Bournemouth

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London second 2 weeks
22 Sept Friday
Woke late and arranged some more credit on phone, and found a few great 2nd hand stores, and got some really nice work pants. Other than that i spent a lot of the day walking around the area and just cruising around and semi planning the road trip to Brighton with Coner, Michael and Nick. That night we had a couple drinks at the hotel bar, and struck up a poker game, I was doing great in the beginning then my luck ran out lol about half way through the American girls came through and asked if I could drop off Sam at the airport and Amy at Bournemouth, they asked so nicely we really couldn’t say no. We drank in the bar for quite a while then we joined some others out front a the water fountain, we drank for a while then decided to head in, one of the hostel guys had come out and given us a bag to clean up all the cans and stuff with. So Conor and I had started cleaning up and we gave the bag to 3 polish guys and they started accusing us of dumping all the rubbish on them in bad English so I assume they prob didn’t understand my explanation, anyway they started trying to push me, about this time Coner realized what they were doing and by the time he got there one of the guys had thrown the fist punch… any as these things go I can’t remember much but what I can remember is that I used a mawashageri and dropped one guy and they didn’t get one punch in on me lol but one guy did manage to throw beer all over me, in the end we just walked away and everyone seemed fine.

23 Sept Saturday
Coner woke me up in the van at 9.15!! was so tired after the night before but was the most comfortable night I have ever slept in the van. We got everyone and everything loaded in the van, totally packed nick had to sit on the spare tire;-p We dropped Sam off at Heathrow airport after navigating through outer London and all various trucks bus’s and crazy motorcyclist’s, have semi arranged a trip to Scotland to visit her on the next long weekend we headed off in the direction of Bournemouth, We managed to get lost trying to get out of Heathrow but after talking to a rather unfriendly taxi drive we were on our way, from there it was an easy 3 hour drive all the way to the south coast of UK. When we arrived we went indirectly straight to the beach. Managed to scrape the top of the van while getting into the parking spot lol they had a random only cars this high going into a totally middle of no where parking spot! After parking we headed down to the beach. Had to do a bit of a climb down the hill/bank to the stone/sand beach, I even swam!!! It was freezing when I first got in but was actually quite warm once I was in😊 we played a bit of Frisbee but were rather unsuccessful cuz of all the rocks. After that we headed in to town to try and find the university to drop Amy off. After picking up some true UK fish and chips and getting directions. Amy checked in and we had a look at her new apartment, then dropping her off we went to the boardwalk and had a look at the carnival type area and had a drink on the beach. Afterwards we drove around the town looking for a good place to park. We drove past a street with 5 or 6 clubs on it and decided to stop there. After finally finding a parking we headed off and had dinner at a little café on the road, after which we walked past all the bars and something seemed a little off… and none of the bars really seamed right. We went into one to find a cabarea and a some guy holding another balls in one hand and a drink I the other! So after swiftly exiting we finally found on that looked alright, and settled down for a drink, I struck up a conversation with one of the locals to find out where we could find some clubs? Turns out we had parked in the middle of gay Bournemouth central, but if we headed straight down the hill it would be club central! So me and the boys downed our drinks and headed down the road. When we got down there some guy handed us a flyer for a bar that advertised half price cocktails, but the boys were still to worried about gay bars lol. So we headed on up the road and after speaking to a local who realized most of us were Aussies, he pointed us in the direction of the local Outback(The Ausie bar), it seems there’s one everywhere. So we headed up there as the boys needed a place unwind;-p So after settling down with our drinks we meet a group of teachers, they were the most random people I have meet in a long time!! Dancing in the window and teasing the people outside in the line lol. Any way Michael met a friend he went to High School with and he ended up getting us 3p jugs of redbull and vodka the whole night with 3 or 4 times the amount of vodka!! We worked out the it took about 12 independent decisions and occurrences that brought about all of us being there and free or really cheap drinks;-p Any way at around 2ish nick got kicked out because he was way to pissed and we started heading back to the van, after 2 chip stops and lots of running away from nick trying to throw up on us we all crashed in the van, one on the front seat one under the bed and two on the bed lol

24 Sept Sunday
Woke up and made and egg sandwich for everyone, we all felt pretty shocking. So we headed back to Amy’s flat to take shower’s, afterwhich we all headed for some food, while there Amy got a duvet and I finally got pillows for my van
Afterwards we dropped her off and headed home, took 3 hours but got back without any issues. I managed to book a night in the hostel and was tired so got an early night.

25 Sept Monday
Spent the whole day looking for a flat and just hanging around the hostel and reading then finding a couple place I headed up with my car to have a look the first was in a rather messy neighborhood and a small shared room in a family house. The second was in a predominantly South African shared house which was in much nicer area. The only issue was there wasn’t really any parking for my van… but the guy who had shoe me the place also had a place just down the road that had an bigger room that included a double bed and a parking place. He didn’t have time to show me and asked if I could come back the next day. So I headed back to the hostel, got totally lost on the other side of London trying to get home but made it eventually. Unfortunately when I got back I had 2 letters from the government giving me two fines for driving in the congestion zone….

26 Sept Tuesday
Spent the whole day writing and calling the congestion charge. Also finished my book, so no more books left😞 oh well I’ll just have to find another one lol.
I headed to the flat and had a look and it was quite nice a much bigger place big kitchen and pretty good room all for 55p a night so I paid my 110p bond and for my first week. Now I just needed to pick up the bicycle I had bought off trademe for 30p lol
So I headed to south London via the tube and got to the right station, called the person she gave me bad directions and I ended up going in the wrong direction! But eventually I managed to find them and got the bike is actually quite nice, now just need to get a lock and some lights for it. After getting the bike I found out there are no bikes on the tube unless they are foldable… so I got directions to the nearest train but it only went to city central. So I got a ride to waterloo then I was stuck biking through the city all the way to swiss cottage!! But I managed it asking two taxi’s and being stopped by one cop(turns out you have to have lights and aren’t allowed on the side walk!) when I finally arrived I told Coner and the rest of the guys about the apartment(coner may move in later next week) and my epic bike trip lol. After a couple drinks and dinner I headed back via the tube I wa too tired and luckily the tubes were empty and unguarded so I made it back to my van and the apartment quite quickly, as it was rather late (12ish) I decided to sleep in the van and move in the next day.

27th Sept Wednesday
Spent most of the day in front of the tv and writing this;-p But in my defence I did manage to do all my washing all 2 packed full bags full!! And I got used to the new flat and explored there version of sky;-p but I am going out tngt with an ausie girl and few of the other guys to the clubs tngt…well arrived back at the hostel and picked up Marco and Teleri(aussie girl) the others all had work or were broke. We headed to old road as we heard that is where a lot of clubs and pubs, when we got there it seemed pretty dead, but we found a bar that served organic vegan beer! I had an always trusty cider. But after a few rounds we walked around and passed heaps of bars and clubs but they were all dead! Although being a Wednesday it wasn’t totally surprising. We ended up in a dance type bar which was quite cool and had a bit of a dance, then heading home I couldn’t find a night bus that would take me home so I was invited back to the hostel and ended up sharing a bed (again!!) in on of the girls dorms lol but in my defense I was a total gentleman!

28th Sept Thursday
Spent the whole day moving in and cleaning up the 3 person room on the top floor of the house, it actually cleaned up quite well. Went for a long bike ride almost all the way into town so biking to work would be a mission but quite do able😊 2 guys are temp staying in the room with me till there apartment is ready, both saffa’s.

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Photos

Bournemouth
the beach

Bournemouth
the beach - Amy

Bournemouth
group on the beach

Bournemouth
the beach - Amy

Bournemouth
Bournemouth promenade

night out.
drinking - a bit to much

night out.
drinking - a bit to much

night out.
nick not looking to happy

night out.
escape to the phone box on the way back to the van

the morning after
all backed in the van

The Room
after a huge cleanup

The Room
the kitchen

The Room
the outside with the van