April 7 - 10: Road Trip! Denver, Moab, Ogden and Whitefish (Heidi)

First of all can I apologise for this being so far behind... It was James' turn to write the next post, seeing as we've been going turn about, but he's been far too busy with trains for that... Hardly surprising, is it? ;-)

Thursday April 7

Despite grand intentions of getting an early start, we slept in again. We ate breakfast at the Four Seasons again, this time both of us opted for pancakes. James had the bourbon pancakes and I had the ricotta, ginger and lemon. They were actually a little disappointing. From the description I thought the ricotta was going to be in the pancakes, but instead there was just some spread on top and a little pitcher of lemon and ginger flavoured syrup. It tasted far better in my head.

Once we had packed we had the valet bring our car around and, once we'd jammed all our crap back in and set the GPS, we were on our way. Not far though. There was a train shop James wanted to go to before we left town and he promised he would be as quick as he could. After 75 minutes sitting in the carpark in a hot car (the weather was quite warm in Denver that day) I was over it and he's lucky he didn't take any longer or he would have been walking to Utah. We finally were on our way a bit after midday.

Lucky for him I soon got over my grumpiness thanks to the beautiful scenery. We went over the Rockies again and there was plenty to 'ooh' and 'aah' about. At lunch we committed a terrible sin and stopped at a Mc Donalds. I won't do that again soon - the buns on their burgers here are very sweet and I really didn't like my chicken burger thanks to that. At least the fries were edible. Our goal that day was to make it to Moab in Utah. Thanks to our late start we were unsure if we would make it so decided to play it by ear and were tossing up staying the night in Grand Junction, but made it there earlier than we thought so decided to eat dinner there and then push on. Dinner was at The Ale House and we were so glad we stopped. The food was great and James was rather fond of their beer too - he tried the Lucky U Pale Ale and even bought the shirt. The food was overwhelming though and neither of us was able to finish our meal. I think James is starting to feel less of a man for his inability to finish an American-size full rack of ribs. They are huge!

We arrived in Moab about 8pm and checked into the Super 8 - daggy and a little musty, but very cheap and perfectly acceptable when you just need a bed. Hard to take after the Four Seasons though! I think we fell asleep as soon as our heads hit the pillow.

Friday April 8

We finally managed to get ourselves up and away at a decent hour! The good thing about the 'cheap and cheerful' motels such as the Super 8 is the free breakfast. Once we'd had something to eat, packing was fairly quick and easy as we'd not really had time to make too much of a mess and very soon we were on our way. First stop for the day was Dead Horse Point State Park. Sounds nice, huh? Wondering how it got its name? Well, apparently back in the wild west days, a bunch of cowboys used to use a corral at Dead Horse Point that only had a very narrow entry/exit to store horses they had caught. They fenced it off so they couldn't escape. Supposedly, one day they left the gate open so a group of horses they didn't want could get out while they were away. However, for some reason the horses didn't get out and they all died of thirst, even though the Colorado River was so close by.

The landscape in the area is quite amazing - huge mountains where plates of rock have been shaped by the force of wind and water of the centuries. We made our way to the visitor's centre first to find out a little about the park and were blown away, almost literally, at how windy it was. Little did we know, we hadn't seen anything yet. Dead Horse Point lookout was about another 10 minutes up the road so we drove up to check out the view. It's quite an amazing site - the Colorado River winds its way around the bottom of a deep canyon - but it's not easy to see when you have a face full of dirt and your own hair as the bone-chilling wind whips at you and threatens to blow you over backwards. It really wasn't that cold a day, but the chill factor in the wind was just nasty. We braved it for as long as we could before retreating to the car where it took me a good five minutes to get all the knots out of my hair.

Next stop was Arches National Park. Utah is famous for the natural arches in this park and apparently there's over 2000 of them. We didn't see nearly that many as we were pressed for time, but we did go and see Delicate Arch - probably the most famous - as well as a couple of others along the way. Once again we were nearly blown away by the wind. I guess I should have expected it seeing as it would take some pretty extreme forces to create the things we saw, but I obviously hadn't really thought about it. I would love to go back to Arches again and spend more time exploring the amazing landscapes.

We ducked back in to Moab for a quick lunch at Denny's (cheap, but better than Maccas!) before we hit the road to Ogden. Ogden is just outside of Salt Lake City and I was doing my first lot of highway driving for this trip. Probably not the best leg to have started on... Utah drivers are terrible and got progressively worse as we neared Salt Lake. Everyone was speeding and weaving through the traffic - and I suppose it was even worse being the tail end of peak-hour on a Friday night.

We consulted with Jill and decided to stay at the Days Inn in Ogden - probably a little bit nicer than Super 8 but owned by the same company so kind of similar. The Days Inn boasts the largest indoor pool in Utah and it was fall of kids splashing around, having a marvelous time. Our room looked over the pool so we were grateful it closed at 10pm.

For dinner we decided to try Roosters Brewing Company and Restaurant in downtown Ogden. It's obviously a very popular place and we had to wait a few minutes before a table came available. James sampled their very cheekily named beer - Polygamy Pale Ale - and bought the shirt which proclaims 'I tried Polygamy in Utah' on the front... I decided to pass on the ladies version which had the choice of 'First Wife' or 'Sister Wife' on the front. I can't wait to see peoples' reactions when James wears his back home... The food was sensational and we had a great time.

Saturday April 9

Before we could leave Ogden we had to make two stops - first for coffee, and then Union Station so James could do some train-stalking... I mean railfanning. Once he'd satisfied himself he had photographed every train and container possible, we hit the highway again and were soon on our way towards Missoula, in Montana. Once again, Utah drivers on the way out of Ogden were all nuts, but thankfully we soon left that all behind and were out on the open road again. It was a fairly uneventful day other than a few trains to photograph and we arrived in Missoula late afternoon. We had dirty laundry coming out our ears so our accommodation that night was to be decided on whether or not they had a laundry. After a few stops we decided on the Holiday Inn Express and it was definitely a step up from the Super 8 or Days Inn. The girl at the check-in desk was most curious as to why we were in Missoula and very nicely gave us a lovely room overlooking the river. Besides the laundry, one of the biggest plusses was the lift which meant we didn't have to attempt to cart our bags up a couple of flights of stairs like we had at other places. That was nice!

For dinner we grabbed a table at the Iron Horse Brew Pub in town. James tried some local brews and I was stuck with a root beer as I'd left my ID at the hotel. Nice root beer, but they had a fabulous cocktail list that I wished I could have taken advantage of.

Sunday April 10

We were up earlyish to take advantage of the motel's hot breakfast (also a step up from the continental breakfast at other places) and coin laundry but didn't have far to drive that day and didn't have to check out until midday (nice!) so took advantage of the extra time to reorganise our bags and sort a few things out.

Once again there was trains to chase at Union Station Missoula before we could go anywhere, but we were soon on the road again.

Once again the drive was pretty, but fairly uneventful. The 93 skirted us around the edge of Flathead Lake which was just stunning. I can imagine it's particularly popular with families in the summer!

Originally we had planned on heading straight to Essex from Missoula, but the hotel we were to stay at had no mobile reception and no in-room phones and I was expecting a call that night so we had to do a reshuffle. Whitefish is about an hour outside of Glacier National Park and a very cute and relaxed little town. We arrived mid afternoon and checked in at the Big Mountain Lodge, which used to be a Holiday Inn Express. Big Mountain Lodge boasts the biggest indoors waterslide - I was most disappointed that I didn't get to use it or the hot tubs out the back. Ah well... Once we'd unpacked and figured a few things out we went for a drive to see what trains we could see. We found a nice little loop that ran either side of the tracks and found a couple of trains just waiting around wanting to be photographed.

Once they had been shot from every angle we went back to the motel for a quick shower and change before grabbing dinner at a lovely little restaurant in town - Tupelo. Unfortunately they only had wine, no cocktails, but it was a lovely meal. Our waitress was most amused when she brought our meals out and had to ask James to stop trying to make out with my hand so she could put his meal on the table. Quite funny, but you had to be there. After dinner we wandered across the street to 'the tallest building in Whitefish' - it's a whole three floors!! - the Draught House, which is Great Northern Brewing Company's brew pub. We sampled a few beers and I was particularly taken by their Wild Huckleberry beer - beautiful! James took a liking to both it and the Big Sky IPA. It was a very quite night in town and we were pretty tired so we soon called it a night.

April 5 - 6 Anniversary and birthday in Denver (Heidi)

Tuesday April 5

When we did the online check-in the night before our flight to Denver, the only seats we could have had side-by-side were the very back row and I was less than excited at the prospect. So, we decided to select seats that weren't together and then ask the next day if something could be done, in the hope that it might mean an upgrade. If we were simply given the back row seats then so be it. But this time, I got my wish! We arrived at O'Hare and proceeded to the bag drop where I told the lady that when we had done the check-in there wasn't any seats together and that, seeing as it was our wedding anniversary, we really wanted to sit together, could she help? She went away and came back and handed us our tickets to seats 13A and 13B - American Airlines' Economy Plus class. All it really meant was some extra leg room but we were very happy.

There was a little turbulence along the way but otherwise it was a pretty smooth flight and a good landing. Soon we were inside Denver International where we had to catch a little train to get to the other terminal so we could collect our luggage. It reminded me of Narita in Japan. We grabbed our bags and then went and jumped on the Avis bus to go collect our hire car.

The guy at Avis tried to upsell us to an SUV, but after much debate between the two of us we decided to stick to the original plan and go with our Ford Fusion - so far we've been very happy with that decision. The Fusion's fuel economy is nearly as good as the Mini! Not quite, but close and when you've got thousands of miles to drive, the economy is important.

While in New York we decided to buy a GPS rather than renting one. We bought a Garmin which is the same brand that we rented last time and we were very happy to discover that this one has the same voice - Jill. So once we had piled all our junk into the car, we set Jill and told her to take us to the Four Seasons in Denver. It was our anniversary after all!

Arriving at the Four Seasons was almost like being in a different world. The kind of hotels we stay in normally are the kind where you park your car outside your room and cart all your own crap in. No such thing at the Four Seasons. There was immediately 2 valet parking assistants there to open the doors of the car for us. They then unloaded everything and put it into a trolley for us. We got our ticket for the car, handed them the keys and were told to just go inside, they would bring our luggage to the room. We checked in and were told that they had given us an upgrade (score!) and were soon on our way to the 13th floor - third from the top! The room was amazing. A bathroom the size of our bedroom in Paris greeted us on the left complete with a TV screen in the mirror, a shower, a bath (I'm used to showers in baths!) and two basins. The room was enormous and best of all was the massive king bed with the most comfortable pillows I have ever slept on. I'm still kicking myself for not checking what brand they were. And we had a pretty nice view out to the mountains too.

Despite the lush surroundings, we decided to venture out and check out the 16th Street Mall and the State Capitol Building before we doubled back down the mall to go check out Millennium Park and then cross the river to have a look at a local adventure store, REI, where there was an information centre about the Rocky Mountain National Park. Unfortunately the info stand had already closed for the day but we poked around and got some brochures which proved very helpful the next day.

Once we were done at REI we made our way back into town and stopped at the historic Tattered Cover bookstore before getting dinner at the nearby Wynkoop Brewery which is just near Union Station. The brewery was established by the former mayor of the same name and had some very interesting beers, including a stout made from milk - really good! They also had a restaurant so we ate there - ribs of course! Afterwards James wanted to look at their merchandise and struck up a conversation with some of the staff. They must have liked him as he was given some tokens for free beers! On our way back to the hotel I stopped at 7 Eleven to buy some water for the next day while James went to make a dinner reservation. Soon we were back at the hotel enjoying a soak in the tub.

Wednesday April 6

We had grand intentions of an early start but they went out the window. My family called at 5am to wish me a happy birthday and then I went back to sleep and didn't wake til closer to 8. I'm allowed a sleep-in on my birthday though, right? We made our way down to the hotel's restaurant for breakfast - James had french toast with huckleberry sauce and I had waffles with strawberries. Both very nice. Once again I was amazed at the level of service - our waiter joked that I was doing him out of his job because I poured my own cup of coffee! So this is how the other half live, huh? James even liked the latte they made for him enough that we didn't have to go out in search of another coffee place to get his fix - hallelujah!

We had preplanned our trip with Jill so once we had the valet bring our car around, we hit the road towards Golden to take the 'scenic' route into Rocky Mountain National Park. It was well worth it. Although it was an overcast and foggy day, the scenery was absolutely beautiful. We stopped for lunch at Backcountry Pizza in the ski town of Nederland where James continued the theme of the trip and tried a Steel Head IPA beer. Soon after we hit the road again we found ourselves driving in very light snow! It melted as soon as it touched anything, but it was quite magical and the first time James had seen falling snow which made it pretty exciting. We arrived at the information centre at Beaver Meadows about 2pm and, just as we were about to go inside, we were stopped by a journalist from AP who asked us if we were aware that the potential government shutdown thanks to their inability to agree on a budget would mean that we wouldn't be able to access national parks as they would be shut down. Um... No... He then interviewed us about how a shutdown would affect us if it went ahead. I haven't seen if the footage was used anywhere yet, but I'll definitely be having a look through our AP resources when I get back to work. Thankfully the shutdown did not happen - it went right down to the wire, but they eventually came to an agreement on the Friday night, saving us a lot of bother.

We chatted to the staff inside the information centre who suggested a route for us to take and soon we were on our way. Just before the park entry gate we came across a whole herd of elk grazing on the roadside - our first encounter with the wildlife. I was very excited. We paid our entry fee and made our way up through the mountains to our first stop - Bear Lake. I really had no idea what to expect in the snow but wow - it was fantastic! We had to clamber over a snow drift and then make our way a short way through some trees to get to Bear Lake. The view was nice, but the most exciting part was just walking in snow! James got a little bit too excited and stacked it after stepping on some ice, but it was quite funny and didn't slow us down. We had a great time just jumping around in the snow and I now know why it's referred to as powder. Once we were done goofing around we jumped back in the car and headed to our next stop - Spague Lake. It was pretty but the snow wasn't as fresh and fun as it had been at Bear Lake. Next stop was the Alluvial Fan which is a rock formation created by the force of water coming down the mountain when a dam burst in the 80s. Several people were killed in the incident. The rocks were carried down the mountain and dispersed at this spot, apparently in the shape of a fan. Personally I couldn't see it, but I wondered if maybe it would be more obvious from above as it's quite a large area. Unfortunately we were fast running out of time so we had to hit the road and head back to Denver once we were done at the fan. Instead of the scenic route, we took the highway which was considerably faster, but also considerably less scenic.

After a quick wardrobe change we made it to the Vesta Dipping Grill just in time for our 730pm reservation. At Vesta you choose your meat and then you can either go with their recommended side sauces to dip your meat in, or choose your own from their comprehensive list. James sampled some more local beer - Great Divide Denver Pale Ale. Our meals were lovely and the standout sauces of the evening were the sweet corn and the BBQ. We decided to order a dessert and share it and went with an apple dish. It was a little odd - basically it was a whole apple, peeled and cored, which was then rolled in a toffee and crumbly coating. It was served sliced up with a couple of dipping sauces and some ice cream. It was nice, but not quite what either of us had imagined. And most of all, not what James had imagined. Unknown to me, when James made our reservation the night before, he had organised for me to get a special birthday dessert. Apparently the person who took our booking forgot to pass that message on though, so it never eventuated. It's the thought that counted though! We went and grabbed a free beer at Wynkoop Brewery before making our way back to the hotel and having another soak in the tub. All-in-all, a fantastic birthday!

March 30 to April 5 - New York and Chicago (James)

Wednesday 30 March

Our trans-Atlantic flight was pretty good and we were soon at JFK, which must have had a facelift in recent years. It had a much more modern appearance than my earlier visits, when I remember thinking the decor must have been pretty good when it was installed in 1973. We made arrangements for our shuttle to our hotel - the Club Quarters Downtown and we were soon on our way... but that is where the speed ended. Shuttles can be a hit or miss affair at the best of times and our total trip time was about 2 hours. No late afternoon adventures this time, as it was after 7pm by the time we were at the hotel. Traffic was pretty busy, we were the last group on the shuttle to be dropped (they even picked one up on the way!) and our driver was insane enough to handle NYC traffic. I had the pleasure of sitting up front with him this time, which was rather amusing.

Our hotel was nice. We booked it through Hotwire, which is a website where you specify the neighbourhood, the quality (stars) and the price range but you don't find out the name of the hotel until after you have booked your room. You can normally get the rooms far cheaper but they don't advertise the hotel name as the hotels don't like you knowing how much cheaper you could get it. Ours was about a 4 star and we got it for about $110/night - cheap for NYC!

Club Quarters was right down the end of Manhattan, only a block up from Wall Street and the subway stop. The location was great for us, as most of the attractions we wanted to see this time were in that area. As it was a business area, it was nice and quiet after dark (no honking taxis all night), there were plenty of restaurants and bars, our room was spacious and clean.

We rugged up and ventured out for dinner and a quick jaunt to check out the Statue of Liberty at dark. It was not quick enough, boy was it cold! We hurried back to a nice little Japanese restaurant the hotel recommended. Heidi quickly ordered some goyza for a starter. She enjoyed her pork with ginger mains and my pork katsudon was very tender and one of the best I've had.

Thursday 31 March

The day began with a quick breakfast at a diner just down the road, catering for the hurried Wall St types. Heidi reacquainted herself with cream cheese bagels and I had a bacon and egg sandwich. It was a rather miserable day and we were pretty much frozen by the time we got to Battery Park and looking out at Lady Liberty. We didn't really want to stand in the drizzle and line up for the Liberty cruise, so we decided to take a couple of photos and move on. Just as well, as we realised that I had left the battery and memory card for the camera back in the hotel. At least our hotel wasn't as far away as when I did the same thing in Hiroshima last year.

After their recovery, we went down to Wall Street, the New York Stock Exchange , St Paul's church (one of the churches used as a refuge during the collapse of the World Trade Center buildings), Ground Zero and the associated rebuilding works, the Sep 11 Memorial Center.

After a quick shopping expedition into JR Electronics, we then trekked it across the Brooklyn Bridge and down to the Brooklyn Bridge Park. Due to the weather, the bridge and the park were all pretty quiet and we were rather amused by the dog we saw in the park that was wearing booties to help protect it from the cold ground. We braved the cold for as long as possible and found a nice little pizzeria in the nearby "Dumbo" development for lunch. I had a slice of their Buffalo Chicken pizza which was absolutely amazing - the blue cheese sauce topping was so yummy!

Before we got to New York I had considered taking Heidi to Yankee Stadium today for their Opening Day - the first game of the baseball season for the Yankees. The prices were a bit steep and our time in NYC was fairly limited, so we decided to give it a miss this time. Our decision was justified with the weather of the day, which included a forecast of snow. Fortunately the pizzeria included a big screen teevee showing the game, so I was able to catch a couple of innings of the game during lunch. For the record, Yankees won.

We caught the subway from Brooklyn back to midtown and headed towards the High Line Park, which is another great example of New Yorkers' ability to make the most of what they've got and dedicate the use of land and infrastructure for public open spaces. In its former life, the High Line was built in the 1930s to elevate the tracks of a freight railroad above the Manhattan streets to prevent the many fatalities that were occurring due to accidents. The railroad delivered milk, meat, produce and raw and manufactured goods to the upper levels of the many factories and warehouses on the west side. The last freight train ran in 1980 and the line sat dormant since, over-run with weeds and decay.

Subsequent New York mayors had long planned to remove the infrastructure, claiming the line was preventing growth in the area. In 1999 a local "Friends of the High Line" group formed to advocate the preservation of the line and to turn it into an open space for community use. The plan eventually received support from city hall and the rest, as they say, is history. Stage 1 opened to the public in 2009 and Stage 2 is due to open in spring 2011 - we can't have missed it by too much. Negotiations are continuing with the freight railroad to secure the remaining section of the High Line for a future Stage 3.

The park itself has been a huge success for the area, known as the Meat Packing District due to its former industrial life, and redevelopment of the area is well underway and it is now one of New York's current hip neighbourhoods. On the way to the park we stopped into the Grammercy Markets for an afternoon coffee (9th St Espresso) and an amazing cupcake at Eleni's. The variety of bakeries, fresh groceries, gourmet foods, snack bars and coffee shops was amazing.

Despite the cold wind, we explored the High Line from start to finish and were thoroughly impressed. We'll definitely have to return when the weather is warmer, the trees actually have leaves on them and flowers are blooming. It was very interesting to look at the adjacent buildings and see where the freight cars were delivered into the buildings thanks to bridges across the street.

Once again we jumped on the subway and headed up to the Rockerfeller Center. In 2008 the rain and low clouds prevented us from checking out the Manhattan skyline from either the Empire State Building or Rockerfeller and it seems we are cursed. We decided the ride to the top in this weather wasn't worth it and we spent some time checking out the roses, the ice skaters, Niketown and the lego shop instead.

By now it was dusk and the temperature was still about zero and after a day of walking, we were pretty well buggered. Another subway ride and we were back to downtown and shivering our way to the Heartland Brewhouse for a sample of their fine ales and a hearty feed. I don't think I've ever come across a plate of ribs so big! Their Indiana River Light Pale Ale was particularly tasty! We rugged up, ventured home and were soon fast asleep.

Friday 1st April.

We awoke to news reports of snow (no joke) in the outer areas of New York City and we prepared ourselves for another day of near freezing temperatures. I had made arrangements to visit a friend in New Jersey, so we caught the subway up to Penn Station and were soon aboard New Jersey Transit's train 10:52 train to Dover. The sight of snow flakes falling along the way was quite magical, but made us slightly apprehensive about just how cold it was going to be when we got off the train.

After an hour on the train we got off at Convent station and my mate Dave soon had us at his office in Wippany NJ for a couple of hours of catching up. It was the first time for both of us to visit New Jersey and it was a nice day out of the city. We got back to Manhattan about 4pm and did some shopping around Penn Station - Macy's got its customary visit, as did the souvenir shops around the Empire State Building. Dinner was a delightful little pizza kitchen near our hotel and Heidi really liked her bruschetta pizza! Another visit to the Big Apple came to an end.

Saturday 2nd April

After the debacle with the arrival shuttle, we decided to just cab it to JFK for our early morning flight to Chicago. We couldn't afford a late arrival and the cab was only $10 more to get us there on-time at a reasonable hour. Our jetBlue flight was uneventful and soon my friend Chad was picking us up from the O'Hare airport. After dropping our bags off, Chad soon had us trackside at Eola Yard to check out some of Chicago's rail action. Chicago's weather was surprisingly warmer than NYC and the sun even made frequent appearances. Eola was quiet busy and quite a few railfans were out. After a while we dropped Heidi off at the local Premium Outlet shopping mall and Chad and I ventured out to West Chicago for some more trains.

Chad's wife Angela was out in Ohio for work for the weekend, so we dropped into a local Asian restaurant for dinner. Wow, what a place. It was an interesting mix of Chinese, Korean, Thai and Japanese foods and had an enormous selection of meals and drinks. Slushies seemed to be the speciality on the drinks menu and Chad (avocado), Heidi (coconut tea) and myself (watermelon) all enjoyed our offerings. Our giant sized meals were delicious and there was enough left overs to feed Chad and Angela for days.

Sunday 3rd April

After a quick breakfast and an introductory lesson on how to use their flash coffee machine, Chad took us off to the Two Brothers brewery for a pre-lunch tour of the facility and a sample of their ales. We had originally planned to spend more of today chasing trains but yesterdays glorious weather had turned into a rather bleak looking morning. I really enjoyed their pale ale and Heidi was quite taken with their coconut flavoured beer. I think she is still disappointed they aren't bottling it yet - almost as disappointed as Angela was when she had learned that she missed out on the tour.

We walked off lunch around the downtown Naperville area. After Angela arrived home we ventured out to Wildfire restaurant, which Chad had introduced us to last time. Heidi joined the sampling spirit and got the martini sampler and I tried another local pale ale. My ribs were as good as last time and Heidi enjoyed her pork and prawns. Angela gave us both a taste of her bison fillet and we were amazed at how flavorsome and tender it was. We all grabbed some dessert from the Cheesecake Factory across the road and returned back home to enjoy another awesome Key Lime flavoured tart. Yum!

Monday 4th April

The Chicago Cubs began their baseball season on Friday against the Pittsburg Pirates and were playing them again this afternoon. Like yesterday, we considered the bleak and cold weather of the morning not good baseball watching weather. The game didn't start until 1pm, so Heidi and I ventured off to do some window shopping along Michigan Avenue whilst Chad and Angela worked. If the weather fined up we were always able to reschedule and meet the guys at Wrigley Field at lunch. We were soon on a Metra train heading downtown with a carriage full of students enjoying "Monday Fun-Day" on their way to the ballgame... and serious drunkenness.

The last time we shopped Michigan Ave it was seriously cold... today was no different. We sampled Intelligistia Coffee, found our way to the river and headed up Michigan. We were glad to finally arrive at the John Hancock Observatory building and took refuge over lunch in the Skyline lounge - enjoying a bowl of nachos and a couple of mini-cheeseburgers (sliders) plus another local beer - this time an Emmets pale ale. All very tasty! This building is one of the tallest in Chicago and like the Willis Tower (nee Sears Tower) has an observation platform offering views of the Chicago skyline. The cost to get to the observation platform is more than a couple of drinks at the Skyline lounge, so we enjoyed our "free" view from the lounge's 96th floor before heading back to the streets and down to the old Navy Pier.
This redeveloped pier is usually packed with tourists and locals enjoying themselves on the Lake Michigan shore, however the place was a ghost town today thanks to the weather. Somehow we managed to brave the cold wind and walked the full length of the pier and back. There was a "stained glass museum" inside the pier that was interesting and quite random. By now it was getting on in the afternoon and we were pretty buggered from all the walking, so we heading back to the station via Millennium Park.

After sampling some last night, I was keen to try some more bison, so after we got home we headed out to Ted's Montana Grill. This restaurant chain, owned by media mogul and bison rancher Ted Turner, obviously specialised in bison meat and other Montana specialities. Thanks to Chad and Angela, we always eat and drink so well in Chicago - it's just as well we always walk a hundred miles when there. My bison fillet was amazing, as promised, as was the beer (Flying Dog pale ale). Chad took us home via Binnys, a local alcohol superstore (similar to Dan Murphys) and I marvelled at the beer selection. Chad and Angela are coming to Australia later this year and I was going to introduce them to Boags beer when they arrived, but it was available at Binnys (along with Coopers) and Chad was keen to take a 6 pack home to try. Not quite sure how they were selling it for half the price we get it for back home - about $7. We headed home and packed our bags, ready for tomorrow mornings flight to Denver and our roadtrip adventures.

Tuesday 5th April.

Our 3rd wedding anniversary began like a few other days on this trip. Wake, shower, eat breakfast, travel to airport, fly to destination. Our farewells with Chad and Angela were buoyed by the fact that we would see them "down under" in a few months and we would be able to return the favour. After a quick cab ride to the airport, we were soon at O'Hare awaiting our flight to Denver. The plane was 30 minutes late to the gate, but we were soon in the air and on our way.

March 24 to 30 - Paris, London, Southampton, Bath (Heidi)

Thursday March 24 - Paris and London
We were up early to finish packing and have our last free breakfast. We wrapped up a couple of the amazing pastries in napkins and smuggled them out for snacks on the the train. Probably not quite above board, but they were too nice! It was a beautiful clear morning with a cold bite and we quickly made it to Gare du Nord. We had gone scouting the day before to make sure we knew where we needed to go and had already snaffled and filled in our immigration cards which made the whole process a bit quicker and easier. Immigration for international rail isn't unlike immigration for international flights, but it was quicker and less painful. The biggest difference was that we were with what would normally be our checked bags when they were x-rayed. The guy was quite interested in our big bad of leads and cords. Makes me wonder how many times it has raised eyebrows at airports. We only had to wait a few minutes before we were able to board the train.

I'm glad we were there a little early as our carriage was packed and by the time everyone was onboard, some people weren't having much luck finding room for their baggage. Strangely though when I went for a walk to the cafeteria later I discovered that most of the other carriages were only about half full. Not sure why ours was so full. James was in his element taking photos of other trains out the window and I went for a walk to find him his caffeine fix. I ordered a peppermint tea. Unfortunately I didn't realise til I made it back to my seat, 5 carriages away, that they girl had made me green tea, which I hate. Oh well.

I didn't find the seats on the Eurostar that comfortable. They don't recline at all and the headrests were horrible - so wide that to actually lean your head against it and try to sleep, your neck was bent so far that you were horribly uncomfortable. I did manage to sleep for the 20 or so minutes through the tunnel but had a very sore neck afterwards. Definitely need a little pillow for that one.

We arrived at St Pancras station in London. The place is enormous - all international train services leave from here as well as some long-haul overground passenger trains and about 6 different underground lines. First stop was to buy an Oyster card so we could get around. I told the guy behind the counter that we just wanted 2 pay-as-you-go cards. He was trying to talk me into a 7-day one that was only valid for certain zones but I didn't want that as we weren't quite sure where exactly we were going to go. Either he was being a jerk or he stuffed up and couldn't have been bothered fixing it (which makes him a jerk either way) but we somehow ended up with one pay-as-you-go card and one 7-day zone 1-2 pass and didn't realise it til a few hours later. Thanks mate.

Our first trip on the tube was on the Hammersmith and City line to Paddington where we were had organised to meet Adam and Sarita and drop our luggage so we could go exploring. Flooding at another station delayed them a bit but they finally made it and we headed to a nearby pub for lunch. It was our first time in an English pub and quite the novelty! After lunch and a pint (which are bloody enormous!) we went for a walk to Hyde Park and were planning on going to see the Princess Diana memorial but our navigator got a bit confused so we didn't actually get to the memorial. It was a lovely walk though! We caught the tube to Oxford Street and browsed through a few different shops including Primark (ridiculously cheap and crowded) and the very posh Selfridges. The boys weren't so keen on shopping and went in search of a pub to watch the rest of the Australia v India World Cup match but couldn't find one that had Sky TV so ended up at Starbucks to recharge James' caffeine levels. We found them there and decided it was time to collect our bags and make our way to Kerry's.

Kerry's place is only a short ride on the tube and soon we were piling our enormous bags into her flat. She greeted us with good news and bad news... The good news was that it was going to be fixed the next day, but the bad news was that the boiler had blown the night before and there was no hot water. Kerry kept apologising and James kept threatening to put it into his trip review. However all was not lost as the gym over the road had very graciously said we could use their showers that night. We called to check if we could all go at once but they suggested only a couple at a time as there was only 6 showers in each bathroom. Kerry, James and I decided to take the first shift. Something the gym forgot to mention was that those showers were communal. Mens and womens were separated, but there was no stalls... just a tiled room with shower heads at intervals around the wall. We didn't know whether to laugh or cry. Best of all we had to keep pushing a button on the wall to make the shower run - it only lasted about 30 seconds per push. There was plenty of laughter. James was lucky enough to have the mens to himself, as were Sarita and Adam when they took the next shift.

Back at Castle de Myatt Kerry whipped up a fabulous chilli con carne while James and Adam went to the bottlo in search of beer and Stones - and came back successful on both fronts! I was a very happy girl. Good food, good drink and fabulous company - a great first night in London.


Friday March 25 - London
We waved Kerry off to work and then the four of us tubed it to Picadilly to head to Leicester Square to get show tickets. We had narrowed it down to a couple of shows and ended up choosing Legally Blonde because it was on at 730 and meant there was less chance of me falling asleep.
Once that was sorted we found some coffee for James and then legged it to Buckingham Palace to watch the changing of the guard. Adam managed to find the spot where the whole thing starts and we then followed the guards to the gates of Buckingham Palace... along with every other man and his dog and his herd of sheep. The place was absolutely packed! It was very cool to see the whole thing unfold. I really don't know how they see out from under those fluffy hats though. We were there for about an hour and actually got so hot that we had all stripped off our coats and jumpers. The weather was glorious!

Once we'd seen all we could see we went for a walk through the royal park to see Big Ben and then down Whitehall. We also managed to stumble across the cavalry guard change... and Sarita nearly got trampled by a horse. But that's a whole other story.

We found another pub for lunch and more pints. I can't handle pints though and had to go with a half pint. At home that would look like a perfectly normal size glass, but in England when everyone around you has a pint, you look like a wimp. Ah well.

After lunch we went for a quick look through the National Gallery. It was really interesting to see the amazing old portraits and I really enjoyed reading the parts about new research which meant they could tell that certain changes had been made to the paintings.

Next stop was St Paul's cathedral - where Prince Charles married Diana way back when. We all made the hike up the stairs to the top of the inside dome but Sarita and I let James and Adam go right to the top on their own - we were already feeling a little dizzy from the spiral stairs up and the ones to the top were much narrower. Instead we sat and wondered at the beautiful workmanship. Unfortunately there was a service on so they started kicking us out a lot sooner than we would have liked.

From St Pauls we wandered down to the Millenium Bridge and then along the Thames to the embankment and back to West End for dinner. We found a Thai place that looked okay and Kerry met us there soon after. We made it to the theatre right on time and had a great laugh at Legally Blonde. Oh my God you guys!!


Saturday March 26 - London
We had planned on doing more site seeing on Saturday but found out there was going to be protests in London and thought it best to avoid the area. We found out later that was a wise choice - there was over 250,000 people there!

Kerry had been going to join us but decided it was time to see a GP about the cold she'd had for nearly two weeks. Poor thing. The rest of us caught a bus to Notting Hill and spent a few hours wandering around the Portobello Road Markets. These have to be seen to be believed! It went for blocks and there was everything you could think of - fresh fruit, veges, hot food, clothes, djs etc. And it was packed - though probably not quite as packed as the protests.
One of the most interesting sites was the massive paella being made in a stall while the world watched on. The smell was amazing and James, Adam and Sarita all decided to have it for lunch. I helped James with his but couldn't go past the bruscetta we had spotted on our way in for my own lunch. So fresh and so good.

After we'd finished wandering we took the bus back to Kerry's and spent the rest of the afternoon chilling out. I had a cold and James had a sore throat so we were both pretty worn out.
Sarita and I decided we would look after dinner so headed to Sainsburys to grab supplies. We had it all sorted out and only needed to get a hot chook when we discovered that we had just missed the very last one so it was back to the drawing board... I think the boys thought we were lost as we ended up being gone for about 90 minutes by the time we'd figured out what to do instead. I think it was worth the wait though.


Sunday March 27 - Cambridge and London
One of the things I wanted to do while we were in England was to visit the grave of my great uncle James Potter in Cambridge. Uncle Jim was a wireless operator on bombers in World War II. He actually survived the war but was killed in March 1945 when his crew was learning to fly an American plane to help with the post-war clean-up effort. Their American instructor told them to do a manoeuvre which shouldn't be done under about 3000ft... at about 1500ft. The plane crashed and he was killed along with the pilot. He was 22 and engaged to an English girl. Although I obviously never met him Uncle Jim has always been someone that we talked about a lot in our family and we've certainly never forgotten him.

James' mum's cousin, Pam, lives near Cambridge and when she suggested we meet there it was perfect for both of us. We got ourselves up nice and early Sunday morning and arrived in Cambridge just before 10am. From the train station we caught a taxi to the cemetery where, after a bit of a hiccup, we finally managed to find Uncle Jim's grave, and the pilot's right next to him. It's a beautiful place and so well maintained. It's also a very sad place and I'm not ashamed to say I shed a lot of tears over a man I've never met but feel such a connection to. We stayed for about 45 minutes and my only regret is that I didn't take flowers.

From the cemetery we called a cab and headed into Cambridge to meet Pam and her daughter Chelsea. Pam, who is deaf, married an Englishman and they live just south of Cambridge. Chelsea is 17, going on 25, and we had the most delightful couple of hours chatting with them. I wish we could have spent longer and really hope that we can go back again to visit both them and Uncle Jim.

We caught a very-crowded express train back to London and then made our way back to Kerry's to start packing our bags and get ready to catch the train to Southampton.
Chris and his friend Nico arrived home from their cycling adventure late on Sunday afternoon and we all went to a nearby pub for dinner - it was about a 7 minute walk... right Kerry?
Kerry and I had both had our hearts set on the lamb dish but the waitress came back with the bad news it wasn't available. We opted to join everyone else and get a steak. It was a fabulous steak so I guess I will forgive them for not having lamb.

We had planned on catching the tube to Waterloo but Chris very kindly offered to drive and give us one of his famous night-tours of London instead and it was fabulous. You should all hit him up for one! Seriously, thanks so much to Chris for the ride and to Kerry for putting up with us all under her feet while she was sick. We owe you!

We made it to Southampton about 1230am and caught a cab to Adam and Sarita's place where we hit the hay pretty quickly.


Monday March 28 - Southampton and Bath
In spite of our best intentions of leaving by about 9am, the late night meant we were only having breakfast about then. Adam and Sarita whipped us up some coddled eggs - yum! I'll definitely be trying to make them myself.

We all piled into the Peugeot and set out towards Bath. First stop for the day was Stonehenge. It's quite an impressive site as you come down the hill and it suddenly pops up in front of you. Roadworks of some kind meant we had to sit through a bit of slow traffic and enter Stonehenge the long and convoluted way, but it was all worth it. It's an amazing site to behold - I really wish you could get up closer and see the rocks better though.

Leaving Stonehenge James and I began to think that we're a curse to anyone we stay with while travelling... About 500m out of the carpark the temp gauge on the Peugeot shot sky high and and 'STOP' warning started flashing. We pulled over and checked the radiator overflow. It looked like it had been filled with water from the creek next to my parents' place, but there was plenty of water in it and nothing actually felt very hot. We restarted the car and despite it running about 20 degrees hotter than normal, the STOP light was no longer flashing and the temperature had actually gone down into safe territory so it was decided that we would limp it to the next town and reassess once we got there. It continued to run hot but without going into the red zone. We stopped for lunch at a cute little country pub. Once again I left the pints to the experienced members of our group and opted for a half pint of ginger beer instead.

After lunch it was decided that we would keep going to Bath, which was only about half an hour away. The car behaved itself for most of the rest of the trip, but did suddenly fly up into the red before dropping away again a couple of times. We made it to Bath in one piece and eventually managed to figure out how to get to the right end of the one-way street our accommodation was on. Stupid roadworks.

James and I headed off to check out the Roman Baths while Sarita and Adam took the car to a mechanic we had spotted on our trip round in circles. We were hoping that it was just that the gross water was full of crap and giving the cooling system the mechanical equivalent of a heart attack.

The Roman Baths are quite an experience. It's amazing just how intact so much of it still is! The water doesn't look overly inviting now thanks to algal blooms which the sun on the water causes, but in it's time, when the roof was intact, you can imagine that it was absolutely amazing. I wish I could have seen it as it was and bathed there. You can read more about the Roman Baths here.


After we'd finished our tour of the Roman Baths we met Adam and Sarita at the Thermae Day Spa for two hours of relaxation - we looked like serious prunes by the time we left! We were all highly amused by one silly middle-aged woman who arrived with a full face of makeup - including bright pink lipstick - and complained that even the coolest of the steam rooms was too hot for her and seemed more intent on making sure her makeup stayed put than taking advantage of the facilities and getting something out of it. I felt sorry for her boyfriend.

Back at our unit Adam and Sarita whipped up a fabulous roast dinner and we tried Crabbies - an alcoholic ginger beer. James doesn't like ginger beer but he does like Crabbies - it was more like a ginger ale. Very nice. I'm going to have to look out for it at home!


Tuesday March 29 - Bath and Southampton
Tuesday morning we had planned to go check out the Cheddar Valley, but as the car was at the mechanic's and was going to be for several hours yet, we set out to explore Bath a little further. First stop was, of course, coffee for James and we stopped at Java Coffee House. Best coffee in England! I wish I'd had one myself and I don't really drink coffee... They also had cakes handmade in house - Maya's carrot cake looked amazing. I'm still kicking myself for not trying it.

First things first we went to the circus to check out the architecture. Everything is so symmetrical - it's quite cool. Next stop was the Assembly Rooms. They were underwhelming. Let's leave it at that. We wandered on to Royal Crescent for a peek before we decided to go and check out Bath Abbey.

I really enjoyed the Abbey - we spent a good hour wandering around and reading some of the both interesting and amusing memorial plaques dating back several hundred years which adorn both the walls and the floor of the church. We opted to do the climb up the bell tower and it was a great tour - our young guide did a great job before we knew it, we'd been up there for an hour. I even got to ring the tenor bell and then we stood in the bell room while it struck for the half hour. Very loud but very cool. You can read more about the Bath Abbey here.


By the time we finished at the Abbey it was nearly 2pm and we made our way to the nearest pub - called All Bar One - for lunch. The menu here was a bit more like the kind of menu you would find at home - far more Asian and Mediterranean influenced than any other pubs menus we had seen in England. James, Adam and Sarita all ordered burgers but I had my heart set on the pork belly. But then the waitress came back to inform me that they didn't have it and I would have to make another selection. Twice in three days! So unfair. I ended up having a lamb and tzatzki burger which was very nice. While we waited for our meals Adam called the mechanics to check on the car... Still not ready. James and Adam had a couple of Doom Bar ales over lunch - James' favourite of the tour.

After lunch we went for a walk down to the weir where, to my delight, we found lots and lots of very cute ducks. We wandered over the bridge, down along the canal and then back towards town. On our way the mechanic called Adam and informed him that the the cooling system was ok now, but that it had blown the head gasket and would not make it back to Southampton. For those of you who aren't mechanically savvy - that's pretty bad.... Small part but a lot of work to replace and means the head has to be crack tested. Not something that would be done in an hour and quite costly courtesy of the hours of labour required.

Fortunately the mechanic was sympathetic that we needed to get back to Southampton as we had an international flight to make and he loaned Adam and Sarita one of his cars on the condition they bring it back the next day. So we piled our stuff into the loaner Saab station wagon and finally started our journey back to Southampton about 630pm. We arrived in Southampton about 8 and went for a bit of a walk to check out the old city wall and gate found ourselves in a pub with a super cheap dinner deal. Everyone else had steak but I had a bit of an upset tummy so opted for an apple and berry crumble with custard, much to the amusement of the man who took our order. James also tried his very first Guinness with dinner and reckons it wasn't too bad.


Wednesday March 30 - Southampton, Heathrow and New York
Adam tried to sneak off without saying goodbye but we managed to catch him before he got too far. Poor guy was a little bit tired. He was back soon after with a flat tyre on his bike though. I hope your day improved, Adam!

We packed our bags up, piled them into the Saab and hit the M3 to head to Heathrow. Traffic in Southampton was a bit of a gridlock at that time of the morning but thankfully the M3 wasn't too bad and we had a nice clear run through onto the M25 and Heathrow, arriving right on time. We'd done an online check-in the night before so all we had to do was print our boarding passes and drop off our checked in luggage. The security check took the longest and it was pretty painless. James coffeed up and we wandered around a bit before catching the shuttle over to our departure gate. Soon we were boarding and on our way to New York.

Right now we're about 45 minutes out of New York and have just been told that we're about to hit some turbulance. Other than the woman behind me who keeps jamming her knees into my back (my seat is bolt upright!!) and the speaker right next to me that started crackling and squarking about 2 hours ago, so loudly that I can hear it over my headphones, it's been a pretty good flight. They have just told us that it's 8 degrees and overcast in New York though and apparently there's the possibility of snow in the next few days. Should be fun!

Paris Recap (James)

There is nothing like a brisk walk to the train station lugging ones luggage around to quicken the heart rate on a cool morning. After quickly getting ready, eating breakfast and finalising our packing, Heidi and I were soon at Gare de Nord station checking into our 9am train to London. We're currently being whisked across the picturesque French country side at a couple of hundred kilometres an hour and will make the journey, which includes the channel tunnel, in about 2 and a half hours.

Yesterday was another slow start thanks to a late meal at a nearby cafe after hanging around Eiffel waiting for the lights to come on the night before. What a view though! Definately worth the wait. We arrived in time for happy hour which meant cheap mojitos for Heidi and cheap 1664s for me. We both had a steak that was rather tough but the meal and the atmosphere was nice overall. The wait staff certainly tried their best to help us out....even though they waited for us to struggle with the french menu for 10 minutes before offering the english version. Cheap laughs?

We filled up on another complimentary breakfast of cereal, bread and jam and some more-ish pastries before catching the RER and metro out along the Seine back to the Eiffel tower. France certainly turned on the good weather for us - the days have had blue skies and the tempartures for us Queenslanders hasn't been too cold. Only two of the accesses up the tower were open again and the queue for the stairs was non-existent, especially when compared to the elevator. Soon we were up on the first observatory level admiiring the view, despite a somewhat hazy morning. Heidi wasn't feeling that well, but we soldiered on to the next platform and grabbed a quick bite and coffee at the bistro. The views were quite amazing and thanks to the blue skies, the Seine was quite appealing. We managed to find all our destinations of the previous days adventures and mini-Liberty just downstream. I went upstairs to check out the options for the lift to the top observatory, but due to maintenance only one was operational and the line up looked horrendous. Spending a couple of hours in line with all those school tours wasn't too appealing either. Heidi still wasn't feeling well, so we decided to give the top observation deck a miss, I'm sure the haze meant the view wasn't that good yesterday anyway. We sat downstairs on the lawns and admired the view while Heidi rested and we soon ventured back to Gare de Nord station.

It was about 2pm and I had decided to put Heidi to bed for the afternoon and give her a chance to rest up. We grabbed a baguette and some mini-macaroons at a bakery and some supplies (ie, beer) at a supermarket for the afternoon. I was just going to sit in our room and start sending some emails for the future part of the trip. By the time we got back and into our room, we (ie, Heidi) had polished off the baguette - boy was it nice. Anyway, the seemed to help out her upset tummy and she was soon fast asleep. I entertained myself with emails, a french dubbed version of the Redford/Pitt movie masterpiece Spy Game and a monster can of Heineken. I woke Heidi up around 6 and we went for a walk up to restaurants surrounding Gare de Nord and had a nice meal in front of the station. Heidi had a running joke with the maitre'd about the packet of chamomile tea she purchased on the way there - we're still not sure whether he thought it was for a possible hangover or morning sickness... but it helped calm an upset tummy last night anyway. Despite the temptation of crepes or creme brulee, we decided against dessert and we now lament not buying more macaroons for our train trip today.

Our experiences in Paris were overall great. We never felt threatened or unsafe at all and unlike "Grandpa" we didn't lose our wallet to a pickpocket or clumsiness. We are definately in the low tourist season, as the queues for the attractions have all been fairly painless - the Palace at Verseilles was probably the longest wait at about 30 minutes and we have a new found dislike for tour groups - despite the magnitude of those French royal palaces a school or tour group in those rooms soon doesn't leave much room for the rest of us. We have had blue skies everyday and the temps have probably been in the low teens, with a wind chill that just cuts you in half. Our venture out last night was the first time I've had to dig out my overcoat but I would have survived the short trip without it. We mastered the public transport system pretty quickly and thankfully managed to navigate our way around the city without getting on the wrong train or going in the wrong direction. Not too bad I don't think for a couple whose French language skills stop at bonjour and merci. And Yopliat. The people we spoke with were generally polite and helpful, but we still witnessed why the French are considered rude.... they don't appear to be that courteous when you are in a crowd (not just a French thing either these days). At lot of the signage at the attractions is all in French and there is a lot they could do to help our their non-French speaking visitors. We were nearly at the end of Lourve visit when we realised that each room had a separate card available with the english explanation of that room..... something Verseille did much better. Regardless, we got ourselves around well and saw all the sights we wanted too and will take away many fond memories of our visit. Our visit was a nice introduction to France and a good look at Paris, one day we might came back to explore some of the other areas of the country.

Soon we'll be at London looking for a score on how the Aussies are going against India in the Wold Cup semi-final.

March 19 to March 21 (by Heidi)

March 19:

*I've put some photos on Facebook which you can see here. You don't need to have an account, that's a public link that anyone can see.*

The day you fly out is never exactly fun. The knowledge that we were about to go and sit through 3 consecutive flights was not exciting, but it's a necessary evil.

The flight from Brisbane to Singapore was fine and uneventful. We both stayed awake and watched movies. None that I was excited about, but they served their purpose. We arrived in Singapore about 730pm their time and had a couple of hours to wander around the termianl before our flight departed a bit after 11. I was very unimpressed to discover upon boarding that we were about to spend the next 14 hours sitting in the very back row of plane. Thankfully it wasn't quite so bad as the last back row flight I took, the seats did actually recline somewhat on this one, but I still was not very happy about how loud it was back there and how many people were constantly standing around me waiting to go to the bathroom. We slept on and off thanks to earplugs and eye masks and eventually arrived in London about 520am local time.


March 20:

We jumped on the bus to take us to the right terminal at Heathrow and then had a couple of hours to kill before our flight to Paris (CDG) at 910am.

CDG was a little bit of a surprise.. It's a bit rundown but they do seem to be doing renovations. Thankfully our baggage arrived with us so we threw all our junk on a trolley and headed outside. The bus was easy to find and we caught it to the train station. We decided to catch the lift once we arrived as the stairs weren't exactly luggage friendly. But inside the lift we found someone had apparently been unable to make it to the bathroom and decided that the corner of the lift was as good a place as any to do a number two. Worst of all, some other poor bastard hadn't noticed it and there was luggage wheel tracks through it. Keeping breakfast down was a little bit of a struggle.

The line to buy a train ticket was ridiculously long so we decided to use the machines and do it ourselves. Unfortunately for some silly reason the machines dodn't like our credit card (we've been rejected most times we've tried now) so we had little choice but to go and join that ridiculously long line. After what felt like an hour we finally had our tickets and jumped on the RER to Gare du L'est, and then changed onto the metro to finally finish up at Jacques Bonsergent.

Once we finally made it onto the street we were unsure of which way to go, but a friendly local stopped to see if we needed directions and happily pointed out the way to our hotel.

Hotel Magenta reminds me of the pod hotel in Kyoto... The room is itsy bitsy teeny tiny but clean and has a very comfy bed. We got it cheap and honestly, we don't plan to spend too much time in here anyway.

First priority was a shower - it was nearly 40 hours since our last one so it felt like heaven. Being extremely tired we had planned on just sticking around nice and close to the hotel, but instead we decided to go for a walk to Hard Rock Cafe. Buffalo wings with blue cheese sauce went down a treat and my mojito had me quite tipsy very quickly. Not such a good thing to combine with jetlag! Steak and ribs for dinner hit the spot and then it was time to walk back to the hotel. In spite of our best intentions I flaked by about 730pm and not even nasty cramps could wake me up for any more than about 2 seconds.


March 21:
(click photos to see larger version)

We both woke about 4am thanks to being early to bed the previous night but managed to get back to sleep until about 7. The free breakfast at the hotel was more than satisfactory and we pushed out on our first day exploring Paris.

Here's a map of our route for the day.

First stop was Place de la Repulique - an impressive monument smack in the middle of an intersection just a few blocks from our hotel. We're not quite sure what it's about, but it does look pretty cool. That's not the first time I'll say that on this trip..

We continued on down Boulevarde du Temple until we reached Bastille - another monument in the middle of an intersection (again, you'll be hearing that a lot). We know what Bastille Day is and the few french words we could make out on the engraving backed us up that it was a war monument. Thank goodness English has absorbed quite a lot of French words (and visa versa, I guess) as we'd be in trouble here otherwise!

From Bastille we walked down beside a canal filled with very prettily decorated boats until we reached the Seine, which we then followed towards Notre Dame. We crossed the Siene at Pont De Sully and walked along the southern side for a couple of blocks before crossing over to head to Notre Dame.

Notre Dame blew me away. Construction on the gothic cathedral began in about 1163 and took about 170 years to complete! That alone is amazing... The thought of building something over 170 years is just mind boggling. Notre Dame has a fine example of flying buttresses. Personally I think they are ugly from the outside, but when you see what they make possible on the inside, all is forgiven.

The cathedral was partially destroyed during the French revolution, but thankfully it was then restored in the 1800s.

The stained glass work is simply amazing and the intricate carving work makes you wonder how many lifetimes it would have taken to complete.

From Notre Dame we crossed back to the northern side of the river and wandered along until we came to Pont Neuf. Sadly there was no sign of Jason Bourne, but it's a pretty cool bridge anyway. Neuf means new - so despite it being the oldest existing bridge across the Seine, they've been calling it 'New Bridge' for the past 4 centuries. Ha.

Next stop was Musee du Louvre - or the Louvre which was orignally constructed in 12th century as a fortress. It then became the royal palace until Louis XIV decided to move to Versailles in the late 1600s and the Louvre was used to display the royal collection. It was made into a museum in the late 1700s.

The Louvre is, of course, home to Da Vinci's favourite painting, the Mona Lisa. I was actually a little bit surprised at just how small it is and honestly wasn't overly taken with her. To me, the enormous and intricate painting of Napoleon 1's coronation was far more impressive.

There's far more to the Louvre than just paintings and we wandered through exhibitions of amazing sculptures such as Psyche Revived by Cupid's Kiss and artifacts from Greece and Egypt. After a couple of hours we decided we had had enough. Only problem was we couldn't get out. There was exit signs everywhere, but they didn't actually seem to point to THE exit, just the way out of whatever room you were in. We looped around in circles a few times until we had to resort to peeking out windows to try figure where the pyramids were so we could try and make our way towards them. We eventually made it out, but it was far from easy!

From the Louvre we headed to Place de la Concorde and the obelisk gifted to France from Egypt. Again, this is in the middle of a huge and crazily busy intersection. On the subject of intersections, neither of us can quite figure out how traffic works here... There's forever people stopped in odd places in the middle of intersections and God only knows how they work out who has right of way... The obelisk is also at the beginning of Avenue des Champs Elysses - seemingly Paris' answer to Fifth Avenue... Or is that the other way round?

At the other end of Champs Elysees is Arc de Triomphe Etoile - one of the best known sights of Paris after the Eiffel tower. The view from the top is stunning - you can see for miles. One thing that really strikes me about Paris is the lack of skyscrapers. Yes, there is a small cluster of them to the south of the arc and a few others scattered here and there, but other than that, the city buildings are fairly low. Most buildings seem to be around 5 or 6 stories high, and that's it.

On our way down we found the area directly under the arc was fenced off for a group of people in military dress. We thought it had something to do with the lighting of the flame for the unknown soldier at 630pm each day so kept going and started to head home. We got a little way down Avenue des Champs Elysses to discover a whole parade of military personel, complete with a band! We stood for a bit and watched the marchers go by. We are still wondering what it was all about....

By this time our feet and legs were absolutely killing us so we took the metro home - even at 7pm it was packed! We found a little place near our hotel which did dinner. Very conveniently it was also happy hour and the happy hour menu included mojitos and a beer - we were set. Not the greatest steaks we've ever eaten, but still a nice meal and a lovely evening. We made our way back to the hotel and fell asleep as soon as our heads hit the pillows.

March 22:

Being so buggered from yesterday, it was a bit of a slow start. We didn't actually wake until about 830. The blockout curtains do a good job! By the time we eventually got ourselves going and to the station - Gare du Nord - it was getting close to 11am. A quick line switch at Notre Dame St Michel and we were on our way to Chateau de Versailles. Versailles becaume the royal palace when Louis XIV decided to move there in the 1680s.

Put simply, the place is amazing. We opted to pay to go inside and were blown away by what we saw. A lot of it has been restored as much was lost thanks to the revolution, but it has been painstakingly restored to drawings, where they are available, or in the style of the day. The Hall of Mirrors was one of the most impressive rooms with its massive chandeliers, but all of the rooms were impressive in their own way. It was interesting to note that the bedrooms of the king, queen, prince and princess were not, in fact, strictly private... Gees...

The gardens of the palace stretch for what seems like an eternity. Unfortunately being early in spring most of the trees are still bare, the statues are all covered and some of the fountains have been drained for cleaning, but it is impressive nontheless. I was particularly taken with the ducks in the Grand Canal. No surprises there.

After wandering the palace and gardens for a few hours we made our way back into the town in search of food before setting off back to Paris.

As it was on the way back, we decided to stop at the Eiffel tower, intending on doing the climb up the stairs to take in Paris at dusk. Unfortunately we were about 5 minutes too late - the line was still there, but the security guard wasn't letting anyone else join it. There was a whole lot of people standing around complaining that he had cut it off early as it wasn't yet 6pm, but he wasn't having a bar of it.

Instead we dodged the throngs of tower replica floggers to go and take photos and then went for a wander to wait for it to get dark enough that they would light her up.

The lights finally came on about 730pm and after a few more photos, we made our way home.

Tomorrow we will probably go back and make the trek up the stairs.