London

21^st May: Hilton Docklands(special rate) Marble Arch Inn

Made sure we were early enough to catch the plane from Mykonos to

Athens, only to lose confidence when the pilot hesitated on where he was flying us to. All passengers sighed with relief when he announced Athens.

On arrival to London we once again had to join a long queue to enter the country - now I know why people rush off the plane. We were picked up and after an hour and a bit we reached the Hilton at Docklands. Wasting no time to unpack we set off to find our feet which involved catching a shuttle bus to the station. (need to remember where you get off so you can get the right bus home!!!!!)

We found the London Eye, went up and as it was such a clear day we were able to see for miles and get our bearings. We were close to Westminster Bridge so we went and took photos of Big Ben.

Sunday saw us navigate the Underground . After arriving at Waterloo Station and taking a few wrong turns and holding the map every which way we found the Imperial War Museum and did the Trench and Blitz experiences and the Holocaust Section. This day was extremely windy and people were sneezing and wiping their eyes(us included) from the pollen and dust .

Next we made our way over to Leicester Square and grabbed ourselves a ticket for Thriller(Michael Jackson tribute)

Monday saw us change accommodation to Marble Arch, a 3 Star with a bathroom outside our room and toilet downstairs, but that's how it is if you pay 60-70 pounds to stay.

Below is a list of what we were able to see while we were there.

Buckingham Palace Royal Mews Royal Guards Museum/Chapel

The Monument Cavalry Museum Churchill's War Rooms

St.Pauls Cathedral Tower Bridge London Bridge Experience

Crown Jewels at Tower of London Thames Cruise

Tour of Wimbledon Westminster Abbey Lord's Cricket Ground (tour)

Lord Mayor's coach at Museum of London Trafalgar Square

Piccadilly Circus Changing of the Guard

As well as this we walked many kilometres to mark things off my list including Harrods, Victoria & Albert Museum for afternoon tea, just to see the tea room-spectacular, 10 Downing Street, Houses of Parliament, The Millenium Bridge, Covert Garden, The Borough Market, Kensington Palace, Clarence House, Hyde Park (the Peter Pan Statue, Diana's Memorial Fountain) Royal Albert Hall and St. Martins In The Fields Church, a lap of Buckingham Palace. and of course back to Leicester Square to get tickets to see Shrek- magnificent costumes.

When Obama came to town, that was the day we were heading to all the places he was going to as well, so that put an end to that and so after arriving at Buckingham Palace we waited around to catch all the pomp and ceremony that went along with his arrival for lunch.

While we waited we got talking to an Englishman who I'm sure thought he was best friends with the whole Royal Family as he had an opinion on all of them, knew every detail of when ceremonies were on and had survived the Blitz- this certainly passed the time more quickly.

We saw Camilla and Charles arrive and then 30mins later Obama cruised in in his sleek black limo, with Prince William- we think, a few cars behind him. The security was amazing with sirens going non stop, helicopters hovering and police every couple of metres- this went on the whole day. We caught him again at Westminster Abbey in the afternoon and then as we passed Downing Street on board the bus his limo was parked in there under heavy guard. We feel the pomp and ceremony outside Buckingham Palace we saw was better than the Changing of the Guard.

We did loads of walking and used the Tube quite frequently to get around and purchased a London 6 day pass that got us into most places on the list. We think maybe we should have purchased a Travel Card to go with the Oyster Cad we used as we think it would of worked out a bit cheaper. Stairs- we have climbed and climbed stairs, St. Paul's was over 500 and The Monument was 300 and I'm sure most Tube Stations had at least 60, plus an escalator. The tunnels are amazing to get to the platforms, often with musicians along the way to entertain. Oh yes, we walked across the famous Abbey Road crossing in the rain while visiting Wimbledon.

On Thursday we went and had tea with Nikki (over in Angel) from our Egypt trip It was lovely to catch up and reminisce over the hot, exciting and amazing times we shared together. Nikki

was very kind and gave us the services of her washing machine so we could wear fresh clean clothes.

Each day we have been exhausted and gone back to our hotel with aching legs.

Photos- I think we've got hundreds all ready so I hate to think of how many we will have by the time we get home.

Forgot to say, on Sunday afternoon we went and saw Jersey Boys again and loved it, mind you the Australian production is every bit as good, we then went home for an early night.

At the moment we are traveling to Liverpool by train to pick up a hire car to travel to the north of England and it is looking very bleak and cold outside. We hope to do the Beatles Museum and tour while we are there.

…..Did the Beatles Museum and the tour around Liverpool and went to the famous Cavern Club Had a fantastic time-museum is well worth seeing.

Left Liverpool to get to Buxton to head on to Eyam and what was supposed o take us and hour and a half took 5 hours due to the tom tom not letting us turn off until we decided we would be in Birmingham if we went any further. So we traveled over all these hills in the middle of nowhere and finally after millions of wrong turns going back we managed to get to Buxton stressed and tired. We are now at a B&B called Alison Park Hotel Buxton Derbyshire.

Hope everyone is well and thanks to all those who gave me info and tips on how to manage London, I can now throw my bits of paper out.

Love C & J

Athens

Getting back to Cairo was an interesting trip with the bus zigzaging back and forth across the road as parts of the road did not have the final surface on top of it. Others in the bus had said the  driver was terrible as they did not realise he was following the finished surface of the roads. The traffic in Cairo was a nightmare and the all drivers including the bus drivers see an opening and go for it. It is better than dodgem cars at the show. Men ride on top of their load in the truck  and all drivers talk on their phone while driving. Hardly saw any wearing seatbelts either.
Arrival in Athens saw us nut our way to the train station and get ourselves into town. On arrival to Syntagma Square a kind lady put us in the right direction and so we arrived at the Achilles Hotel. This was nice and close and we could walk to most places.
That afternoon we went for a walk and got mixed up in the demonstration/riot and took refuge at the underground station as we became overcome by teargas.  All the Athenians took off home on the train and so we stayed with staff until they checked if it was safe for us to go up. I think there will be more demos in the near future as they are not happy with the economic situation.
We visited the Acropolis, Parthenon, Hadrian's Arch and the Temple of Zeus. and  then walked to the Panathenaic Stadium - the stadium that hosted games for many centuries and where the  first Modern Olympics were held in 1896. In the 2004 Olympics the archery and the  finishing line of the marathon were  here  as well. ( an interesting tour)
We took a tour to Delphi the next day which overlooks the Gulf of Corinth from the slopes of Mt.Parnassos and there we saw more ruins. The drive up and back was quite scenic and relaxing.
Next day we set off to  catch the ferry to Santorini and due to getting lost as we came out of the hotel, changing trains and a twenty minute trip we missed the ferry by 3 minutes.( you can laugh as you picture me dragging a suitcase along the platform while running and then falling over) Not to be deterred we set about working out how to get there. Air tickets were nearly $300 each and so the man at the terminal booked us on the ferry for 7.00pm that night, so we went all the way back to the hotel and got our washing done and went for a walk. We then left 3hours before we needed to and sat on the boat and waited for departure.

After missing our comfortable seats on the morning ferry we had to sit it out until 12.45am and then organise a taxi to get there. That was no problem, but when we got there no one was around  and what we thought wa a code to get in turned out to be a phone number and as our phone was not working we had to sleep on the verander of the guest house until someone turned up at 8 o'clock the next morning to get the breakfast. Needless to say by that time I had a headache and was a bit emotional. (There was no charge for that night)
Later that day when we recovered we went for a walk and got lost amongst all the little laneways and blue roof whitewashed churches. Now I can understand why artists paint pictures of the little doors, they are fascinating. The next day we caught the local bus up to Oia and walked around there and then came back to view the sunset from our balcony which had spectacular views. The first night sunset was fantastic but the second night people would have been disappointed with it.( we also saw the red full moon on our first night, not that we were pleased about that) Anyway we are in Mykonos and enjoying just resting and wandering as it is a bit cold to be at the beach.
On these two islands people ride motor bikes and quad bikes, it is strange to see old people getting about on the motor bikes. Jack and I are not game enough to get on these as the driving around these islands is  an art  in itself. I think I would run over someone or crash into something. Some over the alley ways are about 2metres wide but the bikes still go down them. In the busy season it must be chaos with all the touirsts riding them.

Anyway time to eat again, next update will be from London

Love C & J

Egypt

 

….. and so that is the end of Egypt. I type this as I'm looking across the Red Sea at Saudi Arabia from the Bayview (Mecure Inn) in Dahab.

Arrived on the 28^h April at the quiet airport of Cairo, normally bustling with 100s of tourists. ((Oasis Hotel)

We went into town by shuttle to get our first glimpse of the city of Giza and what an eye-opener that was. Their taxis are suped – up combi vans with the engine bonnet up and the sliding door wide open so passengers can jump on and off easily. We were looking for Tahrir Square but heading in the wrong direction thanks to some locals who did not understand us.

First day we did a tour of the Egyptian Museum ( you need at least 2 days to see everything) which is beside Tahrir Square, where from inside the grounds we could see the burnt out police building and the building where Mrs. Mubarak had all her documents .( they burnt that too). Our hightlight was the trip to the Sound and Light Show at the pryamids. The story was about ancient Egypt and we only listened to about half of it (the same story was repeated throughout our tour )but we sat gazing at the pryamids and the sphinx for 2 hours with only about 50 others as they were lit up in different colours. The journey to get there was interesting in itself as we wove our way through the back streets of Giza.

The following day we went out again to the pyramids ( with an armed guard )and took heaps of photos and paid an Egyptian to take some funny photos that all tourists take. We went into one of the tombs and I went for a camel ride in front of the pryamids.

That night we went to the dingy train station to catch the train to Aswan, the cabin was about 1metre wide and 2 metres long with an open toilet to the track for all passengers to use and not in good shape. The bunks were flipped out after dinner(yuk) to sleep on sand we spent the night chugging along to Aswan.

Once at Aswan we went aboard our cruiser to spend 3 luxurious nights drifting down the Nile in about 40+ heat. We could sit up top or relax in air conditioning and watch the activity along the Nile.

There is a severe shortage of tourists in Egypt and so at least 60 boats were

moored at Luxor. One benefit for us was that wherever we went there were no crowds. At markets we were often the only 30 tourists there which is quite sad for Egypt.

On one occasion we took a taxi to a market and the cunning taxi driver took us to a completely different one ran by the government where he gets a commission for dropping tourists and extra commission for a sale. Luckily there was 15 of us and after looking around at their request we convinced them to take us for free to the right place. (safety in numbers)

The temples are all beautiful but we have seen so many we are over them. We saw Tutankhamun's remains at the Valley of the Kings and his mask and coffins at the Egyptian Museum- no crowds so we could take as long as we liked.

Security does not seem to be over done and we have been told that a lot of the Tourist Police have not returned to work since the revolution, but since we have arrived in Dahab we have been through several check points where there have been several armed guards. (I'm pretty sure that this is normal)

On Monday we went by jeep to the Blue hole for a snorkel in amongst camels walking up and down and kids trying to sell us jewellery - great day.

Tuesday was our big day – our trek up Mt. Sinai(what was I thinking)

We started off about 1.00pm after visiting St. Katherine's Monastery armed with plenty of food. After experiencing walking up 900 steps at Petra I decided that after walking 2kms that taking a camel was a good option. Jack was very brave and walked the whole way up while sweating profusely and breathing heavy.

I really enjoyed the views from the top of the camel and some said they thought it was better than the Grand Canyon. On reaching the top we had 4 hours to sit and relax and wait for the sunset. Eager to get down the 700 steps while there was still a bit of light we set off straight after the sun set. By the time we reached the bottom it was very dark and we appreciated the light from the torch.

Before we had reached the top the guide fell and injured his knee and was unable to go to the top so he sat at the beginning of the steps to the summit and waited for us to come back.

There are loads of things to tell you all about our fantastic journey but all that I can say is that I feel we have taken a giant step back in time and that Sovereign Hill appears to be quite modern compared to what we have witnessed- farming by hand, goats outside shops in Luxor, Bedouin people living in the desert with nothing around them, donkey and dray for transport, severe shortage of women on the streets, Egyptians desperate to sell anything, camels straying on the side of the roads, rubbish in and around Cairo and the Nile. Bemos and vans overloaded with people and a stray bull running down the street.

Forgot to mention that I was nearly robbed, the kid had his hand on my money in my bag which had been done up, but I yelled so loudly he dropped it - they got the next group that came along and managed to get score 200 E pounds.

We have met a banker for wealthy families in London(no hope with us) and a Canadian crime analyst with a retired Canadian cop.

We can say that we are so lucky to have had the most wonderful experience but we do have it good in Australia and I think it might be the best place to live. Off to Cairo at 4.00am in the morning and on to Greece on the 12th May.

Love  C &  J