After Venice, I travelled on an overnight train to Nice, where I stayed for a couple of days, including a day-trip to Monaco. Here are a couple of pics. As usual, click to enlarge!

Matisse

Sailing in Nice

“Jardin Exotique”, which is literally “The Exotic Garden”.

Bees are still busy in December.

Cheers to beers in Monaco!

So this boy is back in town!
Gosh, I don’t know where to start over the last week. How about the shorts.
* The overnight train from Krakow is supposed to be THE place to be robbed. To add to it, I was sharing a cabin with an Aussie girl called Monique who has a really bad cough. Well, not only did we have the nicest & most helpful of train guards, but even though Monique was coughing a lot, for some reason I had the best sleep I have had on a train so far!
* Prague: I was worried about finding my hostel (had to catch a Metro train & a tram) but it was nice & easy & the hostel was lots of fun, that is, once I worked past the couple in my dorm who like to have sex when other people are trying to sleep…
THe city itself was awesome, but one of the highlights for me was actually playing “Taboo” and then a drinking game called “Yehaa” for almost a whole night! (Have no fear, I was actually good at “Yehaa” so I managed to nurse one stein throughout it all).
* Heading to London: I got to Prague airport OK, but then things just became annoying. A long needless line to get my ticket, a delayed flight, another delay getting to our disembarking thing in London, then a stressful struggle to finally find Georgie meant that I was a little frazzled.
Of course, that dissipated very quickly. Georgie is a great host & her flatmates are awesome too!
* Christmas: Spent at Caius & Tara’s house, I had a really AWESOME time! Caius, Tara & their friend Durban are all really cool & we had an amazing lunch, followed by good chats, watching episodes of “the Office” and then watching a favourite movie of mine “The Royal Tennenbaums”.
* Back in Edinburgh: I got back at 9ish last night. I spent the mornign with Craig & Jonenne Petty in London, then headed out to Luton airport, before flyign back to Edinburgh, again with a late flight. Great to unpack the bags & to get settled. today I got a small shock though, cause my fave cafe appears to be closed till new years, so I am stuck visiting an internet cafe, instead of going for my usual broadband access with my laptop. DOn’t worry though, I brought a flash card with some pics.
Pictures: I will be showing them for a while. I decided to start with a couple of Venetian ones for you all.
Enjoy…

Enjoying the flight over…

The early art I saw was not in a gallery.

The little “Rios”running through the city were both beautiful & frustrating.

One of about 5 birds in the whole of Venice which isn’t an annoying Pigeon.

The sunsets (when you could see the sun) were lovely!

Nathan’s Villa Hostel didn’t have the most comfortable beds, nor did it have all of the best facilities, but that didn’t bother me a bit.
I never made it to the Jewish quarter & I just couldn’t be bothered going actually into the different parts of Wawel Castle, but it certainly didn’t spoil my fun.
What is it that makes a good time in a new city.
I am convinced that it can be something as simple as meeting a couple of nice people!
The staff at Nathan’s were awesome. When I pulled in at 7am, rather than telling me that I couldn’t check in till 2pm, they sent me straight to bed. When I had to try and make a phone call, but the directions were in Polish, they came and translated for me. Their attitude toward stuff made me feel happy & it seemed to have the same effect on everyone else there too.
Krakow is possibly my fave stop now. Auschwitz is amazing and the salt mines were cool. I did a little bit of shopping in the markets & Polish food rocks my socks (vegetables? What are vegetables?, the city itself is beautiful too, but I probably saw the least of this city that I have of any that I’ve visited so far.
Krakow is now behind me though. I got the overnight train with an Aussie called Monique. She has a really bad cough and I don’t sleep well on trains, so I was expecting a bad time, but the 8 hour journey rocked! I dozed or slept through basically all of it! It appears that the trick to my sleeping well anywhere in Europe is to have the least comfortable conditions! Works like a charm.
So I’ve made it to prague safely, I am in my hostel & trying to decide whether or not to top up my sleep till midday, or just go hit the town? Sleep is looking good.
Only one more stop in london till I get home till Edinburgh!
Only two more weeks in Edinburgh till I am back home!!!

I sat in my comfortable tourbus seat as we prepared to head back to Krakow. The heater kicked in & the feeling started to come back to my fingers. This was good, cause it made it a lot easier to open my chips & drink & operate my i-Pod!
It was at this time, having spent 5 hours in Auschwitz and Berkenau, that it really hit me. I was heading “home”, comfortable in my clean, warm bus.
1.5 million others never got the chance to leave.
Craig was right in saying that Auschwitz II (Berkenau camp) is where things really hit you. Row after row of huts still remain. hundreds, if not thousands more were burned down when the Nazi’s left.
Considering the enormity of the place, (it held 100,000 prisoners, only half of the size it would have been were it finished) our guide made things a little clearer and more heartwrenching by noting that most visitors to Berkenau weren’t actually considered prisoners of Auschwitz. Not because they didn’t arrive, but because those that were not fit enough for hard labour (which was many, given that they had lived in Jewish Ghetto’s for a long time) were separated straight from the train & taken to the shower blocks. They were told to put their names on their baggage, reminded to remember the hook number where they hung their clothes, they even had shower heads that were in the gas chambers, though they weren’t hooked up to water!
I didn’t cry as I sat in the bus and contemplated these things that I have heard before, but now actually seen. Instead I felt a little numb. Encountering something so closely, I just couldn’t comprehend the sheer size and efficiency of what went on there. Even gold fillings and peoples hair was recycled. Even now, 24 hours later, I can’t really comprehend the enormity of it all. I hope and pray that man never has to comprehend something like that again…
In other news:
Krakow itself is a lovely city. In the last 3 days I have:
1: Visited a salt mine which saw me almost 150 meters underground in the worlds largest underground chapel carved entirely out of rock salt.
2: Been to an authentic Polish restaurant where I ate soup from a bowl made of bread and ate lovely meat pierogis.
3: Played “Emporer and Scum” with a bunch of internationals, and a bunch of different types of Vodka, all till 3am.
4: Seen the lovely city square, and eaten sausage from a store that appeared to sell any part of the pig you wanted, just cooked in different ways. The store next door had a whole pig on a spit!
1 more day in Krakow & then off to my final mainland stop of Prague, before back to England for Christmas!

All of the “Man Points” I might have earned over my trip, the points that go toward proving that without a doubt I am one tough hombre who makes Clint Eastwood look like a girls blouse, are now officially null and void.
The fact that I spent half a day looking at and buying knives in Geneva? Forget it!
But I’ve been working slavishly at my “Beers from many nations” study, that has to count doesn’t it? Doesn’t mean a thing!
Why have all my efforts come to naught? Because as of 3 1/2 hours ago, my favourite thing out of this whole European tour is going to watch some Ballet!
Let me start the story roughly 24 hours earlier.
As I read while perched on my high-altitude bunk (you know a country must have lax personal injury laws when hostel top bunks are SEVEN feet up & without a guard rail) when two American guys in my dorm started chatting. I stuck my head over the partition & joined in as we shared our initial thoughts about Budapest. One of the guys let slip that he had been to the Opera house that night. He had thought he was going to see “Tosca” and ended up watching the Nutcracker Suite.
The trouble started when he mentioned that the beautiful Opera house alone was worth the price of the ticket. Photographic alarm bells went off in my head and the seed was sown.
Cut to about 2PM today.
I’m walking to the “Topography of Terror” Museum, so I can learn a little more about the sufferings of Hungarians under Nazism and Communism, when I happen to walk past the Opera House. I decide to go in & see if they have tickets. They do. They’re reasonably priced.
4 hours and only 25 Australian dollars later I am in one of the balcony rooms of one of the more impressive theatre halls I have ever been in. Gigantic domes ceiling, paintings and gold are everywhere, even the carpet is a plush deep red. There is a buzz throughout the crowd as the orchestra starts warming up. What sold me on the crowd is seeing the faces of hundreds of little kids in the audience. Mainly girls & mostly about 5-10 years old, they were the most gorgeous crowd of kids. Some were done up in gowns and fir to match their mothers, others were wearing what was most likely the only clothes they owned that didn’t have holes in them.
Hungarian parents out for a night of culture, little kids getting an early Christmas present, international travellers who wanted to experience a different side of Hungary, we all had one major thing in common at 6:10!
When the curtains opened. Every one of our mouths closed.
The whole performance was almost flawless. The Orchestra was awesome, the sets were phenomenal and the ballet dances were just stunning. The whole audience sat in wrapped attention, some of us almost forgetting to breath, as if the visual spectacle going on would be enough to sustain us.
Trying to describe the performances themselves is always a bad move, so I will leave my thoughts about the show itself there. However I will make one vow. If it is in my power, when they are a little older, I will try & take my nieces Jocelyn, Beth and Charlotte along to a performance of the Nutcracker Suite, because I would have given anything to be able to watch Joss’ face if she could have watched this with me in Budapest.
Then again, maybe I should make a different vow. In keeping with the theme, this could be a chance to introduce me Nephew Toby to his feminin side…
In other news
Travel from Berlin went well. I got to the airport early and having already having finished Dave Eggers’ “A heartbreaking work of staggering genius”, I took Kristin’s advice and bought “The Davinci code”. I’m 200 pages into it & enjoying it quite a bit.
Budapest itself is really beautiful. I’ve walked through a fair bit of the town & made my way up some tracks to the Citadella area yesterday afternoon, despite the fact that it was total dark by 4:30pm! tomorrow I conqour the castle area before I catch a 7pm sleeper to Krakow tomorrow night. I am excited about my first sleeper train & the fascinating/horrifying experience that awaits in Krakow when I get to visit Auschwitz/Berkenau concentration camps.
The next post could have a very different feel to it after A & B.

I arrived in Berlin, got comfy in my new Hostel & sat down to watch the DVD “Catch me if you can” as a little monday night relaxation. WHile watching the movie I met an American dude called Forrest & his girlfriend Aleara from Spain. After the movie we decided to go out & experience a bit of Berlin.
The Fun began here.
The girl at the desk of the Hostel told us to go to a particular street, which we managed to find after a short while. The street was almost empty. We ended up going into a metal bar. Three preppy looking people into a hardcore rocking room. Lets just say that we got a couple of “outsider” stares.
We hung there for about an hour, then headed out looking for somewhere else. We found a place that was just closing & sent Forrest in to bug the owner to tell us of somewhere else to go that was happening. After Aleara and I waited for a while, we headed in to find him & he was chatting to two artists.
Well half an hour later, this guy & girl lead us to a kind of “underground” club in some other part of eastern Berlin.
OK, you are with a bunch of artists, they take you to an underground club. What do you expect to find the main thign they do there?
That´s right…
Ping Pong!
It looked like an almost abandoned shop space if not for the nice looking designer lights & stuff. There was a set of decks set up, lots of electronica music, a makeshift bar, and a big pingpong table, with a bunch of people hanging around it & playing 8 person rounders!
As I sat on a comfy chair, getting the vague whisps of Marijuana smoke from a group in the corner, listening to another group discussing something very important, sometimes in German, sometimes in English, and watching a bunch of people play Ping Pong at 3AM! I felt that finally, I had arrived in Berlin.

I’ve met all kinds of cool people so far since I have been travelling. The Mormon who was addicted to classic heavy metal, entered France illegally and slept in an abandoned castle. I met the Brittish guy dating the Japanese girl travelling the world & working out how to communicate to each other. I’ve also met the American snowboarder who came to Switzerland for the snow, before actually looking to see if there was really any snow in Switzerland in December (He just found 60 runs in Zammat & is very happy).
The most interesting person so far though would have to be Josh.
Josh has been travelling for two months. When I first entered the hostel room in Nice, Josh had his daypack on his bed. Josh doesn’t have any other baggage. Josh is a REAL traveller.
Two pairs of pants, three T-shirts, lots of socks and undies. He also carried a jacket & a rain coat. a side pocket for his i-Pod, Camera & charger & he was done. He told me that if he came over for a week or two, he was pretty sure he could fit everything just into the pockets of his pants!
I sat next to my giant pack & felt like a fraud. We checked & found out that my camera bag weighs significantly more than his whole kit. I didn’t ask him to check my backpack weight.
Travel people are one of my favourite things so far. Having spent all my time in Lyon in hotels where I didn’t meet anyone new, I have to say that the whole experience is heightened when you can share it with other people.
In current news, I made it to Geneve safe and sound. A bunch of hostel dudes said that they thought it was a boring town, but Steve, a British guy closer to my age said that he kind of liked it & that the reformation stuff is fascinating, so I am off to see Calvin’s church this afternoon & then to the reformation wall after that.
Down sides to Switzerland? Unbelievable expensive food. I spoke to a British bloke who ordered a pint of Guiness in a pub & payed $17 francs for it. That is $18 Australian dollars!!!! I don’t think I have met anyone yet who isn’t surviving on supermarket food. Still, Fondue has to be done at some point in time. This should make up for what I have been told is very cheap prices in Budapest, Krakow & Prague. $1 beers, here we come!

OK, I am back a little earlier than expected, but just for a quick second. I had a funny ending to my night last night. There were French cops EVERYWHERE at about 1am when I was heading home. I stopped as four of them passed me and took a pick of their backs (it didn’t work because it was dark and my camera lense decided to stay open too long) and as I was deciding whether to delete it or not I heard a tapping behind me. I looked around and it was another two cops tapping their trucheons & looking suspiciously at me. I told them what I did and asked if it was illegal to take pictures of cops. They said no & continued to tap. One guy asked me where I was from, then pretended that he didn’t believe me when I said Australia.
I ended up walking with them for a couple of minutes as they asked me more questions and politely refused to be in a picture with me. I’ll head out again tonight, but I have a feeling it is not going to be as big as last night. the 40 piece brazilian drum band outside my room at 1:30am was a nice touch though. If only they could have been my alarm this morning.

This will be very annoying to write thanks to stupid French keyboards. I apologise in advance for q’s that are supposed to be a’s, n’s that appear to be colons & also for my usual bad spelling.
This is also going to be long because several people said they wanted mpre travel detail 5OK, I made that up, I just want to tell stories…)
So…
I Decided when I started travelling that I was just going to chill & roll with the punches. Not too much planning & lots of flexibility. This is of course how I ended up in France in the first place. It never really factored into my initial plans.
I was sitting in a cafe in Nice trying to book accomodation here in Lyon, but the hostel was booked. No problems says the new “nothing’s a problem” version of Tim. It gave me an excuse to book at least the first night at the Radisson 4-star hotel (thank you staff card discount)and then just zork it out from there.
Next day the first of tzo trains that I had to catch ran late, meaning that I missed my connector. Not a problem for “I’m so cool you could store a side of meat in me for months” Tim. I went to the info desk and they reissued a ticket for me with an upgrade to a first-class seat for the next train!
Arriving in a totally foreign city in the dark (thanks to the late train) with no real map of how to find your hotel could stress the best of them, but I confidently strode out of the rail depot, confident that things would work out. On this occasion I was right.
A tip for new players: If you are trying to find a hotel in a foreign country when you don’t speak the language, it helps if the hotel in question is situated in the tallest building in that city, and also happens to have a large neon sign ontop of said building.
45 minutes later I am lying on my giant bed, local red wine in one hand, french chocolate in the other & a remote on my lap. Life is good.
8am sees me at my complimentary breakfast. I’d been burned by breakfasts in the states which turned out to be just free muffins, but as I tucked into my helping of Prosciutto, fresh bread and smoked salmon (having already had my bacon and eggs) I was zell pleased with this outcome.
As I walked into the lobby 50 minutes later, skin a ruddy pink colour after another leisurly shower, I was on top of the world. I strode up confindently to the desk, secure in the knowledge gleaned from my own Radisson Hotel, that surely they would have had overnight cancellations, freeing up a room for me. I asked the question and then the girl shook her head…
“Is it in the Slovak Republic, or France where the shaking of the head actually means asscent” I think. Unfortunately it is the Slovak Republic.
I returned to my room still in good spirits, after all, I still had a “Lonely Planet” book full of accomodation suggestions to fall back on. 15 minutes and a number of unsuccessful phone calls later Tim was not so confident.
I’d successfully flown by the seat of my pants for the last week, but today my jeans got their pilots license revoked. By noon I was walking the streets of Central Lyon looking for Hotel signs.
As it worked out, by 12:30 I found a place and by one I was moved into it. It was actually a fun morning in a lot of ways, but I think I will book ahead for my next couple of cities accomodation.
In other news, this it totally the time to be in Lyon. “The Festival of Light” is on for three nights, s the city is lit up and there are hundreds of thousands of people cruising around and laughing in a very “carnivalé” atmosphere. I’ll enjoy it for another day and a half before I head to Geneva.
In the mean time, your job (if you didn’t give up reading 5 minutes ago) it to write me an email so I don’t feel as alone in this city. The only bad thing about having my own room is that I have no one else to visit the city with.
I guess I’ll be back in three days…

My first impressions of Italy? Obviously if your watch costs less than 1000 Euro you really shouldn’t wear it in public. Also, it doesn’t matter that it is winter, perpetually cloudy & usually night time. Sunglasses (often Gucci ones or the like) are to be worn on the head at all times! Oh, and the YSL shoulder bags. Don’t ever think they are just for women!
Venice is a very fashion concious place. Every hair is in place, the make up is immaculately done shoes are only made out of leather & fur never went out of fashion! It was into this image obsessed little world that I arrived late on the evening of December 1st. I had been wearing my clothes for 24 hours straight, there was not a straight crease amongst all of them & there were even more creases under my tired eyes.
I surprised myself by making it to my hostel with only one small wrong turn. THis would in fact be the only time during my stay in Venice that I managed to walk anywhere without wrong turns. Twisty streets are confusing enough, but the real killer in this city is that you can be going in the right direction & still end up with a rio (little river) blocking your way, or as was the case on several occasions, the grand canal!
Most of the time I just walked around the city, passed 1000 glass stores, 5000 sunglass stores & 10,000 somalians selling knock-off handbags in the streets. I did see some of the sights though. In particular, I enjoyed the Peggy Guggenheim museum of modern art. I have worked out that I understand Picasso, quite enjoy Kandinsky and hate Pollock with a passion! I also got to see inside San Marco Basilica & walk around a thousand fascinating objects.
During my stay in the hostel, I met a South African guy called Matt. We got on straight away, spending 4 hours talking about Metal music, Literature, Star Wars (Phil, he has a Bobba Fett Tattoo!) and his returning to his Mormon faith. We hung out a fair bit, toured the city at night, which usually involved playing the left-right game (you have to walk straight until on person says either left of right. You then walk straight down that street until the other person says left or right. This continues till you hit a dead end then you start again!). One night we went out for a beer. One stein of Lager & one pint of (flat) coke cost 17 Euro!!! Basically we got ripped off & I was too shocked/buzzed/nice to complain.
FInally yesterday we took a rour of Murano, Burano & some other island whose name escapes me. Murano is the home of the worlds most famous (and expensive )glass makers. I watched an Australian girl inquire about a vase that she liked, worrying that it would probably like 500 Euro & out of her league. Instead it was 2790 Euro!!!! To make matters worse, they wouldn’t let us take pictures of any of the awesome glassworks.
Burano was a fascinating little island full of lace makers & strangely coloured buildings. Rest assured, you will see pictures of this when I get back to my computer!
After hanging out at the hostel & cooking up an impressive pasta feast, Matt walked me to the Vaparetto & I caught a boat up to the train station where I caught an overnight train to Nice! I have surprised everyone including myself by adding a trip to France to my itinerary. It should also include Lyon and Dijion if I get the chance.
Well that is the basics of my story. It is 11:29 in the am & I have only just arrived here in Nice, so it is time to see some of the city before I crash from sleep Deprivation…
Tim.>.