Al and Jen - Alex McEwen and Jennifer Cox

These are the voyages of the Starship Enterprise.......no, wait, that's not right. It will take you a million miles from home.....no, that's not it either. It was the dawn of the third age of mankind - ten years after...........nope. Still not it. It goes something like......

<<cue William Shatner voice>> These are the voyages of Al and Jen, a million miles from home, and still travelling. Switch on your set and watch their exciting adventures through the United States, Britain and the Continent as they set out to see and do all those things that everyone else has done before! <<cue music>>

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Joined on: August 29th 2006
Last Login: February 18th 2008

Blog Entries: 32
Photos: 631

TB Code: [blogger=22620]
Status: BLOGGER

Blogs & Travel Journals

by Al-and-Jen, order by Date newest first.

By Al and Jen
December 24th 2007

If you'll give me a minute....

Europe » Spain » Catalonia » Barcelona

Jesus Banner
Bizarre. Very bizarre.

....I'l ex-Spain it to you....? Okay, that sucked. Shall I just talk about Spain. I will. We both wondered how a bus to Sevilla could possibly take eight hours from Lisbon. The answer is that it goes all the way to Faro, pretty well the southernmost large town in Portugal and then across to Sevilla. It's one of those funny Schengen land borders and the only way you actually realise you've reached Spain is the large sign saying Welcome to Castille and Leon! We only had one day in Sevilla and it promised to be a fairly busy one! There's a [View Full Entry]

By Al and Jen
December 16th 2007

Where do you get Port?

Europe » Portugal » Lisbon & Tagus Valley » Lisbon

Downtown Lisbon
Most of the city looks like this, with the cool lights.

....Portugal, where else? We arrived in Lisbon in the glorious sunshine and not so warm 12 degree heat of an Iberian winter. The Portuguese claimed it was cold, which I guess it was, but from the damp of France and the cold of Germany, Lisbon was positively tropical. Portugal is an interesting country. It's laid back, introspective and apparently living on past glories. That's what the guidebooks say and for the most part it's probably true. We arrived a bit after lunchtime from Paris and by the time we'd been in the country two hours we'd already been offered hasish by [View Full Entry]

By Al and Jen
December 12th 2007

I'm French......

Europe » France » Île-de-France » Paris

La Tour
and the Jardins Tuilieries

....that's why I have zis OUTRAGEOUS accent! And so to Paris. I'm going to be quite upfront here (unusual for me right?) and say straight out that I didn't like Paris. I know lots of people do but for a city with so much to offer, Paris left me strangely cold. Now I can't be wholly negative because I've managed to see and do some things that I've always wanted to - da Vinci's Madonna of the Rocks at the Louvre, van Gogh's self portrait in the Orsay, the tombs of Napoleon and Marechal Foch, the Arch de la Defense. I've [View Full Entry]

By Al and Jen
December 2nd 2007

Don't Mention Ze...

Europe » Germany » District of Berlin » Berlin

Downtown Stuttgart
The Schloss!

...Football... On to Germany! Home of autobahns, fast cars, bratwurst and beer! What more could a bloke ask for. As a result of our random change in travel plans we wound up in southern Germany instead of in the Czech Republic so we decided that the nearest and most interesting place to Zurich was Stuttgart. Now most people think of Stuttgart and wonder why you'd want to go there. Well, the answer, when it's late November, is mineral baths. Yep. Mineral baths. We came across the border from Switzerland and travelled through a countryside not unlike that through which we had [View Full Entry]

By Al and Jen
November 30th 2007

More Holes than...

Europe » Switzerland » North-East » Zürich

The Jet d'Eau
That's Jet of Water in English. Yep.

cheese? Did you think I'd say cheese? Jeez...... Okay, short blog this time. Six days in Switzerland and it was mostly a holiday. It's funny, the longer we've been away, the more breaks we seem to need from the proper travelling. Having this little break in the most heavily armed neutral mountain republic in the world has been really rather pleasant. Well, aside from the fact that I spent a large amount of time, mostly in the evenings, writing a presentation for a job interview with the Department of Labour. I might tell you later if I got the job, I [View Full Entry]

By Al and Jen
November 24th 2007

Che Errore da Fare.....

Europe » Italy » Lombardy » Milan

Jen....
and our first encounter with Roman statuary!

....or “what a mistake-a to make-a!” NOT! Al's Top Travel Tip for Italy - GO! That's it. Nothing else. Well, maybe go in October or November. It's cooler, quieter and much more sensible. This is possibly one of the coolest countries to visit and it's cities, it's people and it's food make it worth it. I think it may have topped the list of countries to come back to. Well, we have to. I still haven't seen everything in the Vatican Museums. More on that later! Seriously though, we have both really loved being in Italy, it's a fabulous country to [View Full Entry]

By Al and Jen
November 11th 2007

Beware Greeks...

Europe » Greece » Attica » Athens

Grecian Parliamentary Guards
Note serious pompoms. Hardcore!

....bearing Bears Well I would. Sorry for the delay in the last one folks, finding a decent wireless connection has been a bit of a pain. As a reward though, you get two for the price of one. So you've all suffered through the last three entries of the longest blogs ever. I promise that this one is short, since it does only cover six days in Greece (not long enough, I might add!) and only three towns! Lesson One: When Olympic Airlines says “You can't get e-tickets for this flight” they actually mean “You can get e-tickets for this flight.” [View Full Entry]

By Al and Jen
November 4th 2007

The newest members of the EU Family....

Europe » Bulgaria » South » Plovdiv

Hapsburg Palace
Edifices. Hungarian Style.

....and one still won't eat his veggies! Woohoo! Third Intrepid tour in a row! I'm quite the adventurer now aren't I? This last tour was through Eastern Europe, crossing four countries and only on one continent this time. I tell you what though, Budapest was a bit of a shock after six weeks in the Middle East. It's definitely Eastern Europe - it's more industrial, a bit less colourful and a bit cooler. Those judgements made we picked up the airport shuttle direct to the hotel (it seemed a bit of a pain to try and do it by public transport [View Full Entry]

By Al and Jen
October 7th 2007

Across four countries

Middle East » Syria » South » Damascus

Suez Canal
Ship of the Desert.... :)

...and three continents! Greetings dear reader, From a couple of mad Kiwis a long way from home, we bid you hello! We have said goodbye to the Middle East and are heading north to cooler climes, but that's a story for another time. I won't mention our three intermediate days in Cairo. Suffice to say we spent far to long in the McDonalds on Talaat Harb since it had good aircon and free wi-fi and got hustled by a very nice old man to buy some perfume. On the other hand, after that I was able to perfect my techniques for [View Full Entry]

By Al and Jen
September 11th 2007

Walk Like an Egyptian...

Africa » Egypt » Lower Egypt » Cairo

el-Gomhurriya Street
Cairene Traffic!

Seriously.... There's an art to walking like an Egyptian. Not like the Bangles, no, that's not it at all. Here it's all about crossing the road. There are lights but they don't always work; there are traffic police but they don't always work either; there are crossings but they are ignored. The art is in crossing a four lane road with six lanes of traffic in it without getting killed. It's definitely an art. Anyway, on with the story! This whole trip started badly. It really did. So many little things went wrong that I should have expected what came next! [View Full Entry]

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