London

We have just finished a 5 night stay in foggy London town, and it's been fantastic. I could spend all day writing about all the things we've seen and done, so Instead I'll make a list, in roughly chronological order:

* Shared a pint and a roast at the pub with Samantha (Hi Sam!)
* Slept in (a couple of times)
* Visited the local starbucks
* Walking tour (Buckingham Palace, Prince Charles' house, Big Ben, house of parliament, Trafalgar square etc.)
* Jack the Ripper tour (disgusting stories, but good tour. Met some interesting east end folk in the process, and a particularly annoying American. More on this later.)
* Tour of Lords cricket ground (By a slightly senile bloke that was old enough to have seen Bradman play)
* Walked across Abey Road (with every other tourist twat in London)
* Visited Harrod's department store (Predicably, Fiona loved it, I hated it. The bloke in the toilet expected a tip for pointing out where the soap was. Sod off, I can work that one out for free mate.)
* Visited Harrod's ice cream parlour (best thing all afternoon)
* Saw "Dirty Dancing" the musical (Somewhat embarrasingly, really enjoyed this. Lets refrain from questioning my sexuality and just put this down to a quality 80s soundtrack.)
* Caught up with James and Thomas at Hyde park (Jolly good fun. Hi James! Hi Thomas!)
* Visited the Churchill war rooms museum (excellent.)
* Ate bangers and mash with a pint of English ale
* Saw "Spamalot" the musical (By the monty python crew. Hillarious. Only thing funnier than the show was Fiona's laughing.)
* Serenaded Fee with the songs from "Spamalot" for 24 hours.
* Visited the tower of London (Fantastic. Especially if like me, you enjoy a good suit of armour and a gawk at the crown jewels)
* Walked over the tower bridge
* Had a sausage roll and pie with mash at the Borough markets.
* Saw Shakespeare's globe theatre.
* Had a nap.
* Caught up with Mick and Krysty for some pints, some foozball and some tapas. (Loved every minute. Hi Mick! Hi Krysty!)
* Caught a train to Chester.

...And that brings us up to now.

So, obviously there is heaps to do in London. We have only just scratched the surface. It does come at a price though, having easily been our most expensive stop so far, but as mainland Europe was much cheaper than we expected this hasn't been a big concern. It is also very crowded, although people generally seem very curteous and patient, so this helps a lot. Even when lugging around bags and inadvertantly getting in peoples way, they seem to just take it in their stride and you rarely cop a nasty look like I'm sure you would in Sydney.

I think the pubs also deserve a special mention. Many are underground, dimly lit and serve beer at room temperature and food that while tasty is probably taking years off your life. However they are very atmospheric and full of character, and once you're in one you really do feel like staying all day/afternoon/night. That summises my feelings about London in general quite well actually. It's not ideal, or particularly pretty, but it has so much atmosphere and character that you can't help but love it.

   

Ghosts in Edinburgh!

Edinburgh was our first stop in the UK and where we first met up with my parents and sister. For those who don't know Erin has been in the UK for about 9 months now and has done some pretty serious traveling while over here. Before we met up Erin had called us in Berlin and asked if we would do a ghost tour while in Edinburgh with her, she had found one that takes you into a locked part of the old graveyard. Who could say no to an offer like that!
We only had about 36 hours in Edinburgh so a Ghost Tour sounded like a great way to see some of the city at night, and here about the city's gory past.
Now I had never realised what a complete sook my little sister is! When we met up for the tour guide the guide starts by telling of all the ghostly accounts people have had on the tour. He advises us that they have over 3000 people willing to write about their own experiences, and many more who didn't want to go on the record. He then tells us of all the people who have been knocked out cold on this tour, or come back with unexplained marks and scratches. By this stage my sister was already white as a ghost (sorry about the pun) but when the guide advised the group we were on this tour at our own risk Erin was ready to go home!
Thankfully Erin decided to risk the tour on the condition she could hold my hand (I personally was glad someone was more scared then me as normally I'm the sook).
As we walked through the city we heard about the cities dark past, witch burning, plague pits and possibly the first recorded concentration camp. We worked our way to a graveyard. This graveyard is famous for a dog greyfriars bobby that was loyal to his owner after he died and sat on his grave everyday until he died (although this story is exaggerated and has been made into a Disney movie). The graveyard is also the resting place of Tom Riddle (you should know who that is).
In the corner of this grave yard there is a locked section only accessible on this tour. It has been locked by the city council due to a poltergeist that haunts this section.
This grave yard is creepy, it is very old and there are so many bodies that after heavy rain bones frequently come out of the ground. It is built next to the old city wall and some greaves actually have cages over them from back when stealing bodies to sell was an issue.
So the entire tour are standing in a crypt in the locked and haunted part of the grave yard (Erin and I still holding hands). The guide starts going into detail of how people are attacked in this particular crypt. Next thing a man in a cape leaps through the door of the crypt and scares the shit out of us. Erin and I scream. Erin leaps back so she is not attacked dragging me with her which would have been OK if she didn't step on the old lady behind her and both of us didn't smack into Simon. Eventually Erin calms down after calling the man a few choice words and Simon and I stop laughing.
This is the end of the tour and a pint is required to calm everyone's nerves!

Prague

Prague is probably the most beautiful city in the world, and has definitely been one of my favourite stops so far. This is despite the fact that it rained almost the entire time we were there.
The historical centre of Prague is beautiful, and it is like walking back in time or onto a movie set. We also found Prague to be rather inexpensive and it has the best street food ever!
We had a few days in Prague so we got to do a little bit of exploring.
One of the first things we did was walk into the town square to where the famous astronomical clock is. Now every hour this clock does a performance, and every hour hundereds of tourists crowd around to see it. Don't get me wrong this clock is beautiful and an amazing piece of work especially when you consider how old it is and what it does, but this "performance" is  a little bit ridiculous. A few doors open,  a skeleton rings a bell and there is some sort of chicken that clucks.
Clocks aside we saw some incredible things in Prague.
The beautiful castle where we saw the changing of the guards, Saint Nicholas's church (this lead to a strange conversation about why Santa has a church and how baby Jesus delivers presents at Christmas not Santa) and we crossed three beautiful Charles Bridge. An absolute highlight was the nuclear bunker tour, we got to hear about the communist occupation of the Czech Republic after WWII and the lead up to the Czech Republic becoming a Republic. As part of this tour we got to go into a nuclear bunker that was built by the communists. Within the bunker there is a climbing wall, bar and a museum (yep 3 things you expect in a bunker). In the museum there was an amazing collection of gas masks and gas mask products including gas mask cribs for baby's complete with hand pump for Mum to pump air into the crib. We even got to try on a gas mask and hold an assault rifle (Simon advised me after I posed with it for photos that it actually was a real rifle).
Food was a definite highlight in Prague (ok it has been a highlight of the whole trip!). In the main squares there are a head of market stands, and a heap of food stalls. These stalls sold corn on the cob, ham off the bone, chips, spiraled fried potatoes, cider and hot dogs. But my favourite were these amazing donought like creations called Trdelnik, which is basically dough rolled around a rolling pin and cooked on a grill then rolled in cinnamon and sugar. Delicious!
One of the most interesting restaurants we attended was in Prague. Simon had a minor case of man flu so had spent one afternoon in bed sleeping (this was the perfect opportunity for me to buy a bohemian crystal vase when he wasn't looking!) so we set out to find something close to the hotel that was somewhat healthy, mainly not deep fried and served in a smoky tavern. Just around the corner from the hotel we found a restaurant that served pretty standard food - meat and veggies which sounded perfect. What we didn't realise was that this was a themed restaurant. So as we opened the door to get a table and a man dressed like Fred Flinstone complete with animal skin and face paint rushed to meet us. We had walked in to a cave man themed restaurant! We were taken into a large room which was made up with fake rocks complete with cave art and large (hopefully fake) bones decorating the place. To order your meal you were given a large menu and each item had a corresponding code, you had to write the codes down on a supplied notepad and then.... bang a giant rock on your table to get your waiters attention. In fact anytime you wanted anything such a drink or the bill you had to bang your table rock. The wait staff were all looking like they were from the set of the Flinstones and spoke in some sort of cave man language. It was a really fun experience (and rather noisy with all the rocks being banged) and the food was fantastic!
Prague was really one of my favourite cities, everything in the historical centre was just beautiful and it is definitely a place I will be visiting again. Although leaving Prague I was faced with the issue of traveling while keeping a bohemian crystal vase safe....