Jul 06

It certainly has been a long time between blogs I know! But it seems like I've been flying from one corner of Europe to another for the last couple of weeks now (truth be told it hasn't been as much flying as my back probably would have liked, more overnight coaching or training it- but you get the hint!)

After leaving London we spent a couple of days in Paris. We did all the toursity things like marvelling at the mixing of new and old at the Lourve...

Seeing the Arc de Triumph - twice! Well turns out the first one wasn't actually THE Arc, just a big and stunningly beautiful Arc in the middle of a round-about (sure makes the flower arrangements at the ones back home look all the more meagre!) But that mistake was quickly realised and we wandered on down to the real thing

It also took us a while to realise that some of the city's buildings were not simply decorated so extravagantly for the benefit of tourists such as ourselves, but that in fact Bastille day was on the 14th of July- unfortunately we were catching the first train out that morning!

Given that it was such a hot day when we arrived, we decided to lay in the park beneath the Eiffel Tower to have a rest - where we then proceeded to get sunburnt (Can't remember why we chose to lie directly in the sun but I'm sure there must have been a good reason at the time- I think!). Nevertheless, it did give me the chance to take a couple of 21st Century self-potraits with the aid of my digital camera, and as the photo shows yes I was quite pleased with my effort!!

We also took a walk through the Catacombes. Cutting a long story short as I'm paying by the hour for net time, these are housed in an old, disused quarry under the streets of Paris and house what must be the bones of hundred's of thousands of former Parisian's. Apparently the bones were stored down there when the cemeteries became too crowded due to the plague and previous wars. So someone had the nice little idea to stack up the bones make patterns out of them, add an underground altar for those faithful and charge everyone 9 euros to take a wonder!

The walk through wasn't actually creepy, though you might have expected it to be. Maybe that had to do with the fact that I kept wondering how patient they must have been to go looking for matching bones (not sure if the photo shows it clearly, but apparently the bones are stacked so that like bones are with like bones, and only a few type of bones are actually used in the display- or so I heard another visitor who was obviously much more medically inclined than myself saying to one of their friends!)

I can't remember what was actually located in this Paris building, but I thought it was very cool that it had a whole garden growing on its outside walls!

After Paris we headed to Cologne to celebrate their Pride festival. We had a great weekend with their celebrations far exceeding anything London had to offer!! And even outdoing Sydney in some respects with the variety of performances and venues over the three days. After Cologne we travelled onto Amsterdam to our hostel which had an ever present aroma of weed being smoked and which was smack bang in the middle of the red light district (and none of you are to roll your eyes saying- of course it was!)

It's a beautiful city but it struck me that for all the heritage and history that Amsterdam and Holland have, go into any of their souvenir shops and 95 percent of what you see is gifts to do with Marijuana or porn, though granted you could find some wooden clogs. The clogs I can handle, but after you've seen countless of ashtrays with a Marijuana leaves on it, or bongs in all shapes and sizes it becomes a little tacky and tiresome!

Nevertheless, the legal status of marijuana might explain another interesting little discovery about Amsterdam- most of the building are not straight or square! It's like the builders were too stoned to worry about making them square and went with the motto- it'll be sweet, mate! (OK, probably has more to do with the fact that most of Holland has been reclaimed from the sea and Amsterdam is made up of a huge number of canals which probably mean the foundations are too weak to support the weight of all the buildings- but why let the truth get in the way of a good story ay?!)

And just so you don't all roll your eyes and post comments about me walking too closely to the coffeeshops in the city (ie cafe's which legally sell marijuana), I took some photos which will demonstrate my point (well hopefully anyway, otherwise there's no helping me!)

Example #1: Have a look at the building in the middle and the row of windows above the door, especially the one directly over the door

Example #2: A little bit harder to see on camera but have a look at the building on the right side of the picture with the white windows and see how far forward it leans compared to the blank brickwall in the background!

And so I went from London, Paris, Amsterdam to... Fethard. And for those of you who haven't heard of it(which, apart from family probably means everyone reading this), it's a small country town, population about 2000, in Co. Tipperrary where my Aunt and Uncle live. This is where I spent time relaxing, not doing much of anything really and loving every minute of it! You have to love the Irish though, I was at the pub one night (one of 7 in the town- not bad for only 2000 people!) when I noticed a black sign about 50cm x 50cm, not that old I'd guess, with neon writing advertising the beer- BUDWEISER in big white letters. Underneath the sign read - ON TAP. Pretty straight forward you would think, until you look closer and notice that the Publican had written in what looked like liquid paper - NOT. I haven't the faintest why he simply didn't take the sign down but I'm sure there most be a logical reason!

So after Ireland I went to Edinburgh for a couple of days. An absolutely beautiful city though the trek up the hill to the castle was a bit of a killer given the heat!

I also had a look at the new Scottish Parliament which is a stunningly designed building set against this spectacular natural backdrop. Turns out the building was quite controversial because it was very delayed and came in hugely over budget by the time it was finished, but the end result is great

I also took a wander around the yacht Britannia which was used by the Royal Family until the late 1990's. The ship was finished in the 1950's and when you walk through it you realise that nothing much has changed since then- and while that's admirable when considering that they didn't want to waste taxpayers money to redecorate, it also makes the thing look a little shabby and quite dated.

This photo is of The Queen's study, and apart from the State Room on board which housed all the formal dinners, it's probably one of the more modern rooms on the ship.

But here's an amusing random little fact that none of you probably ever really cared to know about- The Queen and Prince Phillip both slepped in single beds in seperate rooms while on board. I say, I can understand why you wouldn't necessarily want to share a bed with him, but what's the use in being Queen when you can't even get a Queen size bed?

Anyway, so now I'm back in London. Turns out they're celebrating Soho Pride tomorrow (ie Sunday). And just for the record I didn't know that it was on when I made the decision to come back to London, and no I am not doing a European tour of Pride events- but how nice of them to put on another party just for little old me!! And as I'm here for the weekend I may as well join in the celebrations I say! Then again friends have said that Brighton Pride is on next weekend and there's a whole group of them going down as it's meant to be great...hmmm, maybe my trip back to the continent will be posponed by a week- after all, the ancient treasures of Rome have been there for hundred's and thousand's of years, what's another week I say! ;-)

Today is our last day in London before taking my first overnight coach to Paris. A 9 hour trip which should be fun...at least I keep thinking that I don't have to pay for a nights accommodation- just not sure how much sleep we'll actually get??

Last week we spent a couple of days in Bath. A beautiful town...couldn't really say the same thing for the hostel we were staying in though.

The Roman Bath Museum was very interesting. Turns out the Romans built a Bath house to take advantage of the thermal springs. This then became overgrown and lost under the building of future generations until rediscovered after another Bath house had been built above it!

After Bath we travelled to Brighton on the Friday for one night before heading back to London. We splurged on a budget hotel for the night as we couldn't find any hostel accomodation. Certainly was a nice change to have our own room and a shower which you could actually turn around in without hitting the walls!

As the photo shows, the weather when we arrived in Brighton wasn't the best, though it did clear up nicely the following morning, enough anyway to allow the Brits to lie on the pebble beach without getting frostbite!

Europride has come and gone! We had a great weekend at the pride festival, though I'm not sure whether it was because we were tourist's or whether that was just the case but it all seemed a little disorganised! The main problem was finding out information of what was on, and then actually finding out where the venue was!

I didn't find the actual Parade on Sunday very exciting I must say, though it was rather entertaining watching the drag queens walk down the length of the parade in their stiletos, sequins & make-up given that it was an incredibly hot day! (I would hate to have seen them after partying all night long!)

After attending the Soho street festivities we went to the after party in this great venue which was a converted warehouse. We had been standing in line waiting to buy tickets, observing the fact that the people standing in line did not look like those who would normally attend such a party. Luckily we realised before paying and going in that there was a straight party occuring at that venue and we had actually wanted to go next door! (and no, it would not have been the end of the world, just unusual to end pride activities in such a way!)

Will probably be leaving London either tomorrow or the next day so will let you know where I go to next. PS: In case you're wondering, I haven't been able to log on to my email since leaving Munich so if you've sent me something, I will reply as soon as I can!