Category: Travel

Day 25 We were up at 05:00, and out the door by 05:30 this morning. At Heathrow by 06:00, two hours ahead of our 08:00 departure. A fairly uneventful flight to Doha, a 3 hour stopover, and a connecting flight to Phuket in Thailand. We’d decided to spend 4 days in Thailand as it would…

We’d booked a hire car for the day, with a view to driving out to Windsor (to check out the Castle), then on to Bath, then down to Salisbury, and then back to Heathrow. We were on the road a little later than we’d planned (about 10:00), and by the time we got out to…

Up after 4 1/2 hours sleep, and we’re off to Gare du Nord, the train station from which the Eurostar will depart for London. On the way, Cath mentioned that we’re booked into a hotel out near Heathrow, about an hour and a quarter train ride out of the centre of London. We agreed that…

Today was another big day of walking around the city of lights. First stop was the Musee d’Orsay, which in a prior life, served as the main railway terminus for Paris. That big clock? That was the clock that gave travellers an idea of when their train was leaving. Then, it was on to Sacre…

Although we’ve done a lot of walking on some of our sightseeing days on this trip, today epitomised what I had come to call “The Walk of Madness”. The three of us walked about 15km or so for the day, me lugging 12kg of camera gear. From our Air B’n’B on Rue de Clery, we…

We caught an early bus down to the Palace, and were faced with a couple of options. We could join the queue waiting for access to the inside of the Palace, or we could go and wander through the gardens, which at this time of the morning, were largely deserted. It looked like the queue…

Today we drove from Bordeaux to Versailles, on the southern side of Paris. We’ll be doing a tour of the Palace tomorrow, but this afternoon, we checked into our Air B’n’B, jumped on a bus, headed toward the Palace, and spent a few hours wandering the streets.For whatever reason, I was not inspired to take…

Today, we drove from Zumaia to Bordeaux, another long-ish day of around 7 hours. I didn’t shoot anything along the way, as we just wanted to get there and get settled so we could hit the streets of Bordeaux. Our Air B’n’B turned out to be the dodgiest of them all (I guess one of…

We’ve been in Zumaia for 24 hours and absolutely fallen in love with place. Today, Cath went off and sat on the beach and had some quiet time while I wandered around with the camera taking photos. These rocks are just mind boggling. At the left end of the beach (the Southern end), I could…

As has been our modus operandi on this trip, we decided yesterday afternoon that it was time to start looking for accommodation for our next port of call (for tonight). We were originally going to go to San Sebastian, but when she started looking for an Air B’n’B there, Cath said “It’s more expensive than…

While we absolutely loved the atmosphere in Fao, it wasn’t an overly photogenic town, so this ended up being a bit of a rest day for the camera. But come the evening, I was starting to feel guilty that I hadn’t shot anything all day. So I dropped Cath back at our Air B’n’B and…

So, having decided to skip our second day in Lisbon, we packed up the car and headed out to Bellum to see the Tower of St Vincent. We then headed out to the area known as Sintra about an hour’s drive west of Lisbon. This area is full of historic buildings. The one place that…

Today we headed back into the centre of Lisbon and wandered the streets some more. We saw some beautiful architecture, some REALLY old footings (dating from the 1st Century AD!) and a great view across the top of the city from a rooftop somewhere. We got to about 8 o’clock in the evening and decided…

We left Portimao and started heading toward Lisbon..But along the way, we decided to stop in Lagos, which was also on the South Coast. It was a beautiful little town and we wandered the back streets looking at all the beautiful white-washed buildings, the cobblestone streets and marveling at some of the frescoes that adorned…

Today, we went on our boat trip to see the sea caves. While we were waiting to get on board the cruise boat, I noticed the dodgem car ride adjacent to the wharf, with its NSFW artwork. There’s that open-European-mindset again! The sea caves can be found all along the South Coast of Portugal, and…

We left Cordoba fairly early in the morning (at least, early for us… about 8 o’clock) and headed to Seville. We stopped to take a walk through the Royal Alcazar of Seville, which has been made (even more) famous by the TV show, A Game of Thrones. The Royal Alcazar has been used as the…

The next day, we visited the Mosque and the Alcazar of Cordoba. The Mosque was visually stunning.A wonderful mix of artistic styles which included classical Roman influences, and very obvious Moorish influences as well. Again, the opulence of the building and its inherent artworks boggled the mind. Then it was on to see the Alcazar,…

We hit the road South heading for Cordoba. After a couple of hours, it was time for a break and we’d been seeing all these castles on every second hilltop. Cath spotted one and suggested that we get off the highway and stop for a look. To be honest, I was a little dubious about…

The previous afternoon, Cath and I had wandered around the streets of Toledo together. Today, we decided it would be a good opportunity to go our separate ways and explore the streets for ourselves. I enjoyed the opportunity to just wander aimlessly and explore my fascination with all these beautiful old  doors. Take me to:…

Our two days in Barcelona were over way too soon, and it was time to hit the road for our next destination, Toledo. A couple of hours out of Barcelona and it was time for a break. We stopped at Zaragoza and marveled at the four pillars rising above the cathedral. The interior was equally…