Too much has been happening

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Yay, internet again!
The past few days have been utter madness.
- 6th February: Today we toured London. Dave (Ozy was busy, but extremely apologetic) led us to as many sights as we could see. We started near the Millenium Eye and headed over the bridge to Big Ben and Parliament. From there we walked up to the Palace (not as pretty as I thought it would be). We watched squirrels stealing food from pigeons, then headed over to Trafalgar Square.
To top it off I got a head cold about halfway through the day.
Still, today was amazing and too short. Dave assures me that we'll do more of it when I get back to England near the end of my trip.
Thanks again Dave!

- 7th February: Quite one today, just shopping for books and breakfast in Rochester. We wandered around most of the day, discovering a whole other shopping area down the road. This was our first brush with Argos(?), an odd style of shop. You walk in, look through a catalogue (from TVs to jewellery to hardware...just everything), order what you want on a computer terminal and then someone brings it out from the back warehouse. The whole time there is no customer service, just you and a computer. Weird.
We had our English bookstudy tonight, and everyone was very sad to see us leave - lots of photos were taken. Next stop was a goodbye drink at another pub, where Tim and Dave joined us. They were a riot (so was Andrea after 2 drinks). *Sigh* Goodbye England.

- 8th February: Packed up early and we all somehow fit ourselves and our luggage into Steve's Ford Ka. Train to Dover, then a long wait at the ferry terminal. We met an ex-hippy by the name of Mo, very cool woman. Ferry across was uneventful - nice view from the top if you could brave the wind-chill.
We got to Calais, had to wait for the bus drivers lunchbreak. Eventually reach the train station and proceed to mis-read our tickets and miss our train. Our only option was a train to Bolougne and try to get the TGV from there.
And so the adventure begins: we get off at the wrong station (Bolougne has 2), had a very helpful (non-English speaking) train guy call us a taxi (Mercedes something, AMG) to the other station, only to find that the TGV was fully booked. No way to get to Paris. We found a hostel across the road and got a three-bed room for about 60E, nice room too. We found dinner at the train station cafe (kitchen was closed, but they made us cheese sandwiches). So far, including a really nice French-Asian girl (REALLY nice), we've had 4 people helping us out on our first day in France! Really shows up the English I'm sorry to say (grumpy lot).

-9th February: PARIS! We hit Paris du Nord station around 10, and got a taxi to our hotel (about 10k's out). I went for a walk to find the train station, breakfast and a cash machine. After finding all 3, we quickly jumped train to Paris. As soon as you walk in, you notice the buildings crowding you in. They go from the narrow footpath, straight up 4 storeys. I noticed that 90% of the shops are womens clothing, so I went looking for food. Several crepes later we got to the Place de Opera. This building is fantastic! We headed south and found the Rosetta Stone surrounded by various statues, then turned west to find the Champ d Elysees.

My hours running out, I'll continue this later.

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Photos

The Millenium Eye
It's big, it's round, and it looks like it's about to fall into the river

Big Ben
The whole time I couldn't help humming that song from V for Vendetta

Squirrels
Squirrelsquirrelsquirrels!

'Nother squirrel
I took about 20 shots and this was the best. He's just too quick!

Buckingham Gates
Honestly, the place itself is a bit boring. Nice gates though

Trafalgar Square
Trafalgar Square an some very unEnglish weather. It's blue!

Comments

[Ashe]

Oh Steve!
Nice literary scrawls my boy! Your trip sound super-duper so far, and mine's over and I'm at home doing a massive pile of laundry... it's not fair!