Tuesday, April 18, 2006
Europe 2006
Ok, time for a mega post. If you have a slow internet connection this will take a while to load...
Wednesday, April 5th (Airplane):
We spent an entire day traveling. We left San Jose around 9:00 AM and arrive in London at 9:00 AM (granted, eight hours is subtracted due to time zones). I've never spent more than an hour sleeping in a sitting position so I took an Ambien to help out. It only made me a little groggy but I was still awake the entire trip.
Thursday, April 6th (London):
We had several hours to kill before checking in so we saw the exhibits at the Victoria & Albert museum and had a pint at a pub called the Drayton Arms. Some hotels let people check in before the official time but this Holiday Inn was run by fascists so we ended up sleeping in the lobby for a couple hours. They wouldn't let us check in until the exact minute of the official time. We were so tired that when we were walking around town in the morning we were afraid we'd be hit by traffic. After we checked in we took a five hour nap!
That night we had a dinner of meat pies at the Olde Bank of England pub and then walked along the banks of the Thames.
Friday, April 7th (London):
We visited Buckingham Palace... (can you find Samantha's finger?):
... and the adjacent St. James Park:
Here's Samantha in front of Big Ben:
There were hundreds of protest signs against the war in a small park that was directly across the street from the Houses of Parliament:
One of my favorite parts of the trip was visiting the Tower of London. Even though I did the exact same tour eight years ago I was still amazed at how many important events took place in that spot. Queens were beheaded, princes were murdered, scholars were punished... Also, it's always nice to check out the crown jewels.
Here is Samantha looking nervous:
Here is a guard at the Tower:
Now you get to see my "famous" long armed self portrait photo technique. You will see a lot of this because I rarely trusted someone to take our picture. Here we are in front of the beautiful Tower Bridge:
Saturday, April 8th (London):
We visited the amazing Westminster Abbey. This is another place that has an insane amount of history packed into one area. Hundreds (maybe thousands?) of famous British people are buried there (most of them are under the floor you walk on). Also, since it was built, the coronation and funeral cermonies for every king and queen have occurred there. Our favorite area was the Poet's Corner where you could see memorials to most of the famous British authors, poets, and playwrites.
Here is the front of the Abbey:
We then headed over to the Tate Modern. It used to be an old power plant and they transformed it into a modern art museum about six years ago. It's a really massive and interesting structure filled with a decent selection of modern art.
We took the Millenium Bridge across the Thames to the Tate Modern:
Here's a shot of the Thames:
While on the bridge we see Shakespeare's Globe Theatre (white building with thatch roof):
Inside the Tate was a huge display made out of white boxes:
We rested our tired feet on the top floor of the Tate which was a restaurant/bar. You can see St. Paul's Cathedral in the background and my beer in the foreground:
We took a tour of the Globe Theatre. The original burned down hundreds of years ago and an American actor helped finance the reconstruction about nine years ago. It was built exactly like the original with no power tools and only with original materials.
Here is a shot of the interior:
Here is Samantha in front of the stage with some drama students practicing behind her:
A shot of the Houses of Parliament from across the Thames:
I kept wanting to go on the London Eye but the line was always too long. It's massive in person:
We walked through Regent's Park. London's parks are huge and beautiful and are a nice escape from the craziness of urban life.
Here is a rare picture of us taken by someone else:
On our trip we saw daffodils featured prominently in every city we went to. Here are some in Regent's Park:
That night we had dinner at a small place named Troubadour Cafe. We found out it had a club in the basement and there was a great band called Solenca playing. We rocked out till they finished their set and then bought a CD off of them. Check them out if you have time.
Here's the only picture I took (sorry about the quality):
Sunday, April 9th (Stratford-Upon-Avon):
My original plan for this day was to take a train up to Stratford-Upon-Avon, hang out there for a few hours, and then take a train to Birmingham to fly over to Dublin. Unfortunately for us this weekend had some sort of national railway maintenance going on. This meant that all our train trips were heavily supplemented with slow bus detours. When we got to Stratford-Upon-Avon we had to sprint from place to place to be able to make it to Birmingham on time for our flight.
Here is Samantha in the backyard of Shakespeare's birth home:
Here I am in the rain with my 50 pound backpack on with the river Avon next to me and the Holy Trinity church in the background:
This is Shakespeare's tomb in the floor of the Holy Trinity church. The inscription basically reads:
"Good friend, for Jesus's sake, forbear to dig the dust enclosed here. Blessed be the man that spares these stones and cursed be he that moves my bones."
I wonder if he was genuinely worried about that or if someone else just wrote that to keep tourists from bothering the grave?
Here is a picture from the outside of the church:
Monday, April 10th (Dublin):
Dublin was a very busy city filled with tons of tourists.
We went to the Dublin Castle which is still the center of politics in Ireland. It's built on top of ancient ruins of a Viking fortress.
Here is a picture of the outside of the castle (the round tower is the only remaining part from the original British castle from the 13th century):
The throne in the castle is never to be sat on again since Ireland became independent. Not even the President of Ireland is allowed to sit on it:
That night we went on a Traditional Irish Music Pub Crawl. It was led by a pair of musicians who took a group of about sixty people to a few pubs. They taught us about traditional Irish music, played several songs, and got us all to sing a long to a few of them.
Here is the only picture I took (our camera takes poor low-light pictures):
Tuesday, April 11th (Killarney):
Even though we were in Dublin for two nights we only had one real day to spend there so we didn't see everything we wanted to. We then headed to Killarney. Unfortunately, we had another train problem. As we were about to leave the Dublin station the engine car of the train had a failure and they took an hour to replace it with another engine. When we got to the middle of Ireland where we were to transfer trains the connecting train had already left because our train was late. So the train company put us on buses which slowly bounced along to Killarney. We were delayed by three hours. They played "Men of Honor" on the bus to try to sooth the frustrations of the passengers. Unfortunately they picked a movie full of people shouting, cussing, and drowning! I thought it was interesting though.
Killarney was the most beautiful part of our trip. It's a picturesque town with a beautiful downtown and it's surrounded by lakes, mountains, and wildlife. In Ireland there is so much rain that plants grow on everything.
Here is a picture of me in front of an old wall covered in plants:
We hiked out to Ross Castle which is an ancient ruin on the shore of a beautiful lake:
A nice field:
Killarney Cathedral in the background:
Wednesday, April 12th (Killarney):
In the morning we went for a day trip to Dingle. It's pretty hard to get to because the roads that lead to it are barely big enough for one car (large tour buses were clogging it both ways) and all along there was a sheer drop down to the ocean.
A beach along the way:
The beach was incredibly wide and wet and it looks like Samantha is walking on water:
A look at the hill behind the beach:
The round stone huts are 2,000 years old:
A cute lamb (thousands of these in the area):
Here is the bus driver's dog "Boo" (not afraid of falling off the cliff):
This stone chapel is 1,000 years old and is built out of stacked stones (but still incredibly solid):
Here is the fishing town of Dingle:
The islands in the lake by Killarney:
The only other picture of Samantha and I taken by someone else (the nice bus driver):
The mountains (largest in Ireland) behind Killarney:
Our guide book for Ireland wasn't great and didn't do a good job of telling how far away things are. We thought that the pub it recommended was a quick walk from our B&B but it took us over an hour to walk there. We were exhausted and cold when we arrived and after we ate we took a cab back to town. I'm pretty sure this walk is what ended up making Samantha and I sick.
Here is the pub (even though it looks new on the outside it is old and interesting on the inside):
Thursday, April 13th (Cork):
Maybe it was because it was the 13th of April but this is the day we started getting really sick. We only went to Cork because we needed to fly out from there the day after. It was a big and industrial town with some amazing buildings but a lot of graffiti, litter, and thugs. We got out of town for a while to visit the amazing Blarney Castle.
The castle from a distance:
The castle grounds:
Samantha kissing the Blarney Stone (nervous about the ten story drop):
A view from the top:
Another view:
Samantha looking nervous:
I only took one picture in Cork (tells you something). Our hotel was really nice and used to be a hospital along time ago:
That night I had a runny nose and a slight fever. Samantha threw up all night. I think we both got the flu because of our weakened state from beind cold, wet, and exhausted in Killarney.
Friday, April 14th (Amsterdam):
The first day in Amsterdam we were so sick and weak that we spent all day in the hotel sleeping. I think I went through about 200 tissues.
Saturday, April 15th (Amsterdam):
We felt a little better and decided to power through and enjoy the town. It's an amazing city with aspects of Paris and Venice mixed together. We tried to see a bunch of attractions but the lines were too long. We waited in line for the Van Gogh museum for about 45 minutes and when we got inside we had to wrestle with people to be able to glimpse the paintings. I had already been there eight years ago so I didn't try too hard but Samantha was frustrated.
A nice old clock tower:
Some sort of sports festival:
We enjoyed eating at the outdoor cafes which had chairs for you to observe the city:
One of the many flower stands:
An interesting building:
One of the many cars small enough to navigate the tiny streets of Amsterdam:
Sunday, April 16th:
On our last day in London we just walked around and enjoyed ourself. I wouldn't have guessed it but Easter Sunday was the biggest tourist day of all our days there. I would have though people would be at home with their families. The sidewalks were so packed that people were forced into the streets. There was also litter everywhere and the lines for all attractions were a mile long. We decided to hide from the crowds and rest our feet by watching a French film.
Here is our view as we rested on chairs in Kensington Gardens:
Here is a nice old church named St. Mary Abbots:
The grounds in front of the church:
Monday, April 17th (Airplane):
It took twenty hours to get from our hotel in London to our house in Brentwood. Our connecting flight in Dallas was delayed by an hour because there were too many bags in the plane. They took off our bag from below (but didn't tell us) and we waited in San Jose for an hour looking for it. Fortunately after I talked to someone there they told me it would be delivered to my house within 24 hours (which it was).
We were ecstatic to see Jace and when we went to sleep it felt like sleeping on a cloud compared to the mattresses in Europe.
There is a lot more that I didn't write about but my hands are sore from typing so I'll tell you when I see you!
Wednesday, April 5th (Airplane):
We spent an entire day traveling. We left San Jose around 9:00 AM and arrive in London at 9:00 AM (granted, eight hours is subtracted due to time zones). I've never spent more than an hour sleeping in a sitting position so I took an Ambien to help out. It only made me a little groggy but I was still awake the entire trip.
Thursday, April 6th (London):
We had several hours to kill before checking in so we saw the exhibits at the Victoria & Albert museum and had a pint at a pub called the Drayton Arms. Some hotels let people check in before the official time but this Holiday Inn was run by fascists so we ended up sleeping in the lobby for a couple hours. They wouldn't let us check in until the exact minute of the official time. We were so tired that when we were walking around town in the morning we were afraid we'd be hit by traffic. After we checked in we took a five hour nap!
That night we had a dinner of meat pies at the Olde Bank of England pub and then walked along the banks of the Thames.
Friday, April 7th (London):
We visited Buckingham Palace... (can you find Samantha's finger?):
... and the adjacent St. James Park:
Here's Samantha in front of Big Ben:
There were hundreds of protest signs against the war in a small park that was directly across the street from the Houses of Parliament:
One of my favorite parts of the trip was visiting the Tower of London. Even though I did the exact same tour eight years ago I was still amazed at how many important events took place in that spot. Queens were beheaded, princes were murdered, scholars were punished... Also, it's always nice to check out the crown jewels.
Here is Samantha looking nervous:
Here is a guard at the Tower:
Now you get to see my "famous" long armed self portrait photo technique. You will see a lot of this because I rarely trusted someone to take our picture. Here we are in front of the beautiful Tower Bridge:
Saturday, April 8th (London):
We visited the amazing Westminster Abbey. This is another place that has an insane amount of history packed into one area. Hundreds (maybe thousands?) of famous British people are buried there (most of them are under the floor you walk on). Also, since it was built, the coronation and funeral cermonies for every king and queen have occurred there. Our favorite area was the Poet's Corner where you could see memorials to most of the famous British authors, poets, and playwrites.
Here is the front of the Abbey:
We then headed over to the Tate Modern. It used to be an old power plant and they transformed it into a modern art museum about six years ago. It's a really massive and interesting structure filled with a decent selection of modern art.
We took the Millenium Bridge across the Thames to the Tate Modern:
Here's a shot of the Thames:
While on the bridge we see Shakespeare's Globe Theatre (white building with thatch roof):
Inside the Tate was a huge display made out of white boxes:
We rested our tired feet on the top floor of the Tate which was a restaurant/bar. You can see St. Paul's Cathedral in the background and my beer in the foreground:
We took a tour of the Globe Theatre. The original burned down hundreds of years ago and an American actor helped finance the reconstruction about nine years ago. It was built exactly like the original with no power tools and only with original materials.
Here is a shot of the interior:
Here is Samantha in front of the stage with some drama students practicing behind her:
A shot of the Houses of Parliament from across the Thames:
I kept wanting to go on the London Eye but the line was always too long. It's massive in person:
We walked through Regent's Park. London's parks are huge and beautiful and are a nice escape from the craziness of urban life.
Here is a rare picture of us taken by someone else:
On our trip we saw daffodils featured prominently in every city we went to. Here are some in Regent's Park:
That night we had dinner at a small place named Troubadour Cafe. We found out it had a club in the basement and there was a great band called Solenca playing. We rocked out till they finished their set and then bought a CD off of them. Check them out if you have time.
Here's the only picture I took (sorry about the quality):
Sunday, April 9th (Stratford-Upon-Avon):
My original plan for this day was to take a train up to Stratford-Upon-Avon, hang out there for a few hours, and then take a train to Birmingham to fly over to Dublin. Unfortunately for us this weekend had some sort of national railway maintenance going on. This meant that all our train trips were heavily supplemented with slow bus detours. When we got to Stratford-Upon-Avon we had to sprint from place to place to be able to make it to Birmingham on time for our flight.
Here is Samantha in the backyard of Shakespeare's birth home:
Here I am in the rain with my 50 pound backpack on with the river Avon next to me and the Holy Trinity church in the background:
This is Shakespeare's tomb in the floor of the Holy Trinity church. The inscription basically reads:
"Good friend, for Jesus's sake, forbear to dig the dust enclosed here. Blessed be the man that spares these stones and cursed be he that moves my bones."
I wonder if he was genuinely worried about that or if someone else just wrote that to keep tourists from bothering the grave?
Here is a picture from the outside of the church:
Monday, April 10th (Dublin):
Dublin was a very busy city filled with tons of tourists.
We went to the Dublin Castle which is still the center of politics in Ireland. It's built on top of ancient ruins of a Viking fortress.
Here is a picture of the outside of the castle (the round tower is the only remaining part from the original British castle from the 13th century):
The throne in the castle is never to be sat on again since Ireland became independent. Not even the President of Ireland is allowed to sit on it:
That night we went on a Traditional Irish Music Pub Crawl. It was led by a pair of musicians who took a group of about sixty people to a few pubs. They taught us about traditional Irish music, played several songs, and got us all to sing a long to a few of them.
Here is the only picture I took (our camera takes poor low-light pictures):
Tuesday, April 11th (Killarney):
Even though we were in Dublin for two nights we only had one real day to spend there so we didn't see everything we wanted to. We then headed to Killarney. Unfortunately, we had another train problem. As we were about to leave the Dublin station the engine car of the train had a failure and they took an hour to replace it with another engine. When we got to the middle of Ireland where we were to transfer trains the connecting train had already left because our train was late. So the train company put us on buses which slowly bounced along to Killarney. We were delayed by three hours. They played "Men of Honor" on the bus to try to sooth the frustrations of the passengers. Unfortunately they picked a movie full of people shouting, cussing, and drowning! I thought it was interesting though.
Killarney was the most beautiful part of our trip. It's a picturesque town with a beautiful downtown and it's surrounded by lakes, mountains, and wildlife. In Ireland there is so much rain that plants grow on everything.
Here is a picture of me in front of an old wall covered in plants:
We hiked out to Ross Castle which is an ancient ruin on the shore of a beautiful lake:
A nice field:
Killarney Cathedral in the background:
Wednesday, April 12th (Killarney):
In the morning we went for a day trip to Dingle. It's pretty hard to get to because the roads that lead to it are barely big enough for one car (large tour buses were clogging it both ways) and all along there was a sheer drop down to the ocean.
A beach along the way:
The beach was incredibly wide and wet and it looks like Samantha is walking on water:
A look at the hill behind the beach:
The round stone huts are 2,000 years old:
A cute lamb (thousands of these in the area):
Here is the bus driver's dog "Boo" (not afraid of falling off the cliff):
This stone chapel is 1,000 years old and is built out of stacked stones (but still incredibly solid):
Here is the fishing town of Dingle:
The islands in the lake by Killarney:
The only other picture of Samantha and I taken by someone else (the nice bus driver):
The mountains (largest in Ireland) behind Killarney:
Our guide book for Ireland wasn't great and didn't do a good job of telling how far away things are. We thought that the pub it recommended was a quick walk from our B&B but it took us over an hour to walk there. We were exhausted and cold when we arrived and after we ate we took a cab back to town. I'm pretty sure this walk is what ended up making Samantha and I sick.
Here is the pub (even though it looks new on the outside it is old and interesting on the inside):
Thursday, April 13th (Cork):
Maybe it was because it was the 13th of April but this is the day we started getting really sick. We only went to Cork because we needed to fly out from there the day after. It was a big and industrial town with some amazing buildings but a lot of graffiti, litter, and thugs. We got out of town for a while to visit the amazing Blarney Castle.
The castle from a distance:
The castle grounds:
Samantha kissing the Blarney Stone (nervous about the ten story drop):
A view from the top:
Another view:
Samantha looking nervous:
I only took one picture in Cork (tells you something). Our hotel was really nice and used to be a hospital along time ago:
That night I had a runny nose and a slight fever. Samantha threw up all night. I think we both got the flu because of our weakened state from beind cold, wet, and exhausted in Killarney.
Friday, April 14th (Amsterdam):
The first day in Amsterdam we were so sick and weak that we spent all day in the hotel sleeping. I think I went through about 200 tissues.
Saturday, April 15th (Amsterdam):
We felt a little better and decided to power through and enjoy the town. It's an amazing city with aspects of Paris and Venice mixed together. We tried to see a bunch of attractions but the lines were too long. We waited in line for the Van Gogh museum for about 45 minutes and when we got inside we had to wrestle with people to be able to glimpse the paintings. I had already been there eight years ago so I didn't try too hard but Samantha was frustrated.
A nice old clock tower:
Some sort of sports festival:
We enjoyed eating at the outdoor cafes which had chairs for you to observe the city:
One of the many flower stands:
An interesting building:
One of the many cars small enough to navigate the tiny streets of Amsterdam:
Sunday, April 16th:
On our last day in London we just walked around and enjoyed ourself. I wouldn't have guessed it but Easter Sunday was the biggest tourist day of all our days there. I would have though people would be at home with their families. The sidewalks were so packed that people were forced into the streets. There was also litter everywhere and the lines for all attractions were a mile long. We decided to hide from the crowds and rest our feet by watching a French film.
Here is our view as we rested on chairs in Kensington Gardens:
Here is a nice old church named St. Mary Abbots:
The grounds in front of the church:
Monday, April 17th (Airplane):
It took twenty hours to get from our hotel in London to our house in Brentwood. Our connecting flight in Dallas was delayed by an hour because there were too many bags in the plane. They took off our bag from below (but didn't tell us) and we waited in San Jose for an hour looking for it. Fortunately after I talked to someone there they told me it would be delivered to my house within 24 hours (which it was).
We were ecstatic to see Jace and when we went to sleep it felt like sleeping on a cloud compared to the mattresses in Europe.
There is a lot more that I didn't write about but my hands are sore from typing so I'll tell you when I see you!
Tuesday, April 04, 2006
Preparing for Europe
As I prepare to spend ALL of tomorrow (and a little bit of Thursday) either in airports or in airplanes I'm also trying to not forget anything. I've assembled several spreadsheets and checklists but I'm sure I'll forget something obvious. Preparing a house to be empty (plants, mail, packages) and a dog and baby to be taken care of adds to the complexity of vacation readiness.
Since Samantha and I are sad to leave Jace behind for so long we made an impromptu DVD last night to entertain him while we're gone. It has us reading four stories, singing four songs, saying goodbye, and I threw in a picture slide show with some music.
I'm also thinking of getting my parents set up with a web cam so we can see Jace while we're in Internet cafes.
I'm also not looking forward to being on a plane for so long. During my recent trip to Atlanta my lower back was hurting pretty badly. This time I will be armed with a pillow to sit on and one for my neck as well as pain and sleeping pills.
I'm just looking forward to stepping off that plane in London and getting to the fun part of the trip!
Monday, April 03, 2006
Atlanta
I just spent a few days in Atlanta last week on business. I didn't get to experience much of the area since I was working pretty hard on the project I was in.
When it was time to go home I got to the airport two hours early so I had plenty of time to waste. When I got to the security checkpoint they flagged me for one of the thorough screenings. I didn't care since I had plenty of time. It wasn't a big deal and people were nice. When I got to the part of the airport where I had to take the lightrail to my terminal I saw how people were crammed into the thing and I decided to walk since I had plenty of time and needed the exercise. After a few minutes of walking I noticed I was in an area where nobody else was. I took an escalator and then when I got to the top I noticed it was the same escalator I took when I arrived at the airport a few days earlier. I was in the baggage pickup area and outside the secure perimeter! So I had to go back through the security checkpoint and since I had been flagged once for individual inspection I had to go through that process again... People kept looking at my boarding pass and saw all the stamps on there and wondered why I was going through again. I started worrying that they would think I was stealing someone else's pass and detain me. Fortunately they didn't really care and I got to my gate with plenty of time left.
I guess that's why it's good to get to the airport earlier. Or... that's why it's good to not try to figure out "clever" routes through an airport.
