Plockton

On the Western isles near Skye is a town called Plockton. We spent a day there on a guided tour run by the equivalent of the National Parks of Scotland and a seal watching boat trip. Here are a few photos

Over the sea to Skye

Okay we have just returned from a week on Skye, a huge island on the inner Hebrides, on the Western Isles of Scotland. It is a truly beautiful place of huge, mist-shrouded mountains, mysterious lochs and whisky distilleries. This is of course the place that Bonnie Prince Charlie sought refuge, immotalized in the Skye Boat Song that we all learnt in primary school. Here are a few photos to give you an idea of the unbelievable beauty of this place.

Barcelona - 2/3 August

We spent 2 memorable days in beautiful Barcelona in hot, sunny weather. We stayed in a great hotel in the heart of the city. The place comes alive after dark and dies at siesta time in the middle of the day. The architecture is amazing, especially the many Guadi designed buildings. This guy Guadi designed a cathedral in the late 19th century which is still under contruction! It's grotesque! I found time to walk to the beach and have a swim in the Mediterranaen, with several thousand others. It's non-stop party time on the beach and I felt like I was in Rio. Beautiful!

Amsterdam - 21/22 July

Amsterdam is noted for its network of canals, relaxed attitude to just about everything, and number of bicycles. It feels more like a theme park than a city. Despite having cold, wet weather we really enjoyed the laidback atmosphere and interesting "window shopping". Everyone speaks English fluently so there were no language difficulties. Next time I would hire a bicycle to get around.

Windsor Castle

Windsor Castle is more like a small village than a residence, as many of the castle staff live within the walls. I was shocked to find that many of the grenadiere guards are women! Apparenttly this is the main residence of the Queen. I thought it was Buckingham Palace, but that's just a weekender.

Back in Shipley

This blog is getting very repetitive... Yes, we are back in Shipley after 4 days in London. We found time to visit Liz and Phil Windsor...at Windsor. They weren't home but we did manage to gain entry to part of their home, which is more like a castle really. It's pretty amazing but I wasn't allowed to take any photos of the inside, but I did get a few of the outside though. Apparently the family has lived there for generations but they weren't called Windsor...? The next day we drove in Dan's waterlogged VW down to visit his parents on the south coast. We noticed as we arrived that there was smoke/steam coming from under the bonnet. Dan & I, with our collective mechanical expertise decided that there may be some problem. To cut a long story short we did not arrive home last night until after midnight in a tow-truck with the sick VW on the back tray. In the meatime we had a pleasant lunch at a very old pub, washed down with too much "Piddle" beer. I don't recommend it.

Back in London

London is like a second home now and we are back here for a few days visiting Tori and Dan. Yesterday we went to the Millenium Dome, near Greenwich, up the Thames from London. It is an emnormous "tent" containing concert hall, restaurants etc and exhibitions. Our purpose was to see the Tutenkhamen exhibiton which was amazing as you would expect. We'll be here for a few more days and then we go back up north and decide how to spend the last few weeks of the holidays.

Mas Saint Antoine

In the middle week of our expedition we spent a week at a small farmstay called "Mas Saint Antoine", near Avignon in Provence, southern France. It was run by a couple of Kiwis called Kerryn (the girl) and Keryn (the guy)Yes, that's right... a couple with the same name! All the guests were English so we didn't have to worry about communicating in French while we were there! In between being good tourists and spending money at local markets and taking photos of Roman aqueducts and arenas, we spent much time lying around the pool and exposing our palid flesh to the sun for short periods. Our "gite" ie flat was tiny and actually inside the pool fence! Here are a few photos of us enjoying the beautiful French sun.

Quinta de Picaria

After 22 days on the road, 10 different beds, 8 long distance train journeys, 5 different countries, hundreds of photos, lots of memories, and a few new friends, we are back home in Shipley (for a day!). Our last leg was a farmstay at a place called "Quinta de Picaria", near Porto, in Northern Portugal run by Maria, who spoke virtually no English. The place was beautiful, as was the surrounding countryisde. We loved the slower pace of Portugal after the intensity of most of the rest of the trip. It's cheap and the people are open and friendly, although most speak virtually no English. Here are a few photos of Quinta de Picaria.

hot night in madrid

A few days later and we are in Madrid. It´s a hot night following a very hot day ie 40 deg + and we are sitting in an internet cafe at 10:30pm and the place is alive!!! We´ve taken a zillion photos but they´re all much the same ie fountains, architecture, palaces etc but I´ll sort them all out later. We spent the last few days in Barcelona - what a buzz that place is!! I swam in the Mediterranean for the first time and.... its not as good as Byron! The weather is consistently very hot and people emerge at night as you might expect. Tomorrow we "do" Madrid then catch the overnight train to Lisbon - thank goodness back on the coast! Everything has worked like clockwork so far (tempting fate?) and I am becoming a huge fan of train travel. we´ve stayed in some great, and not so great, hotels and are having great fun trying to communicate with the locals wherever we go (with mixed success!. Adious for now...