Hanz

After narrowly escaping a few run-ins with the Belarusian Military and the KGB, I was looking forward to getting out of Minsk. We had an unearthly early start to the morning and found ourselves back on one of those odd sleeper train carriages (which stunk like I don’t know what) but at least this time we had more normal seats for another olympic session of cards for the next 4-5 hours on the way to Brest. It was a gloriously hot day (despite the forecast to snow the same time next week), but with our limited time here we only came to see one thing: The Brest Fortress – a WWII Soviet memorial, and originally the largest 19th century fortress of the Russian Empire. The long walk to the fortress in the heat just about killed ... read more

After leaving Clay to explore Latvia, James and I found ourselves off the tourist trail towards Belarus! The train carriage is nothing like I’ve ever seen before – our allocated seats were upper bunk beds, notably higher than normal, but with no ladder to get up! And when you did manage to get up that high, there wasn’t even enough head-room to sit up! For 5 hours! To make matter worse, the train was quite full and EVERYONE only spoken Russian. The ladies that we were sharing the area with made some kind of hand gestures to suggest we could sit on the lower bunks with them, so that was good! Crossing the border was interesting. Firstly we had to leave Lithuania, simple stamp of our passports. Easy enough. Getting into Belarus, however, was a different ... read more

We arrive into Vilnius about a day after we expected due to being forced onto an 18-hours train expedition, instead of a simple overnight coach. In the process we had picked up a strange guy from Belgium who followed us from the train. He started off by saying “he didn’t know where he was staying”, and then after following us to our accommodation, said ‘oh, this is exactly what I was looking for” hmmm... But we managed to loose him and were happy to be here, in what already looks like a quaint city. We decided to reward ourselves with a nice dinner at one of the prominent restaurants in the old town; enjoying the warm evening air and a lovely bottle one wine (once we found one that they did actually stock!). Feeling like we ... read more

The UK had more bank holidays in a row that most people knew what to do with! However, we decided it would be a perfect excuse to get a little off the tourist map and see the rather different sights and sounds of Eastern Europe.... We arrived into Gdansk, and after getting somewhat interrogated at immigration, I managed to get into the country – fourth in the queue and yet the last person in the whole plane to enter!? Pretty sure I don’t fit the classic terrorist profile? We didn’t really know how we were going to get to our hostel – not even sure if the buses were still running, but then an Australian accent pierced through the silence and convinced us it would be cheapest for all of us to get a taxi into ... read more

Since I was home for the first time in a number of years, I decided I should be doing some sightseeing while I was here! So mum, dad and I headed off on a road trip to see the geothermal and cultural wonders of Rotorua! We had such a great trip, and I even got to drive ‘the beast’! On the way down we stopped at the Waihau River near Putaruru, and had a walk to see the beautiful clear waters from the springs. It really is a picture of perfect untouched natural beauty. We carried on down to Rototua, and had dinner at the infamous old Police station, now a pub ‘the Pig and Whistle’. Both mum and dad have spent a reasonable amount of time here, both via work and holidays, so it was ... read more

Oktoberfest: A weekend of German beer, German food, and more German beer! It’s my third year running, and it’s still not lost its appeal Billie, Brent & I flew into Salzburg in Austria to meet up with Tracie, Ellen & Co for a little sightseeing before Munich. Salzburg is such a beautiful city, both day and night, I think it looks like somewhere out of a fairytale. We had a wander around the old town and found an authentic Austrian pub to try some local beers - a bit of a warm up for the days ahead :) We had just enough time to do a bit of exploring the following morning and looked at the beautiful Mirabell Gardens before we caught the train up to Munich, in Germany. Personally I think Oktoberfest is fantastic - ... read more