Went and signed up for classes at uni on Tuesday, which involved me lining up for about 90 minutes to get a piece of paper signed as you can't do it online yet. Also went to the equivalent of 'Market Day' and got lots of vouchers for cheap drinks and meals which will come in handy. Pretty cold here at the moment (max of about 12 degrees) and very windy, though not much rain. Thought i'd put up a few more photos from the very start of the trip when we first arrived in London. On a side not, i'm also considering trying to make the Perth BDO if Rage are playing.

OK....so it seems like as soon as i leave the country some of my favourite bands decide to tour, frist daft punk and now rage against the machine.....not happy jan, not happy at all

The France Finale

We took it nice and easy in Toulouse, particularly as I was coming down with a bit of a head cold and wasn't feeling the best. We spent a lot of time going from bar to bar watching the Rugby World Cup, half the time with commentary in French.

It seems like we spent most of the remaining time in France either eating or drinking as we made our way up through Bordeaux, Tours and then on to Paris. Highlights included snails (still in their shells which i slurped out, much to Bindys disgust), a duck and beef fondue, Bindy ordered mussels and received a bowl with about 50-60 of them, a rabbit and apple stew, foie gras (a special duck pate), duck (which i think Bindy had nearly every day), creme brulee, and surprisingly the best kebab in the world from this french lebanese restaurant (though even calling it a kebab seems to serve it injustice).

On the drinking front, Kronenbourg, Heinekken and Amstel are the standard beers here, along with the Desperados i think i mentioned previously (the beer and tequila mixes). Beer cocktails are very popular here, involving beer, a spirit and cordial. Wine is everywhere (particularly when we were in Bordeaux) and i'm sure it is fantastic, but as neither Bindy or I are that keen on wine we tended to leave it alone.

A large section of Bordeaux is World Heritage listed so we took a mini train tour around the town (along with plenty of Irish fans as Ireland had played in town the night before) and also visited the mirror lake, which was a large flat area with tiny holes that shot up a mist of water to create a mirror effect.
We then made our way up to Tours, in the heart of the Loire Valley, which has large wide boulevards lined with trees. Here we took a half-day bus tour to visit the surrounding areas and some famous chateauxs, Chambord and Cheverny. We had planned on buying a bottle of Chambord in Chambord, but at $60 a bottle, we decided not to. Chambord features a massive double helix staircase (apparently designed by Da Vinci), while Cheverny features in the comic Tintin and had a large kennel area full of the same breed of dog, branded with a V and had the most repulsive smell.

We found this really funky bar in Tours where Bindy made friends with the bartenders dog who was sleeping underneath her chair. The place was packed as France were playing Scotland in the Euro 2008 Football (Soccer) qualifiers. Scotland upset the home team 1-0 and the place went deathly silent when they scored, except for 1 guy outside who was going for Scotland.

Then on to Paris where we climbed the Eiffel Tower, visited the Mona Lisa in the Louvre, went and saw Jim Morrison and Oscar Wilde's graves, strolled down the Champs-Elysees from the Arc de Triomphe (where Bindy bought Chanel earrings and a Louis Vuitton handbag for all the girls interested), visited the Catacombes (a 1.2km tunnel that is 20m underground in Paris and is full of bones and skulls) and spent a day in Versailles.



However the biggest surprise was stumbling into the middle of the 2007 Paris Techno Parade, which is the 3rd largest street parade in Europe (behind Berlin's Love Parade and the Zurich street parade), and featured 22 converted trucks each with various dj's playing from them, as they travel on a route through town. Nearly every genre of dance music was featured, electro, minimal, hardcore, hardstyle, breaks and even a jungle/drum n bass truck that was decked out as a jungle. Any cars parked on the side of the road were destroyed as people jumped up and down on them, people were walking around with half empty bottles of vodka, the place was crazy but so much fun.
The only annoying thing was that hardly any of the floats/trucks had the names of the people playing so i couldn't work out who we were listening to as we walked along (the only person i could work out was Oliver Huntemann). For some reason I can't add anymore photos so visit this other site which has heaps: http://jouissezsansentraves.blogspot.com/2007/09/081-techno-parade-2007.html

As you can probably tell by the use of pictures I am back at my laptop at my uncles place in London. So now its off to pack before heading up to Nottingham tomorrow, where I have to finally get stuck back into uni.

Andorra

From Madrid we headed to the tiny country of Andorra (situated up in the mountains on the border between france and spain), involving a 2.5hour train trip and a 2.5hour bus trip (the only way in and out is by road). Andorra is famous for its skiing and trekking and shopping, and it did not disappoint. The scenery is picturesque, the clothes oh so cheap, ciggarettes cost about $30 a carton. And the alcohol, well Andorra makes Dan Murphys seem really expensive and short on selection. Vodka ranged from about $4.50 a bottle (yep thats right, though it looked dodgy) to about $15 for a 1L bottle of absolut, or $22 for a 2L bottle. Prices were pretty similar for all spirits.

We also went to one of Europes largest spa complexes here, relaxing away an afternoon in amongst saunas, indoor and outdoor pools and spas, indo-roman baths and one cold pool that had a crushed ice waterfall.

The day we were leaving was a public holiday and the town was covered in Andorran flags and statues, as it was a holiday for the patron saint of Andorra. The bus trip to Tolouse was 3.5 hours, and involved a majour detour off the highway into the French countryside as a truck had exploded, leaving only the burnt out shell.

The rest of Spain

Also in Barcelona we came across a man just walking around town stark naked. From barcelona we took the train down the east coast of spain for 1 day and night in Valencia where we just took it easy, walking around the town in the afternoon.
The following day was spent mostly on the train to Seville as it took about 7.5 hours, enabling me to catch up on a dose of music from my ipod. Speaking of music, it was interesting to note that Old man river was very big in italy (not sure if i mentioned that), xavier rudd was playing some shows in barcelona, and skipping ahead to toulouse (where we are at the moment), there are posters everywhere for architecture in helsinki who play here on the 21st.

We arrived in Seville to our nicest accommodation of the trip - somehow we had managed to get a 4 star hotel for the same price as all the other hostels and 1 - 2 star hotels we had been staying in. People in spain dont eat till very late (lunch is between 1.30-3.00 and dinner is normally after 10pm) so they have tapas, which is basically small servings of traditional spanish foods in bars and cafes. There was a great bar near us that we went to both nights for some drinks and tapas, having mini paella and patatas bravas which is basically potato wedges with the bravas sauce, a combination of peppers and mayonnaise.

We did a tour of one of the main bullfighting rings in spain.
We also went to see a free flamenco show which was amazing. The place looked more suited to a beach in australia then in the middle of spain and it was packed (im sure the cheap drinks helped that as well). There was a tiny stage set up and the performance was done by 3 people - a guy with an accoustic guitar, another guy that did vocals and percussion (by percussion i mean hand claps and foot stomping) and a chick dressed in the traditional flamenco who did dancing and foot stomping.

They got huge sound out of simple hand claps and did, what seemed like just a jam, except they would have these huge buildups and all finish perfectly, the timing was amazing. I also now have huge admiration for flamenco guitarists, using no pick and alternating so smoothly between strumming and picking the strings. i dont know how the guy didnt get a sore hand, as they did 2 25 minute performances, and he was hitting the strings pretty hard.

From Seville we made our way up to Madrid, where we did some much needed clothes washing (dont worry though this wasnt the first time we had washed our clothes). We found a fantastic restuarant here where we ate for 2 of the 3 nights. It was an old cathedral that had been converted into a restaurant and served up suckling pig, vennison, rabbit etc. The second time bindy and i got the meat platter to share, and it was piled with so many different types of meat we struggled to work out what they all were.

We did some shopping here (i picked up a few good tshirts) and we also went to another flamenco show, although this one was more professional as we bought tickets for it and it was performed in a proper theatre and featured 12 dancers as well as a vocalist, guitarist and a guy playing what seemed to be a wooden box.

Drink cards are given out everywhere in madrid so it was easy to find cheap drinks, especialy when one place has a 6 hour happy hour featuring $6.50 cocktails and a free shot with every pint ordered. Finding clubs has been more difficult than i had thought, as brisbane seems to be quite unique in having all its clubs in one area. We did go to one in Madrid, and it was quite impressive as it was an old palace that had been converted. Once entering we had to walk up this dramatic stairway, and once upstairs we kept expecting James Bond type characters to walk around the corners. However, it was a tuesday night and tuesday night was 'gold music revival night' as far as the music was concerned (just another name for shit latin pop i think) so we didnt stay too long after our free drinks.

Hola!

From Sicily we caught a plane to Barcelona which was fine, though we found it a bit odd when everyone started cheering once we landed safely.
Barcelona was definitly up there as our favourite place. We found Spain to be really clean in comparison to Italy (though not clinical) and is a lot more relaxing, partly because the traffic isn´t going crazy around you.

The main strip in Barcelona is Las Rambla, which we happened to be staying on. All along the strip are market stalls selling everything from flowers and souvenirs to animals such as squirrels, turtles, birds and fish. There are also heaps of artists and street performers which give it a great atmosphere.

We went to the beach here which was really busy (and lots of topless chicks) but there is absolutely zero swell, its very flat. We also went into a backpackers bar for some cheap drinks and watched this young australian guy try to make some sort of chilli con carne behind the bar, with very little ingredients - he didnt have any tomatoes and we were puzzled to watch him add milk to the massive pot that looked disgusting. As he said though, he didn´t have to eat it, and neither did we.

Barcelona is the home of the Picasso museum which we visited, and was also holding a photographic exhibition of Lee Miller, who took over 1000 photos of Picasso and was also a war photojournalist, she was one of the first people inside Hitler´s house after his death (there iseven a photo of her taking a bath in Hitlers bath). Thanks to Lonely Planet we found a restaurant that used 99.9% of their ingredients from the local region, which was fantastic and quite different, especially the desserts.

Barcelona was the home of Antonio Gaudi, a genius who died in 1926. This guy was an artist, interior designer and amazing architect. The Sagrada Famillia is this amazing cathedral designed by him that has been undergoing construction for over 100 years and hopefully it will be finished in our lifetime because the bits that have been done are fantastic.

To Sicily.....

From Naples we caught the ferry overnight to Sicily (the trip takes about 10.5 hours) and our cabin was surprisingly large, though i did manage to flood the bathroom as our shower was broken.
We had 2 nights in Palermo (the major town in Sicily) staying at Giorgios House, a great bed and breakfast run by Giorgio, who was really friendly, though a bit crazy. On the frist night we were there he took everyone who was staying (us, a french couple and an american girl) out around the town and to a couple of local bars, the first where we got the most amazing fruit platters covered in granita (think fruit slushie) and the second place was packed with locals watching the first football game of the season (though things didnt go too well as Palermo lost to Roma).

The next day Giorgio was meeting his sister and her boyfriend to go to an island (levanzo) off the coast and asked us if we wanted to come. (See previous post for link to photos). It was a fantastic day, the water was crystal clear and despite the near 40 degree temperatures was quite cold. Also, they dont take speed limits too seriously, we spent most of the 1 hour drive doing 140kph.

Catching Up.....

Ok so i can try to catch up a bit now.
Rome
The sights in Rome were amazing, but apart from that, the city was actually a bit dissapointing, especially in comparison to Florence and Venice. The city itself is quite big and is hindered by the poor public transport - the metro only goes around the outskirts of the large centre and the buses are very confusing and always very very full. Once you move away from the main sites, the place was very dirty and probably the graffitti capital of the world.

Naples was similar in its dirtiness however it had somewhat of a seaside charm to it. We only had 1 night here and managed to enjoy some of the best food and drinks here. The best pizza we had in Italy was in Naples, and it was also the cheapest, costing about $3 each for a massive pizza, cooked for 30secs in a 415 degree celsius stone oven.
In Italy (and in Spain) they don´t use measures for pouring spirits, they just pour straight into the glass, so, while you may pay around $6.50-$8 for a drink, you end up getting around 3-4 shots of alcohol (drinks are also served in large glasses so you get more mixer as well).
A bar round the corner from our hotel in Naples was really cheap and we managed to get a 660ml Heineken and a strawberry daiquiri (with about 5 shots of bacardi) for $10.

Whilst in Naples we did a day trip to Pompeii, the ancient ruins nearby of an entire village destroyed by the volcanic eruption of Mt Vesuvius, which was really interesting, and is filled with plenty of friendly dogs.

Sicily

Skipping forward a bit here (don´t worry ill get back on track) but the guy who ran our bed and breakfast in sicily (giorgio) was an awesome guy and we went to this little island off the coast. Anyways he has put some photos and video of our trip on a website, so you guys can check it out.
the link is http://www.sicilyphotos.com/trekking_in_sici_000007.htm