Living La Vida Lester

Cold weather is a Pest

2011-02-08T07:28:00.001-08:00

One of the most recognizable buildings on the Pest side – Hungarian Parliament

Our last day in Budapest arrived and brought with it freeeeeezing cold weather. However, we were determined not to let it affect our plans for the day – a walk around the Pest side of the river. Pest, being the communist stronghold of old, is dominated by ugly communist style block buildings. (When 74% of the city needed rebuilding after WWII, apparently they decided to build as cheap and ugly as possible). However, there are quite a few old buildings interspersed among the “new” buildings. Also, with the elimination of the communists came commercialism at its finest with a large outdoor shopping area filled with designer clothing, antiques, and delicious fast food.

I refused to go in because I don’t know how to order food in Hungarian so I sent Kevin in (even though he doesn’t know any more than I do). No double cheeseburgers in Hungary (What a TRAVESTY!) so I had to make do with a single cheeseburger.

We decided to brave the cold and avoid the mafia run taxis by walking from Buda to Pest via the Chain Bridge. It’s billed as the oldest bridge in Budapest across the Danube, built in 1849 . I’m not sure how they got across before then – maybe they forded the river with their carts and ponies like in Oregon Trail. Since I love photographing old architecture and lions, this bridge was perfect for me.

We had no set plans for Pest other than a stroll and some lunch so we wandered around the streets for awhile, admiring the old buildings that dotted the streets. I took pictures until I couldn’t feel my face or my hands anymore (which didn’t take very long). Along the way, we wandered across a disused Metro station with a fantastic ceiling. It also had some creepy naked statues sticking out the windows above it. Hungarians are weird.

In our wandering, we came across St. Stephen’s Basilica and the Opera House but chose to keep walking rather than go in. Partly because we didn’t want to pay to go in, but mostly because eating lunch was more important.

St. Stephen’s Basilica

Opera House

Since we were traveling with 4 people who had missed a flight back from Paris recently, Kevin and I didn’t trust them and thus we decided to leave extra time for lunch. However, this proved to be an issue as we couldn’t find a place to eat that was open or had customers in it (generally I find no customers = bad food). We made the executive decision, much to our friend Debs dismay, to eat at Burger King. Normally, I would turn my nose up at BK when there was a perfectly good McDonalds right down the street. However, I had just eaten a cheeseburger for breakfast, so I felt like BK should get some of our business as well. After a deliciously greasy Jalapeno Burger (why don’t they have those in the states???), we headed back to the hotel to get our cab to the airport. It gave me the opportunity to photograph the city’s ridiculous public transportation. Apparently, they haven’t upgraded since Communist Days, which may be why there is so much traffic.

Communist Surveillance Team Log: 29 January 2011

2011-02-04T08:51:00.001-08:00

Old tuna can, casually thrown to the side of the road

Americans seen ordering a taxi. Surveillance followed to Memento Park. Overheard telling cab driver to pick them up in 2.5 hours. This is 2 hours longer than needed to see this park. Suspect nefarious purposes. Tall American seen taking 200 “photos” . Suspect it may be some way of communicating with contact as no one would take that many photos. Copies of photos provided for further analysis.

Slid behind a poster in the post office

Followed Americans back to Buda Castle area. Tall skinny man went into Café Ruszwurm to buy 8 pieces of cake. There’s no way someone of that build could eat 8 pieces of cake. It must be code. Further surveillance suggested.

Cleverly hidden inside a hollowed out log.

Subjects seen entering Faust wine cellar. Americans love booze. No foul play suspected. Routine surveillance only.

All together now

2011-02-03T15:42:00.001-08:00

After Kevin, Fred and John FINALLY pulled themselves away from Belgian Beer, we met up and headed out into the city together. We decided to start out by exploring the Castle Hill area a little more. Earlier, Kevin and the guys had walked down to the Royal Palace area before heading to the Weapons Museum, so we started out with a more thorough exploration of the area.

A little history lesson – Budapest was the only city during WWII to get bombed by both the Allies and the Germans. 74% of the city was reduced to rubble. THEN, even more of it was destroyed in 1956 during the “Get Rid of the Russians” debacle. For a city that was 74% destroyed, they did an excellent job of repairing it. However, they did miss a few buildings.

After we walked around the Royal Palace, and I took a few photos of the city during the time period that photographers call “The Magic Hour”, the guys decided that they had the perfect place for us to grab dinner – the Belgian Restaurant. Apparently, they were not content with not having drank the entire menu and decided a little more exploration was in order. I developed a love for Belgian Beer during a work sponsered trip to Belgium with Doyle and was of course game. While the beer menu wasn’t nearly as extensive as the menu at the place in Ghent I went with Doyle, it was huge. And in true Belgian style, each beer came in its own, specially designed glass.

Battle of the Sexes (Boys)

2011-02-02T12:57:00.001-08:00

When the plans for the first full day in Budapest were taking shape it ended up that Fred, John and I were not interested in taking a cooking class so we decided do our own thing. (Amanda’s edit: Really, Kevin should have said they were interested in beer drinking not cooking). We pretty much knew we wanted to check out a Belgian restaurant that Fred had found but had no other concrete plans in place.

Once the cooking class crew (Amanda, Deb, Jen, Joanna and Nate) had left we hung out at the hotel for a bit while Fred and John ate breakfast and then we headed out for a wander. We headed the direction of Buda Castle. Along the way we snapped photos and enjoyed the city.

Hungarian Parliament from the Buda side of the Danube

When we got to the entrance to Buda Castle we noticed that there was couple rows of Hungarian soldiers lined up in front of a red carpet at the presidential offices. We hung around for a while to see if we could see who was going to be coming to the offices. It turned out that a couple of official looking cars with Hungarian flags on them pulled up and a bunch of people got out. A group of them walked directly to the front door of the offices and lines up as to be waiting for someone. This left an old woman and a younger woman. One of the soldiers (looked like the ranking officer of the soldiers lined up) talked to the women and then the older woman walked over to the other group and the younger woman slowly walked down the red carpet stopping to what looked like inspect the troops. They did some fancy stuff with their rifles and then she walked on into the offices. We took some pictures but have no idea who she was. I am thinking that she is the first lady but who knows.

The soldiers lined up…but for what?

The woman with the red scarf is important some how

After all this excitement we decided to walk along the back wall of Buda Castle hill (if that is even what it is called). Again snapping some more photos.

After a while we came to the Hungarian War Museum. This went through the conflicts that Hungary has been part of, which is just about all of them (and they always seem to be on the wrong side)! The World War 1 and 2 exhibits were very cool but the one that really was the most interesting to me (and made me think that Doyle would love to see it) was an exhibit about Alexander Asboth. Not only was he an accomplished engineer in Hungary, helping with the engineering on the Chain Bridge among other things, but he was a Hungarian war hero and a General in the United States Civil War. (Amanda’s edit: BORING! Cooking is much more fun). He was an ambassador for Hungary in the U.S at the time that the Civil War broke out and became a general for the Union Army. After the war ended he became a U.S. Minister to Argentina and died in Buenos Aires. His remains were sent back to the U.S. in 1990 and are now buried at Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia. The exhibit went through his life and contained items from each of the wars he fought in.

Once we had our fill of swords, guns and hand grenades we decided it was time for lunch…ok beer you got me. (Amanda’s edit: Told you so). We knew about where the Belgian restaurant, Belgas Orozo, was so we headed down the hill toward the Danube. It did not take long and we found it and boy was it a great place. It contained a menu of belgian type food and a beer menu that contained over a hundred Belgian brews. We opted for a few appetizers and started with the half a yard beer sampler. This contained 6 tasters of different beers. Then we each had a beer randomly picked from the menu. It was all great.

mmm Belgian beer!

After food and beer we headed back to the hotel to meet up with the cooking class crew and plan the rest of the evening. All in all a good day! (Amanda’s edit: This is why they were late!)

Battle of the Sexes (Girls)

2011-02-02T10:06:00.001-08:00

When Kevin first brought up the subject of him going to Budapest with some friends, I encouraged him to go. With the trip being right in the middle of the time period where I would be taking my nursing boards and looking for a job, it didn’t seem possible for me to go. However, as soon as he mentioned that our friend Jen wanted to take a cooking class, I knew that I would be attending this trip, even if it meant flying over for just the weekend. In the end, we wound up having a crew of 4 couples who headed to Budapest. While I tried to get Kevin to take the cooking class with Jen, Debs, Joanna and I , he decided to hang out with Jen and Debs husbands Fred and John instead. Our friend Nate , being newly married, was much more accommodating than the rest of the men, and decided to brave a group of 4 women.

Our morning started with a cab ride to the Great Market on the Pest side (Budapest is separated by the Danube. Buda contains castle hill and Pest contains the economic parts of the city). We arrived at the market in plenty of time to meet our instructor Suzanna. However, we had a little issue paying the driver. Our fare came to 1200 forints *approximately 4 pounds) so we handed over a 10,000 note (which is what the ATM spits out). “No, No, No! Too big” we were told. We managed to get the guy to take the fare in Euro, but it was a little dicey for awhile. To anyone planning on travelling to Budapest – hit “other amount” and put in 9,000 instead of just choosing the amount they offer on the screen. NO ONE wants a 10,000 note.

Our cooking instructor met us at 9 and took us on a tour of the market, starting with the upper level and its prepared food. We saw Langosh (Hungarian Fried Dough that they put weird things on like sour cream), sausages, soups and men drinking Palinka (Schnapps). Next up was the main floor, full of meat and produce. Hungarians, traditionally being a poor nation, do not waste food. Every part of the animal is used. Some of it is unrecognizable, but still they eat it.

You don’t even want to know what this is

On our tour of the meat/produce section, I learned two things.

1) Hungary is one of the largest producers of Foie Gras in the world

2) Paprika means pepper. I’m not sure what I though paprika was made out of, but apparently, its made out of peppers. And Hungarians LOVE paprika.

After a tour of the main floor, it was down to the basement where we found the fish (mostly river fish since the country is landlocked) and pickled items. Hungarians pickle anything. I have a great love affair with pickles – I once at an entire jar of kosher dills in one sitting, so to me, this area was heaven.

After we purchased some paprikas and bread, we headed over to the cooking school to start preparations for our meal. The staff were extremely helpful and pleasant, even if our cooking instructor was a bit of a control freak. She felt the need to check up on my sponge cake making and give the batter one final stir after I had painstakingly folded in the egg whites to perfection. She seemed surprised that the batter looked so nice. I didn’t almost go to culinary school after I got laid off for nothing!

Our menu of the day consisted of :

Gulyásleves/ Goulash Soup (Pronounced Gouyash)
Krumplileves/ Creamy Potato Soup
Paprikáscsirke nokedlivel /Chicken Paprikash with dumplings
Somlói Galuska/ Hungarian Sponge Cake dessert
Almás rétes /Apple strudel

* Don’t ask me how to pronounce anything in Hungarian. They have like 800 million letters/combinations of letters that all have a different sound depending on what letter precedes or follows.

The menu itself was fairly easy to prepare. A good deal of Hungarian meals start in the same way – sweat onions, add meat and brown, then add salt, black pepper, caraway seeds, bay leaf and finally red paprika powder. This was the start to the goulash and chicken paprikash. It was also the start to the creamy potato soup, but instead of adding paprika, we added a paprika containing sausage and sautéed until the paprika filled oil came out of the sausage.

After lunch, we had some time to waste as the rest of the men were running behind so we headed over to Fisherman’s Bastion to take a few photos. Located on Castle Hill on the Buda side of the city, it was built around 1900 and contains 7 towers to represent the 7 Magyar tribes that settled in the area around 900 AD. It is named in honor of the fishermen who were responsible for defending this section of the castle walls in the middle ages.

Right next to Fisherman’s Bastion is St. Mattias Church with its beautiful tile roof. They are currently working on the bell tower, so they had the bells removed. It’s amazing how huge they are.

Statue of Stephen I of Hungary, the first official King who lived around 1000AD

We headed back to the hotel to await the men, who were supposed to meet us at 1, but called us at 1 to tell us they had just ordered food at the Belgian Pub. Shocker…

If I Were a Rich Pope

2011-02-01T00:21:00.001-08:00

Our last full day in Provence brought with it a chill to the air and a visit to the place I had been looking forward to since I saw it our first day – Avignon.

The old city of Avignon sits on a hill still contains its medieval walls surrounding it. Originally settled by a Gallic tribe as an outcropping of Marseilles, it came to be an important location when it was inhabited by the ever spreading Romans. The city passed through various hands until it became a part of the Kingdom of Arles. In 1309, French pope Clement V took up Avignon as his residence. A series of 7 French popes, from the period of 1309-1377, made Avignon the papal seat of power, rather than Rome. As you can imagine, this went over very well in Italy. The city officially came into possession of the church in 1348 when the countess of Provence sold the city to the current pope, Clement VI, for 80,000 florins. Apparently, her husband mysteriously died and she was being charged with his murder. Low on funds,she sold the city for money to mount her defense. The sale of the city for what was essentially chump change also managed to get the church firmly in her favor, and she escaped the murder charge and went on to marry 3 more times. Avignon remained in church hands until the French Revolution when it was annexed as part of France once more.

With our combined efforts, we managed to find parking right away without getting turned around at all (a feat for us on this trip), and decided to head into the city to walk around. Before we walked into the city through the walls, we headed over to Pont Saint-Bénezet. A famous medieval bridge, legend has it that a local shepard boy named Bénezet had a dream that God wanted him to build a bridge across the Rhône River. It was damaged several times by floods and wear and tear (probably because the city let a small child design and build it) until half of it was swept away by a flood in 1688. Today, only about half of it remains. It is popular in French culture for its mention in the French song “Sur le pont d’Avignon” which talks about dancing round and round on the bridge. In actuality, in its prime, people would have danced under the center of the bridge on the small island in the middle of the river, popular for recreational activities.

We headed into the city, with a quick stop by Katie and I to buy some lavender goods. The region of Provence is well known for producing a huge portion of the world’s lavender and lavande (cheaper version) essential oil used for soaps, lotions and perfumes. Unfortunately for us, it wasn’t lavender season so we didn’t get to enjoy miles of wonderfully scented plants, but that didn’t mean we couldn’t buy some products to take home.

After our short shopping break, we headed up to the Palace of Popes. Having never been to the Vatican, I never realized how much wealth the church had until I saw the Palace with my own eyes. It was huge. And while the palace shows the signs its age, you can see how ornate it must have been in its glory days. The only drawback was that, being the former home of the Popes, it drew a large Italian crowd. Italians are not good company in crowded places. Unless you like to be shoved aside whilst someone yells “SCUSI!”

After a bit of shopping, we headed home to bring in the new year in style. Katie made a really delicious duck pie with a puff pastry top, we bought a Bûche de Noël for dessert and we opened a bottle of champagne. However, as we are all old and need to be up early the next day to catch the train, we decided to celebrate South African New Year as it occurred an hour before French New Year.

Ducks from the butcher still have feathers on them

Traditional French Christmas time desert. Sponge cake soaked in booze, rolled with a mousse like filling and then decorated to look like a log.

Happy New Year! (1 month late)

Arrr Matey!

2011-01-28T12:06:00.001-08:00

When John suggested a trip to the nearby town of Arles, I was immediately on board. Arles sounded like the kind of name a pirate would give a town, and I love pirates, so I figured it would be a good time. We headed to Arles and managed to only get turned around once (much improved over the previous day’s trip to Marseille) and headed into town to explore. A city originally founded by Greek colonists, Arles became a major commercial outpost for, who else – the Romans when a canal running parallel to the Rhone and connecting to the sea was built around 102 BC. It became a prosperous city, often called the “second Rome” around the 4th century AD. However, when Rome retreated, so too did the glory of Arles. That is, until the reign of the great Charlemagne, when Arles was returned to its seat of importance and made The Kingdom Of Arles. Today, Arles is a maze of narrow, winding streets and old architecture with reminders of the Romans former presence spread throughout the city. For someone like myself who likes to take pictures, it was a treasure trove of spots. However, I managed to reign myself in somewhat so as to not totally annoy everyone else.

Some of the narrow streets. Can you guess who might possibly be wearing a Puma backpack in front of me?

We decided to do a little walking around to try and get the “lay of the land” so to speak. The small shops immediately caught Katie and I’s attention and it wasn’t long before we were inside one of the clothing shops that had a cute dress in the window. Of course, Kevin and John refused to go in the shop and decided to wander off while Katie and I were browsing. As I was making one last look around the shop, Kevin came running in, imploring me to come “RIGHT NOW” and follow him somewhere. He lead me around the corner to a shop with Roo’s French cousin in the window. In typical Schnauzer fashion, the dog saw us and knew we were admiring him/her and thus came and sat in the window so that I could get a good picture. Schnauzers are so smart.

Needless to say, I stared whinging (that’s the British version of whining or complaining) about how I missed the Hansdome Man and Macarooners.

After my momentary sadness over the Von Schnauzers was over, we headed out to find the reason why we went to Arles – the Roman Coliseum.

Dating back to the 1st century AD, the amphitheater could seat over 20,000 blood thirsty Romans, eager to see chariot races and gladiator battles. Today, the audience is slightly less blood crazy, as it hosts kill free bullfighting (the matador merely has to remove a flag from the bull’s horn) as well as summer concerts. It was nice to see that the people of Arles were very invested in the conservation of the amphitheater, as they were in the process of restoring a good part of it. We also had a really good time climbing up to the very top to enjoy the view over picturesque Arles.

At some point in between heading up to the top and heading back down, we lost Kevin. Naturally, this did not stop me from taking photos, or from some Katie/Amanda silliness.

Since there was no bullfight that day, Katie and I decided to recreate one. John was not amused.

After we located Kevin, lost Kevin AND John and then found them again, we decided to head over to another Roman ruin, right near by. I thought this one was called an amphitheater, but don’t quote me on it. It wasn’t nearly as impressive as the previous roman ruin, but being a history nerd, it was still neat to see.

Since Arles also had the remains of an old Roman bath, we decided to talk a quick trip over there before heading home. On the way, we came across a square dominated by the statue of Vincent Van Gogh. This may seem a strange subject, as most statues in public places tend to be politicians, military heroes or royalty. However, Vincent Van Gogh spent a good deal of 1888 in Arles. It was in this town where he cut off his ear lobe (only to then be chased out by townspeople for being mad). Some of his more famous works were done while in Arles, among them “Vase with 12 sunflowers” and “ Café Terrace at Night.”

We found the Roman baths but they appeared to have been updated somewhere in the Victorian time, and were not even remotely as impressive as the baths in Bath, England so we decided to forgo them in order to head home to our usual night routine – card games, drinks and dinner by the fire.

Aux armes, citoyens!

2011-01-26T08:48:00.001-08:00

Being in the south of France, it seemed only natural to visit the port city of Marseille. One of the guidebooks warned of the dirtiness of Marseille, but considering Paris is also considered dirty, we didn’t think anything of it. Plus, Marseille had to be cool, considering the French National Anthem is called "La Marseillaise". We headed out in search of the waterfront, where we would get a boat out to Chateau d’If. For those of you literary types, you will immediately recognize Chateau d’If as the place where Edmond Dantès was famously imprisoned in Alexandre Dumas’ famous novel “The Count of Monte Cristo.

We made record time to Marseille, mostly because Kevin was driving 180 kph which he told us at the time was 80ish mph, but we later realized was 110! In a Peugeot no less. As we arrived in Marseille, I realized that the guide book was in fact overstating the visual appeal of Marseille. It was a pit! The town was heavily bombed during WWII (due to the fact that, being a port city, it was the embarkation point for a huge number of Jewish and similarly persecuted people. In fact, Victor Lazlo stopped in Marseille shortly before heading to Casablanca in the famous Humphrey Bogart movie. Apparently, the didn’t feel the need to fix most of the city afterwards. To make matters worse, the GPS decided to throw a hissy fit and get us totally turned around. Poor Kevin was a champ though, finally getting us to the waterfront.

Unlike the majority of Marseille, the waterfront was much more picturesque. The mouth of the harbor is dominated by two forts at either end which were being worked on, so we couldn’t walk around. We headed over to the boat launch to find out the time of the next ferry to Chateau d’If, but soon found out that the Chateau was closed for renovation until at least November 2010. We sent Katie up to double check that it was still closed, and alas it was. A wasted trip to Marseille. However, we did find a nice little Proveçal restaurant to have lunch and then headed out.

Luckily, it wasn’t a total wasted trip. Close by to Marseille is the town of Aubagne, a town Katie had been talking about visiting since we booked our trip. Aubagne is birthplace and home of French cinema great Marcel Pagnol. John was very concerned about Pagnol and his American equivalent. He peppered Katie with questions – “is he like Scorsese? James Cameron? George Lucas?” until Katie finally agreed that he was like Woody Allen. Katie got her picture in front of Pagnol’s house

We found this on the street, so naturally, we had to take a picture.

We rounded off the night with a batch of homemade mac and cheese using the mounds of extra pasta from the night before. After I made the batch, which was way too much for 4 of us, there was still pasta left!

Boulboning Around

2011-01-26T04:22:00.001-08:00

Tuesday morning came, and brought with it 4 very tired people. Instead of making the effort to go somewhere, we all decided to stay in Boulbon for the day. I will admit, part of the reason I decided to stay in town was that I was thoroughly engrossed in The Hunger Games Trilogy and wanted to continue reading. When the non-reader in the group Kevin was thoroughly bored, we set out to explore the fort and the restored windmill in town.

From what I could gather from the information booklet in our house written in French, the fortified chateau was built starting in the 11th century by the local Seigneur (Feudal Lord) to protect his land from invaders (possible other Seigneurs. I think I read something about War of the Lords in the booklet). While the keep still exists today, most of the rest of the chateau, including living quarters, defense towers, and terraces have crumbled over the years. Some of the old walls to the chateau are still located in town, with houses (like ours) built right in. We took a walk around the fort, looking for an entrance, but it appears that the fort is not open for visitors-probably due to the steep dropoff located directly on the other side of the keep walls.

After exploring the outside of the fortress (and Kevin and John climbing the hill to attempt to sneak in), we decided to head over to the restored moulin (windmill). Once again, John vocally stated how much more exercise he was getting today. However, I joined in with John in protestation due to my improper hiking clothes (I thought we were just walking) and improper footwear (Pumas are not good for scrambling up icy, muddy, rocky hills).

My attempt at being artsy

The fort and aerial view of Boulbon

Grapevines as far as the eye can see. I must be in Heaven

Once we got our fill of the view, we headed back down the giant hill, me complaining about my choice in footwear the entire way. Once back at the house, John decided to cook dinner that night and settled on Pasta and Meatballs. Katie and I had bought a 500 gram bag of small macaroni on our binge shopping trip the day earlier, but John thought we needed more, so we headed back to the store to pick up another bag of pasta and jar of sauce. We then headed to the butcher to pick up some ground beef for meatballs. It was actually pretty cool – the butcher grinds the meat right in front of you.

MMM, fresh French ground beef

Katie and I are on reading duty tonight

The food was delicious, but just in case you were wondering, 1 kilo of pasta is far too much for 4 people!

Friends, Romans, Countrymen

2011-01-25T12:10:00.001-08:00

Monday brought with it a town market that was actually open, so Katie and I started our morning out with a little grocery shopping. Our shopping experience was a little like Cameron Diaz in The Holiday wandering around the store throwing random things in the cart. We also gave the shop keeper a good laugh with the sheer amount of food two girls purchased.

After Katie and I bought out the market, the boys decided that we should head out on a day trip to Pont du Gard. (Apparently, a fascination with the Romans is ingrained in the Y chromosome because every male I have ever met is enamored of old Roman stuff).

Kevin and John at the end of the old waterway

Pont du Gard, the highest still existing Roman aquaduct, was built in 1 AD and ran between Uzès and Nîmes, providing Nîmes with water for their bath houses, homes and fountains. The Romans were responsible for its upkeep until the 4th century and it was used even after their fall by the people of the area, until the lack of upkeep lead to it becoming clogged. Long after it was done serving its purpose as an aqeuduct, the local powers that be used it as a toll bridge, collecting money from people and carts wishing to cross the Gard River. It became a popular tourist destination some time in the 18th century, a fact that can be determined from the old school graffiti. In fact, cars were allowed to drive over the bridge up until its renovation in 2000.

We started out our trip by heading up the hill to the Panorama. Luckily, we had two crack navigators with us, or we may not have found it.

After we checked out the panorama, we headed down to the other side. John got more exercise than he’s gotten in a year, which he made sure to point out.

John also did a little weight lifting

On the other side, we were able to see the bridge at the same perspective as you would see it on the 5 Euro Bill.

My incessant photo taking bored the boys, so they wandered off while I snapped a few (okay, a lot) more photos before we headed back to our super fly house.

Once back at the house, John and I tried to start a fire while Katie and Kevin went to the store in the next town over to grab a few things that we needed for dinner. However, we rapidly filled the house with smoke due to our fire incompetence, and had to open all the doors and put fans around the house to blow out the smoke. From then on, we decided to leave the fires to the girl scout and boy scout.

Katie and I made a delicious Potato and Leek soup (inspired by the huge leeks we found on our market trip) while the boys drank their weight in beer. (I’m just glad that Kevin didn’t buy two mini kegs like Katie thought he should). We also played a few rousing games of Uno, Pass the Pig, Bananagrams and Phase 10, which I won of course.

Draw 4 you slick son of a bitch!

Un, Deux, Trois…

2011-01-21T07:28:00.001-08:00

Let me start out this post by saying that if you suffer from a physical handicap, don’t ever go to Paris.

December 26th brought with it the part of the trip that we were all looking forward to – heading to Provence. I have wanted to see this part of the country ever since I read the fantastically hilarious “A Year In Provence” as part of a high school French assignment. Written by Peter Mayle, a British citizen who decides to up and move to Provence with his wife and their dog, it’s part travelogue, and part social commentary. If you haven’t read it, you are truly missing out. Luckily, the rest of our traveling party was totally on board with spending some time in Provence, especially after Katie found a house for rent in Boulbon that looked idyllic.

Instead of driving the 8+ hour journey from Paris, we decided to experience another French masterpiece, the TGV. The TGV is a high speed train line that operates throughout France. The train is able to take an 8 hour car journey and turn it into less than 3 hours by running at maximum speeds of 320 kph. I love trains, especially efficient European trains, and Kevin loves Engineering Marvels, so it seemed like the perfect way to get to Provence. The train to Avignon leaves from Gare de Lyon and unfortunatly, the Metro closest to our hotel did not go directly there, but we could get there in one stop. No big deal, right? WRONG! Apparently, the French don’t believe in escalators or elevators. Which makes it very difficult when you have suitcases with 10 days worth of clothes as they have to be carried up and down the stairs. When your suitcase is half your size (Katie!), its even hard just to get into the Metro station as the barriers aren’t quite big enough to allow you to drag your suitcase through and you have to lift it up and over. It also stinks when you go all the way down the stairs only to realize that the train line you need leaves from another location and you have to walk all the way up again. To anyone who plans on travelling around France – PACK LIGHT. Preferably something with straps so that you can just throw it on your back.

Even with all the stairs and transferring of train lines, we arrived at the train station with an hour to spare (the joys of traveling with John and myself – we like to get places VERY early). However, our train was for some reason delayed. We finally were allowed to board around 15 minutes after we were supposed to have left and it was insane. Parisians running and pushing to get on the train, as if they thought there was only 1 minute to board. We finally got to the entrance of our car and we realized we were on the upper floor. MORE STAIRS! Bollocks! However, at this point, Kevin had taken over carrying both of our suitcases (probably because it pained him to see my weak arms try and lift the thing).

Help! Macarooners! There’s a macaroon under attack!

Macarooners to the rescue!

Our trip started out uneventful, but it seemed like we were moving slower than we should. Come to find out, the tracks were icy from the snow and there had been a derailment so we were forced to reduce our speed. No big deal except for the company we had in our car – loud children playing some card game that looked like Uno but involved them yelling “UN, DEUX, TROIS!!!!!” , slamming a wooden stamper down and then “AAAHHHH”. Annoying at first, horrifying after a few hours. Good thing we had a box of Macaroons to eat to occupy our time. (If you are confused as to why Macaroons are so entertaining, watch the below video)

We finally got to Avignon 2 hours late. However, it was still way faster than driving. Plus, TGV refunds half the ticket price if you are over 2 hours late. Score!

Right away, we experienced the famous Mistral I read so much about in “A Year in Provence” as it blew us across the parking lot and broke John’s wheely bag. The wind didn’t let up all day and we arrived in Boulbon to howling winds and howling bellies. Alas, Sunday in Provence is a day that all stores are closed. Seriously. However, the excitement of seeing our house took away some of the hunger. This house was seriously awesome. Built into the walls of a 13th century fort, it was amazing! Plus it was located on Rue de Fort, which set off a week of Swedish Chef jokes as we thought it sounded like something he would say.

Rue de Fort, BORK BORK BORK!

To fend off the hunger pangs, we decided to explore the town a bit. The poor Boulbonians were probably frightened out of their minds and the crazy Americans running through town, laughing and yelling.

The fort right behind our house

View over Boulbon

Kevin found an almond on our walk and ate it. He was shocked that it tasted fermented…

Dinner time came, and since there were no stores open (or any restaurants in town), John and Kevin went to see if the local bar served food. Really, they just went to get a few beers… We managed to find two bags of egg noodles that the owners of the house had left. However, there was no butter or sauce of any kind that we could put on the noodles. Katie and Kevin made the smart decision to eat theirs plain. John and I found a bottle of hot sauce that we decided to put on the noodles. I am a big fan of spicy food, as Kevin can attest to. My specialty is Fire Chili – so hot it burns off the top layer of skin in your mouth. However, this hot sauce was even too much for me. After the fact, we realized that it had probably been sitting their for 10 years evaporating until it was reduced to pure liquid fire. Maybe we were just trying to channel our hero…

Joyeux Noël

2011-01-20T14:14:00.001-08:00

Christmas morning came and instead of bringing more snow with it, it brought frigid temperatures and ice. Naturally, Katie and I decided that it would be a great idea to go for an early morning run. Katie spent a semester in Paris in college and it was there that she developed her love of running. We decided to run to Parc Montsouris as this was where Katie used to run from her dorm. From what Katie estimated, it would be about a 4 mile loop from the hotel, which seemed perfect. Except it was absolutely freezing out. And the sidewalks were covered in ice. And somehow we made a wrong turn. We did make it to the park, and headed back. However, around mile 4, I hit a frozen wall and decided I needed to take the Metro back. Riding the metro was a bad choice. Not only did standing around make me even colder, but my legs completely seized up and my stomach started to rumble. THEN, we emerged from the Metro right in the middle of Latin Quarter and had to run the remaining mile down streets that smelled of gyros and baguette. It was cruel and unusual punishment!

After our morning run (which the boys did not join us on, SHOCKER), we headed out towards the Eiffel Tower so that the Paris virgin in the group (Kevin) could see it. Somehow, we got on a train that terminated at Les Invalides, so we decided to walk the rest of the way. Normally, it would have been a nice walk along the Seine, but it was icy and cold and we got harassed by a stupid gypsy which kind of took away from the beauty of it. One of the benefits of it being so cold was that the Eiffel Tower was crawling with less tourists that it usually is. However, our plans of going up into the tower were dashed by the huge line that would have forced us to wait in the cold. Either way, we decided to snap a few obligatory photos before we headed off to our next destination.

Since it was Christmas, almost everything in Paris was closed. However, as we walked by Hotel des Invalides on our way back to the Metro, we realized that while the museum was closed, the inner courtyard was open. Since Kevin is a boy, I thought he would enjoy the former military barracks of Napoleon, so we wandered around inside for awhile so Kevin and John could appreciate the cannons and giant gun.

After the boys had their fill of jokes about “Napoleon’s balls”, we decided to head back to the hotel for a drink or two and a few rounds of "bananagrams” before our dinner cruise on the Seine. On the way, we passed my favorite place in Paris – the Rodin museum. Unfortunately (or fortunately if you are Kevin), it was closed. We also stopped to get more gyros for lunch. You really can’t eat enough of them.

Unlike the daytime Seine boat I went on as a student, the cruise Katie booked us required fancy clothes and came with dinner and wine. Anyone who knows me (and Katie), knows how much we love to dress up and thus I was extra excited about the cruise. Even Kevin got into the spirit. We made our way back towards the Eiffel Tower (carefully since it was even more icy than before). I made a very smart decision to wear my pumas and carry my dress shoes (smart because these things literally are 6 inches high and I would have wound up in the river). However, no sooner had I changed into more appropriate footwear and gotten inside, than we hit a snag. The river was too high and the boat couldn’t go out! They offered us the chance to still eat on the boat at a discounted rate, but since the discount was a mere 15 euros (not 50 as the women rudely corrected me), we decided to find another restaurant. A bit of a letdown, but I was still able to see the Eiffel Tower lit up at night, and save 260 euros a couple, so in all, not the end of the world. The restaurant we chose, recommended by our hotel, was fabulous. The staff was legitimately excited to have us in the restaurant, and the food was once again delicious. If you are ever in the Rue Mouffetard area of Paris, check out Le jardin d'ivy. You won’t regret it.

Paris, Je t’aime

2011-01-19T06:24:00.001-08:00

With the previous day’s terrible travel experience all but forgotten, Kevin and I set out bright and early to explore some of the city while waiting for our friends Katie and John to arrive. We decided to start off at Notre Dame as it was a short 10 minute walk from our hotel (and we already knew how to find it as we were wandering around near it lost the day before). First things first, coffee and a croissant as one of the touristy cafés right near Notre Dame. I got to practice my French when ordering and considering the waiter responded in French, it apparently wasn’t so bad that he needed to switch to English to understand me.

As we were walking towards Notre Dame, I warned Kevin of the obnoxious gypsy children that swarmed everywhere like ants on watermelon and told him just to yell Va t’en! or something along those lines at them. However, as we wandered around the cathedral, we didn’t see a single soul. Apparently, gypsies are not poor enough to need to beg in the winter when it is snowing. Although the weather (and the slush seeping into my Pumas) was making us freeze our bollocks off, it was perfect for a photographer like me who can not stand having people in her picture and will wait 10 minutes, hoping to be able to snap a people free photo.

Huzzah! No gypsies in site!

I have an obsession with gargoyles.

By the time we had made it around front, Kevin was already annoyed at how many pictures I had taken and how long it took me to line up “the perfect shot”. Plus, Japan had invaded and there was about 1 million dollars worth of photo equipment ruining my pictures, so I snapped just a few more photos and we were on our way to the next stop – The Louvre.

Kevin’s coat is perfect for perspective when taking pictures.

Charlemagne

On the way to the Louvre, we had to continue across the Seine, and so I decided to take Kevin over Pont Neuf. While its name implies that it is a New Bridge, it is actually the oldest still standing Bridge across the Seine. in 1577, King Henry III made the decision to build a new bridge spanning the river as the bridge near Notre Dame was congested. The original intention was to build houses along the bridge, and thus the bridge was widened. However, no such houses were ever built.

A short walk from Pont Neuf and we arrived at the Louvre. Kevin is not in any means a fan of art and since the Louvre is completely overwhelming, we decided just to walk around the outside, inner courtyard. Kevin’s main concern was finding spots he recognized from Da Vinci Code and mine was avoiding the people who were harassing me to sign some stupid petition. (They were awful. One even called me a Cocotte!)

L’arc de Triomphe du Carrousel comissioned by Napoléon to commemorate his military victories

Today, the Louvre houses an extensive collection of art, including the overrated Mona Lisa. However, it was at one point a royal palace. First used for this purpose in the 13th century, it occupies the site of a former fortress. If my memory serves me correctly from the last time I was in the Louvre in high school, you can see the foundation of the old fort in the basement of one of the wings (perhaps the medieval wing?). The palace was renovated and added to over the years until it became the extensive building that it is today. It was during the French Revolution that the decision to make the palace a museum was made. It originally housed roughly 500 paintings seized from the monarchy after their untimely demise at the hands of the revolutionaries. Today, it houses over 380,000 pieces of art. If you are in Paris for a few days, its well worth the trip, but personally, I would rather go to Musee d’Orsay or Musee Rodin.

Next stop on the Lester walking tour of Paris was L’arc de Triomphe by way of the Tuileries and Place de La Concorde. Again, it was amazing how dead it was. There was hardly a person in site. Granted, Tuileries is best seen in the summer when the plants are actually alive and there are flowers blooming, but you’d at least think some people would be out and about…

Tuileries

While Place de la Concorde may not appear to be much, it appeals to those of us who are familiar with the history of the French Revolution. Even the readers who don’t spend their free time reading biographies of French/English monarchs or history books like myself will have heard of the extensive use of the guillotine during the French Revolution. Originally constructed in 1755, the large public square was called Place Louis XV in honor of the king at the time. However, during the Revolution, it was renamed Place de la Revolution and a large guillotine was erected. In front of cheering crowds, King Louis XVI, his wife Marie Antoinette, and his mistress Madame du Barry were beheaded. In the aftermath of the “Reign of Terror, several high profile executions also took place.

Executed at Place de La Concorde after the fall of the monarchy was chemist and my personal hero Antoine Lavoisier,who is considered by many to be the Father of Modern Chemistry and the first person to discover the Law of Conservation of Mass ( leading to one of my favorite aspects of chemistry – stoichiometry). Lavoisier had the misfortune to not only help foreign born scientists and mathematicians during the Reign of Terror but to belittle Marat’s prism invention and thus when Marat became a leading political leader, he exacted his revenge. Also executed was Maximilien Robespierre. It seems that even the former leader of the revolution who ultimately called for the execution of Louis XVI was not safe in the aftermath.

Today, the Place de La Concorde lacks the gruesome guillotine, but instead has an obelisk from the reign of Ramses II that once stood outside Luxor Temple. Given to the French in 1833 by the Egyptian government along with an additional obelisk too large to move, it was placed at the site of the former guillotine in Place de La Concorde. (The other obelisk was given back to the Egyptian people in the 1990’s and still stands at Luxor Temple today.)

Leading off from the Place de La Concorde is Champs d’Elysees, otherwise known as “insane road leading to L’Arc du Triomphe that I would never ever ever drive on for fear of death”

After dodging all the obnoxious tourists who were fouling up my pictures, we decided to head back to the hotel by way of the Opera House (the setting for my favorite Broadway play). However, we stupidly decided to use the walking GPS that Kevin borrowed from his friend that took us to a random hotel named Paris Opera rather than the actual opera house. After a few wrong turns, we managed to find it and snap a few pictures before heading back to the hotel to await our friends.

Due to our mishap with the GPS, we were late arriving back at the hotel and thought John and Katie might have beaten us there. However, we soon found out that their luggage was being held hostage by French baggage handlers due to a strike. Luckily for me, I was not affected the day before because the strike was taking from from 10-2 each day. This may seem strange to some, but anyone who has ever been to France will be aware of the fact that the French don’t do anything before 10. We had been waiting for John and Katie for lunch, but as they were going to be a few more hours at least, we set off for some food. We had the good fortune to be close to the Latin Quarter, and thus we set out in search of a delicious gyro. The gyros there are delicious and the best I have had outside of Greece. Gyros from the Latin Quarter are on my list of “Things not to be missed in Paris.”

After a quick walk through Isle St. Michel, we headed back to the hotel and finally met up with our friends Katie and John. John and Kevin had a joyful reunion full of hugging and scotch drinking and then we headed out to Rue Mouffetard for some dinner. Katie found us a delicious little place that appeared to be a favorite of the locals. Kevin and John completely embarrassed us with their loud behavior – so all in all a normal night. We enjoyed some stellar food. Katie and I had one of the best bottles of Cotes du Rhone I have ever had, stuffed artichokes, Duck Confit and homemade chocolate mousse which were all to die for. This was not the kind of place one whipped out a camera at, so you will have to take my word on the deliciousness of the food.

An American in Paris the airport

2011-01-16T05:52:00.001-08:00

Almost a year ago, Kevin and I were discussing potential trips for us to take with his remaining time in England and we got on the subject of France with our Francophile friend Katie and how both of us would love to not only go back to Paris, but to take a trip down south to Provence as well. Since Katie’s husband is a teacher and taking vacations during the school year is out, we decided that a Lester/Felty trip to France for Christmas was in order.

Originally, Kevin and I were supposed to have a full day in Paris before the arrival of the Feltys. (I could have flown with them, but since John carries a black cloud over him when traveling and I generally have good luck, I decided to fly out by myself the day before) . However, what we really wound up having was a day in the Charles de Gaulle airport. My flight was due to land 1 hour earlier than Kevin’s. We made plans for me to wait outside his gate for him, unless his flight was delayed for some reason. By the time I made it through the Death Star maze of Terminal 1, on the tram and to the gate where Kevin was due to be coming in, it was shortly before Kevin’s plane should have come in. When checked the board and saw that flight 3123 was due to get in in 30 minutes, I settled down with my latest Teen Read from Borders (I seriously need to mature my reading habits) until shortly after Kevin’s flight was due to land, when I stood up and started looking for Kevin. I stood for almost 30 minutes with no sign of the infamous Red Sox cap, but plenty of British people walking out until I realized that Kevin wasn’t on flight 3123, he was on flight 3121. THIS flight was still in Manchester and wasn’t due in until 12:00. Bollocks! Based upon our previous plans, if Kevin were to be late, I was supposed to meet him at the hotel. So, I picked up my stuff and dragged it a good 10 minutes away to the RER terminal where one could get a train into Paris. Locating a ticket machine was easy. However, paying with an American credit card was not. The machines only took cash or chip and pin credit cards, neither of which I had. Plus, all I could find in the way of ticket offices was one for the TGV. There had to be an atm somewhere, right? Wrong! It took me 15 minutes to find an atm, located half way back to Kevin’s terminal. I got some money, glanced at my watch and realized that Kevin’s plane was due in in 45 minutes. I might as well wait for him at that point. I got back to the gate, and checked the board to make sure Kevin’s flight was still on time, and once again settled in with my book. When 12 came, I once again stood up and waited. However, 12:15 and then 12:30 came with the board still saying “Estimated arrival 12:00”. Weird. FINALLY, the board changed, but instead of saying “Arrived”, it said “Estimated 13:37”. BOLLOCKS again! Thoroughly fed up, I decided to go get the train, now that I had cash. I walked all the way back to the train station, found a ticket machine only to realize that the machines only take COINS and I had paper bills. At this point, I was seriously ready to strangle someone. I wandered around looking for someplace to buy something – ANYTHING, so that I could get coins. Finally, I realized that in tiny, tiny letters at the very top corner of the TGV office, the sign said RER. In pretty terrible French, I was able to ascertain that I could buy tickets in the office, which really pissed me off as I could have been taking a nap hours ago at the hotel if I had realized this. After taking another 15 minutes to make it to the front of the line, I realized that Kevin was due in in 45 minutes, and once again, I might as well wait for him. I bought two tickets and made my way back to terminal 2E for the 100th time that day. By the time Kevin got out of baggage claim, it was almost 3pm, and I had been at the airport for 7 hours. I ‘ve never been so happy to see someone in my entire life!

When we got off the train near Notre Dame and had a huge issue finding the hotel because Kevin printed the wrong thing and I forgot my directions on my desk at home, I was glad that I had such an issue buying tickets. I would have gotten off the train at Notre Dame and then wandered around the city with my suitcase all day, because the only information I knew in my head was where to get off the tran and what the name of the hotel was.

DISASTER!

May the Force be with you

2011-01-14T06:59:00.001-08:00

Its been ages since I have written in the blog. Blame it on the last few weeks of Nursing School and frantically studying for my boards. However, now that I have nothing to do except stress over whether or not I passed, (I PASSED!) I figured it would be a good time to catch up on the blog – starting with the last day trip in England with Mumsy. (I told you – it’s been a while!)

On Friday, in typical BAE fashion, Kevin got out of work after a half day. Since the weather appeared to be decent (for England) and not too cold (for England), we decided to show Mumsy the splendor of hiking in the fells. Since we had limited day light, we decided to focus our energy on a quick walk rather than full fledged fell hike. Mumsy had seen mention of a big waterfall called Aira Force which is located on a huge stretch of National Trust land and we were able to locate what seemed to be a nice circular walk, so we set out in pursuit of a little fresh air.

First of all, I should mention that it was freezing! This is clearly illustrated in my pictures (to follow). When first setting off on the train, we immediately came across a fallen tree with a very strange appearance. Upon closer look, we realized that the tree had thousands of coins hammered into it. Apparently it’s good luck or something. All I know is it made for a cool picture.

The waterfall itself was a short mile walk from the parking lot on a well established path.

Wild stream of Aira, hold thy course,

Nor fear memorial lays,

Where clouds that spread in solemn shade,

Are edged with golden rays!

Dear art thou to the light of heaven,

Though minister of sorrow;

Sweet is thy voice at pensive even.

And thou, in lovers' hearts forgiven,

Shalt take thy place with Yarrow!

Once you catch a glimpse of it, its easy to see why William Wordsworth was so inspired by it. (Actually, its easy to see why Wordsworth loved the whole Cumbrian area so much.) It was also easy to see how cold it was.

Yes, that’s snow up on the top of those hills.

After we viewed the waterfall, we set off to follow the circular path from Aira Force to Gowbarrow Fell, Memorial Seat and back to the parking lot. We had just about enough time to do the whole walk as it was around 1 and the walk said it took a comfortable 3 hours. However, we quickly learned that the directions we had printed from the National Trust were not to be trusted. In what seemed like a simple step, we were to carry on up the main path and through a gate to open farmland and then at the junction, go up and over a stile to head up to Gowbarrow. Simple – right? Well, the stupid directions failed to mention a bridge we needed to take so we walked along the river for a good 25 minutes before the path ended due to a bridge being out (for a good number of years mind you), so we had to head all the way back to where we started and take a bridge there.

Kevin wanted us to cross the river by leaping to the other side, but I quickly vetoed that idea.

Then, we walked over the muddy, icy path for a good mile before we saw anything that resembled a gate, and it took another 10 minutes before we wound up on the farmland that the directions described. It’s a good thing it was so beautiful or I would have been pissed!

Traditional Herdwick sheep found in this area. We found this one to be particularly Cailin like in appearance

Ullswater

Once we finall found the stile, we climbed the incredibly steep and icy hill up, up, up. When it started to flatten out, we could just make out Gowbarrow Fell. Since we had come all this way, we decided to book it over to the Fell as it was starting to get late.

At this point, it was nearing 3:30, and as it gets dark very early in the northern parts of England, we had limited daylight left. On the map, it appeared we were about halfway around the loop. However, since we had so many problems following the directions up to this point, we decided to play it safe and head back the way we came. Kevin was freaking out that we were going to be stranded on the icy dark hills so he literally made us run down, which is dangerous for someone like me who trips over shadows. However, I made it unscathed.

All in all, a good trip. Mumsy was able to bag her first fell and with this hike, and I was able to add another one to my meager list. This area of Cumbria is one I’d love to spend more time exploring, but as I sadly have only one trip left, it will have to wait until I convince Kevin to go back…

Hoad Sweet Hoad

2010-11-27T01:20:00.001-08:00

The very first photo I took in Ulverston way back in March 2009

Since last time Mumsy was here, we went on a whirlwind tour of England/Scotland, we decided to stay close to Ulverston. I took her to some of my favorite places – Birkrigg Stone Circle, Gillams, Market Street and the Hoad. Since I had already written about Birkrigg but somehow, inexplicably have only written a brief paragraph with no actual photos of the Hoad, I decided it would be the perfect subject for today’s blog.

Perhaps the most recognizable part of Ulverston is the Hoad. In fact, it kept me from getting lost my very first day in Ulverston. I decided to take the train to Kevin’s rather than have him pick me up and unwisely decided not to write down directions or even an address of Kevin’s brand new flat (that I had only been to once back in March on his house hunting trip). Also, I had no idea where Ulverston was in relation to the other towns around me, and thus did not have any clue as to when would be an appropriate time to gather up my belongings and prepare to disembark the train. However, as I looked out the window with jet lag forcing my eye lids closed, I saw the Hoad. Just in front of the Hoad, I saw a 3 story blue building. I assumed that Kevin was the only one with a blue building in that general location and thus I was able to get off the train in the right location and wander towards the Hoad in the direction of the blue building and find the flat.

Built in 1850 from stones taken from Birkrigg Common (right down the road), the Hoad commemorates the life of Sir John Barrow – founder of the Royal Geographic Society. For many years, he served in various countries as a foreign secretary. Mini Deal would be interested in the fact that after the very short lived acquisition of the Cape of Good Hope, he served as a secretary in Cape Town, in charge of settling disputes between the Boers and the native Africans.

Fortunately for the Hoad but unfortunately for me, it has been wrapped in scaffolding since shortly after Kevin’s arrival in the UK for major repair works. However, in August, the repair work was completed.

While I walk up the Hoad at least once a week while here, this week marked the first time I had seen it without junk all around it. Needless to say, I have taken quite a few pictures. Its unfortunate that the inside is only open on Sundays because I would have loved to take a walk up and see the panoramic views of the area.

View of the Hoad from Birkrigg Common. Look at all the snow on the fells! No wonder its so cold.

This morning it snowed and I rushed to take a photo. Kevin was less impressed and greeted my cheers of “Snow!” with a grunt. He’s still sleeping…

Mumsy enjoyed our hike up the Hoad as well. Last time she was here, the weather was rainy and the Hoad was covered in scaffolding. However, I made the rookie mistake of asking her which way she wanted to go to the top and she chose straight!

Sooo steep

Mumsy likes taking pictures of the Hoad as much as me.

Happy British Thanksgiving

2010-11-26T12:20:00.001-08:00

Due to the fact that Kevin was VERY annoyed at my post on Thanksgiving, I’ve decided to try and appease him with a serious post about our delicious Thanksgiving dinner yesterday. Note: I was too busy drooling over the food and talking to remember to take pictures, so I’ve stolen these great pictures from two lovely American wives Holly and Pat.

For the third year in a row, the wonderful Braddylls Arms in Bardsea (just up the road from Kevin’s place in Ulverston) has hosted a Thanksgiving meal for the Americans over here. The Braddylls is a great little restaurant with a beautiful view over Morecambe Bay and even better food. We’ve eaten there several times and I have never been disappointed. The food is well cooked and showcases locally sourced ingredients. Therefore, when I heard that the annual Thanksgiving Feast was held at Braddylls, I was excited. (Last year, I cooked Thanksgiving for Mini, our dear friend Katie and some of our friends from Ulverston. Give Thanks 2009)

The proprietress June goes all out for this occasion, sourcing ingredients from France (pumpkins) when not available here and providing a variety of wonderful decorations for the room. For me, one of the best parts was arriving early with the other “ladies of leisure” (aka unemployed American wives) to set up the room. I think we did a fantastic job!

The food was, as expected, wonderful. I especially enjoyed the real Creamed Corn (it was literally fresh cut corn in a cream sauce. WAAAAAY better than the disgusting canned variety.) It was great to spend Thanksgiving with friends and fellow countrymen (and a few Brits to boot). I ‘m just sad that I couldn’t convince Kev to stay another year so that I could enjoy the food again next year.

The best thing on this plate was by far the sweet potatoes. MMM

We let a Brit carve our turkey. Luckily (for him) he didn’t mess it up.

One of two photos I actually took. The girls next to me looked at me very strange when I pulled out a camera to document my food. Little did they know that this is one of my hobbies.

Glorious pie!

Somehow we wound up at the kids table. I blame Jen.

I’m thankful for…

2010-11-25T08:21:00.001-08:00

In honor of the ongoing debate regarding Twilight versus Harry Potter and which is better, and given the fact that I am currently in England, the land of Harry Potter, I’ve decided to do a special edition of the blog dedicated to the very subject. Harry Potter and Twilight are probably two of my favorite things in the world and in keeping with the Thanksgiving Theme, here are the top 5 reasons I am thankful for each:

Harry Potter

5. The Weasley Twins

Like myself, they know the value of a good prank. Some of their better works include the fireworks that crash together and spell “poo” and the swamp in the corridors of Hogwarts.

4. Hermione Granger

She makes hardworking bookworms look cool. Think about it, she was one of the main reasons Harry Potter was able to defeat Lord Voldemort.

3. The Scenery

Filmed at some of the most interesting and picturesque locations throughout England, the film is a treasure trove of places to visit.

2. The Cast

The cast of Harry Potter is like a Who’s Who of British Actors.

Alan Rickman, Maggie Smith, Richard Harris, Robbie Coltrane, Kenneth Branagh, John Cleese, Emma Thompson, David Tennant, Brendan Gleeson, Michael Gambon, Gary Oldman, Julie Christie, Ralph Fiennes, Imelda Staunton, Helena Bonham Carter, Jim Broadbent, Bill Nighy, Miranda Richardson and of course Robert Pattinson. I think all of the British Film Industry has been in these movies. Except Hugh Grant. Wonder what he did to piss off the Harry Potter directors…

1. Speaking of R-Patz

JUST SAY NO!

The number one reason I am thankful for Harry Potter is the fact that I can watch R-Patz without K-Bot ruining it with her blinking, lip biting awfulness.

Twilight

Happy Thanksgiving! Kevin has pointed out that this blog has nothing to do with England, so I’ll return to regular blogs tomorrow.

Robin Hood’s Wall

2010-11-24T06:20:00.001-08:00

Sunday morning brought a bit of sun, so we thought it would be the perfect time to explore the elusive Hadrian’s Wall (Vallum Aelium to my Latin comprehending friends. (Yes, I know more than 1 person who can read Latin. Seriously.) The proprietress of our lovely B&B (Brookside Villas – definitely check them out if you are ever looking for a place to stay in Hadrian’s Wall area) sent up up the road to Birdoswald Roman Fort for a good view of the wall. The fort was closed for the winter, but the view was amazing-well worth the trip.

Buddy!

It’s not a day with the Lesters if we I don’t take a ridiculous picture

Mumsy didn’t appreciate my crazy picture and made me act normal. BORING!

Ridiculous pictures must run in the family. Gaga eye!

After my Mom and I thoroughly annoyed Kevin with the sheer number of photos we took, we headed off to Steel Rigg, an excellent base for hiking along some of the most impressive sections of the wall.

Hadrian’s Wall started its lifeas an earth wall and spanned the 80 Roman miles from Solway Firth to the River Tyne. In 122 AD, the Emperor Hadrian commissioned the building of a stone wall with milecastles at every Roman mile and turrets interspersed. (FYI- A Roman mile is 1620 yards, compared to the current 1760 yards per mile. There is some debate that it is due to the shorter stature and smaller feet of the Roman soldier since they measured distances in paces.) Designed to keep those pesky Scottish barbarians out and the locals from stealing their sheep, it had a ditch at the front and at the back. The ditch at the front served to increase the difficulty of scaling the wall while the ditch set a distance from the backside of the wall served to keep the livestock close to the wall and make it difficult for the citizens to sneak in a steal a sheep or two.

When the next Emperor Antonius came into power after Hadrian’s demise, he was not content to let Hadrian have all the glory and fame, building his own wall further into Scotland called the Antoine Wall. However, the Scottish were much more successful in destroying the wall and very little remains today. Even in death, Hadrian managed to outshine Antonious.

Now that everyone is asleep from my history lesson, here are a few of the better pictures:

One of the milecastles

Turret

Tsk tsk Kevin, standing on the wall when it clearly tells you not to. At least I have my wicked sweet Whalers hat to distract from the fact that you are BREAKING THE RULES!

Aww nuts! Mom caught me being nice to Kevin…

About half way through the walk, we reached the famous Sycamore Gap. Famous for what you ask? It’s famous for being used for filming of Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves with the terrible Kevin Costner. Not only is Kevin Costner a terrible actor, but the geography of the director is seriously off. First, he lands at the White Cliffs of Dover, then two seconds later he’s at Hadrian’s Wall in order to head to Nottingham? Did they even look at a map before they filmed this movie?

Hadrian’s Wall Scene from Robin Hood:Prince of Thieves

Nevertheless, it was neat to see where they filmed the movie. I have only seen it once or twice back in the day so I probably wouldn’t have picked it out on my own, but those people who may be a bit more into this movie than me (I save my allegiance for the fantastic Disney version) probably will have recognized it right off the bat.

Sadly, none of us climbed the tree. If only we had Mini Deal with us. She would have been up that tree like a monkey. After we viewed the tree, we tried to decide if we would turn back or keep going on the loop. Since I come from a long line of non-decision makers, this was a bit difficult.

This is what Kevin looks like when his wife and mother-in-law won’t make a decision.

Since we all decided that we could walk forever, we decided to continue on and complete the loop. Shortly after passing Sycamore gap, we headed down and then across a farm, which afforded a great view of the wall from the perspective of potential invaders. You can really see how imposing it would have been.

This sheep is named Cailin

To Rome and Back: A Lester’s Tale Part Two

2010-11-23T00:31:00.001-08:00

One of the first trips we took when Kevin first moved to the UK was a trip to Northumberland to see Hadrian’s Wall. (To Rome and Back: A Lester’s Tale) What was supposed to be a simple road trip turned into an epic saga when we were unable to find the wall. (How we missed the wall when it is huge and well marked is beyond me). Therefore, when we thought about what we would do with Mumsy when she was here over Thanksgiving, it seemed like a good idea to try and find the elusive wall once again.

This time, we had post codes, maps and advice from fellow travelers. Instead of being an epic trip over misty mountains with the tricksy Gollum GPS, it turned into a civilized drive on the highway. If only Frodo had a GPS and detailed directions, his trip to Mordor would have been far less eventful.

We started out the morning with a visit to Vindolanda Roman Fort. An auxiliary fort, Vindolanda served to protect the Stangate (Military Road) that spanned between the River Tyne and Solway Firth and followed behind the legendary Hadrian’s Wall. The fort holds two claims to fame.

The largest remaining Roman ruins in Great Britain
The oldest example of ink writing found in Britain

The site was quite impressive and it featured a really great introductory video that discussed the history of the site and a reconstruction of what the site once looked like. It also had a great “Bird’s Eye View” of the wall. The only disappointing part was that the museum was closed for refurbishment. However, this was probably the best news Kevin had ever heard as his tolerance for museums is much less than mine.

Lassie –go get help. Kevin’s fallen in the well

A reconstruction of the old timber fort

After visiting Vindolanda, we decided to head just up the road to Vercovicium (for those of you uncultured Non-Latin speakers -Homesteads Roman Fort). Not to be outdone by Vindolanda, this fort has its claim to fame in the fact that it is the most complete Roman fort remaining in Britain. I found it to be far less impressive than Vindolanda. However, this may have been due to the fact that I was wet and cold at this point and in need of some food.

Although Vercovicium was less exciting for me based upon the actual site, what did set my heart skipping was the wide stone wall heading off into the countryside. Finally, we had found Hadrian’s Wall. Given its impressive size and large spans, I am still shocked we couldn’t find it. Since we were all wet and freezing we decided to save exploration of the wall for the next day.

Happy Gagaween

2010-11-04T21:16:00.001-07:00

Man, Kevin is HORRIBLE at keeping up this blog. I know for a fact that he has been having fun over in England, so you think he could share it with everyone else, but Nooooo.

Anyways, as previously mentioned, when people find out that Kevin is not currently living with me, they always comment on how lonely I must be. While I will admit that Roo and Jackson are extremely entertaining, conversations with them tend to be one sided. However, I have managed to effectively fill my time for the past few months in preparation for Halloween.

Now anyone who knows me knows that I love three things:

1) costume parties

2) dancing

3) Lady Gaga

So, when I decided to throw another Halloween party after last years success, and make it a Rock Star theme complete with dancing and a costume or two, it was bound to be a success.

I actually decided to be Lady Gaga for Halloween on November 1, 2009. I then spent the next 10 months watching and rewatching Lady Gaga music videos, trying to get inspiration for my costume. While I love Paparazzi (mmm Alexander Skarsgard), I couldn’t find a easy to make costume from that video.

Puss Puss Askars.

Not content to buy a Gaga costume and after much debate over wether to be LoveGame Gaga or Telephone Gaga, I finally settled on BOTH.

Lovegame Gaga was the easiest. The purchase of wicked sweet white moto jacket and white body suit started the look. Add a “chain mail” headscarf which I cleverly made out of a silver mesh fabric, a pair of glasses made out of chicken wire and a disco stick and voila.

While I loved my LoveGame Gaga, my favorite by a long shot was the Telephone costume. I made the costume completely from scratch with the use of a shower curtain, block of florist foam, seam tape, fabric stiffner, cross stitch thread and a glue gun. Several glue gun burns later and one frightened grey schnauzer hiding from the scary monster – Chef Gaga was born.

In all, there was singing, dancing and general ridiculousness. Also, everyone stepped up and had some fantastic costumes. The only sad part was that Kevin was not there to share in the merriment. Don’t worry Kevin – next year you can join in the fun with our Movie Themed Party. I’m already working on costume ideas….

Dancing is fun!

Mr. Darcy Goes to Hogwarts

2010-08-27T13:20:00.001-07:00

Writing this blog isn’t as fun when its done at JFK while on a 5 hour layover, but at least it reminds me of happier times.

When Kevin and I discussed what to do on our last full day in Bath, I came up with the idea of going to the Jane Austen Center – a museum about Jane’s life during the time she lived in Bath. Surprisingly enough, Kevin wasn’t keen on this idea, and instead mentioned going to Bath Abbey. We debated what to do during breakfast and finally decided to head down to town and figure it out when we got there. However, the weather was really uncooperative towards a walk around town. It was sunny for literally 2 minutes and then would pour for 10 followed by a short period of sun and more downpours. Every time it started to pour, we tried to duck into a shop in the outdoor shopping center located on the outskirts of town center. Kevin wanted a new pair of Pumas, which are hard to come by in England and I just wanted an object. Neither of us wound up finding anything, but at least it kept us dry. Eventually, we wound up near the abbey, but I vetoed the idea since I wanted to be able to take pictures and I couldn’t do so in the rain. Instead, I cleverly re-directed us to the Jane Austen Center. I found out after the fact that Kevin was trying to stall me until after lunch so that he could go to the pub instead, but I didn’t really catch on to this. He was, nevertheless, a good sport.

Like almost all females, I love Jane Austen. I just can’t get enough of her romance stories set amongst the gentry in the time in which she lived. Jane Austen spent a great deal of time in Bath, having an aunt who lived there and living there herself for 4 years and thus Bath is featured heavily in her stories. Two of her books (coincidentally her first and last) were set in Bath and several other stories make mention of it. The museum, located in a Georgian house on Gay Street much like the house just up the road that Jane lived in, focuses on the history of Bath during the 4 years she lived there, and how Bath influenced her writing. For me, it was a fascinating look into Jane Austen’s life. Kevin, I’m sure, was extremely bored, but he at least pretended to look at everything and even waited for the 10 minutes it took me to decide what Mr. Darcy inspired treasures to purchase for myself and Katie from the gift shop. The only time he really started to loose his cool was when I couldn’t contain my love for the painting of Colin Firth as Mr. Darcy that they had hanging on the wall.

After I had my fill of Jane Austen history and the delicious Mr. Darcy, we decided to grab a bite to eat at the Tea Shop located on the top floor of the museum. I of course had the cream tea, which to me is the most delicious thing on the planet – even more so than goat cheese, pasta or chocolate. Their scones were warm right from the oven and the tea (a blend based on what people of the Georgian period would have drank) was perfect. As I was extolling the virtues of cream tea to Kevin, I came up with a brilliant plan – a party involving scones, tea and viewing of Pride and Prejudice (the BBC version of course). Kevin seemed to think this the most ridiculous idea I have ever come up with (shocking I know). He seemed to think that the only person who lived close enough to come that would show up would be my dear friend Katie (Mini Deal and Sharon living too far away to attend). He did laugh when I retorted with “ All you need for a good party is Katie anyway!”

After tea, I released Kevin from his torture and we headed over to Bath Abbey. The last great Abbey built in England, it is not nearly as grand at Westminster or York, but I wouldn’t expect it to be as Bath wasn’t nearly on the same level of ecclesiastic power that York and Westminster were. However, it was still an impressive site. The abbey also offered a guided tour up the tower, which we decided to check out (by we I mean Kevin. I hate heights and steep narrow spiral staircases that are so predominate in abbeys and castles throughout England. However, since he was such a good sport about the Jane Austen museum, I decided to tough it out). The climb wasn’t nearly as bad as some other places I have been in throughout the past year, but it was still not my cup of tea. However, it was worth it for the explanation of all the different ways that the bells have been rung over the years. Plus, the look on Kevin’s face when the tour guide let him ring one of the big church bells was priceless. Not surprising, I refused to look off the top of the tower, but Kevin was nice enough to take pictures for me.

With the Abbey checked of our list of things to do, we were out of things in Bath that we had planned on accomplishing during our two days there. We decided to head to the town of Lacock (go ahead, laugh at the name. Kevin did.) which is located a mere 14 miles from Bath. Lacock is a village owned almost entirely by the National Trust since 1944 and is a great example of 18th century architecture. Because the town has remained mostly unchanged since the 1800s (there aren’t even any visible phone lines or street lights in town), it has become a favorite filming location. Most notably for myself, the village served as Meryton in my much loved BBC version of Pride and Prejudice and Lacock Abbey was used as Hogwarts in three Harry Potter movies.

Since we were nearing closing time of the abbey, we headed there first to try and identify the areas used in Harry Potter. The abbey itself was first established in 1232 and retains much of the medieval parts of the abbey. Its easy to see why filmmakers chose it as the setting of Hogwarts. Right away, I found my first Harry Potter backdrop in the courtyard just inside the door. Appearing in numerous forms in the first two Harry Potter movies, the grassy courtyard is probably best known for the snowy scene, which I managed to find a picture of.

Up next, the hallways around the courtyard, used the hallway outside Dumbledore’s office.

A little more ornate in the film and crowded with students, but still recognizable to a super fan like myself.

Several of the rooms off the corridors were used as various classrooms in the first two Harry Potter films

Professor Quirrel’s classroom. Interestingly enough, the cauldron was already in the room.

Professor McGonnagall’s room

Professor Snape’s Potion Room

Filming returned to Lacock with the filming of Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince. Lacock Abbey was used once again. However, the village of Lacock featured in this film as well, being the fictional village where Harry and Dumbledore find Horace Slughorn.

Not only has Harry and Dumbledore visited Lacock, but the Bennett sisters as well.

Lacock is a quaint little town, and even minus its association with two of my loves (Mr. Darcy and Harry Potter), its well worth a trip. It’s easy to picture the streets bustling with a giggling Lydia Bennett, a parade of soldiers or men on horses.

Bath Time

2010-08-26T07:02:00.001-07:00

Since Kevin was so kind as to take me to not only one but two Pemberleys on our way down south, I decided to be kind and not force any Jane Austen stuff on him for our first full day in Bath. Instead, we decided to take in a little history by visiting the Roman Baths Museum. But first, we took a walk through the city up to the famed Royal Crescent.

The Royal Crescent is a series of 30 Georgian row houses built in the late 1700s by John Woods. However, Kevin read somewhere that Woods only designed the front and thus each house is different from the back and are varying sizes, which I find really interesting. Also, the development was initially called The Crescent, but gained its Royal moniker after it housed Prince Frederick, the Duke of Albany and York.

After we were done checking out the lives of the rich and famous, we headed down to the Roman Baths museum. Underneath the city of Bath lies a network of aquifers which are heated by a geothermal fissure to a temperature of 46 ° C at the surface. The spring was discovered by the Celts in 836 BC and dedicated to their god Sulis (their equivalent of Athena/Minerva). When the Romans came to town in 60-70 AD, they built a temple honoring the Goddess Minerva and spent the next 300 years building and developing a bath complex around the spring. When the Romans were driven out in the 5th century AD, the Baths gradually fell into disrepair and were covered up. In the 12th and 16th centuries, Baths were built upon the old Roman ruins until the site was finally abandoned.

Today, the baths are part of an elaborate museum detailing the lives of the Romans at the height of the Roman Baths popularity as well as the technology behind the functioning of the baths. I found the vast number of different rooms fascinating. The Romans built elaborate steam rooms by building up the floor and heating the water under the floor with a furnace to create steam. Additionally, they had cold and warm rooms along with the baths at their natural 46 °C temperature. I was however disturbed that they lined all the pools with lead to keep the water from leaking out. I have visions of the Romans growing gills or third arms due to lead poisoning. I will however give them credit for their engineering as many of the things they built are still functioning today, including the lead lining on the pools and the overflow drain.

The still functioning overflow drain

After we checked out how the Romans did a Spa Day, we decided to check out how a modern person in Bath does the spa, we headed over to Thermae Bath Spa. Opened in 2006, it was the first spa in Bath since 1978 and the only natural thermal spa in England. The spa is a massive complex consisting of 4 floors with a different attraction on each : indoor thermal pool, a massage suit, 4 different steam rooms with different aromatic scents and a rooftop thermal pool with a view of the city. They sell time in the spa in 2 hour increments as long as traditional spa services such as massages and facials. Since I’d never say no to a massage and Kevin loves getting his back rubbed/scratched (he’s constantly harassing me to scratch his back), we decided to also get a massage while we were there.

The spa was a fun was to spend a few hours, but I’m not sure how people spend more than 2 hours there as Kev and I had just about had enough of the pools and steam room when we left. But how often does one get a chance to relax in a natural thermal pool? To top off a day filled with my favorite things – history, spas, massages and not having to scratch Kevin’s back - we had Indian for dinner. I’m glad that England took over India as a colony as it developed their love of delicious Indian food, a love that I definitely share.

That pile of rocks

2010-08-25T08:14:00.001-07:00

In all my excitement over sharing Hampton Court with our readers, I totally forgot about the rest of our day. When we left Hampton Court to head for Bath, we passed right by Stonehenge, and figured we would stop and have a look around. Initially, I was going to forgo a visit as I’ve heard that all the bloody tourists ruin the experience, but we did literally pass right by it (seriously, the motorway runs right next to it), so I figured we could have a look around.

bloody tourists!

When we pulled up, I certainly feared that the tourists were going to be too much for me. They were crawling all over like ants on a piece of candy. Apparently, Stonehenge is on some master list of sites in England for Japanese tourists. It looked like an invasion. I’d like to think that the citizens of Oxford thought they were in Japan earlier on in the day since about 90% of them were wearing some article of clothing with the words OXFORD written on it.

Also, the entry price was a bit extreme, but luckily we are members of English Heritage and neither had to pay the 7 pounds a piece nor wait in line with all the invaders and their cameras. Luckily, the space around the actual site was wide enough to get around all the other tourists. Also, they had the area around the actual site blocked off (too many idiot tourists climbing on and graffiting it) so you could easily get photos without random people in them. This is my pet peeve and I will wait 10 minutes for a site to be clear of people when taking pictures. It drives Kevin nuts but makes for better photos.

Hurray! No tourists in my photo

In all, we spent about 10 minutes looking around (which is why the entry price is so ridiculous) before setting off for Bath once again.

We got into town just in time for dinner. I am a huge foodie and also love Jamie Oliver so I was very excited that he had just opened a restaurant in Bath – Jamie’s Italian. Jamie is a huge proponent of locally sourced fresh ingredients and good food at reasonable prices. And good and reasonable it was. We decided to start with bruschetta topped with fresh ricotta, heirloom tomatoes and basil which was delicious. Kevin had a delicious Bucatini Carbonara, which featured tubular, hollow spaghetti type noodles with smoked pancetta, courgettes and parmesan. After hearing that they had a special of squash risotto, I had to have that as it is one of my favorite dishes. It certainly didn’t disappoint. The squash was full of flavor, the risotto a perfect texture and seasoned with just the right amount of sage.

We topped off our meals with a lemon polenta cake (me) and tiramisu (Kev). The polenta cake was glorious and I am going to make it my mission to replicate it when I get home. In all, a fabulous meal, but lets face it – it would have to be.

I’m Henry VIII I am, I am

2010-08-24T14:01:00.001-07:00

If our friends and family hadn’t guessed by now, I’m a huge fan of Henry VIII. I find his about face behavior and appearance from a jovial, well liked and svelte young man to an old and crotchety big fat fatty fascinating. Therefore, it only made sense to visit his former palace Hampton Court while in Surrey.

While Hampton Court started its days as a country showpiece for Henry VIII’s advisor Cardinal Wolsey, it came into Henry’s hands due to his rage at Wolsey for failing to gain him a divorce from his first wife. In true Henry VIII form, he appropriated the house for himself, gifting it to his new wife Anne Boleyn. He remodeled the palace for his young bride, making it more grand and ostentatious than Wolsey’s former home, only to have to redo the H + A monographs throughout the palace to H+J with the beheading of his second wife and new marriage. It became a favorite summer home of the court, who liked to escape the heat of London for the summer months and enjoy the gardens, and stocked hunting grounds at Hampton Court. It remained a favorite retreat for the royal family until the mid 1800s. The length of time that Hampton Court spent in the royal eye can be seen in the differing periods of architecture throughout – from the brownstone Tudor Buildings to the red and white grand palace style of the mid 1700s.

Old meets less old

The grounds themselves also show a mixture of styles, with natural looking gardens, sculpture gardens and highly structured Georgian gardens. Since I am the daughter of Brenda Deal, I spent a large amount of time wandering through the gardens and taking photos. In the span of the two hours we checked out the garden, I got ideas and plans for several new garden designs in my own yard (which I’m sure Kevin is thrilled about).

Perhaps the coolest part of the gardens, for the wine-lover that I am, was the grape vine housed in the greenhouse. Certified by Guinness Book of World Records as the oldest grape vine in the world. Planted in 1768 by Capability Brown, the vine is a cutting of a Black Hamburg vine from Essex that no longer exists.

Sadly for wineauxs like myself, the grapes aren’t actually used to make booze, but instead are sold to tourists at a huge markup each fall.

The palace itself housed several different exhibits, from the architectural history of the estate to Henry VIII to the Georgian life of the inhabitants.

In all, Hampton Court is easily a full day trip for the garden/history enthusiast like myself. It even held an interest for Kevin, with a maze, Henry VIII era Royal Tennis Courts and a pair of Clydesdales.

London Revisited

2010-08-23T13:23:00.001-07:00

When Kevin and I finally made the decision to head South, we decided to get in a visit to Kevin’s friends Pete and Mel. Since they live in Surrey, located just outside London, we decided to head into the city for the day. We decided to start the morning with a traditional English Breakfast at the Tate Modern, followed by a quick jaunt through the museum. However, once breakfast had been consumed, we all realized that none of us actually like modern art, and therefore decided to skip the art and head across the Millennium Bridge to St. James Cathedral.

Kevin was very glad to see that the Millennium Bridge had been rebuilt after the death eaters destroyed it.

Once we arrived at St. James Cathedral, it was time to change the plan once again as the entry fee to the cathedral was exorbitant (even for London). This time, we decided to visit a favorite of Mel’s – The Household Cavalry Museum. Formed in 1661 by King Charles II, the Household Cavalry now consists of two troops of the British Army – the Queen’s Lifeguards and the Royals and Blues. What sets them apart from the rest of the Army is the fact that they are the blokes riding on horses with silly hats. The museum itself was fairly interesting, even for a non-horse lover like myself. Its entrance is denoted by the two mounted guards standing outside. According to the Cavalry member we talked to inside the museum, the soldiers with the cleanest kit each day were assigned the mounted duties as a reward. However, after watching all the obnoxious tourists harassing the guards and horses, I would think it a better idea to award the dirtiest soldiers the outside guard duties.

The cleaning of a Household Cavalry members kit is the stuff of an OCD sufferers dreams. Dress uniforms need to be spotless with gleaming buttons. The shoes need to be polished so that they resemble a mirror. Every metal piece on the horses reins, saddle, etc. need to be spotless. It takes the soldier hours just to get ready for duty the following day.

While the horses and the gear excited Mel, what excited Kevin was the different uniforms that you could try on, to get a sense of what it would be like to be a member of the Household Cavalry.

After Kevin got his fill of dress-up, we decided to head to Camden in search of one of the things I love – vinyl Records. Camden is an interesting section in north London dominated by tattoo shops, punk clothing stores and the coolest, hugest street market I have ever been to – Camden Lock and Camden Stables Comprised of stalls containing everything from vintage clothing (even a stall that only sells 90s concert tees), second hand music, purses, new clothing, art, accessories and every type of food under the sun, I could easily spend a week without emerging. Unfortunately, we didn’t have a lot of time or any cash so I didn’t buy anything, but my vintage /ridiculous sunglass loving heart broke at all the glorious items I came across. If and when I am in London again, I am devoting an entire day and a weeks pay to Camden Lock and Camden Stables. Pete took me to a second hand music store he knew of that luckily took Plastic money and I managed to score a nearly mint copy of David Bowie’s “Aladdin Sane” and The Sex Pistols “Never Mind the Bollocks” on vinyl. These things were so mint you could see your face in the record and the cardboard sleeves looked almost brand new.

In all, a great relaxing day in London. I’m sure Kevin thinks so as well, as I was unable to spend all his money in Camden. If we ever make it back, it will be another story…

Will the Real Pemberley Please Stand Up?

2010-08-23T00:17:00.001-07:00

When I initially booked my trip out to see Kevin for my semester break, we went back and forth as to where we would go for a trip. Norway. No, Spain. No, Germany. The problem lay in the fact that Kevin had limited vacation time and all the places I kept coming up with to visit deserved at least a week’s visit. So, when Kevin suggested a trip to the South to visit his friends Pete and Mel and also Bath, I quickly agreed. While Bath itself is a fascinating old town full of Roman and Victorian history, its main draw for me is its association with Jane Austen. I’m not sure what it is about her, but she has the uncanny ability to draw all females in with her witty banter and dark, brooding men. This attraction, however, does not extend to the male part of our species. I knew that Kevin was sure to be unhappy about visiting places solely for the reason that they were associated with Jane Austen, so I decided to start introducing places to visit gradually in the hopes that he not notice the association. When I started researching places to visit in or around Bath that were connected to Jane Austen, the first place that appeared was a country estate called Lyme Park located just outside Manchester – the site of Pemberley for the BBC (and my personal favorite) adaptation of Pride and Prejudice.

Mr. Darcy’s Pemberley

My Pemberley

While I was excited upon seeing Lyme Park looming as we drove up in our car, the first thing I really noticed was the setting of the famous “Mr. Darcy Goes Swimming” scene. While Kevin may share Mr. Darcy’s penchant for grumpiness, he apparently doesn’t share his love of swimming as he downright refused to re-enact my favorite scene for the sake of my photographic documentation of the trip.

As I was merely interested in its connection to Pride and Prejudice and none of the interior Pemberley shots were actually filmed at Lyme park, we decided to forgo a tour of the house and instead take a stroll through the gardens.

View of the Derbyshire countryside

On the way down south to Surrey lay Pemberley #2, Chatsworth House. Considered by many to be Jane Austen’s inspiration for Pemberely, it also served as the filming location for the far inferior Keira Knightley movie adaptation of Pride and Prejudice. Driving up to Chatsworth House, I could see exactly why many thought it the true Pemberley of Jane Austen’s day.

The house made Lyme Park look like a summer cottage and the gardens extended for acres. Much of the gardens were done by the famous gardeners Capability Brown (in the 1700s) and Joseph Paxton (in the 1800s).

One of the first heated greenhouses – built by Paxton in 1842

In addition, the grounds contained a very “Labyrinth” like maze (sadly lacking David Bowie, but containing a very strange Kevin).

Again, we decided to forgo the house tour for several reasons:

1) We still had a 3 hour drive down to Surrey and it was already 3 pm.

2) It already cost over 7 pounds a piece just to enter the gardens and we didn’t want to give any more of our money to the the Duke of Devonshire.

3) Colin Firth never set foot in the house and therefore it is inconsequential.

If I had the trip to do over again, I would have taken a few photos of the house, admired the pond that once held the dreamy Colin Firth and skipped the gardens at Lyme Park in order to head to Chatsworth House and spend several hours strolling through the gardens.

Music, it’s my substitute for love

2010-08-14T06:49:00.001-07:00

A big part of my yearly budget is dedicated to live music, and no time of the year more so than summer. My summer live music tradition started back in high school when I took my favorite concert companion, Mini Deal, to her very first concert – Tom Petty. Since then, we’ve made it a summer tradition to see one of the following: Tom Petty, John Mayer, Guster or Michael Bublé. It’s been hard since she moved to B’more since Mini likes pretty much every artist I do (except maybe David Bowie) and was a guaranteed concert companion. However, this summer I’ve finally managed to (almost) fill her shoes with various friends.

The theme of this summer’s concert experience would have to be “Something Old, Something New, Something Borrowed and Something Bublé”

Something Old

New Found Glory was my first musical love. Back in 1998, I randomly happened upon them at the El N’ Gee, and it was love at first hearing. Fast forward to 2001 at Radio 104 fest to a girl with bright green plaid pants and purple hair, jumping and singing every word of every song they sang in a crowd of people who really didn’t know them. Over the next 9 years, they’ve been replaced in the music industry by sorry imitations of these pioneers of the pop punk genre but never replaced in my heart. When I saw that one of my new favorite bands Paramore was touring this summer (and Hayley Williams of Paramore happens to be dating Chad from NFG), I was immediately excited that there may be one of the greatest pairings in my musical history occuring. Luckily for me, my wish came true. I was also lucky to have a great concert buddy in Nicole’s husband Joey, whose love of NFG is probably the closest on the Earth to mine and whose love of ~~Paramore~~ Hayley Williams exceeds mine. When the band announced their intention of doing a meet and greet after the next band, Joey pushed his way through the crowd and got us a spopt right at the front of the line. We waited over an hour in a crowd of kids who weren’t even alive when NFG started and probably couldn’t name a single member other than Chad, but we didn’t mind because our dreams came true!

Joey started out patient

Wat a gwann! Stop cutting the line!

I’m exploding with excitement as NFG emerges

We thanked them for making the greatest music ever and were rewarded with a photo opp! Chad is touching me!!

It was probably the greatest night of my life (sorry Kevin, but its true). Oh yeah, then Paramore came out and rocked (and made Joey drool).

Something New

While en route to Wales for our fabulous weekend away with Sarka and Al, they introduced us to a favorite road trip artist Frank Turner. Part of a growing movement of former punk musicians turned folk music, his music is dominated by punk cords played on an acoustic guitar. It may seem a strange change of pace for a musician, but punk music (like folk) started as a social and political commentary of the times, much like folk music. Nevertheless, Frank Turner (and his counterparts) appeals to my love of angst filled music and acoustic guitars. Knowing that my friend Doyle shares a similar love, being a fan of Turners American counterpart Tim Barry, I introduced him to Frank Turner. Its a good thing I did, because he spotted an appearance by Frank Turner at the Webster in Hartford. I very quickly agreed to attend, and even got our friend KLF to go as well. The show happened to be in the underground part of the club which worked out perfect for us. For one, there was a bar inside that sold 16 ounce cans of High Life. It also allowed a fantastic up close look at Frank Turner as he enjoyed his American favorite PBR with the rest of us while waiting for his turn. Another reason why I love the man – he’s a musician of the common folk. Also, the venue only holds about 200 people so there are no bad places to stand. A small underground venue works great when you have a musician with just his guitar. I loved Frank Turner so much, I conned Kev into taking me to his show in Kendal when I’m in England next.

Katie’s favorite Frank song of the night. She did not however appreciate the stomping.

Something Borrowed

Hellooo Handsome!

When Doyle sent out an email about Frank Turner, he also included an appeal for people to go with him to see Gaslight Anthem at Lupos. I will admit that I had no idea who they were, but since Doyle and I have very similar taste in music, I quickly agreed to go. The day of the show, I decided I should probably listen to a few of their songs so I would have an idea of what they were about. The opening act was one of Doyle’s favorite – Tim Barry (the American equivalent to Frank Turner). A former punk rocker, he sings about social issues and his time riding freight trains around the country. I found I really like him (but not quite as much as Frank). The second band was horrible. They managed to make every one of their songs sound exactly like some other bands song, but with different lyrics (and it wasn’t always the same band). Also, the lead singer had a huge collection of cheesy lead singer moves that he busted out the whole time they were on stage. HORRIBLE! I began to worry that I would not like Gaslight Anthem, especially when Doyle told me that they are friends with and have played with Springsteen. I HATE The Boss. I was greatly pleased when they came out and started playing. They are a great Old Time American Rock N Roll band. It doesn’t help that the lead singer appeals to my love of tattooed rockers that also play guitar. The only downside was the superlarge superdrunk superfan in front of us who felt the need to stand on her barstool the entire time screaming, pointing and just in generally being annoying. Even my screaming “CHAIRS ARE FOR SITTING IN!” didn’t phase her. Her giant melon head blocked the band most of the time. Rrrr…some people need to learn concert etiquette.

One of my favorite songs of the night

Check them out – even Kevin with his terrible taste in music loves them:)

Something Bublé

Anyone who has met me for even 5 minutes knows of my love for Michael Bublé. Mini Deal and I saw him before his first album even came out at Foxwoods and fell in love. I even somehow convinced Kevin to use his song “Everything” as our wedding song. Not really sure how I managed that one since Kevin really hates The Bub. Up until this summer, we had seen him 5 times, and each time got better and better. So when I saw that he was going to be at Mohegan Sun over 4th of July weekend, I quickly informed Mini so that she could start making plans to come home. Even though I know I could have found someone closer to go with, there’s no one I’d rather see The Bub with than my sister. One benefit of being a superdorky superfan who belongs to the Michael Bublé fanclub is ticket presale. Since the rest of the world (except Kevin) has jumped on the Bublé bandwagon, its become harder and harder to get tickets. However, since I belong to his fanclub. I got the opportunity to purchase ticekts 2 days early, and managed to score 2 floor seats, affording me and Mini a fantastic view of the dreamy Bublé.

In the 6 times we have seen him, he had done a MJ impersonation at 5 of the shows. Always hilarious

Can you see how close we are?? He literally walked 10 feet from us to get over there

Poor Michael can’t find me

The best part about his concerts is that they are always different, he always tells ridiculous stories and he ALWAYS plays some obscure song he never plays when Mini requests it. This time, he played Mack the Knife literally right after Cailin said she wanted him to play it. Maybe she should use her mind powers to request that he show up at 13 Bolles Avenue…

So as you can see, music keeps me busy while Kevin’s gone.

Vineyard, Vineyard, Woop Woop

2010-08-13T15:49:00.001-07:00

I had meant to keep up the blog with things that I was doing stateside, but then realized I don’t really do anything since I’m busy with school. However, I did get a chance to do a few cool things this summer.

Whenever I talk to people about Kevin being overseas, most of them tend to say the same thing. “Oh, you must be so lonely.” While I do miss him a great deal (nobody have a heart attack), I’m lucky to have a really great group of friends on my side of the pond that keep me laughing and don’t give me a chance to miss Kevin. Katie and John have been especially wonderful at feeding me. Although I LOVE to cook, its no fun to cook a big meal just for yourself, and so I have a tendency to eat random things like a sautéed squash and nothing else for dinner. John feels sorry for me (and secretly wants my praise of his cooking) and invites me over for delicious meals like Texas Chili, his famous turkey burgers or whatever else suits his fancy that night.

John’s most recent creation – Baked Texas Chili and fresh sweet corn with polenta.

Another wonderful thing Katie and John (besides the fact that they feed me and have two of the cutest dogs outside of the von Schnauzers) is the fact that they love to share their house out on Martha’s Vineyard with friends. 2 years ago, Katie and John invited a group of us (Kevin and I, Mini Deal, Doyle, Amy, Noe, and Katie/John’s friends Chad and Sara) out to their house for the weekend. From the second we got in the car, the weekend was fantastic. Even Kevin, who is normally grumpy , had a great time. Last summer during the 2nd annual Vineyard weekend, we unfortunately were lacking the Woop Wooping Kevin and the skunk King Doyle, but gained Mini’s boyfriend Jason who was a great addition to our group. This year, we made a trip out for my birthday with the best Vineyard crew so far: Katie and John, myself, my BMF (best male friend) Doyle, and my absolutely awesome college friends Nicole, Joey and Natalie.

There is an art to Vineyarding that I think I may have perfected after my third year.

Get up really early and try and catch the first ferry out. (Unless you are a dedicated grad student like Katie – then you catch a later boat). Catching the first ferry out is always fun because you have the whole car ride to Falmouth to listen to great road trip music (SO-L-O!) and get prime parking. It may not be a great idea if you have a friend who is habitually late, as I do.

Kevin’s bff John has replaced him with JoJo. Poor Kevin…

OMG! Natalie actually made the right boat this year!

Eat your first meal on the island at Lookout Tavern. Its right near the ferry dock, has great views, cold beer and fantastic sushi. Its especially fun if you are with ghetto fabulous friends who have never had sushi before.

Wat a gwann with this food?

Work on your napping skills. The back porch or beach are great places to practice this.

So sleeeepy

John doesn’t need practice napping

Play a rousing game of Pirate Life or “Guess the name on your forehead”. Always a hit (unless you are a complete wierdo and hate games).

The BFFs even managed to both get “Hayley Williams” as their card.

This one was funny when Joey asked “Am I a musician” and I snorted. Steering wheel drums do NOT count.

Come up with one or more inside jokes that last the whole weekend and maybe even longer. This year, we chose to go with the sound of Vuvuzelas, the phrases “GET LOST” and pretty much anything vampire related.

we take our teen vampire movies seriously.

What’s that? Katie prefers a Kindle? GET LOST!

Finger mustaches are the greatest idea ever

Overall, best year so far at the Vineyard, and a great way to spend time in true New England style. I’m looking forward to next year already!

In an English Country Garden

2010-05-06T00:45:00.001-07:00

While Kevin is at work, I’m always looking for ways to occupy my day. I tend to try and do things that he wouldn’t normally be interested in. Since he appreciates neither my love of gardening nor The Darkness, I figured a trip to Holker Hall would be a great way to spend a sunny day. Why would his lack of love for the Darkness matter? Because no trip to an English country garden would be complete without me singing one of my favorite Darkness songs, complete with Justin Hawkins falsetto.

I had heard of Holker Hall on my previous trips to Ulverston, but never realized how easy it was to get to without a car. Had I known, I would have taken Mumsy there when she was visiting last year. Holker Hall is located less than a mile from the Cark train station – for someone accustomed to walking upwards of 5 miles to get somewhere, 1 mile is nothing.

Holker Hall is a country estate sitting on land that once belonged to the Cartmel Priory. In 1536, when Henry VIII dissolved the monasteries, the land was put up for sale. (Everything ties back to my favorite monarch!) The land was bought by a local landowning family – The Prestons. In the early 1600’s, they built a manor on the estate. The estate has since passed through inheritence from the Preston family to the Lowther family and finally to the Cavendishes. Suffering a fire in 1871, the manor house was rebuilt, on a slightly more grand scale. The current owners of the estate, Lord and Lady Cavendish, live on the estate full time, and have opened their award winning gardens and a wing of the house to the public. The gardens themselves cover 25 acres of land and are a mixture of formal and informal, being mainly Victorian in nature. They boast a 4 season planting, so that no matter when you visit, the garden is beautiful. Being spring, the bulbs and rhododendrons were blooming, which made for a beautiful visit.

Formal Garden

The Formal Garden located just out back from the main house was a beautiful example of a formal Victorian garden. The shear number of tulip bulbs that had been planted was amazing. And the amount of work put in to perfectly space the bulbs amongst other plants was staggering. I saw three people working in this section of garden alone weeding, thinning and edging. Do you think they need an American Amateur gardener? I’d work for free!

Just out back from the formal garden is the woodland area of gardens with paths winding amongst the trees and rhododendrons. In among all the trees is a world renowned tree referred to as the Holker Lime, dating back to the early 17th century and named as one of Britain’s 50 best trees in honor of the Queen’s Golden Jubilee

As I was admiring the Great Lime in my ridiculous florescent yellow aviators and singing falsetto, I ran across an older man in ridiculous riding crop and 3 other guests who were followed by a pack of what appeared to be Irish Wolfhounds. The man turned out to be the Lord Cavendish, who stopped to say “hello” to me. I gave him a great impression of Americans as being completely ridiculous. Oh well…

Woodland Gardens

Hidden in the woods is a little sunken garden, with about 5,000 more tulip bulbs and a pergola. If I lived there, I think I would spend all my time out there.

Sunken Garden

The Hall itself is neat to see once as it has beautiful architecture and some really interesting pieces of furniture. However, while I would go back in a heartbeat to visit the gardens again, I think I would skip the house the second time around.

A Wales Tale – Part 3

2010-05-05T08:39:00.001-07:00

AKA – A Day of Really Old Stuff

Sunday morning brought intense pain in my legs from our super hike the day before, but it also brought with it sunshine. We packed up our campsite, and headed into town for some breakfast . On a side note, why must all English (or Welsh) breakfasts be entirely made up of meat? Some of us are not excited by the idea of two different types of sausages, and bacon along with eggs, beans, mushrooms and tomatoes.

Gross! Who wants to eat this for breakfast?

Anyway, after breakfast, we decided to take a walk around the tarn (for you Americans, that’s a mountain lake or pool, formed in a cirque excavated by a glacier.)

Our walk led us past the old slate quarry. Closed in 1969, the quarry now is home to the Welsh National Slate Museum (free) and the Quarry Hospital Museum (free). It’s also a popular destination for climbers who scale the slate faces.

Not my idea of a good time, but whatever floats your boat I guess…

In addition, the pool at the foot of the slate cliffs is popular with the diving set, although there’s not much down there to see.

Again, not my idea of a good time…

After checking out the slate quarry, knowing that all Americans love castles, Sarka and Al took us over to see the remnants of Dolbadarn Castle. Originally built in the early 13th century by the Princes of Gwynedd, not much remains of the castle besides one circular tower. While I pretended to be unimpressed (mostly due to the fact that I had to walk my poor aching legs up a hill to see it), I still had a good time checking the castle remains out.

After we visited the boring, tiny castle, we drove out to Anglesey to check out the seriously awesome Beaumaris Castle. Anglesey is an Isle located in the north-west of Wales, just a short drive from the Snowdonia area. It can be reached by either the newer Britannia Bridge, or the extremely impressive Menai Bridge. One of the first suspension bridges, Menai Bridge was built back in 1826, and still spans the divide between Anglesey and the mainland today.

Snowdonia as seen from the coast of Anglesey

While I love all castles, both great and small, Beaumaris Castle for two reasons. 1) The brochure referred to it as the most “technically perfect” castle in Wales and 2) it has a real moat. I was intrigued by the fact that the castle was considered “technically perfect”, and my sister Mini-Deal is obsessed with moats, so I figured that Beaumaris Castle would be a great castle to visit. (BTW, when I told Mini-Deal of the moat, she was disappointed that toothed creatures were not in there to eat invaders. Guess you can’t please everyone)

I stole this aerial so readers could get a sense of the overall layout of the castle.

Begun in 1295 for Edward I’s campaign to conquer Wales, it was never finished as Edward I, being a typical English King, lost interest in Wales and turned his attention elsewhere instead (Scotland). Regardless, it remains an excellent example of concentric castle building. It really is an interesting example of castle architecture. Upon doing some research, I found out that the castle gate features meurtrières (murder-holes), which are totally cool. If I had realized they were there, or thought to look up, I would have taken a few photos. For those of you not obsessed with castles like me, murder-holes are almost exactly what they sound like – holes in the ceiling through which to murder invaders. In the case of castle defense, boiling oil was often poured through the holes to discourage the breaking down of the castle gates.

At this point, a great number of readers are probably suffering from exactly what the folks at Beaumaris Castle warned of: Warning: History Overload

They were also kind enough to warn of the following:

If you try and abduct a child, you will break your ankle, fall down the stairs and be attacked by killer seagulls.

This sign was placed with the knowledge that Allister would be visiting

While Al climbed the walls (literally) and he and Kevin ran around in all the secret tunnels, I took the time to take a few pictures:

After the castle, we headed to our new campground, but not before stopping at a neolithic burial chamber on the way that Allister had heard of, Bryn Celli Ddu. It consists of a mound at the center of a henge. Not only is it a burial mound, but its also an ancient observatory that has been hypothesized to mark the summer solstice. The coolest part for me was the carving on the center henge stone.

We made our way to our campsite, had a barbeque, consisting entirely of meat. Apparently the spicy pork steaks and spicy sausages were lovely, but I stuck to the burgers. After dinner, we drove down to the beach and walked around a bit. Naturally, Sarka and I took photos while Kev and Al acted like monkeys in the sand dunes and took ridiculous photos.

That night, I froze my butt off even more than usual. Come to find out, it had snowed overnight. No wonder I was so cold…

Overall, I had a fantastic time in Wales. I’d love to go back again and see more of the beautiful country. I highly recommend a trip to anyone in that corner of the world.

A Wales Tale – Part 2

2010-05-04T09:10:00.001-07:00

AKA What Happens When You Hike With Seasoned Climbers

Saturday morning started with relatively sunny skies and no rain, which was perfect in keeping with our plan of hiking Snowdon. While it may not have been raining, it was freezing, so we all geared up for the cold. I, being the person who is always the most cold, decided to wear thermals underneath my clothing along with a microfleece and jacket while Kevin, Sarka and Allister stuck with regular hiking clothes and a jacket. After a breakfast of sausage buns (or a bagel in my case), we set off on our 20K roundtrip hike. Right away, I had to start removing layers, having been overzealous with my layers. By the time we reached the actual trail, I had removed all the layers I possibly could (with the exception of my Tuukka Rask Bruins shirt. I couldn’t let the fact that I was in Wales hiking interfere with my donning of at least one Bruins item a day during the playoffs. The last two times I didn’t wear something both resulted in Bruins losses the next day!) However, I was still wearing a pair of thermals under my jeans, which was a seriously bad idea since it caused me to almost die of heat exhaustion. Needless to say, we had just started the actual hike and not only was I the only one pouring sweat, but I was already lagging behind.

Wait for me!

We decided to take the tourist route up the mountain as we didn’t want to try and take Floss on the bus. The tourist route is the longest route, but it is pretty much a graded path, so it is much less difficult than the other routes. It pretty much follows the train tracks up the mountain, which can be quite discouraging when you are gasping for air and a train full of fatties passes you.

Cheater Train

However, taking the tourist path turned out to be a wise decision due to the fact that I am a snail compared to Sarka, Allister and Floss. Kevin usually isn’t that much faster than me, unless he is with the hiking superstars, and in that case, he leaves me in the dust.

Everyone’s waiting for me - again

Snowdon is the highest peak in Wales, and the highest peak in the UK outside of Scotland. It stands at 1,085 meters (3,560 ft for you Americans), which makes it the same absolute height as another mountain I have climbed – Table Mountain in Cape Town, South Africa. (Come to think of it, I was lagging and sweating bullets on this hike too. Maybe it’s just me?) Because of its height, it should come as no surprise that the mountain has some of the wettest (and coldest) weather in the UK. In fact, there was still remnants of snow on some of the peaks as we climbed.

Floss is glad she is wearing a fur coat up here

The other incredible thing about Snowdon is the fog. In the span of 5 minutes, it went from clear to so foggy you could barely see the path.

The time between the first and the third pictures was only 5 minutes!

We had a contest walking up revolving around who could guess the number of people at the summit. I guessed last and guessed 167 at which point everyone laughed at me for picking such a high number. When we finally got to the top – it was insane. I won by far, and I even underestimated the number of people.

A fantastic photo by Sarka. No, those aren’t pointy rocks – those are people waiting to reach the summit!

Even though I absolutely detest crowds – I managed to get up to the top to get the obligatory photo.

Go Bruins!

Notice how I look like I just died and Kev and Al look fine

View from atop

After a quick rest and food break, we decided to get the heck off the summit and away from the annoying crowds, once again with me carrying the rear. While it was good to be able to say “I hiked the highest peak in Wales”, I think I’ll stick to the slightly smaller peaks next time – if only to avoid the annoying crowds.

A Wales Tale – Part 1

2010-05-03T11:45:00.001-07:00

This past weekend was one of the many, many bank holidays here in England, so Kevin and I thought it would make the perfect weekend for a quick getaway. We had been wanting to go to Wales and hike Snowdon for awhile, but either the weather never cooperated or we were busy. Luckily, our friends Sarka and Allister used to live in North Wales, and were free this weekend so we decided to take a camping trip to North Wales with built in guides.

We set off Friday afternoon, in the little VW camper van that could, affectionately called Lucie by her owner Sarka, with about 20 pounds of meat, a box full of beer, camping gear, and our co-pilot Floss. We were all amped up to go camping, hiking and (for Kevin and Al) drink beer and eat meat. However, Floss had no sooner stopped her start of a car ride barking when we hit a queue. (For you normal English speakers, that’s a line of traffic). What should have been a 3 hour car ride wound up taking 5 1/2 (with a short stop at McDonalds right over the Welsh Border. That makes 8 countries of McDonalds in my quest to eat a double cheeseburger in every country.) It seems all of England was out on the motorways for the bank holiday. Regardless, we finally made it to our campsite just before dark.

Lucie. Jeremy Clarkson, eat your heart out!

Like smart women, Sarka and I left the men to set up the tent while we took Floss for a walk. The campsite was nestled in between mountains just outside the village of Llanberis, where Sarka and Al used to live.

The view from our campsite

When we arrived back at the campsite from our walk, Kevin and Allister had finished setting up our tent and started on a beer, after which we decided to head up to the pub to grab a pint or two and check out the band. When we walked in, I immediately knew we were in for an interesting night as we were easily the most attractive people at the bar and 3/4 of the clientele appeared to be in high school. Allister likened it to the Star Wars bar)which had me hearing that annoying song in my head all night. The band was horrible. The clientele was straight out of Star Wars. We had a guy named Trevor come over with the line “oh, I thought I knew you” as he grabbed Sarka and I who proceeded to talk to Sarka all night about ridiculous things. The most entertaining thing was when he went on an on about how alcohol ruins lives and its taken him 30 years to get away from the evils of alcohol at which point he informed us that he was drinking a Rum and Coke. Luckily, he finally went away and we hurried out of the place once we had finished our pints. As it was supposed to rain the next day, we headed to bed with the intention of hiking Snowdon as long as it wasn’t pouring.

A Sign of the Times

2010-04-29T03:38:00.001-07:00

If there is one thing British people love more than queuing, it’s road signs. However, to the American tourist, they can be quite confusing. Here’s my translation for some of the signs I have come across so far:

Caution: Drunk Driver Ahead

Stunt Team At Work

Horses must also obey the speed limit

Tipping of Cows is taken very seriously over here

Pedophile in residence: Police take note

and finally, my personal favorite

Area known to be frequented by elderly pickpockets

Caution: Handsy Elderly People Ahead

I Sea Wood

2010-04-28T05:30:00.001-07:00

Well, after the world's worst travel day, I finally arrived in Ulverston for the first time since the beginning of December. (I note this because there has only been one blog entry since December, as Kevin was left in charge of the blog...) Since I had such a stressful day traveling Sunday/Monday, I decided to stay close to Ulverston on my first day back. On one of my prior trips, Kevin and I visited Birkrigg Stone Circle, which is located near Bardsea, just on the outskirts of town. When we visited the stone circle, we parked in an area that was posted as "Sea Wood". When I did a little research online, I found out that Sea Wood is a 58 acrea area of woods located along the sea (hence the name) owned by Woodland Trust. One thing you don't see a lot of in England is heavily wooded areas, so I decided the woods would be interesting to visit.

Also appealing to my love of British History, the property was once owned by Lady Jane Grey who, if memory serves me correctly, was England's shortest reigning Queen. She managed to last 9 days as Queen before being beheaded in 1554. Even in his death, Henry VIII was responsible for the beheading of another young Queen. Jane Grey was the great-niece of Henry VIII, and was convinced by her family to assume the throne after Henry's only son, Edward, died. Her reign lasted 9 short days, all of which she was confined to the Tower of London before she was executed due to her father's involvement in the Wyatt rebellion against Queen Mary. Talk about having bad parents!

Sea Wood is a little over 3 miles from Kevin's flat by way of the Coast Road. Since I am a champion walker and the sun was shining, I decided to head out on foot. The Coast Road is a scenic drive to Barrow along the Morcambe Bay, so the walk along the ocean and past farm land was quite enjoyable.

However, the walk quickly became very horrible when I past a farm that was literally spraying manure on the field. It smelled worse than hockey equipment in a hot car, chicken poop and Roo after she eats peppers combined. I literally almost vomited. However, a pair of bicyclists found my exclamation of "OH Dear Lord, what is that horrible smell!!!" while I started running very amusing. At least I entertained someone...

If you ever see a truck spraying something out the back, RUN!

The walk to Sea Wood takes you past Holy Trinity Church in Bardsea, which I had admired from the road many times and never gotten a chance to photograph.

When I finally arrived at Sea Wood, I was glad that I had made the trek out there. The woods were beautiful and peaceful and I hit the perfect time of year as all the flowers were in bloom. It looked exactly like the kind of place Mumsy would enjoy, and if I lived her all the time, I think I would frequent the area with a book in hand. As I am a world-class nerd, the woods immediately brought to mind Lothlorien as I pictured fair-haired elves.

Instead of walking back the same way, I took part of the Cumbrian Coastal Way, a series of footpaths leading along the coast from Silverdale to Gretna on the Scottish Boarder. The stretch of the Coastal Way from Bardsea to Ulverston is especially pretty as it winds along Morcambe Bay and passes farm land and Conished Priory.

Mayrhofen Austria

2010-04-10T03:28:00.001-07:00

Sorry for the long delay on new posts to the blog. To be honest I am horrible at writing them and without Amanda here to do it it has been a lost cause. I figured that I should at least make an attempt at a new post about my ski trip this past February to Mayrhofen Austria.

A while back my friend Pete and I had been talking about a ski trip this past winter. He had been to Austria before loved it. So, we decided to go back to the area that he had visited because there was so much to see and a great deal of terrain to explore on the mountains. Mayrhofen is located about an hours drive South East from Innsbruck Austria. The town is surrounded by the Alps and there are at least 8 ski areas in a short distance from it.

Mayrhofen in the Winter

Pete booked the trip and we were set to go in the beginning of February. Our friends Jen and Nate joined us for the trip. We flew form Gatwick, UK to Innsbruck, Austria and then got on a bus that took us to our ski chalet, the Birkenhof.

Nate and Jen at the Birkenhof

This was a two star ski chalet with shared bathrooms and a ski storage area, with boot drying racks, in the basement. It was nothing fancy but for a week of skiing all you really need is a place to crash after beating yourself up all day.

The next day we got up early, ate some breakfast and headed out on the slopes. There is a large number of choices when it comes to where to skiing and boarding. We stayed in the areas directly linked to Mayrhofen and at Zell Am Ziller, which is a short train ride away (the train was free with the lift pass). The best part was that one 6 day ticket was good for all the areas within the valley.

Mayrhofen Trail Map

Zell AM Ziller Trail Map

We skied for six days and it was amazing. There was fresh snow a couple times and that added to the fun by refreshing the off piste areas. I would have to say that this is definitely in my top 5 ski trips.

Here are some pictures from the fun:

View of the Mountains

The Universal Sign For: Don’t Ski This Way or You May Fall Off a Cliff!

Serious Nate

Jen

Pete Doing His Thing

Great View

The town was a great place to unwind after long days of skiing. We ate all sorts of great Austrian food and indulged in a few of the local brews each evening before heading to bed to do it all again the next day.

Mmm Meat and Potatoes With an Egg on Top and a Cabbage Salad on the Side…Classic Austrian Cuisine.

We became friends with some English guys who were staying in the same Chalet as us that had been to this area many times. Along with sharing a great deal of knowledge about the off piste terrain that was available in the area they had brought along there guitars and managed to get themselves a gig for the week at one of the local restaurants. Pete even got to play a few songs one of the nights.

Pete playing Guitar at a Restaurant in Austria

It was a great six days and I can’t wait to get back there to explore more of the mountains that we did not get a chance to see.

To see all the pictures from the trip go here: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=149145&id=536058549&l=aa0c1bfb87

Edit: Oh, Amanda wanted to know if the “Hills were alive with the sound of music.” Yes, yes they were :)

Sono Su Una Barca

2009-12-16T04:36:00.001-08:00

This summer, Kevin and I decided that rather than get birthday/anniversary gifts for each other, that we should go on a trip. We bided our time, waiting for a good flight deal (we didn’t care where we went). Eventually, one of the fantastic Ryan air sales came around, and we booked tickets to Venice (120 pounds total for 2 round trip tickets). I’ve wanted to go to Italy since I saw my first Roberto Begnini movie (Life is Beautiful…although my favorite is still Johnny Stecchino). We flew from Liverpool to Treviso (Ryan Air’s terminal about 50 minutes from Venice) and arrived late Friday night, managing to find our hotel on the first try (Venice is a maze of tiny streets and alleys made even more difficult by the many canals running through the city).

Needless to say, I awoke extremely excited to see the city on Saturday morning. We decided to visit the biggest tourist destination, Piazza San Marco, first thing on Saturday morning, intending to get breakfast on the way. Now, I had forgotten that breakfast is an American/British thing, so we had an extremely hard time finding somewhere to eat. We finally decided to be tourists and get a cappuccino and croissant at one of the outdoor cafes in the Piazza. 30 euros later (seriously – it was 30 Euros for two cappuccinos and two croissants), we were ready to start our day. Of course, I immediately started taking picture after picture. While I’m sure that I annoyed Kevin, at least I don’t disappear like Don!

Recognize this? They filmed part of Casino Royale here.

One of the buildings that makes up Piazzo San Marco is the Palazzo Ducale (or Doge’s Palace in English). The Doge of Venice was the elected Chief Magistrate of the city of Venice by the aristocracy. However, this did not make the Doge the “King” as his power was checked by the city’s wide range of officials. Thus, the Palazzo Ducale was the official residence of the Doge while in power. As soon as the current Doge died, the family had only a few days to clear out his personal belongings in order to make way for the new Doge (once he was elected). Not only did the Palazzo house the Doge, but it also contained a great number of political institutions (seat of government, city courtrooms, a jail, offices for various parts of government).

The building itself is a wonderfully preseved example of gothic architecture. The palace, as it looks today, was constructed between 1309 and 1423, although a building has occupied this site for much longer. When the last Ducale abdicated in 1797 (because Napoleon took over Venice), the building sat unused for around 100 years until it was restored and turned into a museum.

Interesting facts about the Palazzo Ducale

The facade of the Italy building at Epcot is an exact mirror image of Palazzo Ducale.
Mark Twain toured the Palazzo when visiting Venice in 1867 and even includes a description of the building in The Innocents Abroad

“Bridge of Sighs” – Prisoners would be transported over this bridge from the jail to the courtroom, and legend has it you could hear them sighing.

After we finished touring the Palace, we decided to see the city by boat. However, we were too cheap to use the traditional method of seeing the city – Gondola (they want 80 euro for 45 minutes – that almost 160 dollars!) so we decided to use our previously purchased water taxi tickets and just ride the water taxi up and down the grand canal.

The Grand Canal is the major waterway through the center of the city

The Grand Canal has always been the major waterway for the city of Venice and thus, prime real estate for Venetian aristocrats. Extravagant Palazzos line the canal. Many of the palaces have seen better days, but you can imagine what they must have looked like in their prime and it is amazing.

I was fascinated by the barber poles (to tie boats up to) and stairs leading right to the water(to access your boat from your house) In many of the more grand houses, there was a gated doorway into the bottom story of the house that was filled with water so you could park your boat right in your basement.

Ha Ha suckers! Hope you are enjoying your 80 Euro ride!

We rode the water taxi, or Vaporetti, to the end of the canal and decided to ride it back all the way to the other end of its route, Lido, and get some lunch. However, by the time we got there, it was 3 o’clock, which in Italy is similar to the Witching Hour. Shops all close up and Italians disappear, leaving two hungry Americans to ride the boat back to Venice and beg a cafe to serve them a sandwich. So if you are ever in Italy – make sure you eat between 12 and 3 or you will be sorry!

By the time we were done eating, the sun was starting to set, so I once again got sucked into taking some pictures of the sunset before Kevin could drag me away.

“You don’t get to taste the honey without the sting of the bee”

2009-12-03T01:59:00.001-08:00

Back during my first trip to Ulverston in May/June, I was doing my quarterly task of checking to see which musical artists were touring and might be coming to my hometown area. While many of my favorite artists were not touring at that time (Michael Buble, John Mayer, Guster, Tom Petty), I did get an email that a favorite of Mini and I’s, James Morrison, was touring in the UK and tickets could be purchased starting that day for members of the mailing list. I briefly glanced over the dates and locations and saw that he was playing a gig in Manchester on the Sunday after Thanksgiving. As if fate were intervening and trying to force me to go to the show, Katie and John had to be driven to the airport in Manchester Sunday morning, and Mini Deal had to be there Monday morning. I squealed with joy, went online and promptly purchased 3 tickets, not stopping to think if Kevin actually wanted to go to James Morrison. He is one of Mini and I’s favorite and therefore Kevin had to come. (Although I suppose we could have just left Kevin at a pub somewhere, but that’s beside the point).

iTunes first told me about James Morrison 2 years ago when I was searching for new music to buy with my annual iTunes gift card that Kevin always gets me. Since the album I was obsessed with at the time (and still am) was John Mayer’s Continuum album, I decided to use the “Artists You May Like” function and find artists with a similar sound to that particular album. iTunes came up with Amos Lee and James Morrison, so I purchased both albums. While I love both artists, Amos Lee has a more folk-music meets blues feel while James Morrison has a gospel meets blues meets pop feel that makes it easier to listen to. Since Mini and I share music tastes (the only artist she likes that I don’t is Billy Joel. She hates David Bowie…..how is that possible when he rocks?).

Needless to say, Mini and I were extremely excited, but it seemed like fate was going to intervene and keep us from James.

Problem 1: However, when I went to pack for my trip out here, I searched for my tickets only to realize that they had never sent them to me! However, several people on the James Morrison website had gotten their tickets a month ago. If you want to give yourself an ulcer, try contacting a ticket broker and getting a response. Luckily, I found some woman who took pity on me and agreed to have the box office reprint my tickets and hold them there. I just needed to bring my conformation email and the credit card I purchased them with.
Problem 2: I didn’t hear back from the ticket people until I was already in Ulverston. Where I had no printer. And no way of printing the conformation. I wound up writing the conformation code down and hoping that was good enough.
Problem 3: I went into my purse in Chester to get the postcode for our hotel in Manchester for the Sat Nav, when I realized I didn’t have my wallet. The wallet contained my credit card that I purchased the tickets with along with the conformation code. In addition, I had no way of proving who I was as all I had was an Amtrak frequent customer card and a boarding pass. I will admit I had a mini-meltdown in the car on the way to Manchester. I could care less if my wallet was stolen or lost, but I had to see James Morrison!

Once we got to the hotel, we fired up Cailin’s laptop and I got the conformation code from my email (and took a picture of the conformation email with my camera) and set off for the area in hopes that the ticket people would take pity on me (especially since I was still holding back tears). After all my freaking out, they just asked me to tell them the conformation code and handed over the tickets. All those tears for nothing! Kevin was also pleased to find out that OneRepublic was the opening band. At least he would enjoy 45 minutes of the concert.

By the way, OneRepublic was awesome! They never impressed me with their radio hits, especially that annoying Timbaland mix. However, they sound awesome live. I think the studio processes their music too much. Also, I have a soft spot in my heart for rock music that contains instruments other than guitars and drums. They have a piano, cello and violin. (On a side note, Cailin and I LOVED the cello player because he had a huge white boy fro on his head that bounced when he played). Also, after the lead singer hit a freakishly high note, he referenced that he was now singing in Justin Hawking territory. (Probably only John Felty will get this reference, but Justin was the lead singer for The Darkness, one of the greatest British Bands ever with the best music video ever! And no, the video is not from the 80s…) I definitely recommend giving OneRepublic a try.

While I was pleasantly surprised by OneRepublic, I was blown away by James Morrison. First of all, he cut his hair so he looks less like Bob Dylan and more like Milan Lucic, which is much better in my book. He had a great backing band complete with a horn section. However, the best part was how soulful and beautiful his voice was. Sometimes large arenas cause great singers voices to sound crappy, but his sounded just as good as on his albums. He played the perfect mix of popular singles and other tracks. In addition, he played some of his slower pieces without killing the mood. He also played a killer MJ cover, complete with cute dance moves at the beginning. Probably one of the best concerts I have ever been to. The only regret I have is not bringing my camera. The tickets said no cameras so I left mine at the hotel. We had fantastic seats, so I would have gotten some great pictures/videos. However, I did steal some from youtube to try and entice more people into the James Morrison cult. Maybe if we can get him some more American Fans, he’ll tour in the states!

Sorry Michael Buble, you’ve been replaced!

Chester chooses chestnuts, cheddar cheese and chewy chives

2009-12-02T01:39:00.001-08:00

Sunday morning brought rain, and the departure of Katie. Originally, we had planned on dropping Katie at the airport and then hanging out in Manchester for the day. However, when we dropped Katie off, we looked at the clock and realized that it was only 7:15am. Nothing in Manchester would be open until at least 10. Driving to the airport, I had seen signs indicating that the town of Chester wasn’t too far away. According to the English Heritage book, Chester housed England’s largest Roman Amphitheater that was conveniently open at “any reasonable hour” along with a castle so we decided to head to Chester for the day.

Since Chester is only about 24 miles from the airport, we still arrived in the very early hours of the morning. We decided to start our day with a walk on the city walls. Once a city completely walled in for protection, much of the original city walls remain, and can be walked on. The walls reminded me of the walls in York, but not quite as extensive. Roman gardens

Cailin was VERY cold, so she tried jumping up and down. When that failed, she bought an ice coffee…my sister the genius

By the time we finished, it was 9:00 am. Kevin was hungry (is anyone surprised?) so we decided to get some breakfast. Cailin and I vetoed the first place that we saw as it looked fancy. We then spent the next hour wandering around the shopping area looking for a place that was actually open besides McDonalds while Kevin got mad at us for not just eating in the first place we found an hour earlier. We finally found a pub that served breakfast, and Kevin and I got various forms of breakfast sandwiches and hash browns while Cailin attempted to warm up, still drinking her ice coffee. While it was only 9 am, the pub had about 20 people drinking pints of beer. This not only upset my stomach at the thought of drinking beer so early, but it was also quite sad.

After we re-fueled Kevin, we decided to walk around the shopping area. They had quite a selection of stores, and the best part was that you could walk under-cover around the shopping area. Very useful for us as it had started raining and my umbrella had broken. We spent an hour or so walking around, admiring the Tudor architecture of the buildings and doing a little shopping -a new wind-resistant umbrella for me and a little something for John Felty (no, not more scotch).

Kevin really liked the Tudor style architecture. He kept demanding that I take pictures.

Right near the shopping area was a huge cathedral. Being Sunday, we couldn’t go inside and check it out (unless we wanted to sit through mass which is quite painful for a couple of girls who grew up going to a Baptist church that had much shorter services and didn’t require kneeling and sitting and kneeling and standing.) We did however get a few pictures of the outside.

When we emerged on the other side of the cathedral, Cailin and I saw one of our favorite things – McDonalds. Cailin didn’t eat any breakfast so she was hungry and I can never turn down a double-cheeseburger so we made a quick pit stop into McDonalds. Cailin, like myself, has an ongoing contest to eat at McDonalds in every country she goes to. So far, she has the US, South Africa, The Netherlands and now England. I have the US, France, England, Belgium, and South Africa. I should also have Greece, but Kevin refused to let me eat there when we were in Athens on our honeymoon. I’m hoping (but doubtful) that there is a McDonalds in Venice so I can add Italy to my list this weekend.

After our brief stop at McDonalds, we set out to check out Chester castle. We found the castle easy enough, but it took us forever to find a way to get in. Once we did find a way in, we realized that the castle was inexplicably closed for the day. Boo! Cailin and Kevin trying to find a way in

We decided to head back to the car and make our way back to Manchester for the James Morrison concert. On the way back, I realized we had never seen the Roman Amphitheater, which was located right near where we had parked. However, once we got to the Amphitheater, we realized that it was, like the castle, closed-this time because they were doing work to it. It looked pretty cool, and I wish I had gotten a chance to see it up close, but a picture from the city wall will have to do for now.