Paris and beyond

Well, after loving Barcelona I wasn't sure what I'd think of Paris... two very different cities in a lot of ways (well thats what I would have assumed anyway, yet to really decide if thats true or not, to some extent - in the words of Paul Kelly - 'every fucking city's just the same')

But I had one of those great moments when you realise where you are and how bloody cool it is that I am able to do what I'm doing... just sitting in a train station, having a coffee and a croissant and watching the destination board clacking through all these places... not sure why, was very happy about being there at that point. And I love the old fashioned traintable, the ones that clack as they rotate around... they're much more satisfying for some reason than electronic lights or voices.

Met a wonderful woman yesterday at Notre Dame - she's a volunteer explainer there and after the others all left, she asked if I wanted to see another church she'd talked about so I said sure. Then she showed me a whole heap of cool things, like the hotel that Mozart stayed in and the oldest house in Paris. And she showed me how to find the most famous ice-cream store in Paris. Hooray!

Then I had one of the best dinners I've had in Europe in a cafe by the side of the road. I will try to reserve judgement on Parisian food until I've had a few more meals (maybe it was a fluke) but its damn promising :o)

So I guess to sum up, am enjoying Paris. Even though its raining (just like in the Hunter Valley, although not so many emergency beer drops here), its still pretty nice. Tonight I get free entry to the Louvre and then I think I'll jump on a night boat and then head out to the bars in the Latin Quarter, which I found yesterday and is a cool little maze of cafes, turkish/italian restaurants and bookstores. Reading 'Canidide' because I figured I should read something vaguely relevant to the country... it's actually quite funny (still think Voltaire was a grade-A dickhead but anyway...)

Love you long time

Big Ships and Briliant Houses

I may be showing my ignorance here, but I'd never actually heard of Antoni Gaudi until I got to Barcelona... I've been missing out! He designed some of the coolest buildings I've ever seen along with a church (The Sacrada Familia) that he worked on for 45 years designing and will still take another 25 years to finish building.

The Picasso museum was pretty cool too. I really like Barcelona, its lovely and warm and it has a great vibe, full of energy and enthusiasm. Las Ramblas is the main drag and is an icon in itself, loaded with human statues, capoeria demonstrations, pet/flower stalls, magicians, cafes... its a pretty cool pedestrian area and its nice to sit and watch people enjoying the company of others.

I head off to Paris tonight on an overnight train, which will be nice since I got kicked out of bed at 4am... long story and not entirely suitable for small children.

Anyway, hooray for the Maths-ys who are back in Canberra along with the Smovers I assume... hope you guys had a good tour, and farewell to Rich who will no doubt be working in the galleries when I eventually come back, a wise and wizened woman.

Spanish is just like Italian (in the same way that chicken is just like beef)

I've left the green fields of Germany and arrived in a balmy, coastal metropolis. First impressions of Barcelona are that its easy to get around. Thats about all I've done, only just arrived at the hostel since leaving Frankfurt at 5am (!!!).

Germany was fantastic. Beer, sausages, good mates... what more could a girl want? And just in case anyone is interested in seeing the Heidelburg Castle (with the worlds biggest wine vat but more on that later), I'm sure Torsten would love to walk you up there. Again. Then he can take you to the chocolate museum :o)

Dusseseldorf was pretty nice. They have some amazing buildings, the area around the harbour is gorgeous. They are also known (according to my guide book) for having the worlds longest pub strip. There are a LOT of pubs in Dusseldorf, and thats saying something for a nation that has built a reputation around breweries. I even went up the TV tower, which overlooks the city - pretty scary because the windows lean out and apparently you can lie on them (hence lying on glass about 160m in the air)... which I didnt do because I have a healthy fear of falling 160m.

We visited the Cologne Cathedral which was stunning, and finally made it up the 560 odd steps to the top of the tower - on the way down there were kids about 3 years old literally climbing and crawling their way up the tower, dragging their parents behind them. No-wonder Germans are so bloody tough if thats what their kids can do...

Then we visited the Neanderthal museum and discovered that fathers are the same all around the world - they all know everything already and like to show off just all the things they know. Elly's, Torsten's and my own dear father all knew about the Neander river (we didnt) and that the original Neanderthal discovery was in West Germany (I didnt) and so on and so on. But it was a pretty nice little museum and although the actually caves and area where the fossils were found has been destroyed by limestone-mining, they have a park which commemorates the area. They've also bred cattle and horses to look 'authentically' stone aged but we couldnt find them despite numerous attempts. I think the photos were staged, they just put extra fur around the horses.


Then onto the Rhine Valley, one of the more beautiful parts of the world and a large reason that the Germanic tribes managed to avoid too many Romans living in their part of the world (the other reasons being the Black Forest and the tribes themselves who were famously vicious and skilled fighters..... and now they have kids that can climb bell towers faster than tourists.)

Koblenz was gorgeous and I got to see a medieval festival (Historenspiel) in the old fortress which was entertaining (better than the museum anyway) - and I had a glass of ye olde cherry beer (Kirsh? I think thats what it was called) which was pretty nice.

Then onto the Loreley cliffs, which has a legend similar to that of the greek Sirens. It was stunning as well, and full of grey nomads. On Friday, we caught a ferry unaware that it was half price seniors day so we had to battle old ladies with bricks in their handbags and old men with their sticks and knee socks.... but it was worth it.

Heidelburg was really nice - great for shopping and the castle is pretty cool. And they have a HUGE wine vat, that was used to collect taxes... so everyone put their wine in the same vat... white, red, sparkling... mmmm, nice. Then, to make sure they could collect taxes the next year, they would have to drink it all and the townspeople would come and help. At least you'd get some benefit out of paying taxes.

Long blog - sorry i havent been writing but its been hard without a computer. Bill Gates hasn't worked THAT one out yet. Good for nothing.