In the Orkneys

If you were wondering...

Today is our last morning here in the Orkney Islands. We came here via ferry after we left Inverness where we drove our hire-car to John o' Groats and Gill Bay to board. It dropped us off near Kirkwall from where we drove to Stromness.

I've enjoyed the neolithic archaeology - Skara Brae, Maes Howe, the Stones of Stenness and so on - while Amy has enjoyed the accents.

We stayed overnight here in Kirkwall in a little B&B that is plastered all over with an insane variety of garden ornaments whilst the inside positively drips with stuffed toys of all sorts. The woman who runs the place is an "explainer". I stood there through a three minute lecture on how to open and close the doors which I could hardly understand because of the density of her accent.

I never really thought that people said things like dinnae and cannae, but now I know it's true...

The Orkneys have been extraordinarily beautiful besides being rainy, haily and COLD. We went yesterday to one of the outlying islands and found ourselved in a birdwatchers "hide" that came equipped with binoculars and telescopes and were lucky to be joined by a tean from the organisation that runs and maintains these sorts of facilities who explained to us how they maintained the wetland - very interesting. We also found and explored the Burroughstown Broch, and it was interesting to note the similarity between this building form and the round houses of Skara Brae.

We're both well and having a great time. More photos when we are not on a public access machine!

Where are they now?

Ahem, in Ireland, done Wales, sterting to do Scotland tomorrow. Pictures to foolw.

To be sure, to be sure...

The picture is of Fishguard Fort in Wales. We walked there amd back while we were killing time waiting for the ferry to Rosslare in Ireland. The fort was built in the 1770s when the town was bombarded by a Franco-Irish privarteer in lieu of a ransome.

We sailed for Ireland then flopped in a nice hotel in Rosslare befor taking the bus on a fairly hair-raising journey to Dublin. Another hotel, a trip to the Guiness factory and a night on the town.

Now Amy's asleep and I'm soon to follow because we are flying to Inverness tomorrow.

Good night.

Since Poland...

... We've come down through Slovakia to Hungary; Budapest to be sure, where we went on a lovely river cruise along the Danube with dinner. I recommend the Svent Istvan cathedral asa place to see.

Then to Austria where we poked through the Schonbrun palace. We had an afternoon activity booked but dropped out to do our own things (an art galley and a museum) before going out for dinner in a little town in the Vienna Woods where we ate schnitzel until we groaned, fought back the fruit flies who were after our wine and sand the theme to Skippy the Bush Kangaroo to a piano accordion backing track.

Austria has a severe obsession with the Empress Elizabeth - or "Sisi". She seems to have been the Princess Di of the 1890s!

We're in Prague tonight and will put some photos up just as soon as blogspot get their fingers out and correct their technical issues!

Auschwitz

It has taken us a few days to digest this experience and here finally are a few notes.
First, there are the physical facts of the site. What most people think of as Auschwitz – the place with the sign that says “Arbeit Macht Ffrei” - is the smaller of three sites, although it is by far and away the most intact. Auschwitz II Birkenau is the largest and it covers acres and acres of ground.

It was also the main killing center. It was the place where the rains would pull up; there would be a selection on the platform where – if the labour was needed – the fit and healthy people would be pulled out of the line. The “unfit”were the old people, the pregnant women and the children . An SS doctor decided your fate in seconds.

The place killed 6000 people in a day. You would be marched off to a changing room where you'd leave your clothes all neatly bundled so you could collect it when you came out of the showers, only you never came out. The shower-heads were dummies and instead of water you got Zyklon-B, an agent which was used to disinfect clothing, but was basically cyanide gas.

Today there are displays explaining the process in detail. Hardest to take there are the piles of booty stolen from the dead.

Some of us found different things upsetting. Some found the 'suffocation” cells bad where were kept four people at a time as punishment. For others, it was the huge pile of spectacle frames. For others it was the human hair the Germans made into a coarse canvas-like textile. Others yet again were disturbed by the pile of children's shoes.

There were other things too.

We both agree that one of the most terrible things about this dreadful place is that the people going to their deaths here had no idea what was going on. They were tricked from start to finish by ruthless, men who told them to pay for their train tickets, to label their luggage, to fold up their clothing, to make sure they kept their shoes together so they could pick them up afterwards.

Was that Poland?

As I write this I'm sitting up in bed in Budapest.

From the top of the page down are the St Anthony Church in Kracow from the 12th Century, Mammoth bones from the cathedral in Krackow - people used to think they were the bones of dragons and finally from Bar Bla-bla in Warsaw, just a few beers being consumed.

We've spent the past couple of days in Poland, mostly in Warsaw and Krackow but have been too busy to even get to an internet connection and write this all up, so I'll just give a very brief run-down before I shut off the lights and go to bed.

We spent our first couple of nights in Warsaw where we toured the city, looking at the various monuments. The Poles are big on monuments, and to be fair they have plenty of depressing history to monumentalise.

We've been to Auschwitz, a 700-year-old salt mine near Krackow (or Krackov as the locals pronounce it), the meticulously recreated town centre of Warsaw where destrtruction of the city was at about 85% by the time the Germans were through with the place and the really charming medieval heart of Kracow. Today we left Poland (with an 08:00 shot of honey vodka courtesy of the tour director along with POLISH DONUTS) and came to Hungary via Slovakia which latter place everyone thought very pretty; it was snowing lightly as we had lunch which excited we Australians on the tour, but the Canadians were hardly impressed by at all. Oh, and Amy got to pat a dog which made her day - Amy likes dogs, but the feeling is not always reciprocated.

I'll write some more tomorrow - it's time for bed now and I'm really needing the sleep!

Berlin Again

Today we have been tooling around Berlin.

This morning we visited the Reistag, Checkpoint Charlie and then had a bit of lunch. OK, I got lost and Amy had to send the bus away and then fine me herself, but these are details.

After lunch and another encounter with a Gypsie, we moved on to a Guggenheim exhibit, the German Historical Museum (saw some real fusilier and grenadier caps, by the way...) and a nice little book market at the university.

Dinner again at our favourite Italian restaurant.

Alte Fritz; here's a picture of Frederick the Great for you.

That's about all for now - running out of paid internet timeat the hotel andh ave an early start tomorrow as we are off to Poland.

Germany

Scary, scary Eiffel Tower piccy

Apple Wine - like bad Cider.

Been having a great time so far... London and Paris were great be we decided we like Germany best so far. Everything works, everyone speaks English and you can buy a beer absolutly anywhere. Max would've loved the tower of London, with very old armor, weapons and torture devices on display.

I've had to learn basic French and German at a very rapid pace. It was a bit difficult in France but you can often get by by smiling and pointing.

Germany has strict regulations regarding the quality of their beer – only yeast, hops, wheat and water are to be used – no preservatives etc, which makes it top quality stuff. They cant even import beer that doesn't meet the regulations. All the stereotypes about Germans are true, the men all tuck their t-shirts in and the trains run on time. I got in trouble when I bought a t-shirt yesterday for not bringing the coat-hanger up to the counter WITH the t-shirt. The people here are generally very friendly though.

We stayed at a place called Nue-Isenberg just before the tour, which is just outside of Frankfurt. A lot of towns around here were flattened in the war, so there are very few old buildings like there were in France and London. We drove for most of the day to Berlin, which is where we'll be for the next 2 nights. We're staying in East Berlin which so far looks a bit run down, with lots of colourfully painted apartments (people went mad colouring up the place when Communism died here 17 years ago and buildings no longer had to be grey). I'm looking forward to seeing the Berlin wall tomorrow, and Auschwitz the next day. We've had a lot of interesting European history lessons since we've been here which kind of seem like fairy tails involving kings and queens, but the story of Berlin I find most fascinating, I remember it! East Berlin is still coming to terms with it – there is a 20% unemployment rate here despite the country doing so well economically in general.

Went to an Italian pizza joint for tea tonight, I figured if they don't speak English we might get by with the little bit of Italian I know. The food and service were great, and the waiter did speak English. He offered us a grappa on the house when we'd finished. I said no but Greg took one and he's now asleep in bed at 8.45pm.

Until next time,

Amy

Photos- 1. Eiffel Tower from about a third of the way up 2. Stall at market in Frankfurt selling apple-wine.

Leaving London

We are going to be taking the Eurostar train via the Chunnel today for Paris.

Buying the tickets we had the nasty surprise of being asked GBP300 for them. Ahem. Maybe we should have flown!

Still, we got them along with a museum pass that ought to cover us for the time we are there, so that will be nice. We are off at 10:40 am local time - so about three-and-a-half hours from now. The trip only takes 2.5 hours.

Just to bring you up to date, we did a walking tour of the city on Monday, which wasn't too bad; saw the Life Guards trotting along, watched a couple of guys from the Royal Artillery mounting guard as two of the regular Guards Regiments are on foreign deployments.

Also passed some of Londons' "Gentlemans' Clubs" - a notion with a very different connotation in Australia. It was interesting to note that the sexist old Tory Club had to make Margaret Thatcher an honourary man so she could be a member.

Our tour Guide was the Queen Mums' medic (so he says) and imparted to us a secret we may never share, even if you ask nicely.

After this we went aboard the HMS Belfast, a WW2 "Big Gun" cruiser and had a good look around. I was very tempted by the Airfix ships in the museum shop and had to remind myself they can be bought in any hobby shop back home. Globalisation homogenises everything.

That evening we went out to Soho for a poke around and some diner. We watched a drug deal go down in frot of our pub - do they stage these for the tourists? - and I was offered a sexual service from a tout, but I informed the person that I was taken, sadly.

Yesterday was started with Westminster Abbey and the train booking heart-attack session at Eurostar. Spent a quiet evening last night reading in the pub and updating our travel diaries.

Washed all of our clothes in the bathroom sink - they are nearly dry now (2 days later!)