Obrigado Portugal, e bom dias

Since our last entry a lot has happened and, as promised, I will not be quite as verbose. So here goes, Portugal in a page:

Our first real taste of Portugal was Oporto and it was one we both truly savoured. After a very stressful circumnavigation of the city several times, thanks to a lack of detailed city maps, we decided that although the drivers are maniacs and we love this city: its steep, narrow streets that cling to the hillside along the river; its bright blue skied sunny days and fabulous port (the alcoholic version); the blue and white mosaic tiles that adorn the churches and announce the shops; its skyline as seen from the bell tower at the Ireja Torre Dos Clerigos and the maitre D who goes to the trouble to get an English translation of what I was eating and write it down for me (figado means liver by the way and I really wished that I had waited until I’d finished eating it to ask him that!).



From there it was on to Coimbra – via a picturesque drive through the Douro valley where they grow the grapes to make the lovely port - where we spent 2 days engrossed in history. We saw the 18th century university library that contains books from the 16th century and where there is a colony of bats living that eat the bugs that would feed on the books and destroy them! We walked through the Arco de Almedina - remnants of a Moorish town wall – and saw the chapel where 2 of Portugal’s kings are buried.
I even saw my first squirrel up close and personal in a surprise encounter in a park.

When we left Coimbra we drove via Conimbriga which contains Portugal’s largest remains of Roman ruins – Margot you would have loved it; mosaics galore and yes, I took photos for you. James was in heaven and remained there when we drove to Tomar to see Convento de Cristo which relates back to the Knights Templar. Unfortunately for me, whilst it was very pretty, there was no armour decked Orlando Bloom riding around to get me all excited about knights. Oh well, maybe I’ll get to see Johnny Depp in France somewhere.


We had 2 full days at Cascais from which to see Sintra and Lisbon. We thought one day at each would suffice but in retrospect, we would have skipped the big L and spent both days at world heritage listed Sintra. Whilst there we saw the Palacio Nacional de Sintra and the Palacio Nacional da Pena and both were well worth it. The painted ceilings of Sintra were unlike any we have seen and the eclectic style of, and the fairytale (read Brothers Grimm here, not the Disneyland version) park that surrounds, Pena were just WOW! Tip for future travelers, give a whole day to just seeing Pena and its park, you certainly won’t be lost for things to see. By comparison, Lisbon the next day was disappointing. Unlike previous cities it just had no vibe and nothing to draw us there, other than the view from the Castelo de Sao Jorge.


The following day we left for Seville and on the drive made the following comments, given that this is the first country we have seen as a whole and to which we will not be returning on this trip:

o Great port custard tarts, love the kid (the meat, not the small child, despite the liver part which really was quite tasty until I knew what it was) but road tolls really suck.
o People were really friendly (no elbowing here) and are the best English speakers yet.
o How many gum trees can you get outside of Australia? Apparently a lot, they’re everywhere.

Something else!

The last entry James posted was brief, given that the one before that it might be our last if we didn’t make it out of Paris alive, and given our problems with the internet we just wanted to make sure everyone knew that we were alive. So here is the more detailed version of events.

Monday 1 October – very stressful drive from Paris to a little hamlet called La Musse after being given directions to it by the French guy who we had emailed to book a B and B (but given issues with internet were not sure if he got it – apparently not, and he was leaving for New York that night anyway!) and had our first true French home cooked meal which we shared with an English couple who could speak French and could thank god translate for us when my very meager school French failed us – which was quite often.

Tuesday 2 October – despite the threatening rain we spent the day at Versailles and it was magnificent. The rain stopped 5 minutes before we parked and started 5 minutes after we left so we were very happy given that we don’t have an umbrella or raincoats as we wanted to reduce packing (and frankly forgot to pack any!) It was definitely a highlight for both of us and the gardens and rooms were beyond opulent. The only thing that marred the opulence was all the bloody tourists wandering around spoiling the view. Today we learnt our 3 lesson on the trip so far: how to use a prepaid phone card, which was more tricky than it looked given that the instructions were all in French and it took me 3 goes back into the post office to get instructions in broken English. The first 2 things we learned: Paris is expensive, shops shut early on a Sunday afternoon so if you want to buy anything cheap for dinner you have to do it earlier, or be hungry!

Wednesday 3 October – Rouen to try and sort internet issue (obviously not sorted) and that was about it. It was an emergency stop to try and book accommodation for the next few days and we thankfully managed to do so thanks to internet cafes.

Thursday 4 October – Off to see the famous Bayeux tapestry which was fabulous and extremely well preserved given that it is over 900 years old and had to be rescued from being used as a cover to wrap up weapons and prevent from being cut up. Drove northeast to Omaha Beach and Pointe du Hoc where the Americans landed at Normandy and then on to Monte St Michel which looks incredible from a distance and which we had a fabulous view of from our bedroom window (see picture in previous entry to be insanely jealous and then imagine it at night all lit up and be even more so).

Friday 5 October – Mt St Michel up close and personal and then a side trip to St Malo (just north westish) where we spent the afternoon walking around the ramparts of the old fortified town and watched some boat races on the beach (again, see me doing my best impression of a Japanese tourist posing for a photo on the beach). It was a beautiful day but was still quite cold and only dogs and crazy Russians who had stripped down to their underwear were swimming.

Saturday 6 – a long driving day to Xanton Chassenon which is in the Loire valley and was south of Angers. Stopped at Angers to watch the rugby and were very disappointed to lose – especially as we were in our Wallabies jerseys and sitting next to French supporters who were desperately hoping we’d lose so they wouldn’t have to play us (and ironically as I’m sitting here typing this France is playing England and it’s the start of the second half). Lesson number 4 was learnt today: when in doubt and the bloody roundabouts that the French seem so fond of aren’t on the map, follow any sign that says ‘toutes directions’ until you find one that says what you want it to. Sunday was spent walking 14kms around the Loire on back lanes. Funny me thought that this would be a relaxing few days but apparently we need the exercise.

Monday 8 – Lesson 5: buy bread in the morning because nothing seems to be open on a Monday, what is with the French and this open when we want to attitude? Don’t they know that I’m on my honeymoon and it’s supposed to be PERFECT?? Arrived in Bordeaux where I was assaulted on the street while returning from the laundromat by a large woman of African descent, again, how does this fit with perfection? Perhaps it is karma for being quite chuffed with the fact that everyone else had to go back to school today and we could eat pain au chocolate and drink espresso whenever we felt like it.

Tuesday 9 – thank god, crepes. We have missed dinner and lunch lately and the dessert crepes we ate for lunch today were to die for, and I think some of my arteries did with all of the chocolate intake. Then it was off to Gascony to make up for the lack of food by eating and drinking our way through the next few days.

Wednesday 10 – Friday 12 – Eating, drinking and planning our foray into Spain with the help of our lovely Band B hosts Bruce and Jenny who gave many useful suggestions re Spain and what to see was all that was done. It was the longest we have stayed in any one place and it was nice to stop and relax. Great food: ‘duck bits’ salad and foix gras (the area is known for duck) and I even ate the duck hearts in my salad; crème brulee and chocolate dessert stuff that was heavenly; wine by the ½ litre; duck leg; lamb oh my god we certainly made up for the not eating lately.

Saturday 13 and Sunday 14 –

left France for Spain and spent the afternoon at

St Sebastian and then drove to Bilbao to see the Guggenheim. Tapas is great and the Guggenheim was another highlight for both of us where we spent over 3 hours enjoying the art and architecture.

Monday 15 and Tuesday 16 went to Picos de Europa where we did some walking in the mountains and saw some spectacular scenery.

Today, Wednesday 17 we’re in Salamanca, the white city for a few days. Our next update will be from Portugal and I promise will not be as detailed as this one, I just didn’t want anyone to feel cheated out of 10 days of what you’re missing out on! Plus, any chance to rub it in is good with me! Adios!

We are still alive!

It’s a shame, but we have discovered that not all internet connections are created equally, or at least, they are not as accessible by our Compaq as we would have liked. For some reason, and I have spent numerous hours trying to work it out, the laptop we brought will not access the internet in France through a wireless connection. We have no problems picking up a wireless, and at times have excellent connectivity, but we just don’t seem to be able to get the net. Internet cafes unfortunately do not always allow you to upload images and can be quite expensive. All suggestions for a fix would be most welcome.

Since our last entry we have seen the Palace of Versailles, the Bayeux tapestry, visited Mont St Michel, walked the fields of the Loire valley and eaten the best crepes in Bordeaux. If you say it fast it doesn’t sound like much but it accounts for the last 10 days.

Our current location, at the time of writing anyway, is Gascogne in the south of France. We have been staying in a little village, once fortified, called St Justin, not far from the town of Marciac. Looking out our bedroom window we can see the Pyrenees in the distance. Today we did a tour of the local countryside, having lunch in Auch, west of Toulouse.
Tomorrow, we go to Spain!

JH

PS Special thanks to Jenny and Bruce Lawson for allowing us access to the net at their home.

I love Paris in the Autumn!

It’s true; Paris in winter was stark, bare and beautiful, but Paris in Autumn is spectacular. The temperature dropped by about 15o from Hong Kong and the city when we arrived was mostly asleep being a Saturday morning at 8am. As we couldn’t check in until 2pm we spent the hours by walking down to Notre Dame via the Place de la Republic and the Bastille. The air was crisp, the trees were changing and the place felt so much slower than Hong Kong as the streets were less crowded and there were places to stop and sit and drink in the scenery. Our plan to watch the rugby didn’t go quite as expected but we did manage to see the second half and spent the afternoon despairing at how quickly our Euros were disappearing and how much more expensive everything was – especially when compared with HK!

Sunday was (for me at least) the best day by far as we could not have asked for a better day weather wise. The walk down the Champs Elysee – after successfully managing to negotiate the Metro which didn’t end up quite as scary as we thought it would be – was wonderful and I must say both James and I felt slightly more chic today than walking around yesterday after our 12 hour flight. We walked through the Jardins des Tuileries and it was a mixture of brown leaves, colourful gardens and lots and lots of Irish Rugby fans. I learned, upon asking a couple of said Irish supporters to take our photo there, quite a bit about us from the following conversation with the guy taking our photo:
Irish guy: where do you want to stand?
James: over there Me: over there (pointing in opposite directions)
Irish guy: that’d be right he wants a naked statue in the background and she wants flowers!
Me: What naked statue? I didn’t see any naked statue.
Then again, perhaps it says more about the Irish than us!

Today we are off to pick up the car and negotiate our way out of Paris. Both James and I are a bit apprehensive about this as we have seen the map, seen the traffic and know that we have to drive on the wrong side of the road. Oh well, this may be our last entry and if so, at least I had fun in Paris. If not, then it is the start of a new adventure with (no doubt) many wrong turns yet to come! SH