their poor hearts breaking before my very eyes. They were apparently looking for singles for a singles club the following night. Because it was filmed I had to sign a release form for them to use my image. I'm expecting to be contacted any day now by London talent scouts. Any day now.

Wednesday we visited Windsor Castle, which was really quite amazing, especially as it's a functioning castle with many areas off limits because royalty frequently reside there. Then we hit the road for Salisbury (see pet's posting for details of our accomodation there).

Thursday we got up early and went to Stone Henge, followed by Old Sarum, which is the remains of an old fortress and castle that was abandoned when priests and the military there couldn't co-exist, resulting in moving the settlement to Salisbury (occasionally referred to here and there as New Sarum). We then drove into Salisbury (or New Sarum, call it what you will) and wandered through Salisbury Catherdal. fascinating. Salisbury itself was quite nice, but in comparison to Windsor - Windsor's a princess and Salisbury's a slapper.

After the Cathedral, we drove out to Avebury, which Pet has already posted on. That night we had an extremely dodgy "Thai" dinner in Salisbury. You don't realise just how excellent food is in Australia until you come to the UK.

Friday morning we checked out of the Old Post House and drove up to Caerleon in Wales. Caerleon is the site of an old Roman Fortress from nearly 2000 years ago. We chekced into a B&B called Camelot, run by a lovely old gent by the name of Allan. That night we went to the Red Lion for the best meal we've had in the UK.

And now we're in Glastonbury. Who knows what adventures will follow!

Things that are good

2007-06-12T10:50:00.000-07:00

This post will be an ongoing post about things that have stood out to us as being excellent:

- British Heritage Trust membership. Because admission fees are for saps and rubes
- Westminster Abbey
- London public transport
- Shopping in Harrods
- The friendly staff at Balan's 2 cafe in Earls Court
- Malteaser ice creams
- Marks & Spencer Simply Food
- London cabs with tvs in them
- Maple & Pecan pastries from Tesco express
- The Crown Jewels
- Aquamarine Hotel, Phuket
- Ting and some other waiter who taught me to say "Hoi" properly at the Aquamarine
- Snorkelling at Phi Phi Island
- Singha beer
- Weather in Phuket
- Our luxury cab ride into Patong and pick-up by same to return to the hotel when every other poor fool was stuck with god-awful tuk-tuks
- The exchange rate of AUS$ to Thai baht
- Windsor
- Salisbury Cathedral
- The Old Post House B&B - best breakfast and shower we've had in England
- Not paying the 1400 baht departure tax we were told we'd have to pay upon leaving Bangkok
- Old Sarum
- Portchester castle
- The crepe girl in Paris
- Barcelona
- Spanish food
- Gaudi
- The view from the top of the Eiffel Tower

My Spidey-sense is tingling...

2007-06-12T02:55:00.001-07:00

Yesterday we had a bit of a lazy morning, after walking ourselves ragged the previous couple of days. We decided to catch a train over to Putney, where Pet stayed the first time she visited London, after reading in a London paper that Spiderman 3 was playing there.

So we caught the train over and did a spot of shopping before rocking up at the cinema to discover that the information in the paper was incorrect! The guy at the Odeon, who seemed very friendly and helpful at the time, gave us an Odeon guide so we could see where it was playing. We went and had a beer and checked out the guide and discovered that the two most convenient locations for us to see it would be either Wimbledon, at 5:00pm, or Kensington High St, at around 2:15pm.

Opting for Kensington, we jumped back onto the Tube. However, when we arrived at the Odeon Kensington, we were told by the girl there that Spiderman 3 was in fact NOT playing there that day and pointed out that the Odeon guide the guy at Putney gave us was from last week!

We were not impressed, Pet in particular, who, after I'd torn the guide in half, snatched it from my hands and threw it to the ground outside the cinema and quite loudly declared the situation to be "mailto:*&@#ing" That's my girl.

The poor girl behind the counter didn't know what to do. We asked her if we could get a bus to Bayswater, another Odeon cinema purpotedly showing Spiderman. She gave us some convoluted instructions on how to get the bus there and so we decided to hell with that, let's just get a cab.

So we hailed down a London cab and to my delight discovered that inside the cab was a tv and a remote control set into my armrest. I set it to a comedy channel and we got some good laughs from some English comedienne before arriving at the cinema.

Lo and behold this cinema was actually showing the damn film! So we bought our tickets, went for a wander in search of shoes, saw a couple of awful trannies, had a beer, bought some snacks and when 5:00pm eventually rolled around we finally got to see Spiderman 3.

So, after all that, a brief review of Spiderman 3. It was a lot easier to follow than Pirates of the Caribbean 3, which was a convoluted mess of subplots. Toby McGuire was suitably dorky, Kirsten Dunst was Kirsten Dunst and that cheeky Stan Lee made a cameo appearance, as is his wont.

London Tower

2007-06-11T09:37:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, after a visit to Westmister Abbey, which Pet will be writing about, we wandered over to Tower Bridge and London Tower, stopping off at a nice little pub along the way for a pint and some bangers and mash.

Tower Bridge was very impressive, one of the many bridges crossing the Thames, which is a sorry brown excuse for a river if ever there was one. Once at the Tower, we walked ourselves stupid through ancient winding stone spiral staircases and a multitude of rooms. Pet was quite taken by the Crown Jewels, especially the koh-i-noor diamond (see Pet's posting for this!).

We checked out the armory in the White Tower, former bedrooms of royalty, the Bloody Tower where two princes were said to be murdered by their uncle Richard the 3rd and the room in one of the towers where prisoners - usually political or religious - were held. This room had graffiti carved into the stone walls by some of the former prisoners, stretching back centuries. Anne Boleyn had been a prisoner there, along with Elizabeth 1, with more recent inmates including Rudolph Hess and Eastend gangsters the Cray twins.

By the time we left there our feet were killing us. We caught a bus and two trains back to Earl's Court, bought some supplies, including beer, Pepsi and dip, with the intention of having some drinks and heading out for dinner - our first dinner since we arrived! But, instead, we passed out on the bed, exhausted. At one stage we awoke around 12:15am, with Pet suggesting we get up, get dressed and go and get ourselves some Big Macs. Surprisingly I vetoed the idea and went back to sleep until around 5:00am. We still can't get the hang of the time and we still have never been awake to have dinner in London. On the one hand, it's saving us money, but onthe other hand it'd be kind of nice to experience a normal day and sample some of the London nightlife (even though it's not dark until 10:00pm). Can we make it through today to have dinner tonight? Only time will tell. I'll let you know tomorrow...

You wouldn't steal a car...

2007-06-11T09:00:00.000-07:00

Or maybe you would. I wouldn't know. I'm not your conscience.

In any case, this posting's title comes from the anti-dvd piracy ads they have at the start of dvds and its relevance pertains to a film we saw whilst in Phuket.

One afternoon, I can't remember which and it isn't relevant anyway, we flicked on the hotel tv to the movie channel to discover they were showing Troy. With subtitles. In English. Which is kind of strange considering it's an English speaking film.

Now whoever pirated this movie and decided to add these irrelevant subtitles really did a half-assed job of it. It was like they listened to the dialogue once and then just wrote whatever they thought was said. The highlight for me was when Achilles was informed by his second in charge that his cousin had been killed. I can't remember Brad Pitt's actual lines at the time but it was something epic and anguished and accompanied by him striking his second in command in a mighty fashion. Unable to translate the line, the pirate just wrote the subtitle as "Shit!"

The lesson here: don't buy pirated dvds, kids. Although they can be quite entertaining in their own way.

On a related note, we found that the stalls selling pirate dvds (Spiderman 3, Shrek 3, etc) and video games really weren't particularly good value at all. Being an ultra-cool guy, I got quite excited when I saw a wall of Nintendo DS games (Pet bought me a Nintendo DS for Christmas last year), including the Justice League game and many Star Wars games (ultra-cool guy, remember?) But when we found out the price and converted it back to AUS$, they really weren't much better than what you'd buy on sale at Target, and for something dodgy it just wasn't worth the risk.

But that's enough about Phuket. There's no sense in living in the past. Unless your present and your future suck.

Kensington Palace

2007-06-10T10:57:00.000-07:00

One of the main reasons I wanted to return to London was to see the royal palaces of Henry VIII. Kensington Palace wasn't lived in by Henry VIII, but it was an easy one to get to, so we went there yesterday and were quite delighted by the place.

Of course Kensington Palace was the home of Princess Diana, and when she died 10 years ago, it was the focus of many people's grief, with unprecedented numbers of flowers being left at the gates by the mourning public. The tour included an exhibition of the Mario Testino's photos of the Princess, taken barely months before her death. Diana was undoubtedly an extraordinary feast for the eyes. And Testino's photos seemed to open a window directly onto her soul. I understand she suffered borderline personality disorder, which is a very serious mental disorder (and which in the Princess's case is virtually never discussed), but there is no trace of her inner turmoil in the photos. She looked peaceful and serene in the photos - the very essence of a Princess.

Also included on the tour was Princess Margaret's apartment, which was surprisingly small, considering how ROYAL she was. I remember her children recently sold many of Princess Margaret's personal effects - how sad that must have been for them. Some of her clothes were on display in her rooms - she was equally a fashion icon in the sixties as Diana was in her day - much of which was captured in pictures by her husband, Lord Snowden, a famous photographer in his own right.

The highlight of the tour, in my opinion, was the King's Apartments. Which King, I hear you say? It was in fact King William III and Queen Mary, although Mary was the one who ascended the throne. William was her husband, a Dutch Royal by birth. Mary was daughter to King James I. He actually had two sons - the heir who died as a youth and a second son who was physically handicapped (and who must have died but I don't know how). So Mary found herself on the throne and only agreed to be Queen if her husband was named King in his own right. She brokered a deal that ensured that in the event of her death, William retained the throne. As it turned out William died first. And since they had no children, when Mary died the throne passed to Anne, her sister, the last child of King James the first.

Poor Anne's husband died at a young age - only after he'd managed to impregnate the Queen 18 times! Unfortunately none of the children survived beyond the age of 11, which made the Queen so depressed she became morbidly obese. When she died, there was no direct heir and the throne passed to the Hanovarian line, which eventually led to our Queen, Elizabeth II ascending the throne.

Back to the actual palace - we saw the presence chamber, the Privy Chamber, the Queen's Privy chamber, the Queen's dinning room - a very small room with a small oval table big enough for two to sit at, and we also saw the Queen's bedroom. There were two galleries of 30 metres in length, one for the Queen and one for the King. Both were decorated with numerous priceless artworks (none of which were particularly interesting to me). We were told the King in particular liked to walk laps of his gallery on days when it rained.

Also of note - Queen Victoria was born in Kensington Palace, and she lived there with her mother, the Dutchess of Kent, until she ascended the throne at the age of 18. We saw her bedchamber, and while the bed in that room was hers, it had actually been brought there from Buckingham Palace.

In all I thought the tour of Kensington Palace was great value. It's smack dab in the middle of Hyde Park, which is explains why Diana was spotted jogging or rollerblading in the park as often as she was. Kensington itself is quite a cool place - I can see why Diana enjoyed the neighbourhood.

Money

2007-06-09T20:13:00.000-07:00

Well, I thought we'd saved a mountain of money for this trip, but after only one day in London, we've demolished a goodly portion of our cash. Not through frivolousness, either. We went to the movies today, which is a fair thing to do when your feet are killing you. The price of the ticket was £12.50 each. The exchange rate here is 2.6 Aussie dollars for one pound. So, you do the maths and what you come up to is a movie ticket that basically cost AUD$33. EACH.

EACH!!!

It cost us AUD$66 to get in the freaking door! Never mind the snackies! We didn't have any because we don't have a bloody overdraft!

The startling reality is we got better value for our £12 entry fee into Kensington Palace than we did out of our movie tickets. It just goes to show that the pursuit of history is a happy one afterall.

The trouble with toilets

2007-06-09T20:10:00.000-07:00

There is one thing every Australian should be thankful for, and that is the reliability of toilets.

When is the last time your toilet got blocked? When, for that matter, is the last time you encountered a blocked toilet? It doesn't happen too often, does it? That's because Australian plumbing seems to be the best in the world.

Not so in England. Today I have encountered two blocked toilets. One in McDonald's Leicester Square, and another in the Odeon Cinema, also in Leicester Square. I wouldn't think too much of this, except the toilet in our room at Aquamarine in Phuket also got blocked - not once, but twice.

I note that in all three cases the toilets were "American Standard". Well American standard is obviously crap. Australian plumbers should consult to the world. They'd make a packet!

Jet-lagged

2007-06-09T19:58:00.000-07:00

First off, before I get into my daily update, what the hell is going on in Sydney and the central coast with the rain??? If anyone can give us some updates on what's happening back there it'd be appreciated. I keep seeing things on msn news about it and it looks pretty bad.

Anyway, enough about some of you, let's get back to me. And Pet.

We finally got to check into the b&b yesterday at 2:00pm and promptly went straight to bed and slept through til a little after 1:00am. Wide awake and still on Thai time, we got up, showered, got dressed and went for a walk around the neighbourhood. It was weird walking around at 2:00am on a Friday night and all the pubs were closed! We went to a convenience store and bought some snacks, including a Malteasers ice cream - hands down the best ice cream ever. We then wandered past a private club where a bunch of paparazzi were hanging out, waiting to see who'd come in or out of there. Had a brief chat with them and saw in the paper today that Kate Middleton had been in there. They showed a picture of her leaving the club, along with a close up of her sandalled feet and a blurb about her grubby toes! She'd been out dancing in a nightclub for the love of Pete! Of course her toes are gonna get a little grimy!

We ended up back in bed around 3:00am or so until 7:00 this morning. Spent the day in Harrod's, which is excellent, then wandered over to Kensington Palace and had a look through there. Very staid place, not particularly grand for the most part, although some of the artwork on the walls and ceilings was really quite amazing.

We thought we'd go see a movie so we bought tickets for Pirates of the Caribbean 3. At £13.50 each our two tickets ended up costing us approximately $70!!! Suffice it to say, we didn't dare get any popcorn or drinks.

So now it's 8:10pm and still broad daylight for another two hours and we're seriously tired. We're neither on Thai time nor London time - we're in some wacky twilight zone time, so our plans are to go back to the hotel and pass out like party machines and hopefully in the morning we'll wake up and be able to co-exist with all the Londoners.

Goodnight. And good luck.

Photos

2007-06-08T11:43:00.000-07:00

Sadly, I note the PCs in the Internet cafe in London do not even have USB ports, let alone card readers. So we might not be able to show you any pictures until we get to France - I'm hoping Sophie will let us do a little uploading at her place.

Unless we find a more sophisticated Internet cafe before then... that's the best we can do...

Seriously though, we are very fricking tired, thanks to a very long trip from Phuket and a stupid check-in time of 2.00pm at the B&B which was NEVER stated during the booking process. The dodgey Indian bugger that mans the front desk suggested we leave our suitcases in the breakfast room and go for a wander for four hours, but I refused. They would have been sitting out in the open for any man's brother and his dog to walk off with. And since Mark's drink spill on the plane last night wiped out his underpants, that would have been very bad news for him - it ain't easy going stag, you know!

I'm nearly asleep in my chair waiting for the clock to tick around. We're going to install ourselves in a pub shortly, although what good we think this will do is a wonder to me, since one whiff of booze is liable to put me into a coma.

ZZZZzzzzzzz.... what? Where am I? Sawadee... g'day... bonjour... ola... how do you do old chap?

London

2007-06-08T11:40:00.000-07:00

Well, here we are in London (Earls Court, to be precise), blogging away in an internet cafe as we can't check into our room until 2.00pm (it's now only 10:48am).

What a trip! Phuket airport was overflowing with Aussie bogans and seriously, I was ashamed to be Australian. So you can now call me Fritz Hammenheimer, German Eurotrash guy.

We had about a three hour stopover at Bangkok while we waited around for our 1:10 am flight to London. The flight from Bangkok took 11 hours and 35 minutes and then it took us approximately an hour to get through immigration, so by the time we got the Tube from Heathrow to Earls Court and dragged our suitcases, or ports, if you will, to the B&B we were ready for a shower, some breakfast and a sleep. But, due to not being able to check in until 2.00pm, our revised plan is for some breakfast (done), some blogging (doing), a wash and blowdry for Pet to get her hair all glamourous again and some time spent in a pub, reading magazines, drinking beer and having some lunch.

London! It's Pet's third time here and my first and it really is quite a fascinating place so far. It's so similar to Australia yet so completely different - it feels both familiar yet new at the same time. They've turned out some good old fashioned grey British sky for us, which was nice of them. I think the thing that's taking me the most to get used to is being surrounded by people who speak English as opposed to Thai! I haven't seen Tony Blair yet, but I'm sure it's only a matter of time.

Until next time, your pal, Fritz.

Terrible blast from the past

2007-06-08T11:38:00.000-07:00

I think I told many people we had specially chosen the two seats in the second last row of the plane for our trip to London, and were delighted when we settled in 69J & K last night - the roominess, the seeming privacy, we thought our flight to London would be bliss.

Sadly, as the last passengers began to fill the plane, a bloke came strutting down the aisle to sit in row 70, one back and across from us. There is only one word to describe that bloke - putrid. He was wearing black pants, a black shirt, a black t-shirt, black baseball hat and smelled like he'd been in a nightclub for the past week and had failed to go home and wash. His personal odour was incredibly pungent - so much so it permeated throughout the cabin to at least three rows in either direction. In Mark's opinion, he had the appearance of a junky.

Maybe I could have handled the stench. The problem was, the stench was AN EXACT REPLICA of the stench sported by a guy I lived with in Hong Kong in the early nineties. My days with that guy were not happy ones, and a lot of difficulty I had with myself when I left HK was because of that guy. Suffice to say I suffered a lot of psychological trauma at the hands of that guy. With the stench of Passenger 70G ripping through my nostrils, all my nightmares of that period in my life seemed like they'd become real. So much so, I kept having to check to make sure it wasn't the actual guy I'd lived with - but it wasn't. It was just a carbon replica.

Mark asked how a person gets to smell like that and I explained it to him in simple terms: firstly, you become utterly careless about your personal higene, washing infrequently, but always sweating profusely. Then you fail to wash your clothes, but keep wearing them, oblivious to the developing funk. You go nightclubbing in places where people smoke freely and they use a fog machine to create false ambience. Then you drink a lot, and maybe spill a fair bit of your drink on your already oversoiled clothes. And to enhance the stench, you eat bad food consistently, to the point where your kidneys and liver are on the edge of failure. The perspiration that makes it out through your pores is entirely toxic, leaving your skin sallow and pale.

I took out the lemon grass essential oil I'd purchased duty free and began to wipe drops of it on me, Mark and our seats, hoping to come to terms with the personal affront to my olfactory senses. But then Passenger 70G took his shoes off and I was over whelmed. The wave of stench was tidal, washing over me, reaching Mark by the window, and sending the poor Japanese couple in 70 D & E scrambling. I covered my nose with my hands and began to cry. Mark got out of his seat, leaned right over the guy and told him to put his shoes back on because the smell was making his wife sick. Sadly, when Mark attempted to slide back into his seat, he knocked his JD & coke all over himself and his seat. He snapped with fury.

So I went to the cabin manager and told him in no uncertain terms that we had to be moved. It took a full five minutes - maybe more - of me explaining in great detail exactly why we were not able to remain where we were. There were six empty seats opposite the galley midway up the plane which obviously the crew were retaining to help them handle the service of food - they were already covered with food service trays and empty cups. But I was told they were for "sick" passengers. I offered to vomit on one of those seats to demonstrate that I was sick enough to be seated there. Can I vomit on cue? I honestly believe the stench of Passenger 70G could have driven me to it.

Needless to say the cabin manager finally relented and reseated us, but told us they were bad seats because of the galley. No seat could have been worse than the ones near Passenger 70G. It is a wonder the enitre rear of the plane didn't mutiny. While we were very grateful to be moved, I do feel we were treated with a definite lack of sympathy for the rest of the flight. Mark said he had a feeling we were regarded as being "difficult" passengers. Which is not appropriate. We worked really hard to get our heads back in a good place so that our trip wasn't ruined. I feel the least Thai's flight staff could have done was apologise for the inconvenience.

We never saw Passenger 70G get off the plane. But I do think he's the type that gets strip searched at Heathrow. Whatever his fate was, I pray to God that we never cross paths with him again.

Phuket re-cap

2007-06-07T14:20:00.000-07:00

Well, sadly it's our last day in Thailand today. Come 6 pm we hit the road for the airport and fly off to Bangkok and then to London, where we're due to arrive at 7:45am London time. We've spent today swimming, reading and relaxing by the pool - it's actually been the nicest day weather-wise that we've had since we arrived!

So a few last tidbits that may not have been mentioned before...

The guy in Patong who handed us scratchie cards then did a dance and kissed Pet's "winning" card when she scratched off 3 stars. It was basically a Trendwest-style scheme, with the criteria being that we were either "single, married or divorced." That should keep away the riff raff.

The elephant that hacked elephant slobber all over Pet when she was feeding her. [they all did it, not just one! - Pet]

The old guy who couldn't get back into the boat when we went snorkelling, broke one of the ladders trying to do so and then eventually got hauled in by two of the tour guides, with myself and another Aussie guy trying to push him up whilst treading water. [He started out all wrong by throwing himself like a breaching whale into the water where a coral reef lay a mere two feet below, so I think instant karma got him, hence the broken ladder and the embarassing re-entry to the boat. - Pet]

Sadly, I can't remember any more right now. So now, London here we come!

I will add a bit more, since I still have the sweet vocals of the duo who sang every night at the resort ringing in my ears. Suffice to say after a full day out in the speedboat, we both agreed that our last day in Phuket should be spent chilling out. We slathered up the sunscreen and headed for the resort pool at 8.30am, and apart from a midday lunch in airconditioned comfort, that's pretty much where we stayed for the rest of the day. By 4.30pm we had our bags packed and by 5.45pm we headed down to the bar for happy hour - although we decided to abstain.

A couple of Aussies, Lindy and Stuart, and two ladies they'd just met were lounging around sipping wine. The singing duo had just turned up for their nightly gig, so I asked them to sing a bossanova song they'd performed the night before, which I thought was really masterfully done. I didn't know the name of it so I sung some of the words - "baby your mine, you are blowing my mind, we are two of a kind..." and that was enough to get them started. Before they were half way through our airport transfer turned up and that was how we left the Aquamarine, Kamala Beach and Phuket - the Aussies cheered us goodbye, the duo sung us out the door, and that was it.

Travelling malarchy aside, I thought Phuket was wonderful. We chose a place to stay that was well away from the madding crowd and at the same time was very familar in the way it ressembled Le Meridien in Port Vila. The staff were brilliant, the food was delicious, the atmosphere was very relaxing, and as I sit here typing in dreary old London Town, I still feel the motion of the ocean from our trip to Phi Phi. It's nearly happy hour at the Aquamarine... but that's a different time and a different place...

After the fall

2007-06-06T18:34:00.000-07:00

It took several days, but people have finally started to talk about the tsunami and the effect its had on Phuket area. We see signs along the streets that state "tsunami hazard zone". If you turn your head the other way, you see a flat bay covered in water that stretches out to the Andaman Sea, so anybody who thinks a tsunami couldn't get them at that point is deluding themselves.

We also see signs pointing to evacuation routes. But again, I can't see how useful they'd be. "In the event of a tsunami, walk down the main street, turn left at the Seven 11, then right at the evacuation route sign." Like people aren't flailing about in water at that point. And the piece de resistance - the grass hut which is labelled a tsunami refuge... it's hardly any better than the canvas marquees you buy at Kmart.

So today, when we arrived by speed boat in Phi Phi Village, we finally got to see just what can happen to a place when it gets hit by not one but two 10 metre waves from either side of the sea. On the surface Phi Phi Village looks really cute. It sits right on the water's edge and has a paved road about one car width wide with wall to wall cafes and trinket shops running down either side which partially block out the harsh sunlight. People are ambling up and down the streets, kids are riding by wrecklessly on their pushbikes. English blokes are flogging something from open air shops (I didn't stop to find out what) and Germans are wandering into cafes for a coffee or Coke. I almost think Phi Phi village could be a really cool place.

Only it's not. There is an overwhelming feeling of "weird" permeating the village. Several streets back from the beach the locals are selling fresh produce in an open air market, and things are a little more lively, but in general, Phi Phi felt sad to me. It felt like a place that's had the wind knocked out of it and has never gotten its breath back.

And it was clear, as I wandered along with my Pentax digital SLR in my hand, that I was a boat person - pulled up with 25 minutes to take a look, then take off again. No comittment. No real interest. Even the tourists in the cafe seemed to get more kudos than me.

But I'm not sorry about that. I was glad to be away from Phi Phi. Looking out the back of the boat as we sped away, I told Mark without tourism there's no point to Phi Phi. He agreed.

Thankyou

2007-06-06T18:30:00.000-07:00

I just wanted to insert a heartfelt "thankyou" to my wonderful wife who booked this holiday for us in the first place. Pet brought us here especially for me and to her I say "Thankyou and I love you."

Bananas

2007-06-05T19:10:00.000-07:00

DearAustralia,

Your bananas are huge!

Signed,
The People of Thailand.

Posting times

2007-06-04T20:38:00.000-07:00

I never set the time on the blog to Australian time when I created, so all our posts from Australia are running late and out of time table order. And I note that everything we've published since we left is also showing whacky dates and times.

So I think we'll set the time stamps manually on each post, which will accurately reflect the date and time of the place we're in when we're posting. Hopefully that will add some additional depth to our trek...

Two Sides to every story

2007-06-03T21:50:00.000-07:00

While Mark tells tales of naughty scheisters in Patong, I will extole the virtues of the Thais who are our hosts at Aquamarine. They have been THE NICEST people. Always polite, always friendly, and very interested in seeing us experience the Thai culture. They've helped us with our crap Thai, which is fair because their English is generally pretty crap too. Nobody cares! Everybody just repeats themselves until they're basically understood. God knows how they deal with the French, Japanese and Korean guests!

Speaking of people from other places, we have been observing with horror as the French people fry themselves to a crisp under the Thai sun. Every Thai person we talk to tells us to use sunscreen - but being from Australia, they're preaching to the converted! We are well aware of the risks of sunburn and worse - skin cancer, so we slip, slop, slap at every opportunity. When we don't have to be in the sun, we take cover.

Not so with the European guests - they spread themselves out like strips of bacon, coat themselves in oil, and proceed to fry themselves to a crisp. Yesterday I spotted one guy that was so red, I wanted to take him straight to the mini mart and get him a bottle of Aloe Vera Gel. I'm pretty sure he had first degree burns. But it's not our place, is it?

It makes me wonder what kind of sun they have in Europe? Is there a hole in the ozone layer over the Cote D'Azure? Or it that phenomenon unique to Australia? The Thai sun is definitely not as biting as the Australian sun, or even that in Vanuatu, but surely they can feel their skin burning?

So while we relocate according to where the shade is, we watch the other guests collapse the pool umbrellas to get more sun. Suddenly I am thankful to our Government for going hard on the skin cancer scare campaign. It's saved us here. That being said, we have a half day in the sun tomorrow, and a full day on Wednesday. I am praying we make it out okay. There could be nothing worse than a 10 hour flight to London with the backs of our legs burnt. Cross you fingers for us.

Patong

2007-06-03T21:38:00.000-07:00

Sawasdee! In order to differentiate my posts fom Pet's, I've switched to blue italics, which are very fetching and quite stylish.

So we finally left the hotel today and headed into Patong. Quite an amazing town - if I'd have come here when I was 20 it would've seemed like paradise: countless open air bars right on the beach. I would've drank myself stupid.

There are street vendors EVERYWHERE. You literally can't walk past one without encountering another and they are all desperate to sell sell sell. And to try to rip you off. One guy wanted to sell us something for 1200 baht and we ended up buying it off him for 300 baht. We wanted a couple of Cokes so went into this bar and ordered 2 Pepsis from the girl behind the counter. She brought out two cans of Diet Coke and said we'd have to pay this other guy down the other end of the bar. So we walk down to him and he's busy buggerising around with his pad and calculator (no sales get made here without a calculator). We get sick of waiting for him and turn to walk away. "No no no!" he calls and comes after us, quoting us 95 baht for our two Cokes. So we get out our 95 baht and then he picks up his calculator and writes 114 baht on the bill. So we get out more baht to make up the 111 and then the cheeky shuyster writes 141 baht on the bill! At which stage we said "No way!" and stormed out in righteous indignation. A curse on him!

But every cloud has a silver lining (which is kind of apt as there seems to be a big thunder storm brewing) and our silver lining is that I got a new cap and that you can buy cans of Singha Beer from the chemist for only 30 baht each! And they sell Leo beer for 24 baht! So I'll be stocking up on that for when we get back to the hotel. And if I see that guy with his dodgy calculator...

The odyssey

2007-06-02T22:58:00.000-07:00

Sawasdee!

Being the highly organized individuals that we are, we dutifully left for Sydney airport at 5pm, only to arrive there and be told that they weren't checking anyone in yet and that we'd have to wait. But we couldn't wait within the line-up area until they were ready to check us in so we had to loiter around and watch and wait. So we did. After checking in, having dinner, waiting around, etc we finally board the plane and discover that we would be stopping off in Brisbane to drop off and pick up passengers. We arrived in Brisbane a bit after 11pm - so thus far it had taken us six hours to get from our house to Brisbane! Happy travellers we were not!

To make matters worse, we had to get off the plane and hang around Brisbane airport for an hour and a half. Pet managed to get herself a seat after getting some guy to move his bag off it and I got to sit on the floor. Once back on the plane we were finally on our way to Bangkok - thank God!

We had dinner around 1am, followed by some nasty wine, a couple of JDs and some cognac. The movie was some Disney film about some kid. My description of it is about as interesting as it was. Then followed eight hours of sporadic, uncomfortable bouts of "sleep". Fortunately, Pet slept better than I did.

17 and a half hours after leaving home we finally arrived in Bangkok, where we zipped through immigration and jumped onto our plane to Phuket. Hoo-bloody-ray!

Ah, Phuket. Jewel of the Andaman Sea.

Phuket is beautiful. It's so green and lush, the air's so hot and wet and the people are so friendly and welcoming and helpful. They've tried to teach us some basic Thai phrases and they've introduced us to some amazing foods (for more details see Pet's post). We spent yesterday sleeping, swimming, eating and sunbaking and last night when we turned on the TV, in amongst some very amusing Asian pop groups we discovered that one of the stations was playing Star Wars, followed by The Empire Strikes Back. What a way to end our first day in Phuket!

So, we're off on an elephant-back ride through the jungle on Tuesday and heading out to Phi Phi Island by speedboat on Wednesday to go snorkelling.

Until next time...

And now a word from our sponsor...

2007-05-31T19:28:00.000-07:00

Alright, so I'm not actually our sponsor, but I thought it was a catchy intro and it was high time I contributed to this blog.

It's D-Day! Departure Day! After counting down the days for nigh on 4 months I'm now finally counting down the hours (silently, in my head, so that I don't drive Pet insane). I've packed my bags, had a shave and a pedicure and now I'm good to go.

So so long, Sydney, so long Australia. Be sure to miss me and I'll send you a postcard. In honour of Thailand, our first destination: "la-gon, chok dee. Lao jer gun!"

Today is the day

2007-05-31T19:21:00.000-07:00

There is nothing left to do except get on the plane. That and cope with the hangover I have, thanks to my work colleagues. We went for drinkies last night to mark the end of my contract, and it was really needed. By everybody, think!

Next post from me is coming from Thailand. Ta ta!

By this time next week...

2007-05-24T21:47:00.000-07:00

We are finally on the home stretch! We've started to pack our bags, we've looked at exchange rates, we are getting more excited by the day.

There's not much more to say other than: seven more sleeps!

What's two weeks?

2007-05-17T16:13:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I told Marky he wasn't to rip the page of the holiday countdown without me this morning. I made the countdown 12 weeks ago, commencing at 14 weeks. I set it up so that every Friday, a sheet could be torn off and we'd know our holiday was slowly but steadily approaching. That's how desperate we are!

So this morning, after waking up and lying in bed complaining about what a bad night's sleep we had (thanks to the rain hammering on our neighbour's garage door all night), we got up, went to the countdown and carefully removed the page for three weeks, revealing that there are only two weeks left. Hooray!

Our greatest concern at this stage is the change from a proper paper ticket to an international e-ticket. What if, at Heathrow, they take a look at our flimsy paper print out and decide that we're not planning to go home and decline our entry on that basis! That would seriously tick me off.

I guess the reception at Bangkok will be the litmus test!

Three weeks and counting

2007-05-10T18:56:00.000-07:00

It's three weeks to go until we set off on our adventure. Might I say we are growing more and more restless as the day approaches - the anticipation is almost as keen as the final countdown to our wedding. We want these weeks to fly, and yet not - because the weeks of our holiday might fly past equally as fast. Oh Thai Airlines! Warm my seat for me! Chill my wine. Crank up my movie. I can't wait to get on that plane!

Itinerary

2007-05-06T20:12:00.000-07:00

Throughout June we'll be travelling to :

Bangkok - transit only!
Phuket, Thailand - where we intend to lounge around in the sun, swim, snorkel and consume a few fancy coctails with umbrellas in them.
London - to check out the palaces of Henry VIII
Windsor - to see the castle, and now to check out Legoland!
Salibury - where the Cathedral and Stonehenge are
Bath - to inspect the Roman Ruins
Caerleon - the mythical site of King Arthur's Camelot
Glastonbury - Byron Bay of England, and home of the Tor, the fabled gateway to Avalon
Brest - to visit friends
Paris - because it's romantic!
Barcelona - because it's there
London - and maybe up to Beccles to search for remnants of our family
Bangkok - another stopover
Sydney - where we lament how time flies!