Long, interesting final day...

By my calculations my yesterday lasted 19 hours - starting at 7.30am in Reykjavik to find a way to tune in to the All Blacks and finishing at 10.30pm in Canada (when it's 2.30am in Iceland) when I finally succumbed to jetlag.

So my alarm went at 7.30am and I grabbed my laptop to find a way to watch the game. There were a number of factors to this, the first being I don't have a European adaptor because I left it with Peggy so I borrowed one the night before from some Aussie girls so I would get my full four hours. The next was that the internet is like a magical promiseland where everything is available... unless you're in Iceland. I couldn't stream the game because every channel is country-specific, so I just got "This service is unavailable outside New Zealand/England/Italy" (The last one was in Italian, but still perfectly understandable after the two earlier messages.) BUT determination will find a way... I found a Christchurch sports radio station and three online newspapers live updating the game with photos AND skyped with Mum throughout. So no video, but lots of information :) It actually worked really well, because the radio people tell you all kinds of things you wouldn't otherwise know because they can't leave any silence and they have to try to "make you see".

Anyway... the All Blacks' win came 16 minutes before check out so I didn't really have time to be elated, had to throw everything around the room (actually, check out is kind of the opposite of that) and head out. Took one last walk around Reykjavik and reflected that it's a nice but weird city. Maybe it was just my timing, but the city didn't seem to have any residents. In two days I only saw tourists, or people working in tourist shops/restaurants. So who lives in the pretty lakeside houses?

The Blue Lagoon is THE thing you're meant to do if you only have two hours in Iceland so since I had two days I signed up for one of the many airport transfer including lagoon stop thingees. Very convenient. Pick up at 10.30, get to the lagoon before midday, pick up at 2pm, get to the airport at 2.30pm for your 5pm flight.

I was a bit dubious about the lagoon because it sounded so touristy and overly organised. I pictured pools and loungers and not being able to move because of all the people but it was, in fact magical. The water really is blue thanks to some kind of mineral/algae/natural phenomenon. (Pfff, that was an awesome explanation, I don't know what you're complaining about. Just google it.) It's a natural hot pool and the steam rises up over rough volcanic rock surrounding it, and over the rocks you can see a geothermal power station. It's very atmospheric and despite getting there late in the morning it wasn't too busy until after 1pm. I hopped out about then and got some lunch then went for a walk to take a million photos. Highly recommended experience :)

So then another airport, another plane, finished two books, watched Super 8... Arrived in Toronto and was picked up by Faith, a family friend from way back. She has a lovely house where I will be staying for a while to job hunt and set up some kind of life.

I do have some really sad news. Tragic even. I bought a bottle of Hendricks Gin duty free because it is the elixir of the gods and is expensive and special and a big treat... and somewhere between plane and house it broke (insert vehement swearing here). So now I have no gin AND spent my morning cleaning all my gin soaked stuff. Peggy, I think the gin shrank my black wool hat. Remember how it was a bit too big? Now it fits quite well :p Anyway, since I have three members of my immediate family visiting in the next four months I'm sure I can convince one of them that all I want for Christmas is Hendricks Gin.

So that's probably all from me on here. If you want to know about the job hunting//life creating let me know, I could always convert this to a "Catie whines about how hard the job market is" blog, or "The things that really annoy Catie about moving countries". But mostly, thanks for tuning in. I'll be back when I next have a plane ticket somewhere exciting.

Góðan dag

Hello from Reykjavik, of all places. It is very very cold. I am taking a break from the cold to thaw out my feet and figure out how to watch the rugby tomorrow! Maybe I will be able to watch it online? It seems a little complicated.

So I got to London fine and spent four days catching up with Sophie, Laura and Paul who I have known since high school/uni. It was really wonderful to see them, we drank a lot of red wine (and some sake) and ate a lot of food. I also bought a new camera, yay, and made it to Camden Market (bought a bowler hat - it's fantastic) and Tate Modern. Paul played tour guide for three of those days, I got lots of good history about pubs, architecture and where he used to live.

Friday I flew out to Reykjavik, arriving very late at night, and tried to sleep in to make up for it but I'm bad at sleeping in now. I'm getting a cold, and I think it's winning. Lame. Reykjavik is really pretty, but quite expensive. It's not so much that every item is overpriced, but that they don't seem to have the cheap and cheerful options so don't expect presents from Iceland!

I saw the Leif Erikson monument, which is outside Reykjavik's cathedral, Hallgrímskirkja. The statue was a gift from the USA in 1930 for the 1000th anniversary of Iceland establishing a parliament. Ooooh. The cathedral is really neat, modern and imposing. I just googled it and apparently it's the tallest building in Iceland. Another Oooh please :)


I'm getting sick so I just wandered around for three hours then came back to nap. Socialised with dorm-mates and in the lounge for a bit and now early to bed so that, fingers crossed, I can stream the NZ-France game online in the morning. So excited! If it doesn't work I'll be totally gutted.


Next stop Toronto so probably just one more blog to tell you how the game, the Blue Lagoon and the flight go tomorrow, then I'll be far to busy having a life to write on here twice a week ;)

Barcelona and beyond

So many changes in the past 24 hours - and so many to come! Let's start where I left you, I guess?

So we got the early train to Barcelona arriving about 2pm, hostel by 3pm and out the door again shortly after. We thought we'd check out La Sagrada Familia but the queue was around the block so we walked to Park Guell, Gaudi's model community attempt. It's like a Dr Seuss fun house park - so crazy but so cool. Spent a couple hours there before heading back to the hostel and grabbing dinner (microwave paella - very authentic). We went out for mojitos that night and just soaked up a never sleeping city. It was lovely. We found a bar where Hemingway and Miro used to drink (maybe not together...?) but it was choca so we got crepes instead. Good alternative plan, I say.

Sunday we had an amazing day! Started with the rugby, NZ vs Australia, for the semi-finals. We watched the heart-wrenching, seat-tipping amazing game, surrounded by Kiwis at "Flaherty's" off La Rambla. We had a lot of fun. We cheered when NZ got the ball at one point and a drunk Aussie behind us said "Don't clap yet girls" and then we scored and I was like "Can we clap now???"

Then we accidentally ran into a parade! There were big puppets and music and those climbing groups you see pictures of, where they make big human pyramids? So much fun! It was some kind of cultural party thing and we followed it for about four blocks until it stopped in a square. It's the kind of unplanned magic that really makes your trip extra special.

Then the big shit of the day - I dropped and broke my camera. I'm planning to buy a new one here in London because I already feel ghost-limby without my camera. Have lodged an insurance claim so we'll see how that goes, but mostly I'll just pay for a new one and hope I ever see something from insurance.


It was Peggy and my last night together :( So I took us out for a Visa-inspired tapas meal, which was STUPENDOUS. We checked out a few menus as we walked around today and saw a place we liked the look of, with reasonable prices, which turned out to be a mission to find again but so worth it. It was called Xaloc and was in the middle of the Jewish quarter of the Gothic area.

We got six tapas - an olive selection, gazpacho, roast red pepper, onions and eggplant, chorizo and potato meatballs, fish fritters and a warm apple and goat's cheese salad. Plus fries. The gazpacho was a miss and the roast veges were unexpectedly cold but even that was fun because that's tapas - whatever you get is it! Everything else was delicious and we had it with sangria :) The meatballs, or "bombas" were crispy on the outside and squishy yummy a little spicy inside - with aioli on top. Goat's cheese is so magical, I saved that for last. The home fries were just roughly chopped potato deep fried and the "fritters" were just chunks of fish deep fried - so good!

It took us about an hour to work our way through that. It's always surprising how filling tapas is. We waited a bit and ordered dessert. We basically ordered the two things that confused us on the assumption that if they were bad we would get waffles on our way home. They weren't bad :) We got chocolate fritters and "cinnamon and milk fried bread". The first was basically chunks of dark dark chocolate in donut batter, deep fried and sprinkled with sugar. O.M.G. It was a magical experience. I would buy a deep fryer purely in the hope of repeating that experience. The bread was unusual, but yummy. It seemed to be a chunky piece of milk-soaked bread, covered in cinnamon and somehow fried so that outer layer was crispy. Came with hazelnut ice cream and was heaven.

Enough about food? Probably :) Basically Sunday was amazing, minus a little incident of breaking vital, expensive equipment.

Monday we got up early to get to La Sagrada Familia before it opened. I saw it in 2008 and was very excited because now the central part is open. It is so overwhelming, and really interesting to see as an example of a modern cathedral. Words don't do it justice but the sculptures are moving, the inspiration from nature is clear and the scale is worthy of comparison to any great cathedral around the world.


After that the flea market (I got a bag) and then some camera browsing... then just back to the hostel to head to the airport for me. It was a sad goodbye at the train station because Peggy and I have had so much fun and now we won't see each other for months but it's nice to be in London catching up with people I haven't seen for years.

Not sure when I'll next update, I'm in an internet cafe now and won't be able to charge my laptop in Reykjavik so we'll see what ends up being convenient.

Eep - so behind!

Lisbon was really cool. We spent day two there just wandering the streets. There's a Moorish district, which is sort of medina-esque, but with plumbing and minus the scary men, and we found a great viewpoint over the harbour. It was interesting because it had a lot of similar characteristics to Seville, but wasn't as obsessively maintained so it felt more lived in and authentic. Like the city wasn't obsessing over its history, was just living around it. Very cool.

We got an evening train to Porto and got to our hostel about 9.30pm and I'd been a bit sick so it was an early night and a late morning then just four hours walking around Porto. A really lovely city, it just felt comfortable. It's a university town built across a big river with hills on either side so there's lots of stunning scenery and neat sights, but also a lot of hills to climb! It was one of those places you say "Yeah, I could live here." You know, with caveats like employment and speaking at least a little of the language.

Wednesday we headed to Coimbra, which is also where our night train was leaving from. It's meant to be a really lovely pretty town and it seemed quite nice but the heatwave struck and we melted! It got up to at least 35 degrees, and there was a mean, scorching edge to the direct sunlight so we made our way sloooowly up the hill to the university (which dates from the 1200s and is one of Europe's oldest, oooh) and then bought icecream on our way down but I don't think we took much in. A few degrees less heat and it would have been great! So night train left at 7pm and we were on our way back to Spain. We really loved Portugal. I keep telling Peggy to move there so I have a reason to come back, and she's pretty tempted :)

Arrived in San Sebastian at 6.30am yesterday and made it to our hostel to dump our bags then left to track down breakfast. Nothing really opened until 7.30 at the earliest so we grabbed a couple croissants to tide us over but eventually found a pretty decent breakfast, including hot drink. Peggy got their specialty of brioche and jam while I got the "catalan" breakfast of tomato and olive oil on toast - delicious. We spent the morning dragging ourselves around the city. It's really really pretty and there's lots to see so we did have fun, but we were so tired (this particular night train sucked - uncontrolled children and argumentative couples, ick) that everything was hilarious. So, yeah, good times had by us. Check in was 1pm so we ate lunch and took naps after that :) Went for another walk but didn't get up to much in the evening, just food and bed.

Today we went to Bilbao, to see the Guggenheim Museum there, which is amazing. It's all fluid metal that looks like it should move or grow. It was a really beautiful building that pictures don't really do justice to. After that a tram to the old town and to go to the Basque (Euskal) Museum. There wasn't a lot of info in English but it was really interesting. The Basque language is fascinating because it's not related to anything around it, as you can tell from reading signs - nothing in it is familiar. It's not even an Indo-European language, which is so mind-blowing. I'll definitely be doing more research there.

This afternoon we walked up the only hill in San Sebastian, which has a big statue of Jesus on top. The game all the way up was "Have you found Jesus yet?" and then when we found him he had a big cell phone aerial out his head, which I thought was hilarious and so practical! I mean, say you live in a reasonably flat coastal town surrounded by hills, cell reception has to be a bitch, right? So your options are build a big ugly tower on your nearest hill, ruining one of your town sights because there's an old fortress up there, OR you could adapt the big statue someone put up a couple hundred years ago so Jesus is not only watching over your city, he's also connecting your calls. Smart, I say, and just a little disrespectful. I respect that.

Tomorrow Barcelona, on the 7.30am train. Ouch.

Cork and castles - hello Portugal.

What did I last write? I just made Peggy look it up so now I know - we had shopped and eaten. We didn't go out for a drink but we did find chocolate cake at a random Mexican restaurant near our hostel.

We made it an early night, but our dorm was quite loud so we didn't sleep well. We had a massive day planned and managed to get it all done! Up at 6.50am, out by 7.30, train station at 8am, bought all our tickets for the day and left our big bags in a locker at the station to make our way to Segovia.

A pretty little town half an hour from Madrid, it is famous for it's impressive Roman aqueduct, which was supremely cool. It also has a big cathedral and a fairytale-esque fortress. We skipped going through the cathedral and made our way to the Alcazar, which has princess turrets and a big tower. We climbed all 152 steps of the tower - which was more really because just before the tower Peggy made us go to the cellar so that was added to our total. It was quite a tight spiral, but well worth the effort (and the two euro) for the view. We wandered the palace for over an hour, and spent four hours altogether in the pretty town, and took a ridiculous number of photos.

After Segovia we headed back to Madrid and got there at 4.30pm, then took the metro all the way to the other train station to see the modern art museum, Reina Sofia, which has a lot of Picasso and Dali works, including Guernica. It's free after 2.30 on Saturdays and we got there about 5.30pm but it wasn't too busy, except in the Guernica room. All the Picasso works were fantastic - he communicates stories and emotions so well. I'm not as much a Dali fan. I have the constant feeling that I don't "get it". We only spent an hour there because we skipped the top two floors, which are mostly temporary exhibits. Then dinner out and a metro all the way back to Chamartin train station arriving at 9.20pm, an hour before our night train to Lisbon arrived. How romantic does that sound? I took the night train to Lisbon. I slept through most of it, although neither of us slept all that well.

Today we got to our hostel early, ate breakfast, chilled out for a bit then headed to Sintra, the "must do" day trip from Lisbon. It's a lovely town, with lots to see. I figured out we walked more than 10 kilometres over four hours, with half that uphill. It was tiring but great. I saw the Moorish Castle - an 8th century fortress with stunning views across Lisbon and towards all the other, more recent, palaces in the area. It was a great trip topped with really good hamburgers. We keep meaning to try local foods, but our budget likes the hamburger deals offered at tourist places. Six euro for a cheeseburger, salad, fries and drink? Yes please...

Back at the hostel we've just chilled out. We're kind of amazingly tired but we're fighting it off so we can sleep well tonight. Overall it's been a huge couple of days including seven metro rides, five train rides totalling 13 hours, plus about ten hours of walking and not nearly enough sleeping! I wasn't going to post again so soon but I figured if I didn't post today I'd end up with 20 pages of news next time.

Real Madrid

Do you see what I did there? No? Oh... it's the football team. So it's like a joke - real/Real Madrid. Still no? Nevermind...

I'm a few days behind. . . What have we been doing? Seville was beautiful and amazing, we had a really great time there. I would highly recommend. On... Tuesday? Yes. Tuesday we headed to Granada to see Alhambra, this amazing hillside fortress. Long story short, they are dumb and have a limited number of tickets per day and we missed out so instead we ate pasta with a stolen fork outside the cathedral. It was a nice day anyway :)

Got to Madrid quite late and had a bit of a mission to find our hostel, which made Peggy and I both a bit grumpy. In the end we got a taxi, which cost less than three euro and was totally worth it. Wednesday we were going to go to the palace but it was shut until 1.30pm and then the queue was massive so we skipped it. We went to the Prado, the big old art gallery full of El Greco and Goya. I had an amazing time. I wasn't very familiar with El Greco so was blown away by his large-scale works. His style is so different to anything before or even after him for a few hundred years. Peggy could probably have done the gallery in half the time but was very patient with me. We went to a nearby park and ate ice cream afterwards. It was idyllic.

Yesterday we went to Toledo. It was a bit of a non-stop drama to get there, but once we made it it was lovely. El Greco lived there at the end of his life so the museum has a lot of his works, as well as some well preserved medieval statues and tapestries. The cathedral was huge, it went forever and included a planted courtyard. The last of the top three stops is the Iglesias de Santo Tome, which has a big alterpiece by El Greco. We got to the church but decided we were church-weary so we ate ice cream and walked around instead.

Today was designated a plan-nothing day and plan nothing we did. I went to find a second hand bookstore I had read about, but it was closed when I got there. The good news is all the clothing stores were open so I may have a few new things to fit in my bag now. Peggy and I split for the morning, she stayed at the hostel a bit later then went for a walk so she didn't have to put up with my umming and awwing (is there an official spelling for that phrase?) over dresses. I found a great store called Sfera - very cute and very reasonable prices. I got a gorgeous black dress and also found a cardigan from a different shop. So yes, I had fun :) On the way back the bookshop was open so I picked up a few things. More than I probably should have, but I couldn't resist the one euro table.

This afternoon we went for another walk around the area our hostel is in. Ate hamburgers, bought a sim card, window shopped... Peggy bought an adorable skirt, which is not very practical for travel so I'm very proud. Now we're resting and deciding whether to go out for a drink tonight. We have quite an early start tomorrow but I'm keen to experience some of the famous (infamous?) Spanish nightlife. Oh well - maybe in Barcelona.

Sevilla

Some oddbits first and an update at the bottom.

I have been collecting tidbits that I keep forgetting to put into posts – partly because they're juvenile (like Ufuk hostel, where we didn't stay) and partly because I'm generally forgetful.

One long-running joke in Turkey was about the bus company Kamilcok... We never ended up riding Kamilcok, but often saw it around Turkey. I also laughed at the Lecheria in Tangier. If your French is up to scratch then you'll know it served milkshakes, but the name seemed to suit most of Morocco. They could rename it Lecheria, or Lechopolis, Lecherton...

Last giggle is courtesy of a man in Tangier who clearly has no idea where NZ is...

Him: Where are you from?

Peggy: New Zealand.

Him: Aaah, Irish.

Me: Um. No. New Zealand? Kiwi? Near Australia.

Him: Aaah. I like Scottish Whisky.

Peggy: Okay... Good.

So Seville is pretty. We walked around a lot yesterday (three hours) and this morning (five hours) and were generally pleased with the openness and colours. Made it to a flamenco show – very passionate! The dancer looked like she was in pain most of the performance, but I think that was on purpose. They sell a lot of dresses and combs and fans here, I'm tempted to bring home a flamenco costume but they cost upwards of 150 euros so I guess no.

Today we saw the cathedral and the Real Alcazar, the palace here which was first built in the 9^th century and then added to and adapted for another 800 years. It's huge with a beautiful garden. A highlight was the musical fountain. I haven't had much luck googling it but basically as water runs behind it a drum spins and makes an organ play – it was really fun! We spent about two hours there altogether, it was another beautiful palace that made me think maybe it wouldn't be so bad to be a princess.

We had seen postcards of a really neat plaza so we made our way slowly through alleyways and across squares to Plaza de Espana. It was more recent than the cathedral or palace – built in 1929 for some international expo – but in an older style that was reminiscent of the tile work we saw in Morocco. It was a lovely space with a canal running around the outside. Now we're back in the hostel for siesta (actually it's because no one else is using the shower at the moment. There's one shower for 14 people so mornings and evenings are too busy.) Lots of things close from 2.30 to 4.30 (very civilised) so we figure we'll head out around 5pm and maybe do some shopping :)

Ole!

We have made it to Europe - hurrah. It was a long awaited , exciting arrival which required a train, a ferry, a bus AND a tram to get us to Oasis Palace Sevilla - in beautiful Seville.

Fes was a bit disappointing. There were some good sites and our hostel was pretty but we took a tour of the medina with the hostel and our guide clearly didn't give a shit about what we experienced. Every stop included a sales pitch from someone so while it was amazing to see 1100 year old tanneries and learn about traditional medicines and carpet making, then having leather, spices and carpets aggressively sold to you is a little off-putting. I wouldn't discourage anyone from going to Morocco, but we both found it tiring to put up with the non-stop sales pitches and people trying to rip you off. We decided to just take Saturday morning off and chill out before going to Tangier

Taxi to the train station, train (very hot and sticky and uncomfortable) to Tangier where we found a random cheap hotel near the port. It was worn but clean and it did the trick - much like Tangier which was more open and less smelly than Fes so thumbs up there. We got the 8am ferry to Tarifa, which really left at 8.30 and was so rough kids were crying and lots of people were being sick. Through focus and staunchness Peggy and I did not fall into either of those categories but we were horridly uncomfortable. Bus to Algeciras, bus to Seville, tram to Plaza near hostel, walk to hostel, cue collapse.

We have two nights here, and we're trying to figure out how to best spend the next 15 days. Seville is beautiful so we're going to go for an evening walk and then do some research about where we want to go next.