This is how excited I was...

...to get to the front of the bloody line to see Michaelangelo's 'David' at the Galleria dell 'Accademia in Florence.

Blooming hell, in Florence you have to line up for everything. To see 'David' we were in a queue for almost 3 hours in the sun, standing. I finished an entire book. Not happy Jan. Johnny and I actually developed a rotating shift system whereby we would each get to sit for 15 minutes in the shade while the other person lined up against the sunned on wall. It was pretty bad.

Plus right at the front of the queue some guy who pretended he only spoke French and didn't understand the rules tried to cut in. I led the lynch mob to kick him out of the queue. Eventually he backed out although he tried to cut in a bit further down the queue. So I did the civil service of informing the people he tried in front of that there was a queue jumper on the loose. They lynched him too. I did the triumph dance when he left, defeated. Muahahahaha!!!

Okay I spent the whole post talking about lining up because it wasn't worth it. The statute is pretty damn good but the rest of the gallery is pretty crap and just seeing David is not worth lining up for 3 hours AND paying 10 euros for no matter what anyone says. I'm glad I did it this one time, but I will definitely not be repeating this epic feat any time soon...

For those of you after photos I have uploaded new photos in my Album (look for 'Italy').

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It Leans! It Leans!

Okay I know it's the Leaning Tower of Pisa but really, I was really suprised by how much it actually... well... leans.

To be honest, there isn't really much that Pisa has got going for it apart from this tower. Sure it's on this beautiful square that the locals call 'Campo dei Miracoli' ('Field of Miracles') full of other leaning buildings (personally I think it earned the moniker because it's a miracle that any structure is standing on that damned field at all) but there's really nothing else in town (no matter how many 'Pisa, More than just the Leaning Tower!' brochures they hand out).

Also, I should mention angrily that they charge a whooping 15 euro to ascend the tower and make you wait over an hour (we waited something like 80 minutes) before allowing you up there. Luckily we made good use of the time by taking as many of these stupid 'With the Leaning Tower' pictures as we could.

Oh, plus we got endless amusement out of the fact that you're not actually allowed on the grass so every once in a while the security guard would come out with a whistle to chase everybody off but after 2 minutes people would resiliently get back onto the grass (if once you fail...)...

Eventually they just turned the sprinkler system on :p

Roma, non basta una vita...

Rome, a lifetime is not enough.
That's what they say, and it's pretty damn true. Although I've left Rome I'm still feeling a little overwhelmed by the plethora of sights there.

I crammed as much as I could into the three and a half days that I was there - I ran through the museum in the Vatican (oohed and aahed at the Laocoon and berated Johnny when he complained that he didn't 'get' classical sculpture), marvelled at the beauty of St Peter's Basillica, sweltered under the relentless Roman sun while I took at tour of the old Roman Forum, covered my shoulders while visiting countless churches, sat on the Spanish Steps which are no longer populated with beautiful people hoping to be picked as artists' models but rather surrounded by endless glitzy and over-airconditioned designer outlets, ate Italian food (which is not nearly as good as good ol' Papa Gino's on Lygon) and took a bus ride out along the Appian Way (not as glamourous as it sounds) to visit the old Christian catacombs (called the Callisto Catacombs if you're reading this Lil!) to see the history and old burial site of St Cecylia. It was pretty full on.

But my favourite, favourite part of Rome, which most people miss out on, is just wandering around the back roads around the Trastevere area which has the coolest little bric a brac stores and themed stores (one completely devoted to maps and time!) and cheap Italian restaurants. At night a bunch of stalls and neat bars come out along the Tiber river and you can spend ages enjoying the sight of the lights dancing on the fast moving water. The best part is when I was there, a big group of marimba players had lined themselves up one after the other equidistant along the water edge, each spotlighted and playing together a symphony of chimes and tinkles that was pure magic...

When in Bavaria...

... you do what the Bavarians do. That is you drink beer. By the LITRE...

I haven't done much in Munich. I took a walking tour of the city and watched the Glockenspiel (the famous chiming clock which isn't doing much chiming because the bells are being cleaned so you kind of just stand there for 10 minutes straining your neck to watch the figures in the clock move around rather surreally), saw the place where the Munich Beer Hall Putsch happened (and the place where Hitler's bodyguard took 11 shots to save his life, there's a road block post there) and then just sat in the beer gardens and watched Johnny drink. I took some sips of the stuff but considering I don't like it much I let Johnny do most of the drinking.

Now this all makes Munich sound a little boring. It's not true. Munich is a gorgeous city, rebuilt to look the way it did before 80% was destroyed in WWII and there are heaps of galleries, palaces and stuff to check out. But since we can do all that in any European city Johnny has just decreed that we spend all our time in the beer gardens.

If you haven't check out my lastest photos:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=11372&l=7e5da&id=709057418

The Crazy King Ludwig II

...built the Schloss Neushwanstein just outside the small town of Füssen in Germany (on the border with Austria).

Now Füssen itself is a charming town with its cute little Altstadt (old town) all nestled into the most magnificent mountains. It truly does look like a town at the start of the Romantische Strasse (Romantic Road in Germany) should.

But the tourists don't come in droves to see the town. They come for the aforementioned castle which is built by the mad king Ludwig II and is apparently the inspiration for that famous white Disney castle icon.

It's easy to see how the castle could be inspirational, the exterior of the castle gleaming perfectly creamy white really does look magical, especially when it is settled so charmingly atop spectacular mountain forests.

The interior is something of an exercise in what can happen if you allow someone who is really that side of loopy with a penchant for swans and Wagner an unlimited interior design budget. It's a little wonder that the king died in 'mysterious circumstances' and construction work on the castle ceased immediately upon his death.

It has come to my attention that my FastAlbum isn't working.

If you're keen to check out my latest photos follow the link below instead:

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The Hills Are Alive, With The Sound of Music...

It's true. In Salzburg the hills are always singing. Mainly because every day there are at least 4 odd 'The Sound of Music' tours ranging through the hills blasting those epic Rogers and Hammerstein's songs at an unreasonably high volume all the while encourage a bus load of tourists to sing along completely out of tune.

Yes, I did take one of these tours. Yes I did sing along. And yes, I did do cheesy poses next to all the film locations. Did you expect anything else?!? I love The Sound of Music!

But aside from the kitschy tours, Salzburg really is a place to make you want to sing. The Alps and the natural beauty of the place is almost unbelievably heart-wrenching. One amazing experience was visiting the world's largest ice caves just outside of Salzburg. They give you old fashioned oil lanterns and you spend a hour trawling through the cave with a guide seeing the most amazing natural ice formations... wow...

For Xin's newest trip photos go to:
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Hungry in Hungary!

Okay, I realise that was so far that side of cheesy but I can't help it.
Johnny and I made so many hungry/Hungary jokes in Budapest that it is now thoroughly ingrained into my conciousness.
Not that this gorgeous city is anything to shake a stick at - there is an absolute wealth of things to do, it's unassuming grandeur and sheer 'fun-ness' has allowed it to vault into one of my favourite cities of all time.
I could write so much here but I'll just settle for a 'Top 3 Budapest' in the vein of all iconic travel writing.
1. The thermal baths! Okay, so they are little more than overglorified swimming pools like the ones that they have at home but they are housed in such elegant buildings and the water is supposedly sooooo good for you so I'm not complaining. Plus after travelling for so long, relaxing in the 30 degree pools and then steaming in a sauna before plunging into cold water was just the ticket for my tired muscle. Mmm... chilled and relaxed Xin...
2. Buda Castle - the whole hill actually. It's incredibly beautiful. The palace houses the national art collection (which lacks famous faces but makes up for it with some utterly dreamy paintings which you can spend all day sinking into) and underneath the whole complex a damp, dank, utterly fake but utterly fun labrinyth lurks. They play atmospheric music to make the fainthearted jump and have tunnels with no light to truly shake even the most courageous soul. Plus they have the beautiful white Fisherman's Bastion and the beautifully painted Matthias Church (which is currently home to the Hungarian crown, that is to say the oldest crown in Europe) so Xin is a happy, happy tourist today.
3. The best 'gem' of a hostel. It is called the Vamhaz House and it is located at the top of a long, winding staircase that looks like it could be used for a serious James Bond chase sequence you get to a tiny but charming hostel where the staff have the best advice in the world and the internet and breakfast is free!!!

It's places like Budapest that make travelling (more!) worthwhile... :p

PS: To everyone who hasn't heard, CONGRATULATIONS TO CHIAN AND CC WHO ARE NOW OFFICIALLY ENGAGED!!!

...But the dancing was a lamentable mess!

Yes it's true, Vienna remains Vienna even as the years go by and the big glassy buildings go up. There is something so quintessentially Viennese about this city that nothing can destroy. Mozart and Strauss rule supreme here and you can feel so classy just by ducking into one of the elegant coffee shops and sipping on a latte (or Viennese coffee if you're feeling particularly touristy! :p)

There is so much to do in Vienna that it's easy to feel overwhelmed. Almost every building is beautiful enough to be a 'tourist' sight.

But personally I think it's worth pointing out two highlights.

First the Hofburg (the royal palace in the city) houses some extraordinary state apartments as well as the Sissi museum! For those of you who don't know Sissi, obviously you didn't get to watch that delightful Romy Schneider movie when you were little. (For the unenlightened, she's a famous Hapsburg empress who's beauty and tragic life have made her famous.)

The second is the incredible gallery at Belvedere which is another palace housing an exquisitely eclectic collection of art, the centrepiece of which was The Kiss by Gustav Klimt (see picture). Not all the paintings were famous but there is something beautiful and special in each and every painting to appreciate.


On another note I let Johnny talk me into seeing a kitchsy touristy performance of Mozart and Strauss instead of catching a performance at the Staadtopera and although the band had a phenomenally cute Audrey Tatou lookalike it wasn't enough to save the more than average male singer and the worst ballet dancers I have ever seen (they probably couldn't even make it into the corps de ballet of the Australian Ballet, a true lamentable mess...). The performance was also spoiled by people who kept skipping into better seats than they paid for, the entire crowd who got up to leave before the orchestra had left and people watching the entire performance through their video camera. (I know, I'm a ballet snob but I can't help it...)

But all in all Vienna is such a beautiful city, it's the kind of grandeur and beauty that you hear in the music of Mozart and Strauss, it really is a song in life.

Prague? What Prague?

My apologies to Christine and everyone else who raved about Prague. But seriously, everyone who loved Prague must not have been to Cesky Krumlov.

Cesky Krumlov is everything I thought Prague should have been. It is an utterly gorgeous little town nestled into the Czech mountains with a castle that looks like it belongs above the clouds and the Vltava meandering idly through.

It was utterly beautiful.

We only had one full day in Cesky Krumlov (due to aforementioned bus crisis) but we made the most of it! We got up at 7am in the morning and rode horses through the wheat fields and forests. Then we had a mini picnic morning tea by the banks of the Vltava before hiring a inflatable raft and boating down from Vetrini back to Cesky Krumlov (the boat hire company drove us to Vetrini). I even navigated down 4 rapids created by dams which gave me a micro (VERY micro) taste of white water rafting but really was more like going down a water slide. And then we ran around the castle before running for a bus and running to a train connection that (after quite some drama) got us to Vienna. *Sigh* Tired, but very happy. It was worth all the trouble to get there and away. (Ask me for my "oh my god Czech public transportation rant sometime, it's too long to put here)

Ooh... I should add at this point that Cesky Krumlov is cheap. I had two very, very yummy and very, very satisfying Czech meals and added together they didn't even equate to the cost of one very average Czech meal in Prague. In one restaurant we even had the privilege of an elderly gentleman jamming away merry tunes on a piano and some locals singing along with maracas in hand.

Plus there are infinitely less tourists to jostle against in Cesky Krumlov... always a plus!

Czech it Out!

Okay I saw that on a touristy souvenir t-shirt here in Prague and couldn't resist using the horrible homophone myself!

Prague is a smallish city teeming with tourists. They come by the busload and inevitably wander around with their cameras following a tour guide brandishing a kitschy umbrella or long-stemmed plastic flower. It's hard to get a quiet moment anywhere. And all the prices are overinflated due to the presence of the tourists.

Given that you would think that nobody could possibly like this city. But they do. I certainly do.
There is something so charming in the air - I love browsing through all the puppet shops, the stalls of artisans of the famous Charles Bridge, taking in the view up at Prague Castle or even just sitting by the bank of the river and watching the sun go down.

I walked for hours from one side of the city to the other just ducking into the cute little stores and marvelling at the beautiful buildings here (although I have to say that 'world famous' astronomical clock was a little disappointing).

We also took a little day trip with a couple of gorgeous Canadian girls to a little town 70km out of Prague in Kutna Hora. This town, while not very exciting in and of itself, is remarkable for its Ossuary which is a church with all the decorations made out of human bone. It is estimated that the bones of approximately 40,000 people were used in making giant bone chalices, bone chandeliers and bone pyramids. It was a macabre but surreal experience. The cleaned and whitewashed bones did not really resemble pieces which had once been part of living, breathing people. But still, wandering the church and the small cemetary on its grounds really gave you a sense of your own mortality.

Now if you're wondering why I'm writing a blog in the middle of a beautiful day in Prague the answer is NEVER, EVER, EVER under ANY condition stay at The Golden Sickle hostel in Prague. It is one of the WORST hostels I have EVER, EVER stayed at. The receptionist is constantly hung over and/or high and has a habit of just disappearing and abusing the guests. So this morning when there was a queue of three groups waiting to check out she decided to go buy milk and disappear for 45 minutes causing us to miss our bus to Cesky Krumlov. EVIL, EVIL woman. GAH!!!!

We're Going to Ibiza...

Ibiza is nothing at all like I expected. Okay, so I really kind of expected it to be like a Vengaboys video clip with the Vengabus coming and everybody jumping in true cartoonish, endless party style. But although I'm sure that's what Ibiza is like to a lot of travellers (the bar district in San Antonio is ALWAYS pumping at night) this is not all that Ibiza is about.

So here, officially, is "Xin's Guide to Travelling Through Ibiza".

First of all you must always sleep in. It's true, you'll need the energy if you want to party through to early morning.

Then you drive (or scooter, whatever takes your fancy) around till you find a perfect little beach. Then you siesta for the rest of the day. It is unlikely that you will get any of the 40 odd beaches in Ibiza to yourself, so you'll just have to content yourself to sharing sand space with the topless and sometimes naked sun worshippers.

Then, about 40 minutes before sundown head to Cafe Del Mar (yes, the same Cafe Del Mar of endless CD's of ambient music fame). The location of Cafe Del Mar supposedly gives the most beautiful view of sundown in Ibiza. I don't think the tourist brochures were hyperbolising in this case - the Cafe Del Mar sunset was truly perfect. (And yes, the music accompaniment that made this lounge famous really was just right) It was so good that Johnny and I didn't even take any pictures. No photo could do this sunset true justice.

Then hit the bars in San Antonio for some cheap drinks and rowdy British pub fun. (I say British because there are so many Brits in Ibiza that I actually thought I was back in London for a bit) This is the prelude to the main event...

...which is hitting one of the big, famous clubs in Ibiza. Space, Eden, Pacha, take your pick. We went to Pacha mainly because it was a Tuesday night and basically no other big clubs were open this close to the start of the season. Pacha was nothing like what I expected. It looks more like a super modern, ultra chic lounge than a crazy techno party. (Personally I think it's just famous because it has cherries on its logo and cherries are sexy fruit...) Party till at least 4am in the morning. You've done well if the sun is coming up when you leave.

Crash into bed, repeat daily cycle till bored or death (whichever comes first). :p

Ole! It's Barcelona!

Barcelona is a kooky city that Alice and all her friends from Wonderland would feel right at home in.

I site, for your consideration, exhibit A - the photo to your left of Xin in front of La Sagrada Familia. This crazy building would probably look normal under the influence of strong, hallucinogenic mushrooms. It was begun by Gaudi in 1882 and is still under constant construction today. One facade (the only part completed by Gaudi in his lifetime) looks like a normal gothic cathedral overgrown with wax shrubbery and then maliciously melted. The other side is suprisingly sleek adorned with countless scenes from the Passion of Christ in ultra-modern sculpture. I'm not even going to start to describe the inside (partially because a lot of it is obscured by scaffolding erected to facilitate the constant building works). To conclude I would like to point out that the soaring spires are topped by giant vibrantly coloured fruits in glass. Nuff said...

Even this though does not compare to the heady smelting pot of activity that is La Rambla (one of the busiest strips in Barcelona). The wide street seems tiny as a multitude of tourists jostle for space whilst gawking at vendors selling everything from tiny hamsters to dragonfruit and coconut smoothies, street performers (human statues stand side by side with contact jugglers and people sitting on papier mache toilets) and street artists creating either photo-realistic portraits or grotesque carictures.

And you can't really escape the craziness by ducking into a church or garden like you can with other cities since the most famous of these are created by Gaudi and are as likely as not to make your head spin harder.

But even so I think you can't help but love Barcelona. The city and all its citizen (and even the tourists!) have so much energy! It's kind of like being caught up in a giant whirlwind, you can't control it, it makes no sense but since the ride is so much fun you sort of just have to go along with a big grin on your face!