Holiday is over

I'm back at work again after my long break.  Back to reality.  I have to earn money.  It was a good break mentally and physically.  It was really nice to not be at work all day and then have to go home and cook dinner and do all the other things that need doing.  Being able to do life chores during the day is nice and to get plenty of sleep.
The trip was good.  I didn't get sick once - I'm still in shock that it could go so well.  Thanks for all your comments and sorry for not replying.  I was posting by email from my iPhone and therefore not replying to comments because trying to access blogger on the iPhone is a nightmare.  They have just released an iphone ap a few days ago, but too late for me.  Photos will come soon.  The photos I posted while I was away were just mobile phone photos, so I will post some proper ones soon.

Love never dies

So if you've read the comment on my last post you will see a very unfavorable review of the show. Although I enjoyed it it because I like live musicals, I have to agree in part. It has not the class of phantom and spoils the characters.
There are some really nice songs but because it is set in a carnival vaudeville setting the chorus numbers are in vaudeville style which I'm not a fan of. Phantom was so beautiful and majestic with it's opera house setting and big operatic chorus numbers. An over earnest young boy plays the son of Christine and while he sang in tune it was all a bit forced like most childhood singing is. The only time I've seen really natural extraordinary children in live musicals is in billy Elliot in Sydney. The other performers were exceptional. The cast didn't need to be propped up by talentless celebrities - this is London- the people on stage really do know how to do musical theatre and I did get goosebumps several times.
The storyline is simplistic and not where you wanted to see the characters end up and is a big disappointment if you loved the story and characters of phantom.
There are some great moments with the use of animated puppets and projected images are used a lot to create the scenery. It's interesting to see how new technology has been used to effect in live theatre.
So I wouldn't say a complete disaster but I can't see this show going down in history as one of the great musicals. I'll be very surprised if it comes to Australia. I do wish I could have had more time in London and gone to see les mis. Even though I've seen it twice it would be so good to see it in London.

London 4

I got going a little earlier to get to liecester square where the discount theatre ticket booths are. I couldn't go to London without seeing a west end musical, seeing as seeing live musicals is one of my favorite things. So I got a discounted ticket to love never dies which is the sequel to phantom of the opera. I'll do a bit of a mini review in another post.
After I got my ticket sorted i headed to St pauls cathedral. I walked most of the way past the royal courts of justice, BBC bush house and a few other nice old buildings. I paid to go inside St pauls. It's worth going in. It's really beautiful inside and you can go up to the top of the dome for a great city aerial view. I spent a couple of hours in there altogether looking around and climbing millions of steps.

London 3

Day 3 I just started off wandering around and got to the national portrait gallery which was awesome. It contains portraits painted in the 1500s which were really interesting to see. The British portrait awards were also on display. Then I walked around some more and then got on a bus to see where I'd end up and got off when I saw a camper store and got a pair of shoes which would cost twice the price in Australia. Then it was time for a nap before heading to the proms again. I couldn't resist! It was the London philharmonic playing a program of Russian composers. Loved it. Especially the Prokofiev symphony no3. And no I didn't stand up. I paid the extra money for a seat in a fancy box. Still cheap tho. Not every day you get see the London phil.

London 2

Day 2 in London I did the obligatory sightseeing of the places of royalty and parliament. I saw the horse guards then the police with guns guarding the start of Downing St. Then i walked down to the houses of parliament where big Ben is. It is quite beautiful with all that gold trim. Then saw Westminster abbey and then walked around to Buckingham palace and saw lots of squirrels in the park along the way. Then it was time for a nap before heading to royal albert hall for a Bach organ recital for the BBC proms. The proms are cool. They were started so that concerts could be accessible to the common person. So for £5 you can go in and stand in the stalls like the Shakespeare globe. But this is under cover. I was going to do that but a scalper sold me a £10 seated ticket for £5. I was a little nervous the ticket might be a fake but it was worth the risk. It was a good ticket so I got to sit down.

London

This was my last stop before heading home. In my first 24 hours I mastered the tube and caught buses as well. London public transport is so cool. It was raining so I thought I'd take cover in the Tate modern. I got on a bus but missed the stop so decided to go and see the tower bridge and discovered there is a big castle right near it. I've never seen pictures of this tower of London. But I've seen millions of pictures of tower bridge so I always assumed that the tower was one of the towers on the bridge. But it's not. Then I got on the bus back towards Tate and decided to stop in at burrough markets because I'd been told there is good coffee there. It must be good because the cue was so long I couldn't be bothered waiting. Then I went to Tate modern to see some Andy Warhol and picasso and other whackies. I really liked the series of photos of the new York subway by Bruce davidson. Then I thought I may as well call in on shakespeares globe theatre seeing as it's right next door. I ended up going in for a tour which was worth it because rehearsals were happening for the merry wives of Windsor and we were allowed in to watch. It was a nice little taste of the theater experience without having to sit or stand through a whole production. Yes they have kept it authentic with open air standing room in front of the stage with seating in the round. Performances still go ahead if it rains and umbrellas are not allowed.
Then later on I met a friend from SMADD days long ago and had dinner before he started playing his piano bar gig.

Stonehenge

Bath

I'm in bath now. I really like it here. I could stay longer. I've been on a free guided walking tour which was good for pointing out interesting architectural things such as the dunny hole in the back garden wall (not what they called it) and how the fronts of buildings all had to fit the style but the back could be whatever they wanted. So the backs of the apartment blocks are really varied and messy looking while the fronts are all uniform. I've walked around in the rain too. I went to the roman baths of course. They're definitely worth seeing. The whole town is worth seeing. It's like nowhere I've been before and seems like you are not in England. Not having been to many places i can't say what it's like but it doesn't seem englandy.
And I went on a bus trip to stone henge so I've been the ultimate tourist. They are a nice bunch of stones. I was relieved to see that they are bigger than the ones on Spinal Tap. I also saw Salisbury Hill. This is significant if you like Peter Gabriel.

Bath

The view from my window.

Oxford

I got to have another train trip and went to oxford. I was feeling a bit lazy and didn't really find out much about what I was seeing. I just walked around and took photos. It's a nice looking town with all the old colleges and churches everywhere. I went up a tower hoping to get some good aerial views but they weren't so good. It just wasn't that good a location to see any of the significant buildings close enough or high enough.

Oxford

Sheffield

I spent a couple of days just hanging around Sheffield relaxing and enjoying the company. The local main street has some nice little shops. The butcher has DVDs in his front window along with meat and also some old medals. I also enjoyed looking in the gallery of a Sheffield artist Pete McKee .
On Wednesday n and her friend took me to clumber park for a picnic. We didn't really have picnic because it had been raining but we ate our sandwiches and went for a walk. We accidentally walked for 2 1/2 hours. By the time we realized how far our walk was we were already half way and couldn't cut through to shorten it because there was a lake in the way. It was a really nice walk though. Clumber park is part of Sherwood forest and is where the dukes of newcastle used to hang out. It's nice going on forest walks in other parts of the world because there are so many types of greenery that we just don't have in Australia. I saw squirrels for the first time too. And mole holes. And real holly. We ate raspberries and blackberries off the bush along the way too.
On Thursday N and I caught the train up to York for the day. York is an old walled city with lots of interesting little buildings. Lots of them are very crooked. I climbed up the tower of the minster cathedral which is about 275 winding steps.

Fish therapy

The fishes nibble the dead skin off your feet. It felt funny and nice.

My highlights of Ireland

- the scenery and the live music and the pub and street in Doolin
- beating the fog at Slieve League to see the most amazing view ever
- climbing on Ballycarbury Castle on the Ring of Kerry
- visiting Belfast
- having a Guinness in Temple Bar area in Dublin
- lots of the scenery

Sheffield

I've left Ireland and am now in Sheffield in the north of England staying with my friends R and N.  And Felix.   It's so good to see them.

Ballymeena

We left our b&b in enniskillen and headed to to ballymeena just north of Belfast where kg's friend's parent's house is. We got there for lunch with them. Kg and her friend k went off sightseeing while I stayed back at the house for a rest and a went for a late afternoon walk and talked to the cows It was a nice relaxed day.
The next day after a full ulster grill for brekky at midday we made our way into Belfast. We got on a city sight seeing bus which we had all to ourselves. It was a good tour for about an hour and a half. It took us through the area of town when huge fences had been erected to separate the Catholics and Protestants and there were heaps of murals to do with the tensions and different peoples alliances. Really interesting.
One thing really noticeable about northern Ireland is the number of union jacks flying everywhere. There weren't very many Irish flags flying in the republic. Bit you very quickly know you have crossed the border onto northern ireland because of the union jacks. And because the speed limits all seemed really slow. We didn't realize for a while that they were in miles per hour and everyone had good reason to be overtaking us. There is quite a different look with the buildings too. In the republic there seemed to be a lot of painting of homes and shops in bright colours or white. But it seemed to me that in the north most houses were grey. And Guinness didn't taste so nice.

Enniskillen

We left claremorris and headed the extra long way round to enniskillen to see if we could make it to see slieve league. We headed up to Sligo where there is a huge tableland called benbulben. We saw the bottom of it. The rest of it was covered in fog. We were starting to think we were going to miss all of the speccy views because of fog but kept going anyway. We drove through donegal and finally saw what we had imagined as the rolling green hills of Ireland. We stopped at some lookouts where you were supposed do be able to see slieve league from across the water of donegal bay but all you could see was fog. But we kept going anyway. We got onto the coast heading towards slieve league and went down a little peninsula called St johns point and saw some nice coastal views but the cliffs of slieve league were foggy. But we kept going. Slieve league is sheer mountainside cliffs going into the water. They're not vertical but pretty steep and about 600 meters high. The road going up was really steep and windy. We got to the top car park and could actually see the cliffs. There was cloud up the very top so couldn't see them in all their glory but we got a pretty decent view. It has to be the most breathtaking view I have ever seen. You could walk higher up the mountain past the viewing area and higher than where they had built the protective fences. It was a fun climb up into the fog and higher views. The fog came down really fast so we walked back to the viewing area and the view was completely gone. If we'd been 15 minutes later we would have completely missed it.
We then doubled back to donegal and headed to enniskillen which is in northern Ireland. It was a long day but really worth it. Enniskillen is quite a big town but in a really beautiful green area. A nice place to be.

Northern Irish cows

Claremorris

We left doolin unfortunately after only one night. It's such a nice place with live music every night. We had toforget about the cliffs of moher again because of the thick fog. So we drove around the burren area for a bit in the fog. It was actually kind of nice driving in the fog. It was safe fog. You could see where you were going but it was thinck enough to create a real eeriness. Daytime fog is not a normal experience for me. Neither is night time fog. We stopped at a 5000 year old burial tomb which was interesting and the landscape is all limestone so something different too.
Then we headed to Cong and stopped and looked around at the old monastery ruins and saw the the ashford castle across the river. It's a really green leafy town with lots of parkland which is rare. We are getting frustrated with ireland's lack of places to stop and eat your picnic lunch. We keep ending up in the car in some bizarre town parking area to eat as picnic areas just do not exist like they do in every single town in Australia. Ireland has plenty of paddocks but they are all fenced off for cows and sheeps so you can't really have a picnic. It keeps raining anyway.
We got to our b&b in claremorris where we stayed for 2 nights. My bed had ten pillows on it.
The next day we drove part of the Connemara ring out to clifden. The mountains around there in the Connemara national park are beautiful. We saw kylemore abbey from a distance. It's really nice but you have to pay to go in so we continued on. This area you need to stay a while in so you can go for walks and explore properly.
One of the nearby towns called ballinrobe, that we had to drive through three times, has the dumbest intersection EVER. It gave us grief each time and I even ended up driving the wrong way down a one way street. I can now tick that one off the list of things you never want to do.

Some Irish green hills

Live traditional Irish music

Doolin county Clare Ireland

Doolin

Today is Sunday and we headed up to county Clare to see the cliffs of moher but the fog was too thick to bother. Our b&b is in a nearby town called doolin, famous for traditional live music. We wandered around and ended up in the pub for an early jam session and dinner. It's really cool. The musos sit around a table in the pub and different people come and join in while others leave.

Killarney

We left cork and headed to the blarney castle where the blarney stone is. I was happy just to look and not lie on my back and lean backwards over a big gap way up in the air and kiss a stone that hundreds of others have kissed. The castle was nice as well as the Druid gardens.
Then we headed toward Killarney and ended up on the wrong road but realized before too long. We got to kilarney around lunch time and discovered the self service salad bar in the department store and took our salads to eat on the grass next to Ross castle. Then went to muckross abbey which is an old ruin of a friary. Killarney is a nice town but way too much traffic for a little town. Our b&b called salmon leap is about 15 km out of town. Really nice rocky mountain views and very quiet.
The next day we drove the ring of Kerry. We took the skellig ring detour which was great because we found an old ruin of a castle to climb on. It was great because it was unattended and just standing in a cow paddock. We could easily have fallen off it and hurt ourselves but didn't. Then we found an old fort to climb on. That was fun too. Unfortunately the views weren't great because of the fog. But still a really nice drive. We stayed in the same b&b two nights just outside Killarney.

Cork

After Wexford we headed down towards cork. The only real stop we made was just before cork in cobh which is a port town and where the titanic left from. It was a little eerie walking along the dock. We arrived in cork and decided we didn't really like it. It's an old grimey depressing looking place. We walked around the town centre and struggled to find a nice inviting looking pub. Eventually we found one and then wandered around trying to find a cheap feed and discovered that doesn't exist. Our guesthouse was very nice which was lucky. It was nice to leave cork the next day.

Wexford

We picked up our hire car and headed south and stopped at he town of a avoca where ballykissangel was filmed. It's a really picturesque town with a hand weaving factory which was interesting. We arrived at our b&b and were greeted by some really friendly people. We told them how our grandmother was born in the nearby Glebe house which they knew well. We were escorted by one of the b&b family members to the house and also to the grave of several of our relatives in the yard of the church where our great great grandfather was the rector. After dinner we ended up in the kitchen at the b&b for some fun conversation.

Dublin

The next leg of my trip is in Ireland. My sister kg and I arrived in Dublin and booked into our hotel and then went for a wander and had dinner and Guinness in temple bar. I really enjoyed the Guinness. I haven't liked it before but now I do. Our hotel was pretty close to the centre of town.
The next day we went for wander to trinity college then the national gallery then the Dublin castle then St Patricks cathedral and back to hotel for dinner. And Guinness.

Walking in the Swiss alps

Swiss mountains

Switzerland

I've spent a week in the Swiss alps. It has been very relaxing. The view here is amazing. You look across the valley to snowy mountains. And the mountains are really steep. I've loved the walks. We went up a cable car to the top of one of the ski slopes and walked down. It was hard walking down because it was so steep and gravelly so very easy to slip over. Another day we went walking up in the cow pastures. All cows have bells so you can always hear them even if you can't see them. We did see them on the way back. They were right near the path and came over to say hello. I was glad because I wanted some cow photos. Twice this week we have eaten fondue for dinner. Melted cheese with bread dipped in. If you don't want tummy ache you have to not drink any cold water until the next day. You have to just drink wine and hot tea.
I went down to montreux for a day for the jazz festival. Unfortunately not much happens during the day. But I did see a uni band play and there are markets all along the edge of the lake. Montreux is on a steep hill overlooking lake Geneva so I walked up the hill a bit and explored the town. Switzerland is so cool because everything is so old.

Switzerland