Edinburgh, Scotland, Fri 28 - Sat 29 Aug 09

I'm a bit behind my blog! Whoops :) Oh well better try and catch up. We took the train up for the long weekend to Edinburgh. I decided we'd go by train because even though it's a bit longer I thought it would be less hassle, haha yeah right. The train network in the UK needs a serious overhaul. No seat allocation even though we paid a silly amount for the tickets, delayed and overcrowded trains. I think the UK could take some advice from the French, their train system was awesome.

So anyway, August is the Edinburgh Festival and the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. A month long event of theatre shows, plays, dance performances, comedy shows etc. They also have the Military Tatoo on and lots of street performers and the like. We spent Friday night wondering around this madness, checking out the main street (The Royal Mile) watching the street performances and dodging the pamphlet pushers (there were a lot of them!). We had dinner in a nice japanese restaurant and did our best to stay warm in the freezing Scotland weather. Seriously, considering it was the height of summer, I could not believe how cold it was! I ended up getting sick thanks to the freezing wind. Only in the UK can you get a cold during summer! :)

We went and saw Edinburgh Castle on the Saturday. We had to queue for ages to get in so we ended up spending most of the day there. Edinburgh Castle is up on a hill at the top of the Royal Mile and the wind picks up off the Forth of Firth and blows a freezing gale across the castle grounds. The castle was fun, lots to see. We timed it really well and caught a free tour from the castle gates. It was great to hear some of the stories about the place.

At 1pm they fire a big canon from the castle grounds which was a lot of fun to watch. It gave me a huge fright when it went off even though I was expecting it! We had a look through the old Prison rooms which have been re-created so you can see what it would have been like to be a Prisoner of War there. We also saw the Crown Jewels (not as impressive as the British ones at Windsor). There was the Palace Quarters where Queen Mary of Scots was born and another room had a large memorial to the thousands of soldiers killed in WW1 and other battles. And of course we spent a bit of time just admiring the view across all of Edinburgh.

In the late afternoon we went on a mission to find a building we had seen from the castle. It was very old and black with age, in fact it was more of a monument really. We found it next to the gardens near the train station and tried to chill there in the sun but it was too damn cold in the wind so we kept moving.

We walked along Princes St, the main shopping area and kept going till we reached Carlton Hill. On the way we found an old graveyard full of beautiful tombs and monuments from the 18th century. Once we got to Carlton Hill we walked up to the summit to enjoy the view over to Arthur's seat (Edinburgh's mini mountain) and the Old Town of Edinburgh, including the view back over the castle. Man how I had missed hills! London is way too flat. I love the challenge hills bring to walks and the views always make it worthwhile.

Carlton Hill had a nice collection of monuments on top too. One was this collection of huge pillars that Nick managed to climb up on (I was too short and couldn't make it up). We chilled up on the hill for ages and found a nice spot near the edge to enjoy the views.

We'd had a pretty full on day so we headed back to the hostel. Unfortunately within half an hour of being back and relaxing at the hostel I started feeling terrible. My throat was dry & sore, I had a hazy headache and my body was aching. I knew for sure I had caught a cold. I couldn't believe how fast in happened. Damn this weather! I had absolutely no energy to leave the hostel so gave up on the idea of a night out whiskey tasting and instead got Vietnamese takeout (they had Pho, which is the tastiest dish ever and perfect for killing all sorts of nasty bugs - lots of garlic and chilli!).

Bath, England, Sun 16 August 09

We headed to Bath for a Sunday day trip. We got there about midday and after a quick bite to eat at a local cafe, we spent most of the afternoon at Bath's main attraction, the Roman Baths.

The Roman Baths were much more detailed than I expected. I thought it was just going to be a couple of old baths but it turned out to be a large excavated complex with models of what the full baths and temple would have looked like, museum artifacts and excavated rooms. It was really interesting. We spent a good couple of hours there just exploring and learning all the history. It was really well done. You could really imagine what it would have been like in Roman time.


The rest of the afternoon we spent exploring Bath's cute streets, buildings and bridges. It's a cute town. There was this semi circle row of houses next to a park that was a great place to chill out and we enjoyed a nice stroll along the river and a look at the Bath weir.

And of course no visit to a small British town would be complete without ending the day at one of the local pubs :)

Amsterdam, Netherlands, Fri 17 - Sun 19 July 09

Oh Amsterdam, ... well what else can I say except that it was a very eventful and party filled weekend! We were here for Nick's birthday, 8 of us ready to party.

Things Amsterdam taught me?

1. It will take 3 days to recover from a weekend in Amsterdam!
   
2. What happens in Amsterdam, stays in Amsterdam ;)

It was a fun city, we really had a great time. So the run down on who came; Nick and myself of course, my friends from Wellington Cherise and Tracey with their boyfriends Leighton and James, and my friend from working in Auckland Sam and his girlfriend Louise. So 8 in total.

We were staying in two apartments (4 per apartment) in what turned out to be the center of one of the bar districts (yepee!). I had booked it over the internet and didn't really know what to expect but we got really lucky.

They were 1 bedroom apartments so one couple had the room with another in the lounge and full kitchen facilities and big couches and tvs, great for hanging out. We were also literally right in the heart of it all. Although we were on the other side of town from the train station and the red light district we found ourselves in an area called Leidesplein which was the bar/clubbing area of Amsterdam. Perfect! Our apartment was just off the main street and was above a Thai restaurant. In fact people were hanging outside our apartment till 4/5am in the morning. Good thing I had bought air plugs!

We had to pick up the keys for the apartment from a hostel in a different part of town and when we were looking for it we walked up and down the street a couple of times before we spotted the door.. behind a thai restaurant menu! Felt weird walking up next to the outdoor tables with all our bags and unlocking our apartment door.

We had arrived late but luckily we were on a street full of restaurants and we found an italian one who would stay open to feed us even though it was midnight. Once the whole gang had arrived we headed into Leidesplein square and spent the rest of the night at the bars there.

On Saturday morning after a breakie of ham, cheese & fresh bread (yay go Sam our provider of tasty breakfast) we all headed for the Sex Museum for a bit of a laugh. All sorts of weird crazies there. We then split up with half heading off to the Rembrandt museum and the other half heading for Anne Franks house. Sadly neither had much luck as Anne Franks had a line a mile long so we gave up on it and the museum apparently only had print copies so wasn't worth it either.

So instead we went for a day time wonder of the red light district and found a nice pub for lunch where I tried Bitterballen (a classic dutch snack of crumbed meatballs with mustard). Weird texture, less meat and more gooey gravy but tasty. I also really really enjoyed the dutch frites with mayo we had at various times over the weekend. Seriously yum! The dutch know how to make good chips!

We had a big party night Saturday night. A great celebration for Nicks birthday. Of course we were feeling a bit worse for wear on the Sunday so we had a morning sleepin (go the 1pm apartment checkout time!). Again the group split up for the afternoon as Cherise, Leighton, Tracey & James had an earlier flight. So we went with Sam & Louise on a boat canal tour which was a cool way to see Amsterdam although the rocking made me a little queasy and put Louise to sleep! Some really cool houses along the canal fronts.

After that we hired some bikes and biked around Jaaden, an old pretty area of Amsterdam full of cute shops and cafes and then just biked around all the canals till it was time to head back to the airport. It was great fun, cycling is one of the best ways to see Amsterdam.

Milan, Italy, Sat 27 - Sun 28 June 09

What Milan taught me:

1. Milan is for art lovers and rich shoppers, there isn't too much else to do if you don't fall into one of those categories.
2. The food is fabulous!
3. Gelato is one of the tastiest things in the world, especially on a hot day.
4. Italian's like to drive ridiculously fast, even on crowded city streets. They also don't pay attention to red traffic lights or pedestrian crossings.
5. Italian's have a relaxed approach to service.
6. Mosquitoes love Milan.
7. Milan has one of the highest ratios of Smart Cars I've ever seen.

It was a late night in on the Friday and with limited maps it was a bit of a mission to find our hotel. Needless to say we took a wrong turn a few times. When we did finally find our way there we encountered our first introduction to Italian service. We queued to check in for about 20mins. It was 1 in the morning!

We took in the Cathedral in the morning before the sun got too hot and the crowds too dense. The Cathedral is stunning, tall intricate spires with a gold madonna topping the highest and a beautiful white marble exterior. The interior was beautiful too with unique statues and colourful stained glass windows.

We took the stairs up to the roof where you can walk all along the top, a very unique experience for a Cathedral. The sun was packing a punch by mid day so we took shelter in a shady section of the roof.

The rest of the early afternoon was spent walking through the town and up to the Palace where there are lots of museums and art galleries. We stopped for Gelato and to dangle our feet in the fountain, a much needed cooling off in a stuffy city. I had selected two separate types of gelato, mine was strawberry and mango. Nick had a melon, lemon & kiwifruit three type selection. They were seriously the yummiest icecream ever!

We attempted the park behind the palace but the heat and an abundance of mosquitoes made us abandon the idea and we decided to chill out in our air conditioned hotel room instead.

We had dinner in a small Italian restaurant in the shopping district. A bottle of Italian red wine, fettucine and pizza turned out to be one of the nicest meals out I'd had in ages. Italy does food miles beyond your local London fare.

Sunday was pretty relaxed since we'd pretty much seen everything already (yes there really was that little to do in Milan). We didn't venture out till the afternoon which turned out to be good because nothing opened till the afternoon anyway, and in fact many things didn't open at all.

We did some window shopping in the golden quad (think Versace, YSL, Gucci, Prada, Dior etc etc). But by the late afternoon the sun was beating down again and even worse than the day before so we treated ourselves to Gelato's for a second day in row and spent the new few hours people watching with our feet cooling off in the fountain.

Copenhagen, Zealand, Denmark, Sat 20 - Sun 21 June 09

Things I learned about Copenhagen:

1. You can walk the city easily but with so much to see your feet will be killer by the end of the day so hire a bike (something I wish we'd learned BEFORE the weekend!)
2. Copenhagen is the most bike friendly city I've ever visited with cycle dedicated lanes and it's so trustworthy people don't bother to lock their bikes either.
3. The water taxis have a very limited timetable, not so great when you want to use them as a mode of transport :)
4. Everyone speaks English but trying to pronounce Dutch is a fun pastime.
5. Food is delicious, so many great cafes and eateries.
6. It's a party city so walking through the streets in the morning is peacefully quiet.
7. Copenhagen is very green with it's windfarms, recycling bins everywhere, bikes and even a drink cup recylcing programme at the theme park.
8. You can't find a sign with Zealand on it, no matter how hard you look.

We saw so much in Copenhagen, it's a beautiful city. It had never been on my list of places to go but a cheap airfare came up so we took the opportunity and I'm so glad we did. Copenhagen was one of my favourite places yet!

We walked a lot of Copenhagen. There were so many beautiful buildings and places to see. On Saturday we also took a canal guided tour which was a fun way to see the city. It kept bucketing with rain so we'd have to take cover under the little canal boat roof. The best part was going under the low tiny bridges where the boat could only just fit. We had planned to use the water buses to get around but it turned out their schedules were annoying so we just walked everywhere.

We strolled down Nyhavn, the famous quay full of picturesque houses, wooden boats and water front cafes. Beautifully colourful and made for great photos. We walked around Stotsholmen, an island filled with parliament buildings, museums and a gigantic library where we sheltered from the rain. One side of the library is called The Black Diamond, called this because at sunset the water reflects off the black glass of the building and makes it sparkle.

We walked through the Amalienborg Palace where the royal family live and caught the end of the changing of the guard. There is a gorgeous fountain there with views over the river and the opera house in one direction, and the spectacular marble church the other.

We kept walking along to Kastellet (a military fortress) where we passed a beautiful fountain of the Goddess Gefion showing a legend on how the island Zealand came to be.. and damn still no Zealand plaque. I so wanted some proof I'd been to the old Zealand :) And then we carried on to the Little Mermaid, the famous Copenhagen statue depicting the Little Mermaid from the fairytale written by Hans Christian Andersen.

We spent Saturday night at the Tivoli Gardens, Copenhagen's adventure park. We had so much fun. There was so much to do there. They had amusement park rides, we went on the Himmelskibet, the world's tallest carousel at 80 m. It was pretty scary. I'd like to say we had beautiful views of Copenhagen but you couldn't see much when you're spinning around.

We watched some of a Pantomime show which was kinda weird and there were lots of pretty gardens and lights to look at. On the main outdoor stage they had a jazz band and a team of professional dancers who entertained us for a few hours. It was great music and the dancers were fun to watch while enjoying a tasty cider. It was such a great night.

On Sunday we walked up the Round Tower, an old observatory built in 1642, it had great views over Copenhagen and a really fun spiral walkway. We wondered through the beautifully manicured lawns of the Kings Gardens and admired the Rosenborg Slot (castle), and it turned out to be a pleasant place to rest our weary feet. We then headed back to the Marble Church for a peak inside (it had been closed on the Saturday for a wedding).

Our last stop was Christianshavn, an island full of canals, cafes, boats and pretty houses. We had the tastiest home made pizza for lunch sitting on the side of the canal.

Christiania is also on the island. An 'alternative lifestyle' community it made for some interesting people watching. No photos were allowed in there though. Something a bit different.

We spent the last of the afternoon simply sitting by the canal enjoying the sun. It was bliss. Would love to head back to Copenhagen.

Los Angeles, Fri 22 May - Sun 25 May 09

We spent a couple of days in LA on the way back over the London and I found it quite different to what I had been expecting. Hollywood certainly isn't glamorous by any sense of the word but is a lot of fun. The weather was incredible and there are so many crazy people there. LA is also one of the only cities I've been to where the main downtown is one of the least interesting places in the city.

Flying in we realised how huge LA really is and how it is flat like a pancake! There are a couple of hills out the back but otherwise it is a completely flat, very wide, grid like system. Unfortunately we also found out that LA has the most dreadful public transportation system (it could rival Auckland!). The metro is frequent enough but limited in it's destinations so it was pretty much buses for us. Sadly the buses are a lot more infrequent (sometimes only 1 an hour), you have to change often, finding a timetable is impossible and stop information once your on the bus is virtual non-existent. Getting from our hostel back from the beach took close to 2 hours. The one good thing is it was very cheap!

We spent most of our time in LA exploring the town and the famous areas. It was memorial day weekend so everything was packed which meant we decided against any of the adventure parks. We did spend a whole day down at the beaches including Venice beach and Santa Monica beach (although technically it's just one really long beach). Venice beach is fantastic for people watching. There are some crazy cats around that area. We watched the beefed up muscle men in the outdoor gym and wondered the market stalls selling everything from permanent tattoos to a 2 headed turtle.

We walked from Venice beach along the bike track up to Santa Monica. There was every type of bike you could imagine including apehangers (bikes with huge handlebars) and tricycle bikes. It was too cold to swim but I enjoyed just laxing on the beach for the day. The beach is really wide which means it feels like nobody is there, it could have been a quiet day though too.

Santa Monica beach has a pier full of stalls and fairground rides. It also has a great shopping district that we checked out. We found this delicious frozen yoghurt shop called PinkBerry where you can choose your flavour and toppings. I had a pomegranate frozen yoghurt covered in fresh strawberries, blueberries and chocolate chips. Yummy!

Of course we checked out the Hollywood walk of fame and the Chinese Theatre with the hand/foot prints of the stars. There were a lot of people dressed up in costumes on Hollywood Boulevard. We also went down into Beverley Hills and checked out Rodeo Drive with every designer label you can imagine. The car spotting was incredible too from Ferraris to Porsches there was a lot of money in that area. We had a wonder through the Beverley Hills neighborhood to check out all the fancy houses too.

As something a bit different we went to the Famers Market which has been around since the 1930s and has lots of food stalls and wondered through the Grove, a nice shopping area next door to the Farmers Market. We also went to the La Brea Tar Pits, which are a collection of pits where tar has seeped up from the earth over thousands of years and created a kind of tar 'quick sand'. Of course back in the days when the animals were roaming around they were death traps, so the tar pits hold a large collection of fossils. One of the pits has excavated over 50,000 fossils alone. All a bit science geeky I know but I found it fascinating.

The hostel we stayed in was really cool with a bar (cheap drinks, yay!) and lots of events like comedy night which was a lot of fun thanks to the 5 local comedians who came and performed. We could even see the hollywood sign from our room. We went on a walking tour with the hostel up into Runyon Canyon Park, a dog park up in the Hollywood Hills.

The climb up is pretty tough but its worth it with the views over LA and the Hollywood sign. It's also a good location for celeb spotting cause a lot of them take their dogs up there to walk and exercise. I saw the actress who played Jean Grey on Xmen but no-one else over our couple of day in LA.

We had a lot of fun in LA, more than I expected to.

Update

Well after nearly 3 months of waiting and waiting my visa finally came through and I'm back in London. It's nice to be back into the swing of things, it was pretty stressful being in hiatus like that. Of course it was wonderful seeing family and friends but I'm excited to be back in London to get my adventure back on track!