Finally... some photos...

Hi all,
Here are a few pics for you of the trip to date. Hope you like them!
Sentosa Island in Singapore

Dark Horse, Jess and Halfway in the courtyard of the Royal Palace in Copenhagen

And just to prove that I was on this trip too... me in front of the Sibelius monument in Helsinki

The fabulous Peterhof Gardens at Peter the Great's Summer Palace

Sunset at the Kremlin in Novgorod

Me and the "crap dogs" in Moscow

The summer palace in Warsaw

And finally for today me and the Berlin Wall

Obviously I have heaps of photos so didn't really know where to start but I hope this gives you a bit of a sense of what I have seen so far.

Happy weekend all you!

Pest by name... Pest by nature

Hi all from sunny (yep another hot spot!) Budapest. I am not going to talk about yesterday cos brave Clare ran out of batteries and I was not so much in love with Budapest. Everything was hard and confusing and I didn't feel safe or happy so I called it early and sat in my hotel room watching MTV and eating chips... pleased to report that this battery recharging effort worked and today I have been very busy.

After a bit of exploring it turns out that I don't particularly like Pest but Buda is fantastic and makes up for it so there you go! This morning I checked out the parliament (third largest in the world behind argentina and UK), Heroes Place, City Park, Elizabeth Bridge and Liberty Bridge, the castle district and Fisherman's Bastion. I have one more stop on today's big tour (the citadel and liberation monument) and then hoping to hit St Stephen's Basilica tomorrow, and maybe the national museum if I have time before I get to the airport. Given yesterday's airport efforts on arrival, not that I am talking about it, I am leaving lots of time to get to my Hungarian Air flight... dear lord... wish me luck...

I get to Egypt in the early hours of Saturday and am not to sure about internet or phone facilities so don't be alarmed if I am incommunicado until I take the Clare Allison roadshow to London on the 21st. If you could all assist me by sending my mum telepathic happy birthday messages on the 19th I would be most appreciative...

Catch you all soon!
C

Farewell to the land of the Danish... oh and my budget...

Hi everyone - well here is your last post from sunny Copenhagen and I hope it finds you all well. I had a quiet day yesterday in an attempt to not blow my budget for this part of the trip but I ended up feeling a bit miserable, bored and lonely so today I got some more money out and set out to do the most I could do in my last day here.

Since I last wrote I have visited the Rosenberg Slot again (my favourite of the old royal palaces) and spent some time in the gardens there relaxing and reading up about Budapest. I also did a bit of a wander around the botanic gardens and climbed the Rundetaarn (Round Tower) for some great views of the city. Last night I went to see Pirates of the Carribean to get out of the hostel for a while, which was cool and reasonably amusing to laugh at stuff a few minutes before the rest of the theatre who had to read the subtitles to figure out what was going on. Halfway - note for you (I hope you got home safe by the way) I had a Dumle ice-cream at the movies... most excellent but not up to Dumle Original standards.

I also spent a bit of time at the NY Carlsberg Glyptotek (a bit art museum, mainly sculptures but also a lot of impressionist paintings and egyptian and greek artifacts), went to the Hard Rock Cafe (had to be done... come on, I have been a tourist for a month now!) and had a really fab canal cruise. The cruise was supposed to last about 50 minutes but we got about 90 minutes because we had to spend a while rescuing one of the other cruise boats that had conked out in the harbour. I didn't really see anything new on the cruise but I did get to see lots of the sights from a different angle and that was very cool.

Now I am about to head off for a quiet 'goodbye to Scandinavia' beer (I will miss the cobbled streets... a great leveller between the un-co people of the world and everyone else) and then go back and sort out my bags for my flight to Budapest in the morning.

talk soon!
Clare

Things Clare has learned...

Hi all - I hope you are all well! I know it hasn't been long since my last update but here goes what I have been up to in the last day and half....

Yesterday I met up with Caroline, Toby and Rebekah (one of the cutest little people you ever did meet!) for the day... we wandered around, ate, drunk and caught up as much as you can when you haven't seen people for four years and you only have a couple of hours! It was so fantastic to see them and I hope it won't be quite so long next time!

Last night I went walking on the waterfront to visit the culture and activity festival (i think... the signs were all in danish and my danish is a little rusty!) which showed me some random death metal, line dancing, water sports combo, and also provided me with some ice cream and kebabs for dinner so was all good.

Today I have just had a chilled out day sunbathing and wandering through the shops and am now thinking about heading back to my hostel to see who I am sharing with tonight (all my room-mates left this morning... was it something I said or do I really need to do some washing)?!

Anyway... since I have not really been up to much since I last wrote I thought I might share a few lessons I have learned in the last month...

1. pizza is the universal food
2. men in Europe drink bacardi breezers and no-one mocks them
3. if exposed to enough currency or time changes in a short period you simply give up trying to figure it out
4. there is nothing quite so satisfying as a clean bathroom that you don't have to pay to use
5. exposing new zealand winter skin to european sun will result in sun burn
6. when drinking alone remember... God counts as a person (thanks for the tip Halfway)
7. scandinavians REALLY like ice cream
8. so do i
9. some people will never be happy, no matter what happens
10. history is not always that long ago
11. a palace, a fountain and a patch of grass will make me happy
12. i don't like mcdonalds
13. summer is my favourite season
14. a smile and hand gestures can breach the language gap in almost all situations (ie anywhere but Moscow)

Hope you are all well!

C