England swings like a pendulum do...

I've always wondered about that lyric - with the use of the word "do" followed by the line "bobbies on bicycles two by two". If an Aussie wrote it it would probably be:

"England swings like a pendulum does, bobbies on bicycles - here come the fuzz"

Anyway, we stayed in an apartment/flat in a part of London called 'Little Venice' in Paddington. It was a great spot - very picturesque, quiet, near a number of restaurants and pubs, and near a couple of tube stations. Robert Browning lived there at one stage and is responsible for its name.

There were many barges on the canals - one of them a cafe berthed just outside our apartment where we had breakfast on two mornings. One other was named "Milton" so of course we took a photo. And another we took on a trip down the canal to the Camden markets.

As so many before us, we thought that the London Underground system was fantastic. And here's something that I didn't know (and that many of you already did): the London Underground was first opened in 1863!! And we have our current state government's greatest plan being yet another road link!

While the underground was great, it certainly wasn't matched by the tea and coffee. A number of good cafes have emerged over the last few years and they are mostly run by Aussies - but they are not easy to find in a big city. Judith, as a tea drinker, was expecting more from what she thought was the mother-country of proper tea.

We spent five days in London and managed to see a number of the most notable sights. These included Westminster Abbey, the houses of parliament (from the outside), the Tate Modern, the Wallace Collection, the Camden Markets, St Paul's Cathedral, Buckingham Palace (again from the outside), the View from the Shard, the Liberty department store, and a live show - The 39 Steps.

We then took a train down to Dartford in Kent where we stayed three nights with some lovely distant relatives of Judith. Roy and Dulcie were very hospitable and showed us around their part of England.

Highlights of this part of the trip included a visit to the Church of the Holy Cross at Bearsted where some of Judith's forbears lived and were married, and Canterbury Cathedral. Canterbury town itself is a beautiful town and it claims to still have one of the original ducking stools. The cathedral is magnificent and bears testament (take the pun or not) to the power of religion and the church in the lives of the people of these times.

 

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Melbourne to Hong Kong

Well we're off again - or maybe I should say "yet again". Anyway, we're off again. Early start at Tullamarine so stayed at an airport hotel for the night. Now here's a tip for beginners: when you're at an airport hotel, always check the bedside alarm clock and set it or turn it off. Yes, we were woken up by the alarm at 4.00 am.

Hong Kong wasn't too bad this time around. We had a very good meal on the first night at an Indonesian restaurant not far from our hotel. And yes, Milton did have yet another Laksa - which, by the way, was pretty good.

On the first morning we asked the concierge for a western style cafe nearby. We like to have a western style breakfast and then eat local for lunch and dinner. He told us of a suitable restaurant just nearby called "Daily Friends". We thought that sounded fine so went in search of said restaurant. We passed a Deli France but no "Daily Friends" in sight. Until Milton (with two years university level linguistics under his belt) realised that the concierge had really been saying Deli France/Daily Friends/Deli France!! It's an aural joke - I guess you had to be there. Still, we had a bit of a laugh at the pitfalls of international travel.

Our plane didn't leave until 35 minutes after midnight but the tropical rain set in late afternoon so we decided to cut our losses and go to the airport early and wait for the flight. Next morning we arrived at Heathrow early in the morning and headed for our accomodation in Paddington in a pre-paid mini-cab. But that's another chapter.

The rain in Spain falls mainly in Madrid

We have been extremely fortunate on this trip to have had reasonably good weather almost all of the time. The one exception has been Madrid where it has rained each day for a significant time. However, this has not prevented us from seeing the sights and particularly the galleries.

Now I know this must sound like heresy, but I am a bit over the old masters and far prefer to see contemporary artwork. As a consequence, we are not going to visit the Museo del Prado (quelle horreur!!) So on our first day here we visited the Centro de Arte Reina Sofia which, among other things, houses Picasso's Guernica. This is a very poorly laid out and sign-posted gallery and, while there are some Picassos and Dalis, I was expecting more. Guernica was good although, given its iconic and idealised status in Spain, it is not easy to get to see as it is surrounded by many onlookers for most of the time. All in all we were both quite underwhelmed by this art gallery.

Day two saw us visiting the Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum. This museum is made up of art works collected by two generations of the Thyssen-Bornemisza family which have subsequently been donated to Spain. It is a breathtaking collection which includes at least one painting (and often more) of almost every significant European painter and a number of American artists from the 20th century. At the same time they are running a blockbuster exhibition of the works of Marc Chagall. We both saw the Chagall exhibition and were very pleased we did. He has never loomed large on my art radar but seeing his paintings together has given me a real appreciation for his work.

Anyway, the T-BM was a highlight for us both.

We have been out and about in many of Spain's plazas, streets and malls now, and one dominant feature of all of them are the buskers. Many of these buskers, however, are the sort that wear elaborate costumes or makeup and generally stand stationary (apart from the occasional gesture and posing with individuals for a photo shoot - and a donation for the privilege). Some of these look impressive and others just look pathetic or bazarre.

I guess it's a living in a depressed economy.

We were going to take a day trip to Toledo on our last day in Madrid, but we have decided to return to Australia immediately as Judith's 92 year old father is ill and has been hospitalised.

We will have to save a visit to the Guggenheim in Bilbao and a week in Paris for another trip. C'est la vie.

 

Cordoba: more of the same? Not exactly.

We got to Cordoba by train, but on arrival were greeted by a shower of some very heavy rain. So it is quite plain that the rain in Spain did not fall mainly on the train! (I've been waiting for something like that...) We hurriedly got into a taxi and took the short trip to our hotel which is a five star Marriott - at last a bit of luxury!! The hotel is very swish, and our room on the fifth floor has a spa bath and a double shower, all the amenities you could want and a great view of parkland.

The biggest tourist attraction in Cordoba is a cathedral (what else) called the Mezquita (the Mosque). Now, Judith and I have seen a few Cathedrals by now, and to be honest we're starting to develop a rather large dose of cathedral-lag (it's a bit like jet-lag where you see too much of the inside of a Boeing 747).

However, I would have to admit to once again being surprised and impressed by yet another oversized religious building. It was originally a Visigoth church (AD 600), converted into a mosque (AD 785), expanded over the centuries by many moorish rulers to its current size, and then converted back into a Christian church in 1236 when Ferdinand III of Castille recaptured Cordoba. It has remained a Catholic cathedral since then with a few modifications every couple of centuries or so.

So, it looks very much like a massively huge mosque with a huge cathedral bunged into the middle of it - which it in fact is. However, it still looks spectacular and is different from any other cathedral we have seen. We certainly thought it was worth seeing.

After we saw over the cathedral, we had an ice cream and walked over the bridge to the other side of the river where we walked along the bank, getting back to our hotel via another bridge further downstream.

Today we have really just taken things easy, done some washing, bought some supplies at a supermarket, looked around the shopping centre nearby, and generally enjoyed the amenities of our hotel. We have needed to take a break from all this sightseeing and traveling.

Tomorrow we take the train to Madrid where we are scheduled to stay five nights.

 

Yes we are in Seville, and no I don't need a haircut!

We tried to get a train to Seville yesterday but the 11.24 am and the 2.00 pm trains were full so we had to take a bus (which was also full). We are paying top dollar (euro) for a fairly small hotel room so we wondered what was going on. It is the week of Seville's Feria de Abril or April Fair, which is possibly the largest annual Fair in Andalucia. A lot of women and their daughters are walking around in flamenco dresses and many Sevillians (those not in uniform) are out and about eating and drinking.

Today we walked into town and queued up to see the Seville Cathedral and its tower (the Giralda). The Giralda was once the minaret of the original mosque on this site until the Christians conquered the city and took over, changing the minaret into a steeple (as you do). The architects of this Cathedral said in 1402 "We're going to construct a church so large, future generations will think we were mad." They were right.

Now I know that these cathedrals are meant to be big, but this one is !!#&%+ huuuge! In fact we didn't think of it so much in terms of a "church", but rather more like a Medieval religious mall. It has 80 chapels if you need to shop around for your particular saint. And the treasures contained within - Judith thinks that Spain could solve its financial woes if it sold off just a fraction of them.

The remains of Christopher Columbus are claimed to be here in an elaborately carved catafalque (above). However, that is a matter of debate and DNA testing is being conducted to establish the truth. I'm not sure that the truth should stand in the way of a good story, so I'm sure that whatever the outcome, many people will continue to believe the status quo. Besides, it is an impressive allegorical sculpture so it must be true.

The second day in Seville we walked to the Espacio Metropol Parasol which is a large structure that the locals call "the mushroom" and which has caused a bit of a stir. You are meant to be able to take a lift up on top to see the city but it all seemed to be closed. Took some good photos though. We then went to the Real Alcazar de Sevilla (the royal palace of Seville) which, again, is lavish, enormous, impressive and showing the moorish heritage of southern Spain (took some more good photos).

We watched TV for the first time since we left Australia on the first night in Seville. We tuned in to the BBC 24 hour world news service. It had a special segment on how unemployment in Spain is currently at 25% and in fact unemployment among the under 25's is at 50%! We can see the evidence of Spain's economic woes right here in Seville in the number of apartments for sale and to let.

Incidentally, the BBC program had a panel discussing Rupert Murdoch's appearance before the Leveson inquiry. It was brilliant! (not his appearance - the panel discussion).

Our next stop is Cordoba, and we are looking forward to it, but we are thinking that three cities in quick succession in Andalusia with its moorish heritage might be a bit of overkill. We'll let you know...


 

Granada

We flew from Barcelona to Granada (one hour and ten minute flight) and settled into our hotel in the old part of town. It was quite a small hotel with quite a small room but it had a heated towel rack which made it easy to wash and dry clothes. The owner/manager was very nice, but he was a strange mixture of Basil Fawlty and Manuel - but without Basil's nastiness. I'm not sure if he was from Barcelona or not.

Anyway, we found Granada to be a lovely city; very geared up for tourists but that comes with the territory. We saw over the cathedral, next to which Queen Isabella and King Ferdinand's burial chapel is. It is a very impressive cathedral. Those Roman Catholics know how to do gilt!! (I think I've spelled that right).

The Alhambra fortress and associated palaces is the thing to see here. We hadn't booked two months ahead so the best way to get in (besides queuing at 7.00 am in the morning) was to take a guided tour. This we did the following morning and were very glad we did.

The Alhambra is yet another UNESCO World Heritage Site (we're notching them up). In this case it is so because, constructed in the mid 14th century by the Berber rulers of the emirate of Granada, it is the best preserved moorish ruins in the world. As well as that, it includes extremely well-preserved 16th century and later christian buildings.

Again, it is impressive for its size alone, but also for the amount of building that has survived and the advanced technologies underpinning it - such as its intricate series of water channels that supply the whole city (2000 people at its height). The Spanish government is restoring significant parts but this will take a great deal of time and even more money - not sure how much spare they've got at the moment.

That evening we did the obligatory gypsy flamenco thing in a "cave" but we would have to say that we were a bit underwhelmed. Maybe we saw the real thing or not, but as a piece of theatre I think they might have been going through the motions.

Oh yes, the photo below is another WTF!!? moment. We saw these boomerangs in one of the trashy market stalls that line the laneways behind the main streets. Spanish boomerangs!! Who would have thought? And coincidentally Spain's indigenous people use the same painting techniques and motifs as ours!

 

Four days in Barcelona

Hi everyone - Judith here this time.

We had four leisurely days in Barcelona. Our hotel was in a great spot quite close to La Rambla which is Barcelona's well known thoroughfare.

Highlights for Milton were Gaudi's La Sagrada Familia cathedral (commenced in 1882 and still not completed), a visit to the Joan Miro Museun, and a tour of a once private residence designed by Gaudi .

I was singularly underwhelmed by La Sagrada Familia especially the most photograped front Nativity entrance.
Barcelona the city, like the people who live there, seems to be an elegant and stylish place. I spent some time looking at the shops getting a preview of next summer's fashions.

I also went on a historic walking tour and discovered that, like many European cities, Barcelona's history is studded with wars and invasions from the Ottoman empire to the Spanish Civil War.

St George, of the dragon fame, is the patron saint of Catalonia and Monday 23rd April is St George's Day. It is Barcelona's equivalent of Valentines Day. Women are given red roses and men are given a book so it is a great day for booksellers and florists. The streets were crammed with people and temporary stalls selling flowers and books. We noticed quite a few of the flower sellers were charitable groups so obviously a big fund raiser day too.

We also visited Sephora, the cosmetic store, as the Barcelona store is the biggest in Europe. If a perfume or cosmetic exists in the world they probably stock it.

Next stop ....... Granada.