The Falafel Tour(ists)

Kia Ora

2009-06-02T09:51:00.003+10:00

Hello from sunny Wellington!

Today is Day Three of The Falafel Tour 2009, Part 1. So far we have encountered sleety ice rain, howling winds and sunshine. Nothing about the weather in Wellington seems certain.

The past three days have been spent wandering the streets of Wellington, exploring the Te Papa museum (pretty good), drinking many beers of NZ origin and "enjoying" the whip of the wind on our little faces.

It is a lively little city with some great architecture and strong coffees! I'm doing my best to avoid the shops - Cuba Street is crawling with op shops and concept stores - as my suitcase already weighs over 20kgs.

This afternoon we are off to Christchurch where more beer drinking and window shopping will occur before we pick up a car on Thursday and head to the mountains. The weekend saw snow to sea level on the east coast of the south island but that should have cleared today and we are expecting sunny, warm days for the rest of the week.

Until then, see you!

Public Displays of Art, Paris, April 2008

2008-11-01T15:50:00.001+10:00

Here you go, Dad.

2008-10-28T21:07:00.000+10:00

Officially in mourning for the Australian dollar now.

Au revoir Paris

2008-04-18T20:59:00.002+10:00

So today is it, our last full day in Paris. We are booked on the Thalys to Amsterdam at 12:25pm tomorrow and have only to pack and tidy our apartment.

Today will be spent capturing the last glimpses of our favourite places, Paul wants to go for another run, and then we will catch up with Steve for dinner and a couple of drinks.

Amsterdam is a one night stop so it will likely mean some more Maoz, a few drinks and a quite night in a nice hotel before we head to the airport for our flight to Tokyo on Sunday afternoon.

And then Tokyo...so much more to see and do there. Fingers crossed we will find an internet cafe of some description!

Until then,

Sara & Paul

Tick, tock

2008-04-17T20:55:00.002+10:00

Arghh...it is now Thursday and we only have two more days in Paris before we return to Amsterdam, and then hop on another awful flight to Tokyo.

So what have we been up to?

Monday we did finally make it to the Orangerie. It was lovely. The waterlilies are just how I expected them to be but the collection in the lower half of the museum was even better. I even found a new favourite artist whose name I cannot recall, but her work is lovely.

We then headed over to the 6th to wander the Grand Epicurie at Le Bon Marche (so many lovely foods to choose from) and then through the department store itself. I oohed and aahed over many, many, many beautiful designer dresses (as if), fondled some wallets and handbags (as if again) and finally settled on some moderately priced tights for my collection. We took our time wandering through the Odeon and Luxembourg areas before reaching Bvld St Michel and walking across the Ille de Cite to grab a bus home. There we had a lovely night in cooking the handmade ravioli and white asparagus we had picked up at Le Mon Marche earlier.

Tuesday the weather was finally mostly fine so we headed to Versailles. The queue was only 90 minutes long (apparently this is quite good) and before long we were in the Palace itself where I longed to stroke the velvet wall coverings, but thought better of it. The palace was packed with tour groups, lots of belwidered looking elderly Chinese people and packs of Eastern Europeans. I ended up having to buy a postcard of the Queen's bedroom just so I could see what it looked like (as far as I know it looks like rude pushy people's backs).

We emerged from our brief tour and headed into the gardens where we stopped for a bite to eat and wandered for hours. Unfortunately the Petit Trianon (where Marie Antoinette spent most of her time) is closed for a touch up prior to the summer so we checked out the Grand Trianon instead before lesiurely walking back to the Palace and onto the train to come home. After a long day on our feet we were happy to pick up a couple of bottles of wine, grab a quick meal at our cafe around the corner and head home to enjoy one bottle of the wine and a read before bed.

I woke yesterday with a urgent need to take more photos. I don't know why, I have already taken about 1600 photos on the trip, but somehow not enough of them in Paris. We headed to the Marais (right around the corner) where we wandered with very little direction through the Place des Vosges, to St Paul Village, through the Jewish area where we happened across what we now call "Falafel Alley". Paul eyed up the stores and finally decided the one with the second longest queue and the sign saying "The Best Falafel in the World" was the one to pick. And so he joined the thirty or so people standing in the street (there is nowhere to sit) munching away on their falafel. I tried it, it was v.good but the best? Mmm, not a big enough sample for that claim.

On and on we walked, through Beaubourg to St Eustache and then up Rue Montgrueil to Rue Reamur, through to Bourse and back to Palais Royal, then the Lourve, across the Pont des Arts and along the quai/promonade of the Seine. Eventually we ended up at the Jardin des Plantes where we headed for the Grande Galerie d'Evolution. Picture a massive hall full of real stuffed animals (rhinos, polar bears, elephants, several girafes, in fact a whole stampede of African animals, display cases full of butterflies and bugs, some scary looking koalas etc etc etc). It was huge and again, full of brats. No one had thought to mention that kids in Paris have Wednesday afternoon off from school (and go on Saturday morning to make up for it).

We dragged ourselves home to recuperate before we headed to the 20th to meet up with Steve for dinner. He took us to a great place whose name I again can't remember, but there were olive trees, live music, lamb chops for me and a decent cocktail list. After dinner we headed to another bar for some more drinks before jumping on the Metro before it closed. The late night put to rest any ideas we had of heading to Chartres today. While it isn't far away, the Gare we need is across town and it seems a shame to head somewhere and only have a few hours to explore. Instead we will head to Gare du Nord to reserve our seats to Amsterdam on Saturday and spend more time soaking up Paris.

Tomorrow we don't have much planned at all, except to avoid getting grumpy (me) because it is almost time to leave this lovely place.

Paris, Nocturnal

2008-04-14T20:54:00.003+10:00

Us again...

We've had a great weekend seeing Paris by night - thanks to Steve who has been a great Paris city guide again!

Friday we finally made it to the Museum at Quai Branly. The building is new and designed by Jean Nouvel (could have that wrong) who has won some prestigous architecture prizes since. The museum itself is non-western cultures - you start in Oceania, then go to Asia, Africa and the Americas. After a couple of hours of dodging French brats and seeing some interesting textiles (and waaaay too many phallic totems), we left the museum to take a Seine river cruise on Bateaux Mouches.

Friday night started quietly enough, we had a quick snack at home and then headed around the corner to see a movie (Horton Hears a Who - or as they say in France [silent H]ort-on). We got home and found a text message from Steve who had offered to take us out for a drink, so a few minutes later we were on a Metro heading north to the Canal St Martin where we drank away the hours until the last Metro home at 2:30am.

Saturday morning was a write-off (recovery is everything) and Saturday afternoon I didn't manage more than a trip to St Paul in the Marais to pick up a couple of new novels. This time we knew we were going out for a big night and by 8:30pm were waiting to meet Steve at Place d'Italie in the 13th. We headed up the (very little) hill to Butte Aux Cailles where we drank wine out of plastic cups on the footpath while waiting for our table at a cheap and cheerfully frantic Basque restaurant. Let's just say, if you go to Basque country I don't think there will ever be any chance you will starve, even if potatoes are the only food available.

Full to the gills, we stumbled past a bar Steve had told us about the night before, but it was too full to go in so we settled in across the street. One strangely herbal boutique beer later, we braved the scrum and headed into the bar (whose name I have no recollection of). The feature of this bar (other than the countless flavoured rums you could choose from) was the tiny dance space in the back where they played tacky French hits from the 1980's to a very drunk (that rum again) and very enthusiastic crowd. It was hot, it was squashed, the rum was scary (we had a couple of shots each of the barman's choices - one I could say was Banana, the other I have no idea) and the people were a little crazy. Paul freaked out a bit so we quickly moved next door for some quieter cocktails and personal space.

A couple of cocktails later the bars closed (2am is the closing time away from the big clubs) and after a fruitless search for the last Metro (not so lucky this time) we went our separate ways, Steve to find a Velib for the short ride home to his apartment in the 5th, and us for an hour long home through the 13th, 12th, 4th and finally 11th arondissments. I didn't mind one bit, walking across Pont Sully at 2:45am you could still see the silouette of Notre Dame, and the top of the Eiffel Tower in the inky blue sky. Ahh.

Sunday again was a day of leisure. We don't mind spending the weekends reading and drinking coffee in the apartment - it is way too crazy in our neighbourhood all weekend anyway. Not having something to do is the reason we are staying so long in Paris - having both done the whistlestop craminasmuchasyoucaninthreedays trips to Paris before. Besides, stamina is going to come in handy over the next couple of weeks.

Last night we again were treated to Steve's hospitality, this time a long-ish walk to the 20th to see live music at the Flesche D'Or, a famous indie venue which has free entry (!!!) and an ever changing line-up of up-and-coming bands. We had hoped to eat there as well but the kitchen was closed so we settled for a quick pizza around the corner. Back inside, we caught the last half of Peter from Peter, Bjorn and John's set, had a pricey beer and then watched The Bronson Brothers from Denmark. I'm not sure how to describe the experience, it was somewhere between guitar rock, vaudeville and bluegrass with some prog-rock thrown in. And every single band member looked like someone else - one of the guitarists seriously was the spitting image (but maybe blonder and thinner) of Dawson from Dawson's Creek.

Not ready to go home quite yet, after the show ended we stopped in at the bar next door for some more live music, this time French, and another beer before the call of the last few Metros of the evening forced us to leave. Safely home, and now it is Monday again.

Today our plan is to head finally to the Orangerie to see Monet's waterlillies and I may even try to convince Paul to brave the Christian Lacroix exhibition at the Museum of Decorative Arts (I mean, it is just around the corner!). Tomorrow will likely mean Versailles (if the weather is not too bad) or maybe even Chartres to see the cathedral.

Au revoir,

Sara & Paul

(And for those who missed the pop culture references previously - Marimekko is a famous Scandivanian textile design firm, and Ingrid Bettancourt is a French/Columbian political activist held hostage by Columbian rebels for the last six years who is now dying so France is trying to rescue her from the jungle).

More from Paris

2008-04-11T20:36:00.002+10:00

Hi all,

We are still enjoying our slow pace of life in Paris. Lazy mornings (it isn't light until about 8am anyway, so why rush?), long afternoons in the intermittent sunshine (stays light until 9pm) and late dinners.

Wednesday we caught up with Steve for a couple of beers and a lovely meal, having spent the day walking the streets of Paris again.

Yesterday we headed to Pere Lachaise cemetary to soak up the atmosphere and take some B&W photos. Paul refused to see Jim Morrison's grave (now fenced off) despite my best attempts to trick him into it. I was a bit shocked about how much graffiti is now all over Oscar Wilde's grave/tomb/sculpture - last time I was there in 2002 there were only kisses.

We had decided on Steve's recommendation to head for the new museum at Quai Branly but for some reason unknown to us the bus terminated at the Lourve so we abandoned that idea for the day. I had spotted the new Marimekko capsule collection in the windows of H&M so decided to finally get shopping! After a coffee break we headed up the Rue St Honore to finally visit Colette, the famous concept store. Happily, we left with a new coffee table book.

Three H&M's later, I was happy, a bag full of cheap (and bright) goodies from the Marrimekko collection. Paul bought some new sunnies too and thankfully the shops closed before we could get ourselves into any more trouble! We wandered home via the Rue de Rivoli and decided to head to a local cafe for dinner. No such luck - the neighbourhood was full up and our little cafe had no seats in sight. After a quick stop at the supermarket we were back in our apartment for some ravioli, salad and a baguette.

Today we are planning to do much the same - possibly head to Quai Branly again, possibly try the queues at the Orangrie later in the afternoon, I am needing a new novel to read so we will seek out an English language bookstore and we might even try to see a movie (version originale of course!).

Bye for now...

S&P.

Paris dispatches...

2008-04-08T19:50:00.002+10:00

Here's a shortlist of what we have been doing the past few days:

Eating lots of chocolate breakfast goodies...mmm.

Wandering around the Canal St Martin.

Getting caught up in a rally for Ingrid Bettancourt.

Avoiding the queues at museums on the one free day per month.

Walking around, a lot. Walking so much our feet ache and today we are considering travelling only by bus (you can't see anything on the metro).

Sauntering down the Champs Elysees, avoiding eye contact with the thousands of police and army officers sent to secure the Olympic Torch route.

Taking lots of photos of statues and sculptures.

Wandering the Marais, trying to stop Paul from shopping for questionable shirts.

Lunching outside the Pompidou Centre before exploring the bookstore.

Bus-ing it to St Germain des Pres to look at the fancy shops (from the outside). Then walking all the way to the Eiffel Tower via Musee Rodin and Les Invalides.

Feeling sorry for the Contiki kids who had only ten minutes to jump off their bus and run to get their Eiffel Tower photos.

Admiring the disco lights on the Eiffel Tower at 9pm last night.

Grocery shopping.

Today we are off to...umm...who knows? We'll work it out at the bus stop!

Happy Paris!

2008-04-06T03:29:00.002+10:00

Hello all,

We have arrived in Paris, yay! After some secret squirrel business involving key codes and safes we have settled into our lovely little apartment on Rue de Lappe in the 11th district. It seems to be a groovy little street full of bars, restaurants and little boutiques and is crawling with people. Happy we are...

To quickly recap the last few days:

Interlaken - no Jungfraujoch (that is the highest train station in Europe for those who wondered) for us as the weather was mostly terrible on the mountains and rainy in the town. Instead we soaked up the atmosphere, ate some lovely meals (I even tried white asparagus for the first time - YUM, and we had a cheese and mushroom fondue), drank lots of beer, visited the St Beatus Caves and Paul had "the best run ever".

After a lovely train trip through the alps to southern Switzerland we eventually arrived in Martigny, on the Swiss side of the French alps. Having enjoyed Chamonix so much on our last trip we had hoped it would be just as nice. Not so much. The hotel staff were awful so we quickly escaped to wander the town, see the Roman ampitheatre, spot some St Bernard dogs (this is the region they are from) and settled in at Cafe Barock, a local bar where the barman even gave us free drinks. Maybe he doesn't see many people drink 2L of beer each on a Thursday afternoon? Nicely sozzled, we then enjoyed quite a lovely Thai meal across the square before meandering back to the hotel. We had almost changed our mind about the town until we encountered the staff again at breakfast. Le sigh.

Happy to escape, the train trip north and then west to Geneva via Montreaux and Lausanne was beautiful. The views of the alps across Lake Geneva had me regretting we didn't stay in Montreaux afterall, or even longer in Interlaken as we most certainly could have done the Jungfraujoch on Friday. Geneva itself was lovely, we explored the old town and the lakefront for a few hours, had a coffee (and then a nap) before an early dinner in order to be well rested for our relatively early TGV ride to Paris.

We left Geneva to the hot air balloon festival and arrived in Paris early afternoon. Now it is time to explore the neighbourhood, and maybe further afar...

And tomorrow? It is Paris Marathon day so who knows what we will see?

Larking in Interlaken

2008-04-01T23:51:00.002+10:00

Hi all,

Well we have had a lovely couple of days in Lucerne and have now arrived in Interlaken.

We arrived in Lucerne on a warm and sunny Sunday afternoon, and after checking in at our little hotel in the city centre, we headed out with the rest of the town's population for a stroll along the river and lake.

People stare at other people a LOT in Lucerne. The entire lake front was just a parade of designer-clad people checking each other out, wrapped up in furs and Burberry trench coats as Paul walked around in a t-shirt and I sweltered in my long sleeved t-shirt.

By the time beer o'clock rolled around (that's 4pm), we had settled in at a riverside hotel near the Chapel Bridge, in the shade, to enjoy some weissbier and to watch the parade until the sun went down around 7:30pm. Almost the last to leave the bar, we then went back to the hotel to grab a jacket and head out for some more beers, this time at a British themed pub on the riverfront. I enjoyed the best cheeseburger and chips ever (at a relatively bargain price of around CHF 18 - this is a country where a vegetarian curry costs CHF 18, before you even add in some pakoras, naan bread etc) and we both got a little bit tipsy.

Monday we slept in. Sunday had been a short night's sleep after all, the clocks had gone forward for summer time and there was the night of drinking to recover from. The weather was not kind to us, where yesterday there were mountains and snow, today was rain clouds and mist. We had a lazy coffee, did some groceries (not so mundane here), wandered around the town some more, had a lovely picnic, did some shopping - I bought a watch and a swiss army knife, and Paul even squeezed in a short run for the first time all trip.

Early evening rolled around before we knew it, so off to dinner for an expensive, yet interesting curry it was. A short walk around the town to work off the bread at least, and our short stay in Lucerne was over.

No improvement in the weather today but it didn't detract from the beautiful train trip to Interlaken. The lakes are a perfect turquoise, the mountains snow-capped and the passes steep and slow. We even saw a couple of fighter jets take off. We arrived in Interlaken just after 2pm, checked in at our great little hotel/hostel, FINALLY put some washing on and wandered around the town to get our bearings. The weather outlook continues to be overcast and rainy which may mean we don't get to the Jungfraujoch, but Ursula - the hostess - has given us plenty of other alternatives to try. Like Curling...

Zoo-y Zurich

2008-03-30T06:15:00.003+10:00

It is me again...what a difference having internet access in the hotel lobby makes!

Tonight is our last night in Zurich - so far, so good. We spent yesterday exploring the city, taking a cruise on Lake Zurich (or Zurichsee as they say here), wandering the little back streets behind the Banhofstrasse - the famous shopping street under which lie the vaults of countless swanky Swiss banks. We soaked up the rare sunshine with a couple of beers at a cafe before retreating again to our hotel to watch the curling on TV at the hotel bar. Strangely addictive.

Today we had only one plan - hit the zoo. Fun was had by all and it was followed up by some emergency shopping (cannot find laundromats anywhere), a light dinner and hopefully some cold beers after this.

Tonight the clocks go forward for summer time so it will be an early night before our short trip to Lucerne tomorrow.

Auf Wiedersen.

Guten Tag from Zurich

2008-03-28T07:47:00.002+10:00

Hi all,

Well we have made it all the way to Switzerland. The keys on the keyboard are in funny places again so please excuse any silly typos I may make. Especially y and z which have swapped places.

We had a great time in Strasbourg - there is a spectacular cathedral, beautiful half German, half French architecture and another lovely modern art museum.

We wandered the town (grande ille) and stopped only for numerous hot chocolates and espressos. Food was great - Paul has discovered Munster cheese, originally created by monks and unique to the Alsace region (but hopefully available in Paris so he can eat more of it). Last night we had a fantastic meal - pasta for me and the biggest and tastiest vege lasange for Paul ever.

We did all the usual touristy things, from exploring the catherdral to taking another boat cruise, this time to see the European parliament.

Today was a day of travel, from Strasbourg to Basel, and Basel to Zurich. After a loooong 2km trek to our lovely hotel (carrying an extra 25kg does wear me out), we checked in about 4pm, and had a nice long nap. Tonight we headed back towards town to search out a vegetarian restaurant we had seen on our trek, where we indulged in the BUFFET (Paul´s dreams coming true) and some local wheat beer before heading back here to the hotel for a nightcap and some internet-ing.

Tomorrow will be Zurich, Zurich, Zurich. We are here until Sunday when we head to Lucerne. Looks promising, the neighbourhood is packed will bars and restaurants...

Till then,

S&P.

Hello from Luxembourg

2008-03-25T00:52:00.002+10:00

So it has been a while since we updated, we are still finding it hard to locate internet cafes. Now we are in one with a silly keyboard with no punctuation marks.

I had planned to have longer posts, describing everything we have been doing but that looks not possible with Paul sitting over my shoulder whispering "enough with that, tell them it is SNOWING!".

In short then:

Tokyo last day was fun.

Flight to Amsterdam sucked but we made it.

Amsterdam is the same as always. We ate falafel at Maoz, went to the Rijksmuseum at last, ate Pancakes at Pancake Bakery, took another canal boat cruise, wandered around in the rain and hail and Paul finally saw what all the fuss was about at the Red Light District [eww].

Train to Belgium was packed and when we hopped off at Antwerp to change trains there was a tiny bit of snow. Then we went to Gent which was lovely, but still in Belgium so it had the crazy mix of baroque and urban decay.

We both had colds, mine in my chest, and Paul's producing some horrible man flu symptoms such as fevers and really bad hair.

Brugge as a day trip was a good choice as it is wayyyy too tacky to stay there. But we did our bit for the chocolate industry, as well as indulging in frieten and waffles {with chocolate sauce of course}.

We took a lovely train ride to Luxembourg but were suprised to see so much snow in the Belgian countryside.

And now, Luxembourg. We are staying at a modern and swanky Novotel with an excellent buffet breakfast that for the first time features BACON. I am so happy about this.

Last night we wandered around the town centre for a bit before having another early night to try to sleep off our afflictions. This morning {having joked about it last night} we awoke to SNOW! After the breakfast {with bacon and sausages wrapped in bacon} we headed across to town to enjoy the snowy fairytale wonderfulness of it all.

For the first time ever we actually bought tickets for the hop on, hop off tourist bus, mostly because it was snowing and our feet were cold. Good thing we did, we discovered the lovely modern art museum, a beautiful building designed by I.M. Pei {of the Lourve pyramid fame}.

Back in town we stopped for our usual refreshments, coffee and hot chocolate, before we wandered through the markets {today seems to be a holiday here too} and entered the casements, the caves inside the city's fortifications, dating from the 10th century.

So that's it for now, expect there will be more snow to come as most of Europe is covered in a cold front. Tomorrow we head south to France where we will stay in Strasbourg for a couple of nights before we hit Switzerland.

Au revoir!

Days 1 - 2 (Tokyo)

2008-03-20T01:11:00.010+10:00

First things first, flight was OK and we arrived in Tokyo with no problems, passed through immigration (including photo and fingerprinting) and customs without trouble and were there, amidst the craziness that is Japan.

Some two hours later we arrived at our hotel, Hotel Sunroute Asakusa, where we had stayed previously in 2005. Nothing had changed, room was small but pleasant and we again had the electronic toilet to deal with. This time Paul promised to NOT fiddle with the buttons (no one likes a bidet flood).

Saturday dawned, we slept, and eventually dragged ourselves out for coffee and a light breakfast down the street. Asakusa (pronounced A-sak-sa) is a popular spot for Japanese tourists - there is a large Shinto shrine, Senso-ji, there as well as popular cherry blossom viewing spots, rice cracker shops and a crazy street called Kappabashi-dori where they sell everything you could ever want for your kitchem like a plastic bowl of ramen, or any one of three thousand varieties of order pads.

We wandered the streets for several hours, mostly looking stunned as there is just SO much to take in all at once. We are so used to a flat landscape of advertising and shopping - here you look up all the time, shops can be on the 7th or 8th floor of a building, each restaurant's speciality is depicted in the form of a animal icon (pig, cow, pufferfish) and there is neon everywhere. We did a little bit of shopping (Paul would like to mention the tracksuit top he bought that has the slogan "Master Groove Dept.") and picked up a great little picnic of inari sushi, salad, grapes and Asahi beer (hey, we're on holidays) before heading to the banks of the River Sumida for our picnic under the freeway motorpass in the shadow of Phillipe Starck's golden flame (or poo, take your pick) atop Asahi HQ.

Sakura (cherry blossom) season is only weeks away and all of Japan seems to be on edge, anticipating the explosions of pink blossoms that herald the start of Spring proper and last for only a week. Some early blossoming trees (not sure which variety) were already out and we walked the river banks searching them out and watching the locals coo and look on in awe at the pretty blossoms. All this walking (it was actually pretty hot in the sun) had worn us out so we headed back to the hotel for a little nap (hey, I mentioned already that we were on holidays).

By late afternoon we were ready to head back into the fray, this time heading to Ginza, the posh shopping strip that is home to all the designer labels that you see everywhere in Japan. The street is closed off to traffic on Saturday afternoons so it was not too crazy - all that extra space helped. We browsed the food hall of one of the department stores, wide-eyed again at the range of things (some of them I wouldn't call food) on sale. We also popped into a toy store to swoon over the crazy gadgets and stationery and remote-controlled cars and kawaii stuff, vowing to return on the second leg of our trip.

By dark our appetites were calling and we headed to Roppongi, the main bar/nightclub/restaurant area for gaijin (foreigners). A few cocktails and some burgers later, we wandered the streets again, pausing in amazement to view the "pet store" hole-in-the-wall where the cages were more like vending machine windows, the cats and dogs *tiny* and the space inside packed with women ooh-ing and aah-ing at the little critters.

A walk around the Roppongi Hills complex later (pausing only to look inside the window of Kate Spade, I promise - even though it was open at 8:45pm on a Saturday night) and a few failed photos of Mori Tower and Tokyo Tower later (no tripod), we called it a night and headed back to the hotel for a convenience store dessert of mochi and Pocky (mmm, marble white/milk chocolate flavour for those Pocky lovers out there) and a few beers before bed.

On a Sunday in Tokyo there is only one thing you can even consider doing - the Shibuya to Harajuku walk. And that is exactly what we did. Even though we were staying on the opposite side of the city, our subway line went all the way to Shibuya where we jumped out at probably the most famous pedestrian crossing in the world, under the neon screens and signs of the Hachiko crossing. After a trip to my favourite shoe store for a browse, we headed to my absolute favourite department store in the world, Loft. A couple of hours later I emerged only with a card holder and travel pass holder but with a promise made to conserve every centime I could in Europe so I could spend up on our return to Tokyo. Swoon. Paul also had fun, picking up a little remote controlled 4WD modelled on one he had wanted as a kid. Aah, Tokyo.

A little further up the hill we arrived at another of Tokyo's famed department stores, Tokyu Hands. I left an hour later convinced that there is nothing in the world that you cannot possibly get at Tokyu Hands. Seriously, forget Harrods, this place had everything. Hardware, novelties, schoolgirl costumes (for those into that kind of thing), electronics, toys, bags, cosmetics, kites, shoe repair equipment. EVERYTHING.

We escaped with our wallets in tact, and continued on our way towards Harajuku to Yoyogi Park, past the former Olympics site from 1964. Along the path bands had set up to play to the passing traffic, some selling CDs and all with exactly the same set-up - a couple of Gibson guitars, an electronic drum kit and a lead singer in tight jeans and crazy hair. The crowds wandered along, occasionally stopping to listen and cheer.

In the park proper we wandered past a band of bongo players (or a collective, I don't know what to call them), another Free Tibet protest march, a pair of small children riding unicycles, lots of small dogs in silly outfits including a trio in matching sunglasses, and eventually as the park led to the bridge near Harajuku station, the famous Rockabilly dancers. By now there weren't many cos-play girls left, just a couple of Lolitas and some strangely dressed men, so we joined the massive crowds heading down Ometo-sando.

Now, Tokyo doesn't strike me as the kind of place you would find a St Patrick's Day parade, but sure enough we did. Half of Omote-sando - one of the largest shopping strips in Tokyo - was closed off for the little parade that consisted of the strangest bunch of people ever. There were a few ex-pats (judging by the flags they were mostly Aussies anyway), a Japanese bagpipe band, some girl scout groups and the Irish Setter and Wolfhound clubs of Tokyo - dogs in Irish costumes and all. It was crazy and funny and they were selling Guiness from cans on the street. People were smiling everywhere. Aah, Tokyo.

We (OK, I) did a bit of shopping at the toy store before we grabbed some coffee and a snack and walked back to Shibuya, heading straight into a crazy rally or protest or something. There were sirens and loudspeakers and people everywhere. At times it felt like the entire population of Brisbane was on the streets (and realistically, that is probably not far from the truth). To escape from the crowds we popped into a pub for a couple of beers and some chips before leaving almost as quickly to escape from some revolting Americans.

It was a quiet night in of tofu for Paul and lots and lots of beers for us both. A bit of tranquility before another day in Tokyo.

More later...

Regular transmissions will commence shortly

2008-03-20T01:09:00.002+10:00

Hi all, sorry for the tardiness in posting...we've had some trouble locating internet access. In Tokyo we were lacking in membership cards (and basic communication skills) and here in Amsterdam the old place I was looking for seems to be no more!

But here we are, and a post is not too far away.

12 hours to go...

2008-03-13T21:06:00.003+10:00

So...I'm all packed (except for my toothbrush and my phone).

Paul? Not so packed and STILL AT WORK.

Thank you to everyone who has sent us their best wishes for our trip - we will remember you when we go to the Lindt factory, I promise.

The Falafel Tour will commence shortly

2008-03-11T22:59:00.003+10:00

It's the green places that we're going.
And the ones that are half green / half yellow.
If you can see them.

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(Criteria for inclusion as a "place I've been"? I had to at least have gotten out of the car / off the train / bought something in a shop / eaten there / used the conveniences / taken a photo.)

Signs that a holiday is near

2008-03-10T21:31:00.003+10:00

The exchange rate for the currencies you need to buy is RUBBISH.
Time seems both too fast and too slow, all at the same time.
You can't find any socks.
Meals are more creative when there are only condiments and sorbet in the fridge/freezer.
You actually find CSI interesting. Well, interesting enough to distract you from folding and packing and cleaning. Interesting enough to distract you from the things YOU NEED TO DO.

How many is too many? (Advice welcomed)

2008-03-04T21:01:00.003+10:00

Guidebooks? How many should you take for a six week trip that involves six countries? Would three plus a deck of 50 walks on cards plus a phrasebook or two plus a map be too many?
Shoes? Is there an actual answer to this question? Six weeks, six countries, two - no three - of the most stylish cities in the world.
Pairs of tights? In Spring?
Packing lists? Is it reasonable to separate the lists for clothing and other/miscellaneous/proper stuff I might need that isn't clothing?
Kilos in my bag, or litres for that matter? Can I cope with 20kgs on my back for six weeks? Has 75l ever been enough?
Questions? I don't even have any readers yet, why am I asking them so many questions?