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Published: June 15th 2010
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A monument in a park in Madrid . Yes yes, I know, slack. Sorry. No excuses really (unless you count being too busy gallivanting around?). Although we're a good 2 weeks on I'll pick up where the last blog left off so that you don't miss any of our unmissable adventure...
From Almeria we trained our way through Spain up to Madrid. Although most people had told us that Madrid wasn't really anything special, we thought we'd better give the capital city a chance to woo us. Foolish. It was a nice city, but that's about it - nice. We only had a day there so maybe we didn't really give it a chance, but (and not meaning to offend any Madrid-lovers out there) the city didn't have anything terribly special about it - just the same as most other European cities we'd been to but without any particularly iconic features (oohhh listen to us, so jaded in our travels). We did make our way to the beautiful Royal Palace, the highlight of which was the royal apothecary attached to it. Although in
Madrid, Bordeaux, Loire Valley, Brighton, London, June 2010 284
A fountain in a Madrid park - there's nothing really special about it but we hadn't taken any photo's in Madrid so thought we should snap something the opinion of the typically hyperbolic American behind us “I would never have dreamed that there could be a room like this”, it was actually just as you would dream - rooms lined with many jars containing all your pharmaceutical needs (laudanum, wolfs bane, ground toad's testicles; just the usual).
After a couple of nights in Madrid and a 6 hour wait at the border for a connecting train, we made our way back into France and up to Bordeaux, which in the understated words of Drew was “yeah, good, yeah, nice little place”. It was actually a lot more than this, being listed as a UNESCO world heritage site due to the innumerable buildings and monuments that have remained unchanged for centuries. We spent a long time wandering the streets and lanes goggling at pretty much every second building, took in a few churches, stumbled on a quaint wee market, walked the longest shopping street in Europe (didn't buy anything though, Drew was in control of the wallet), and made the most of combining the facts that Bordeaux is a famous wine region and wine is very cheap in France. In other cities we had felt superior to
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A beautiful glasshouse/rotunda in a Madrid park. It also had cool turtles in the pond in front other tourists for not exploring via overpriced tourist transport, however we decided to bite the bullet in Bordeaux and upgrade our status to MegaTourist by taking the 'Little Train' around the main sites. Although we received a few scornful looks and mocking waves from the locals (and smug non-MegaTourist tourists) while cruising in the train, the commentary made the experience worthwhile, if just to hear someone apart from Drew speaking English.
Being sick of the drizzle in Bordeaux, we decided to move on to the Loire Valley, the region just below Paris famous for its hundreds of chateaux. Due to the complications of googling chateaux tours from Tours (the biggest town in the valley), we decided to stay in Blois, a small medieval town. We'd kind of gotten used to everything we saw being older than New Zealand, but Blois was in a different league altogether - think small, steep, winding streets and stairs and an abundance of half-timber houses. (Plug: Would definitely recommend Blois to anyone looking for somewhere to base themselves in the Loire Valley). We had two days here and spent the first exploring the town, its chateau, and Robert-Houdin's House of Magic (this (aside from
a slightly lame magic show (which was probably aimed at kids anyway, not at razor sharp intellectuals like us)), was awesome! Highlight was the illusionascope (or somesuch), where a bit of mirror-trickory made it seem like we were walking in all sorts of unlikely places (like on turtles). Very clever).
On our second day, we put our lives into the hands of a red-light-running local bus driver and went to two other chateaux - Chambord and Cheverny. Chambord was built in the 1500s as a hunting lodge for King Francois I, which just goes to show the extravagance of people back then as you've never seen anything less like a hunting lodge in your life - see photos. In contrast, although called a chateau, Cheverny could have been a hunting lodge as it's just a giant square mansion really (I say this in comparison to the other, castle-like chateaux - it blows a normal sized mansion out of the water). Chambord's grounds constitute the biggest enclosed park in Europe; Cheverny has the most dogs ever seen in one place (again, see photos). I could spout facts about these two forever (since I have the pamphlets in my hand), but
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Not sure what this building is but there were men in tails outside so we snapped it you can just look at the photos and google them if you want more information.
After lamenting the fact that we didn't have bikes to cycle round the Loire Valley and promising ourselves that we would return some day, we zoomed back through Paris and up to Calais, where we spent the night in a decidedly average hotel before catching the ferry from Calais to Dover (an enterprising pigeon also caught a ride over; he must be multilingual).
After consuming fish and chips (Jo) and a massive English cooked breakfast (Drew) from a 'chippy van' in Dover, we jumped on yet another train, and then another, and went to Brighton to visit Adam (Drew's school friend). We stayed a whopping four nights in Brighton, displacing Adam of his bed (thanks Adam) and revelling in the ability to speak to, and understand, anyone we came across (well, apart from Liverpudlians - we heard some in Dover but thought they were speaking a different language). Brighton is a curious mix of kooky, alternative shops (it's considered the UK's gay capital and is also a student city) and tacky touristy areas (aka the pier - think A&P show [I think this
is a farm thing, just think rainbow's end on planks - Drew] meets $2 shop). George IV's royal pavilion was definitely worth the entrance fee; its architecture is Indian from the outside but decidedly oriental inside, but we weren't allowed to take photos so you'll just have to imagine from my brilliant description. The highlight of our trip to Brighton is a toss-up between stumbling across a live jazz band playing at a tiny typical English pub (and then going back the next night to play Cluedo over a pint) and walking over the nearby cliffs, downs and farm lanes to see the Seven Sisters (a bunch of seven cliffs that to be honest would have been a let down if we hadn't enjoyed the walk there and back so much). Just kidding, Adam, you were the real highlight.
From Brighton we took a train (what else!?) back up to London where we picked up the bag we had left behind (clearly full of unnecessary stuff we hadn't needed for the month we were away), caught up with Theresa and Nic, visited the Natural History Museum (awesome, despite the hoards of irritating kids), and got lost a few times
trying to find our way from our hotel (which was off the tiny map we had) back onto the corner of the map to get our bearings - easier said than done. (Also, FYI, don't jump on a tube to Hampstead Heath glibly thinking you can find your way there without a map either. You can't.) . After 3 nights in London we caught the bus (mixing it up a little there) down to Hythe (very near Southampton) to stay with a family friend of Drews, and here we are, probably for a couple of weeks. Drew spent the first five years of his life in Hythe and so has requested the privilege of telling you about our time here (frankly, I don't think he deserves it - I recognised his childhood home before he did), so no doubt he will regale you with our adventures here sometime soon.
Oh, and I almost forgot - due to group cancellations we have had to change the school we are working at - same organisation but now we will be working at their
school near Nottingham. Most of you didn't know where the 1st one was so this news won't make much difference to you.
And of course: How many hippies does it take to screw in a lightbulb? Hippies don't screw in lightbulbs, they screw in dirty sleepingbags.
Bye for now x
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