Day 51: Musèe de l'Orangerie, Notre Dame and sad farewells

Shanny, Shazzy and Ken were already waiting for us at Café des Deux Moulins, otherwise known as Amèlie’s Café.

Day 50: Versailles and Offenbach

And today we go to Versailles.
Versailles: Loius XIV, XV and XVI’s monument to excess and decadence.  No wonder the people revolted. Luckily the palace survived the revolution, as I’m sure it is a great money spinner now for the French. Just like Ludwig’s tributes to the Sun King back in Bavaria are huge tourist attractions.
We met Shaz, Shan and Ken at Abbesses and metro’d our way, with a little bit of getting lost between line changes for just that little bit of added excitement, to our RER station at Musèe d’Orsay.

Day 27: Nudist colonies, pedibuses and erotimechanica. This is Switzerland.

Sorry about the News of the World style headline, I'm trying to attract a larger readership ;-)
Today I got up nice and early to help walk Marianna to school; she's such a cutie.  She talked and talked and talked the whole way there, and she made sure her bat was kept nice and warm tucked away in her top. Pedibus?  yeah I had no idea until Henric explained it.  One volunteer parent is the head of the bus, one volunteer parent is the tail of the bus, and they are both holding a rope which all the kids on the bus have to hold onto.  The bus then makes it rounds, stopping at the pedibus stops to take on new passengers, and bring them all safely to school. Very cool for the first year kiddies.  Very uncool for the 2nd year and older kiddies. We walked back via the lake shore which was lined with a multitude of market gardens.

Day 16: Pintxos! Xurros! Votives and more Barcelona!!

It was a bit cooler this morning.  Looking out the window across our terrace and seeing a sky full of chattering swallows and the sound of church bells ringing across the city was just beautiful. Today's plan was bus turistic again, this time the blue route.  For the first stop, we hopped off at Gaudi’s Homage to God,  La Sagrada Familia.  An amazing homage, spectacular and grandiose in vision and size, a work in progress since 1882, and not likely to be completed for another decade or so.  God mustn’t have thought too much of it though, because Gaudi ended up getting hit by a tram and dying a few days later, mistaken for a vagabond.  :-(

Day 15: Gaudy Gaudi and Magic Fountains - Barcelona!

I was tasked with being the tour guide during our Barcelona visit.  The bar had been raised pretty high with Ken’s London and Edinburgh itineraries; I quickly knocked a plan up on the last couple of nights in London, and today it would be put to the test.

Michelle and I had a simple breakfast at Bar Castells on the corner down from our apartment: cured ham in a baguette with americano coffee and juice, while we awaited Ken and Shaz’s arrival.

The itinerary didn’t really make it much past breakfast when we decided to catch the Bus Turista to get a good all round overview of the city.

We walked up La Rambla to Plaça de Catalunya and queued up for the bus.  There were a lot of people, and everybody wanted to sit on the top deck.  We let the first few buses go, and it wasn’t too long though before some brand new, and more importantly, empty buses rolled up.  Then we were off.

Day 14: From Gatwick to Barcelona

Today was our last day in London.  Sad face :-( Today we had to say goodbye to Shanny.  Huge sad face :-( :’(
Shaz, Mich and I walked along the Thames to London Bridge Station and had breakfast under the Shard while we waited for Ken to join us.  Sliders for breakfast is OK, yes?  Actually it was 12, so technically it was lunch, and Pimm’s O’Clock!  I got my first Pimm’s and it was really delicious.  Into Dan Murphy’s again when I get home :-)

Day 13: Nipple biting snakes, labyrinthine mazes, glorious gardens - Hampton Court

Today we were very privileged to not only have Shanny all to ourselves, but also to have Shanny as our very own private tour guide for Hampton Court, where she would be sharing her love of all things Tudors with us.

Day 12: Urinal Games, college pranks and dog's seeing ghosts

London’s damn Tube strike was still on. So for our trip to Cambridge we caught a double-decker bus to Waterloo.  As luck would have it, the northern line was still operational so we could tube it quickly to King’s Cross Station.
I grabbed our tickets and within minutes we were on the Cambridge Express, and almost as quickly, getting off the train at Cambridge less than an hour later.  Too easy!

We walked downhill into town and after a quick wander around, grabbed a pretty decent burger at Ta Bouche for lunch.  Now, I wouldn’t normally share any toilet experiences, but the loos downstairs at Ta Bouche were certainly a little novel, at least in my experiences to date.  You see, the urinals all had screens above them, and little sensors in the urinal to allow you to control a game with, well…
Read about it here on Wikipedia

Day 11: London Gardens and Pubs

Today I decided to do a little exploration around London.  Shaz and Ken were back at work, and Michelle wanted to have a quiet day.  I had a rough idea where I wanted to go, including visiting a few of the London parks so off I headed.
Today was a tube strike so I decided to bus it to Waterloo.  Now buses aren’t the quickest way around London at the best of times, and during peak hour when there are no tubes running they pretty much were hardly moving.  So I got off at London Bridge and decided to walk it.
Since I’d walked the south side of the river before, I crossed over and walked along the north bank.  It was an enjoyable if uneventful stroll: passing morning joggers, like-minded tourists and families, and suited workers grabbing their morning coffees.

Europe Day 10: Tower of London

Today we spent the entire day exploring the Tower of London.  All Day.  From about 10 in the morning, all the way through till 5PM.  I think I saw pretty much everything.
Let’s see….
I’d bought the tickets online the night before to avoid queuing, and so I had to pick them up from Tower Hill.  This meant that I ended up walking around the entire periphery of the Tower of London site.  But I didn't have to queue.  So entire wall of Tower of London from outside.  Tick.

Europe Day 9: Edinburgh

Today we were leaving Edinburgh to head back to London, but that did not mean we couldn't still make the most of our remaining time here.
We had lived right across the road from this amazing church, and yet in our time here had not once visited inside, so that was definitely the first thing on today’s agenda.
Not only was this a really beautiful church inside, with some lovely stained glass windows, but as an added bonus, the choir was warming up for the Sunday Mass. What an amazing sound; sends chills and shivers right through me.

Europe Day 8: Edinburgh

The Deacon House Café.   A most fine place for breakfast: close, full of history, and full of scones.  Drambuie scones.  I mean, could there ever be a finer scone, ever?

Europe Day 7: Edinburgh

Today was an early start.  I like the early starts.  I’m getting up around 6 in the morning anyway, and getting out and about early means that so much more can be seen and done in a day.
Today we were off to Edinburgh with Shanny, Shaz and Ken.  Ken was again playing tour guide, a role he takes on with great enthusiasm and passion.
Rather than catching the tube, it was decided to take a black cab to King’s Cross Station, since there would be the 4 of us travelling today.  Shan had to work today, so would be travelling up tonight.

Europe Day 6: Bath to Canterbury

Today we had to get from one side of the country to the other.  Now back home that would be a 4 day journey.  Here it was only about 3 and a bit hours, but it still meant a light breakfast and a good bit of driving.

Europe Day 5: Cotswolds to Bath

Next stop was somewhere starting with ‘B’.
Let’s see, Bourton?
Banbury?
How about Broadway?  Yes.  Broadway was a very large town, however the inner city was a beautiful village in the same style as the other Cotswolds towns we had so far visited.

Europe Day 4: Cotswolds

Today we were off in our Zippy car for a taste of England outside of London.
Opening the boot to load our luggage, we found the previous renter had forgotten theirs.  A bag full of ciggies.  Blugh.  Why couldn't it have been chocolates?
Back to back double-decker buses blocked our view from Waterloo Bridge; peak hour London was very slow going til we eventually got out into the suburbs.
On the motorway we made good time as we passed green hills and paddocks of sheep and drove on the outskirts of Oxford.

Europe Day 3: London

Michelle and I were up early to try and get some internet time in.  The internet at Shaz and Ken’s is pretty much broken, so we thought we’d head down to Starbucks.  Luckily they weren't open and we went to Caffe Paridiso, on Shad Thames for breakfast instead.  Shaz and Ken joined us a bit later, and after we finished coffees and breakfast we caught the tube to Hampstead.

Europe Day 2: London

This morning we walked downriver and mud larked again with the low tide. Though there was much less to find at this point of the river, we still managed to pick up a couple of broken smoking pipes and pieces of old crockery.

We have arrived: First day in London

The plane trip wasn’t actually as hard as I thought it would be. Sure I knew it would be long, but I managed to get in a good seven hours sleep between Hong Kong and London; and that was without drinking any alcohol at all on the second leg.
The early morning lights of London were laid out beneath us as the plane flew on and circled around to Heathrow. I love flying over cities at night, and really love arriving 30 minutes ahead of schedule!
A very quick passage through customs and baggage collection and we were met by Shazzy and Ken with many cuddles and smiles; a lovely warm welcome after our long flight.
Ken had arranged a private taxi to take us all back to their apartment in London. Leaving the airport and out onto the motorway I still didn't really feel like I was in another country, at least not until we were passing these beautiful multistorey apartment buildings with their high pitched roofs and tall chimneys.
Our taxi driver took us on a little impromptu tour of London: Kensington Gardens, Hyde Park, Buckingham Palace, St. James Park with Big Ben in the distance. Along Whitehall and past Trafalgar Square, Cleopatra’s Needle across London Bridge and to the apartment. Yeah, we were in London. :-)
A couple of hours to change and freshen up, and then we were off on Ken’s lovingly and painstakingly prepared itinerary.

Hiking with friends on the Everard Circuit. should that be Ever Hard circuit??

We got off to a late start on this walk, and driving through St. Andrew's I noticed the market was on, so it was going to be a little while before we actually started walking...
After exploring around the market, muffins and coffees we decided we should get going or we'd never get this walk finished.


We parked the cars, and after a false start, we found the actual correct start of the walking track and begun our hike.


The walk was quite easy to start with, passing along Lavers Circuit and Shelley Harris Track, hugging the edge of the gully. We passed through tree ferns and box, opening up to drier open forest with banksia and tall grass trees.


The track wound down through a small gully to Pinchgut Creek, a clear mountain stream flowing under the tree ferns and across a rocky bed. The track then continued back up and crossed over Heidleberg Kinglake Road.

 We passed over Cookson Hill, and descended back down to the main road. For some reason we took a wrong turn at this point. We should have followed the walking track from the carpark up to Mount Beggary, but remembering the directions wrong (and not bothering to check) I turned down Old Kinglake Road.

We had travelled quite some distance down the road before I realised we had taken the wrong turn. Not wanting to turn back, we decided to go cross country, and climb straight up the ravine to rejoin the walking track.
These are the events that make a walk memorable. We weren't quite lost, but travelling off the track up the side of a very steep ravine is a lot more fun, challenging and exciting than just walking along a well travelled walking track.


The track along the top of the ridge was quite wide, and was frequented by mountain bikers. We stopped for lunch on Mount Everard, which had a trendy memorial to the peak's namesake, William Hugh Everard.


Bundy Track descended quite steeply from Mt Everard, and some mountain biker's that had made their way down ahead of us would have had some fun.


The views from here were quite good looking back north over where we had come, and where we had yet to travel.


The track rejoined Old Kinglake Road, and we followed the closed section fo this road down to Steele's Creek Picnic Ground. We crossed a small bridge and then headed on an uphill climb along Mount Jerusalum Track, spotting a Southern Boobook watching us from a tree.
The track was following a forest access track along the ridge tops, with quite steep ravines on either side. it was starting to get quite late in the day, and we were getting a little worried we might not make it back before dark.
We arrived back at Shelly Harris Track, as the daylight was dwindling, and it was getting quite dark as we travelled the last few kilometres back to our car. But we did make it without tripping or any other mishap.


We drove over to Stony Creek were we started up a fire and cooked ourselves a tasty BBQ, the signature ending to a days walking for all my future walking trips.