London

Wow – well people told me that I would love London… and I would have to say that I did – I had a brilliant time there. We were so busy the whole week – it was insane.

On Wednesday we went to the Monument of the great fire, It this massive thin column – which you can go up and see 360 degree views of  London. There were soooo many stairs (I think about 312 stairs) to climb up but the views were pretty good – they would have been much better before all the buildings around it were built.

We then walked to the Tower of London which is famous for holding the Royals crown jewels – the place isn’t a tower it’s a massive fort next to the river – back in the olden days it was also used as a prison, torture chambers and executions. But we went there for the crown jewels mainly. We got in there for free (woo London Pass) and saw the traitors entrance, which is where traitors were brought in by boat through this gate (from the Thames) and into he fort where they were then dragged to the prison. Guy Fawkes was brought here after his attempt of town hall and all the royal family and important people.

We then went to the crown jewels. They have a lot of boring golden plates and big steins and things which look so delicate and very old. We got to the good stuff – but we couldn’t take photos… they have travelators to go pass the crowns and septars so you couldn’t just stand in front of them which I thought was a good idea. The amount of diamonds, rubies, emeralds, sapphires that these puppies had was insane! They have two very impressive diamonds (Cullinan I & Koh-i-Noor) – the jewels in total are something like 23,500 – how shiny is that!! We then went and saw an exhibition on the armour worn by the kings hundreds of years ago. You could see how big and how small some were.

After wandering around there for a little bit we kept going and went to the tower bridge – where we could go up and see the history of the bridge and the stunning views. It was pretty cool – thankfully we got a lift ride up and didn’t have to climb any stairs. haha.

We then went and saw the HMS Belfast which has a sister in Sydney (which we saw when we went to Sydney). It was pretty cool but we didn’t stay to long here as the day was getting on. We then got some lunch in an Italian restaurant and kept going to the transport museum where we saw old trains, buses, coaches, the underground back in WW2. We also played some interactive games where you could drive a underground train – the museum was great.

We then went out to Chelsea to an Independent film cinema where we saw the film – Whatever Works- which was a brilliant film. The same guy directed Vicky Christina goes to Barcelona. We also got to see that for free and we finished the night off with free tokens in a timezone place.

That day we got 60 pounds worth of value each. So we made our moneys worth double.

On Thursday we went to St Paul’s Cathedral… It was nice for a church. The outside is impressive. We then went to  Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre and did a tour around here – It was interesting to see the history behind the theatre and the techniques applied to creating effects back in the day. The theartre itself is a close spitting image to what it would have looked like back in the day (thatch roof and everything). I was a little disappointed in they didn’t have much on Shakespeare. (except from the gift shop).

After that we went bowling!! Cindy beat me.. but we didn’t play so great!

After that we went back to the city and walked around – we ended up buying tickets to the theatre that night – like and hour before the performance. We were going to see…. Priscilla Queen of the Desert. We grabbed some dinner and then walking past Leicester square we saw the Eclipse Premier (twilight movies)… we couldn’t see anything as too many people and baracades blocking us out so we just heard screams. We then went to the theatre.

We were up soooo very high – up in the balcony but we had a good view. The show was brilliant – so clever and funny – it was brilliant.  It was nearing midnight when we got back to the hostel.

Friday we went and saw the entrance to the leaky cauldron… and bought tickets to see Oliver that evening. We went back to the hostel to eat dinner and get ready. We also had balcony seats but I think there was many people attending that night because they closed the balcony so we were upgraded to the 2nd row in front of the stage. At first I was put off thinking I would be too close – but it was pretty good. The kids were great in the performance and the adults were brilliant. It was much different to Priscilla which I enjoyed more but the show was still good.

On Saturday – was Pride Day! We got to Trafalga square and went to the stalls where organisations were giving things for free so we got some pens, badges, stickers, posters, magazines, keyrings… so we got lots of free stuff.

Stonewall which is an charity for LGBT – but they had the best brand at pride. They had t-shirts that said – SOME PEOPLE ARE GAY – get over it and  Love your inner lesbian. haha so we wanted to buy the t-shirts but they weren’t selling any on the day (which we thought was a missed opportunity) – so you can buy them online (http://www.stonewall.org.uk/what_you_can_do/2590.asp and http://www.stonewall.org.uk/what_you_can_do/3696.asp)

Anyway the parade was awesome – so many companies and organisations were marching proudly (nothing like home)… We had politicians, the armed forces, police, fire, ambos, sporting clubs – I was asked to play hockey for a club lol. Businesses like British Airways… They weren’t letting normal riff raff like us in the march – but I didn’t like being told to go behind the barriers so I just pretended I was an official photographer and I got to stand on the VIP side of the barrier – muahahahaha… After a while Cindy snuck back over and we joined the parade – everyone was clapping us and we had a ball. We ended up catching up with Stonewall and hung out with their float.

This parade stopped traffic literally – Pride shut down Baker Street, Oxford Street, Regent Street to Trafalgar square.  It was brilliant… whereas back home we used to start of at town hall and block off a little portion of George street… we now start at Roma street and go back streets… Doesn’t show the same message does it.

Pride was brilliant we hung out at Trafalga square all afternoon watching the performance and people getting up on the big fountains in the middle and then watching them getting told off and then security getting into the water to drag them off… haha good times. When we left I saw that they were wearing waders (what fisherman wear)… and standing in the fountain making sure no one would be going in. I thought it was funny.

We then went to Westminster and walked over the bridge there and went back to the timezone like place and did some bowling and games – it was fun and when we got out it was near 11 and the eye was glistening in rainbow colours.  Pretty cool. We went back to the hotel.

On Sunday we got up bright and early as we were on a tour to go to the Stonehenge, Bath and Salisbury. Stonehenge was good, small and rocky. The amount of people there was crazy… you couldn’t go up to the rocks but I thought it was amazing that these rocks are still like that after however many years…. We then went to Salisbury where we saw the cathedral there and the original magna carta which is a legal document back in the day saying the rights of the kings people – and the responsibilities of the king. That was cool.

We got some lunch there and also walked around the town. It was good.

We then stopped at Bath – where we saw the Roman Baths. The brains behind the Romans were way ahead of the times – the genius to come up with the plans for them were so clever. The baths were great.

Bath is an Amazing town – I would go back there in a second – it’s so beautiful.

That night we got Chinese for dinner ( sooo good)… guy gave us free prawn crackers.

On Monday – we slept in and then packed our bags. We went to the train station and jumped on a train to go to East Midlands Parkway station (in the middle of nowhere) where our megabus was waiting for us to take us the rest of the way to York.

We got to our hotel and we’re right up the top and have a nice view if you peer out the window. We went to the pub for dinner where the owner was very nice and chatty… After dinner we went to the SPAR and got some drinks and snacks and went back to our room. The SPAR guy was also very friendly….

We then called some people and had a good time chatting to them.

Today is now Tuesday and all we have done so far is lie in bed.

Photos will be up this afternoon…. maybe.

Love us. xoxo

London Sunday-Tuesday

Well we’ve been busy busy beavers the last few days.

Sunday – we headed to Wandsworth to a pub there called the Ship. We beat Simon there so we got a drink and hung out in the sun. It was so hot… I skulled my beer… We met up with Simon when he arrived – He’s changed so much and London has been great to him, We had a great catch up and his pub had some new ciders that we tried (Cindy’s cider page has been updated). England lost 4-1… hahaha suckers. We got back and CSI sunday was on TV… So we died in the heat while watching tv.

On Monday we moved to the other side of London to Brixton where the other hostel is. Its much cooler here… we’re in an 8 bed dorm, and we’re sharing with 4 live in girls… who are very messy. After checking in and making our beds we headed back to the city and picked up our London Pass which I will talk about later. We then walked to the British Museum and checked that out. The only thing I really liked was the Rosetta Stone (How scientists were able to decode Hieroglyphics), that was awesome to see – I remember our Egypt guide being quite annoyed that Britain had it. We then walked to a nice little park and sat for a while, I fell asleep… lol It was nice and cool in the shade, after a while we headed back to Brixton and got stuff for dinner.

Okay so explaining our London Passes. We bought a 3 day London pass for 62 pounds each and we get free access to a whole bunch of attractions, you get up to 80 pounds a day.

So today (Tuesday), we got up early ( I know, it was hard) and it was raining quite hard but by the time we were ready the rain vanished and we went to the London Zoo and got free access to that and saw lots of cool animals and also saw where they filmed a scene of Harry Potter. My favourite animals were the sleeping Otters and the yellow frogs. We stayed there for a few hours before continuing back into the city and went to the Jewel tower (free access) – its an old tower (the old parliament/storage area) back in the 1800′s (I think). It was pretty cool, we then had an Ice lolly to cool down.

After our break, we went to the Churchill War Rooms (free access) which is like a basement underground where Winston Churchill ran the British War movement against Germany and Japan in WW2. It was very interesting to read and see what it was like 70 odd years ago. After the museum we headed to the river and jumped on a river cruise (free access) and went down the river Thames and saw the London Bridge, Tower of London and went all the way to Greenwich and saw the outside of National Maritime Museum. We just took the boat back once it got to the end.

We then got the metro back to hostel, had dinner and now bing bang boom – the blog is done! So our total spending for our London Pass is 50 pounds each so we’ve nearly made our money back and we still have 2 days left.

Tomorrows an even earlier morning… going to see the crown jewels…ooo

Until next time,

Love us.

P.s will put photos up now.

Krakow

Saturday

We got up early, as we had to change hostels and wanted to go on the free walking tour of Krakow. We checked into the new place but just put our bags in the luggage storage – then off we went into the city centre. We had a bit of time to kill so we walked around and looked at some information for tours that went to the Salt Mine and Auschwitz (we realised that they were quite pricey)… Krakow has so many info points it’s scary… but when you ask them how to get to these places by yourself… they tell you lies about prices and tell you about the tours. So we just kept it to ourselves and went to the starting point of the tour.

This free tour is run by a different company to the ones we have done everywhere else… The tour guide was Polish and seemed pretty good. He waffled on during the tour… The tour was good though we saw the the main market square, the cloth hall, a church,  the town hall tower,  the florianska gate (which is this cool medieval wall and tower that has survived around the centre of krakow. When we were here we saw a parade of Krakow’s army, police and veterans march past us for the 65th anniversary of the end of WW2.

We then walked through a nice park and saw the old pope’s living quarters… where we saw a large angry Catholic protest…we continued to the Wawel Castle which is not really a castle but is on top of a hill surrounded by a wall and towers and stuff… we walked up the hill and saw the church where all the dead kings/presidents are laid to rest.  We saw the old residence and heard stories about the people who used to live here.  We then saw a carnival and the dragon (which is a metal giant statue of a dragon that breaths fire every couple of minutes).

At the end of the tour we were very hungry and walked back into the centre of town and had a late lunch at an Irish Pub. The meals were massive and cheap.

After lunch it was about 4pm so we walked back to the hostel, and checked into our rooms and hung out – resting our leggies.

Sunday

The next day we decided to go be salt miners!! We had asked the tour guide the day before about how to get to the mines. He told us which bus to get and everything. When we got there we bought our student tickets to the tour and waited to go down the mine.

We walked 380 stairs down to be 64m below ground level into level 1 of the mine. Our guide informed us that the mine had 9 levels and 264km of mine and we were only going to cover 2.5km. We walked through various mine shafts and saw and felt the sides of the mines. It was pretty amazing to see some of the equipment they used… They used to keep horses down there to work and only bring them back to the surface after a number of years. The last horse to leave was only 8 years ago…

We made our way deeper and deeper into the mine, and saw many cool chambers and some pretty impressive salt sculptures. They have lots of churches down there and one was massive!! It was pretty cool for a church and they actually have weddings and things down there now.

We saw brine lakes where the salt content is so high… I don’t think anyone could sink or drown in it.  They did a cheesy sound and light show in one section…  We saw the difference of the tunnels dug by hand and by explosive… Miners these days have it much easier… I’d hate to dig those sized tunnels with only hand tools.

We ended up at level 3 which is 135m deep and caught the scary mine elevator up to the surface. This lift is what the miners used everyday. Quite scary.

The tour was great – we had an amazing time. We’re glad we didn’t pay for the tour company though as we paid 114 polish for transport and tour to paying 110 polish each for the tour company to take us. I started to feel sick again… which sucks.

Monday

Today we got up early (and I was sick) and went to the bus station to catch a bus to Auschwitz. On the way we popped into the info point to ask which bus – she didn’t help but wanted to sell us a tour, we politely said no and found the bus ourselves. It took 2 hours to get there… we arrived just after 10.   Apparently Auschwitz is so busy that they actually make you buy a tour guide to take you around… but it was quite cheap and we got in as students so I wasn’t too miffed. The tour guide was very good, we started in the Auschwitz camp – which was a museum – that showed the lives of the prisoners, their personal effects, and the history… the personal effects was quite tough to see… they had a room full of all the shoes, the glasses, the pots and pans, and what was horrifying to see was the human hair and the quantity… it was really disgusting – as you could make out whole pony tails, or plaits.

We saw a room with photos of children – who were brought to Auschwitz and Birkenau. Birkenau is where the mass genocide was done and was one of the largest camps. We went there after the tour and it was MASSIVE. It was so big  and down the middle of the camp were train tracks that stopped at the platform – where the Nazis would pull everyone off and split the men from the women with children. The Nazi doctors would then decide who would live and who would die. Most women and all children were nearly always sent to the gas chambers.

The living conditions here were much worse than the camps in Germany that we saw as they lived in horse stables without floors, or insulation, or anything.

The gas chambers were blown up by the retreating SS just hours before soviets liberated the camp. You could still see parts of the chambers as it built underground. One chamber could fit 1500 people and kill them in less than 30 minutes. They had 2 of these chambers in this camp. They had massive industrial burners to cremate thousands of bodies a day. It was horrendous. Auschwitz -Birkenau killed over 1.3 million people (1.1 were jews).

After we had finished, we caught the bus back to Auschwitz, then waited under a tree in the pouring rain to get the bus back to Krakow.

We ended up saving money again by not doing one of those tours. In your face Information points! haha

We got back to the hostel at 6 and found we had been moved back to primary school as most of the rooms on this floor have been filled with school kids. So that night we spent listening to kids run everywhere slamming doors, yelling, playing with balls and throwing it agaisnt walls… needless to say we complained – the guy said he’d talk to the teachers… but hasn’t improved much… They’re here for 5 nights… thankfully we are only here for 1 more night.

Today we are off to the aquarium (biggest in Poland) and off to the pub… We take a 22 hour bus to Brussels tomorrow… not looking forward to it. We have plenty of new movies to watch… so that should be okay… shame the computer can’t recharge itself…

Well that’s the update for now.

http://www.goldcoastmarathon.com.au/default.asp?PageID=7665

Our day trip to Salzburg, Austria

Yesterday we headed on a long train out to Salzburg. When we arrived we went to the tourist information centre to get a map and some directions to the sights we wanted to see..
We caught the bus out to the Hohensalzburg Fort, which was built in the Medieval times in Salzburg. It had great views of the city.. the only way to get up there was by cable car. So we got into the car.. Standing only! It goes up the hill at quite a speed! It was good fun.. When we reached the top, we wondered around the fortress and admired the views of Salzburg.. And I spotted some of the Sound of Music “sets”…  We went into a few museums.. One was a puppet museum.. it was pretty cool.. There is a good pic of Kath and I as puppets in the pictures. We also saw some armoury and some torture things.

There was a souviner shop which had all of these road signs saying NO KANGAROOS IN AUSTRIA.. We thought it was pretty stupid, but maybe there are stupid tourists who go there expecting them! hahahah

We left the fort via cable car… When we reached the bottom I spotted a cemetry that looked like the one out of the Sound of Music so we walked through there then made our way to the Museum of Natural History and Science.

We got in as students there and they had a cool aquarium section. We spent ages looking at all of the fish.. There were baby clown fish which were so so cute and very tiny… We then went into the Science Centre part of the museum and played some games in there… There were some cool activities like Skiing (like on the wii) and throwing activities.

Once we were exhausted we went for a walk along the river and everyone was sun baking as it was quite hot! We sat by the water and had a rest. We then wandered through some gardens, the flowers were lovely.. Spring is here! We then made our way back to the train station and caught our train back to Munich.
We picked up our bags from the hostel then headed back to the train station, as we were staying at Karens again. She met us at the train station in Ergweg and took us home. We then met her daughters and she made us some dinner. It was really good! We went to bed after the girls were sent to bed.

We both slept really well.. Today we are doing washing and packing our bags, ready for our bus tonight to Vienna!

Apparently it is set to rain all week! Hopefully it changes as we are in a nice campsite for the next week!

Chat soon

Love Cindy and Kath

Amsterdam -> Antwerp

The canal cruise was pretty good, we realised we got a bargain because the price we paid for the tickets was more than half the actual price of the cruise! It was great seeing all the canals and bridges all lit up. It was an enjoyable evening!

The next day we went to the Anne Frank house. There was a big line, but we were prepared for it… It didn’t take as long as we thought it was but it was freezing because there was a really cold wind. The museum was okay, it was quite sad when you hear the audio accounts from Meip and Otto. The attic was really small and it makes the memory of the diary come to life. It would have been nicer if it wasn’t so busy… The man behind Cindy kept standing on her feet.. It was packed… Its like that everyday… they charge 9 euros a person… They must be making a killing…. I don’t agree with that at all.

After the house we went back to the hostel and had lunch… at this stage it decided to hail… which was crazy.. next minute the suns out… This side of Europe, the weather is very bi-polar. We then went out walking around the city some more.

That night, we were chatting to some British girls, when these 2 girls come in… One must be sooo drunk because she’s stumbling around, and finally collapsed into her bed and pretty much passed out there and then. The British girls were just about to start playing a drinking game which they invite us and the other girl to play. As they were drinking only vodka and juice, we decided to watch. The other girl agreed and it was a very funny couple of hours, I was rolling around laughing at some of the stuff they said. The girl who joined in with them got so drunk that she forgot which bed was hers and about to pass out in someones else bed and she would not be told, because she was insistent that it was her bed… We finally convince her that her bed was on the other side of the room next to her passed out friend… she then goes to the bathroom and takes her locker keys in with her (Cindy was like that’s odd, because she didn’t come back out with them). Anyways so the British girls go out, and we get ready for bed (time is probably 11),… an hour later the girls come back and not very quietly pass out.

The next morning the girl who took her keys to the bathroom, well she couldn’t find them and it was only until she used the bathroom – she found them… I laughed. The other girls apparently went out and nothing was happening so they got high and came back… They didn’t feel well the next day… I guess drinking and marijuana isn’t a good combo.

We walked around the city today and looked at doing canal bike rides but the weather was horrible so we put it off and just walked around. In the afternoon, the sun and blue skies came out and we thought we’d see if the canal bikes place was still open (it was 6pm)… so we walked all the way there and it was closed, so we just head back to the hostel where most of the girls have just been lying all day in bed (Nice way to see Amsterdam). They went out again that night to see a sex show… turned out its too expensive and just walked around and hung out at a ‘coffee shop’.

I enjoyed Amsterdam, it’s a nice city… but too many people who we met were just all about the drugs… but we liked the architecture and loved the Heineken Experience.

We were first ones up the next morning and Cindy showered.. I started to feel quite ill, sore throat and a yukky cough.. We headed to the bus stop to catch the bus to Antwerp. It was very busy on the roads (everyone going away for the weekend) and we arrived later than expected. We found the hostel rather easily. Its not the nicest hostel we’ve stayed at… Cindy leant on her bed and it collapsed… so we changed beds. After we got settled we decided to go explore the city, we walked down the main street and got something to eat for late afternoon lunch… we then shared a delicious waffle (It was superb)! We saw an Authentic Australian Ice cream store… I didn’t know we made great ice-cream… who knows.

It was starting to get lateish and the rain had followed us, so we headed back to the hostel and hung out.

Today, I am still not feeling 100% but am doing much better. We walked around Antwerp. The train station is probably one of the nicest buildings here. Its amazing. There was this ‘trapped monster’ which is this massive inflatable dinosaur which you can go in and be eaten and see what its like in the stomach of a dinosaur. Looked pretty cool, but we passed it up to go to a pub and try a new beer and cider each. We went to the back of the zoo where they have windows peeking into some of the enclosures – we saw rabbits and a couple of giraffes – the giraffes looked really young (as they were quite short). We headed back to the hostel for lunch and then we headed back out into the sun (which had come out) and walked around the other side of the hostel.

Antwerp is a nice enough town, people seem quite friendly – we’re looking forward to going to Brussels tomorrow.

That’s all for now folks.

Love us.