Austro-Hungarian Tour 2009

As I write this we are en-route to Budapest from Vienna, on the train. We have spent the last 4 nights in Vienna, and have another 4 days to go in Budapest.

Anyway, Vienna. It is a lovely city. We arrived in the afternoon on Saturday and spent the evening wandering from our hostel down to the old town, looking at the impressive buildings and discovering the Rathausplatz (square in front of the town hall) which had a big screen and outdoor foodcourt for the Summer season of music movies. The weather was balmy and we had pizza and beer sitting on the street. Vienna has wide streets, many trams and cyclists, and lots of drinking water stations where you can re-fill your bottles and push a button to get a mist to cool you down!

On our wandering we discovered a sort of outdoor festival area in the Museums Quarter (MQ) with bars and cafes and a DJ, so we had some drinks and hung out here for a bit soaking up the atmosphere.

The following day we had a breakfast of Viennese croissants (they were invented here, apparently) and coffee and jumped on the tram to Schoenbrunn Palace. That is where Marie Antionette was born and raised before she was married off to the French guy. The palace was EXTREMELY grand, huge gardens, fountains, statues, a maze, and luxurious state apartments. I couldn't keep up with all the info about the important people that lived here but it was pretty impressive to look at.

We had a very Viennese dinner of Gulash (well Richie did, vege gulash doesn't exist) and more beer and spent the evening wandering some more. Vienna is a city with plenty to look at even if you aren't doing anything in particular. I attempted to speak German with varying degrees of success. Because of the high numbers of tourists and the fact that nearly everyone learns English at school from a young age, just about everyone speaks perfect English so as soon as they heard me speaking to Richie they would revert to English. This was a little bit annoying since this is one of the few countries where I can actually get around without speaking English! But hey I still spoke lots of German so that was cool.

That evening we went on an adventure to the Donau tower, like the sky tower. We rode the lift up 200 odd metres and took in the view of Vienna by night. They take your picture as you go through the barrier and try to sell it to you as you come down. So weird. Especially as they take the picture with basically no warning and so you look completely stupid and then they print them all off so there is a big wall of surprised looking faces staring at you as you come out.

On Tuesday we had a lazy start and more coffee and croissants, before catching the u-bahn (underground) to Kunsthaus Wien, which is an art gallery designed by Friedensrich Hundertwasser and which contains lots of his paintings, models for buildings and other art. Hundertwasser is the guy who designed the public toilets with the grass and trees on the roof in Kawakawa. He lived in NZ in his later life and is buried there. He also designed the green Koru flag as an alternative to the Southern cross/Union Jack one. The building was fab, all crazy tiling and undulating floors. He was totally against straight lines and obsessed with spirals. He also experimented with plants as water purification tools and came up with the ideas of 'Tree tenants' for high density city housing, where the trees are grown in 1 metre square window boxes just inside the walls and grow outside the building and up the walls. All very interesting!
We also visited the Hundertwasser House, which is basically his ideas put into practice in a council block in Vienna. You can't go inside, as people live there, but it's pretty choice.

That night we planned to go and watch a music movie at the Rathaus, but when we got there the heavens had opened and we were completely soaked. I have never seen it rain so hard. Umbrellas and raincoats stood no chance whatsoever. We basically waded back to our hostel and in the end spent the evening drinking lovely CHEAP Austrian wine instead.

The next day, after our customary coffee and croissant, we headed to the MQ to the Museum Moderner Kunst. The building was choice, the modern art was somewhat over rated, but maybe I have just been spoiled by the Tate Modern in London. Each to their own and all that.
We also visited the Architecture Centre, which was quite interesting, and conspicuous in it's absence was any reference to Hundertwasser. Maybe he isn't classed as a real architect.

We took a tram ride around the city, looking at the old buildings and interesting new ones, and did some more wandering. There are dozens of interesting churches and statues all over Vienna.

This morning we had an interesting time getting on the train which was overflowing with young people heading to Budapest for the Music Festival. We didn't have reserved seats and the corridors where full of people sitting on the floor so we decided to take the later train and went and reserved our seat for that one. So now we are lucky and sitting in a carriage by the window looking out on wind farms and fields of sunflowers. I think we have passed the border as the ticket inspectors are no longer speaking auf Deutsch, but we haven't shown our passports yet.

Anyway this has been a good way to while away some time on the train, this baby computer of Richie's is brill.

Steph

Camping in Norfolk Part 2.

On one day we ventured out to Felbrigg Hall. This is another National Trust house (Read huge mansion) in amazing grounds. We walked through the woodland and along the Victory V made of trees planted in 1945 to commemorate WW2. There was an amazing walled garden and a walled vegetable garden and orchard. They were managed using organic methods and I have never seen so many insect flying about. The garden was beautiful but I probably looked like I had tourettes from all the flapping I was doing. I have never seen such huge rhubarb. The tomatoes on my balcony look a little sad in comparison....They also had a massive brick dove cote, built in 17something. They used the pigeons for a ready source of protein and fertiliser.


Another amazing NT property we went to was Oxburgh Hall. They were having a 17th century re-enactment of an event that happened there during the English civil war. There were muskets and cannons going off all around us, and people dressed up. The coolest thing about Oxburgh Hall was that it had a moat. The family who lived there (and in fact still do, in one wing of the house) were Catholic, and so they kept a moat full of fish to eat.) The house also had a priest hole - a hidden space in the garderobe (toilet) where the Catholic Priests could hide when the Protestant rulers came looking for them. It must have been a good hide out as the house was searched at least three times and it was never found. I guess you wouldn't want to look so closely down the toilet for a hidden priest.

We did loads of walks around the countryside and along the beaches while we were away. I was determined to swim in the North Sea but never quite got around to it! It was not quite warm enough.. but I am off to Cornwall in a weeks time so perhaps I can remedy that then.

The past week I have been hanging at home and in town, relaxing, seeing various teacher friends who are also about in London and last night we went to a 'prom' at the Royal Albert Hall with my aunt Val, who lives in London. The space is amazing and it was great to see a huge orchestra play. I was amazed at how hard out the musicians play, they really get into it.

The other night I was with my brother Alex, my cousin Bruce, Richie and Anne. We chilled in Bruce's garden with a few beers after work (well, me and Anne are on hol so we had spent the day at Camden Market)and then went to a random Vietnamese restaurant down the road. Alex and Bruce said it was like being in Vietnam, and the food was pretty delish.

I also spent the afternoon at the Natural History Museum with a friend and her 3 year old daughter. The place was PACKED - mental note - never go here during school hols again. There was a queue to get in and then a queue to see the dinosaurs. (They are great - skeletons and a life size animatronic t rex). But can you imagine a queue to get into Te Papa?

Anyway, we are off to Vienna tomorrow. I will have to see if I can still speak a word of German. We are staying there for 4 nights, then either catching the train or the boat up the Danube to Budapest for another 3 nights.
Straight after that I am going to Cornwall for 3 days for a girls holiday of seaside, charity shop bargains, Cornish pasties made by Flair's gran, and no doubt, knitting. Don't pretend otherwise, I know you are all really jealous!
Steph

Camping in Norfolk

I thought I had better update the blog before we jet off on yet another holiday this Saturday!

We went to Norfolk for a week and camped in East Runton, near Cromer. We were about a 15 minute walk from the beach at Cromer, which is an old Victorian resort with a pier and seaside rides etc. We hired a car for the week and it was lovely to have the freedom of a car again! (only once we left London!)

We arrived and pitched camp and after cooking on our wee primus went exploring in the town. Of course it started to rain and then continued to rain all night and most of the next day. I was convinced that it would rain all week so we bought a gazebo so that we would have some shelter. We were in a tiny tent so a week of camping in the rain would not have been so much fun!

On the first rainy day we went to Blickling Hall. Anne Bolyn was born here and supposedly her headless ghost reappears here every anniversary of her execution. We searched for ghostly evidence but didn't see so much as a shadow. It was very grand, with huge gardens. We even joined the National Trust, so we are basically old people in young bodies (young-ish - I am still in my twenties for a few more weeks!)

The next day we went to Cley-on-Sea and Blakeney. We walked along the Coast Path and through the Salt Marshes. This is where we first noticed the ladybirds (see Richie's post). It was very picturesque and a beautiful SUNNY day.

Rosie arrived that evening and we BBQ'd and drank some lovely Suffolk beer at the campsite. The next day we all bundled into the car and drove East, to Mundesley. Mundesley is where my mum spent her childhood. We saw her old house on the clifftop, and her old church and the village. Mum says the village looks the same as it did in the 1950's! It is a popular seaside holiday place now, though still very small.

We carried on to Horsey Windpump which is a drainage windmill at Horsey Mere. (One of the 'Norfolk Broads' or lakes.) It no longer runs but you could climb to the top and we walked around the lake through the reeds.

The next day we went to the Shire Horse Sanctuary in West Runton. It was run by militant vegan types who rescue farm animals from being turned into dinner, as well as a Racehorse who didn't cut the mustard, Shire horses and donkeys! After that we went to Baconsfield Castle, some castle ruins in the middle of nowhere.

We also went to Richie's fave place of the holiday, a working water mill in Leatheringsett. It grinds wheat into flour in the traditional way using 200 year old mill stones, all powered by water from the river. There was a very interesting tour - the miller and his wife bought the derelict mill in the mid '80s after leaving the army (knowing nothing about milling) and restored it.

The week is only half over but I think I will continue tomorrow and add some pictures for your viewing pleasure....

Steph

A plague of Ladybirds upon you house

We have just returned from a weeks camping near Cromer, North East Norfolk. It was great, the camp ground was on an old Farm. It was packed, but there was heaps of space. We did lots of walks and visited various picturesque places, particularly those affiliated with the National Trust.

Unlike camping in New Zealand, there were absolutely no mosquitoes, which is absolutely brilliant (trick #1 to appearing british is to call everything brilliant like Harry Potter does). There are annoying quantities of hover flies, which is a bit disturbing as they have yellow stripes so at first you think they are wasps. What is more noteworthy however are the plague like quantities of LadyBirds.

These pictures were taken at Mundsley, which is where Steph's mum Wendy grew up. When you are by the coast, it is like this everywhere. You sit down on some grass and there is one every 10cm. You walk along a path down to the sea and you crush one of the little buggers with every second step and have half a dozen on your back by the time you get back to the car. With any other kind of bug it would be really annoying, but with LadyBirds it's somehow okay.

I went into a flower shop and asked the lady there what the story was. It turns out it is like his every 3 or 4 years. I thought it might have been a one off occurrence. Fortunately when you get further away from the coast it's not so intense - I guess they like the sea air.

Swine Flu Free

Hello Loyal Readers
I don't know how many of you there are but I hope it is at least our families...
So Richie blogged about the dress up party in Sheffield. It was really fun, my hair is still rather on the black side, but it looks OK, I am channelling my 17 year old self.

I am now on Summer holidays - the best part of being a teacher :o)
I am going back to the same school in September and I will have the same lovely class for 3 days a week, then have a year 5 class at the primary site of the same school (where I originally worked for 3 weeks) for 1 day and then the other day will be a mixture of other Yr 7/8 classes at the secondary - modern foreign languages!! Hahaha but it could be fun! I am pleased about this because it will be quite varied, but I get to keep working with mainly the kids I already know and it will be good to see them make progress over a whole year rather than coming in 2 months before the end. I also get to keep working with the same TA, who is a lovely lady - we make a good team. :o)

So holidays are great, not that I have done much yet. I have slept in, and been to the gym, and hung out with Rachelle (my flattie) and helped Bruce (cuz) move. We hired a car and drove from North East London to South London, a total of 37 miles and we probably spent about 4 hours in the car - mainly sitting in traffic.

Tomorrow I am hanging with Stacey and Anne, both recent arrivals from NZ. We are hitting Greenwich, if it is sunny we will picnic, if not, there are loads of nice pubs and a market and interesting things to see there.

In the last couple of weeks of school we spent most of it out doing trips while the school was being packed up ready for a big move into brand new premises. We went to Hampstead Heath, London Zoo, the bank of England and the RAF museum. The kids were pretty good throughout and I really enjoyed the Heath and the Zoo. Actually the RAF museum was cool too. The Bank of England was probably interesting if I had been able to actually read anything instead of herding my class around. I did get to touch a gold bar worth a quarter of a million pounds.

We also went to see Harry Potter which was fab! I love Ron, he is so funny. And I dreamt about riding broomsticks afterwards. Then I went out with 'the knitters' to a club night in Angel called I love the 90's. They played cheesy (and not so cheesy) 90's hits all night - it was totally awesome. I definitely channelled my 17 year old self that night. Anne and I stumbled across Tower Bridge at 4.30 in the morning as the sun was coming up and promptly woke up Richie to tell him how fun it was. I think he was really happy with me that night...oops. So Anne and I got up at the (I thought) quite respectable hour of 10.30am, and Rachelle had already been for an 18km run that morning. I think she wins, though we did dance for a solid 4.5 hours.

That day Richie and I went with Bruce and John to the Lambeth Country Fair. Yes, a country fair in London. We saw Sheepdog trials, falconry, a goat milking demo and animals made of vegetables (Actually not only animals - there were 3 Vege Michael Jacksons too). Random and fun!

I also visited Tring, to see Emma, a friend from last time I was in London. She has left the rat race and lives about an hour North of London with her husband and 6 month old baby. The main attraction of Tring is an outpost of the Natural History Museum - basically one man's taxidermy collection - including 2 dressed up fleas! So strange! They were made/dressed in 1905, and you look at them through a magnifying glass, while surrounded by stuffed polar bears and zebras and wolves and any other creature you might care to mention.

That is about it for now. We are still Swine flu free despite Tower Hamlets being the area with the highest rate of infections... Eek I have become a hand washing maniac but it is hard to know if it is a media storm in a teacup.

We are off to Norfolk for a week of camping at the weekend which should be great fun, as long as the rain stays away!

Steph

London Weather

I don't know what all the fuss is about the weather in the UK. When not looking for a cup of tea, the natives around here are always complaining about the weather.

When we got here in February it snowed on the beach at Brighton which was awesome. I guess you could argue that that was bad whether, transport services across the country ground to a halt, and schools were closed. But it was the middle of winter and it did snow on the beach!

Since then however the weather has been great. Last week was particularly balmy with temperatures getting well above 30 in the capital. A heat wave apparently.

Today we got the first really awful weather. It started about 3/4 of an hour before I finished work and rapidly progressed from torrential rain to hailstones the size of your knuckle bones. And then it abruptly stopped. Everyone decided to rush to the tube and it started again, we only had a three minute break. Half way to the tube station there was a massive bolt of lightning that I didn't see but I sure did hear - it must have struck less than a mile away.

Safely at Kilburn Park Underground Station I made my way home. Paddington, my usual interchange, was closed because of flooding. The train got through and I got home only a few minutes slower than usual, but by then the rain had stopped.

It's not sunny yet but I reakon that's the last of it. 1 3/4 hours of crappy weather. The weather here is unbearable. Time for a cup of tea I think.

Goths and Pirates from 1969

Last Saturday we went to Sheffield to go to Mike's birthday. Steph knows Mike from her last expedition to the UK and from New Zealand. Mike and his partner Alex lived in Masterton for a year a couple of years back.

Mike was born back in 1969, the anniversary was on Sunday, I'll let you do the math. His party on Saturday night was a dress up party so we faithfully prepared costumes. We decided to dress up as Gothics/Emos, so we died our hair black, I bought tight skinny jeans, clip-on nose ring and a studded belt. Steph, well Steph surprisingly already had everything she needed in her wardrobe.

We turned up at the party and found ourselves surrounded by hippies. It turns out that it was a 1969 dress-up party. Oh well, we looked good, and it turns out we weren't the only ones who didn't know about the 1969 theme. There was a wizard and and elf queen and two generations of pirates.

We got talking to the pirates and were asked whether we were dressed up or if these were our normal clothes. Turns out, when not dressed up as pirates, the pirates were actually
Goths. Apparently we would have fit right into their circle.

Mistaken for a Goth by a Goth. Now that's a good costume.