Paris – Day 19

This morning the weather is fine but cloudy and the forecast is for rain. We have plans to do a river cruise tomorrow night for our last night in Paris so we want to head down to Pont Neuf where the river cruise starts from to book some tickets. We also want to go to see a small garden dedicated to Anne Frank and the George Pompidou Centre (or as the kids would say “the George Dabadabadoo Centre”) which is a museum of modern art. We are also looking to go out for dinner tonight and then go up the Montparnasse Tower after dinner to get some views of Paris by night. This is an easier day than yesterday as the Anne Frank garden and the George Pompidou Centre is right next door to our apartment and Pont Neuf is over near the Notre Dame Cathedral so less walking will be required. So after brekky we start the “short” walk to Pont Neuf. It ends up being a little further than expected (a 3 ½ km round trip). When we get there we are told there is no need to book, just arrive 15 minutes before the departure time we prefer. Ok, would have been nice to know that 3 ½ km ago. Doesn’t really matter because but it was a very nice walk. We get back to the apartment for a short break before heading back out to see Anne Frank’s garden. After that we head over the road to George Pompidou and head to the ticket office. Once there we get informed that 1/3 of the museum is out of commission and it’s the good third (still charging the same price though, €26) so we pull the plug on that and bail. We make the decision to go to the Musee d’Orsay which has really good reviews. We look on the map and it doesn’t look far so we decide to walk. We grab some lunch to eat on the way and lucky we did because this joint was miles away but again, it is a great walk. We manage to get there just before the rain comes down. The museum proves a winner with works by Monet and Van Gogh and heaps of other stuff that is way above my intellect. By the time we leave the rain has stopped and we consider getting a taxi back to the apartment. Kris makes the suggestion that we stop and get some souvenirs (crap) on the way home. The souvenir shop is half way home so we decide to just walk. By now we are all a bit sore and tired from all the walking but we continue on. The kids are buoyed by the promise of an ice-cream (they are easily swayed). We do the souvenir shopping and get the kids an ice-cream and get back to the apartment just after 5pm. The round trip this time ends up being 6km, so much for a day of less walking than yesterday! So, with the 10 ½ km we walked yesterday and 9 ½ km we have walked today we have notched up 20km in 2 days. I’m starting to think we are a bit thick but for us, the best way to really see a place is to walk. We have a rest for a couple of hours before heading out to the restaurant for dinner which thankfully is directly over the road. We shower up and head downstairs to the Le Bouledogue restaurant. This is a very French restaurant which is exactly what we want. We end up having entrée, mains and desert and we also have our first coffee since Inverness as well as a bottle of French wine. It cost us an arm and a leg but the experience was worth it. After dinner we walk to the corner to hail a cab to get us to Montparnasse Tower. One thing we know from our last visit is taxi drivers over here hate taking four people because they always have their crap strewn over the passenger seat. We flag down the first guy and he motions for all 4 of us to get in the back. I tell him like hell, we want one in the front and three in the back and he starts rolling his eyes and moving his stuff off the passenger seat like it’s a real chore for him, so we tell him to stick it and slam the door shut and hail the cab coming up behind him. The next driver is more accommodating and we get to the Montparnasse Tower without any problems. The good thing about Montparnasse Tower is there is no line so we fork out the €42 and we get to the top within a minute. We get out of the lift at the 56 floor enclosed observation deck and the views are incredible. There are some stairs leading to the 59^th floor which is the roof of the building and the outdoor observation deck where the views are even better with gaps in the glass to look through. The one advantage this tower has over the Eiffel Tower is that you actually get to see the Eiffel Tower and being night time the view of the Eiffel Tower is stunning. We stayed there for over an hour and got to see the lights flashing on the Eiffel Tower twice. The flashing lights on the Eiffel Tower happen every hour for 5 minutes and it’s worth waiting for. We catch the lift back down and hail a cab with the exact same problem as before. We slam the door on another arrogant pig of a taxi driver before finding one that has a lesser look of disgust on his face to get us home. We finally get back to the apartment just before midnight for what has been a long but fantastic day. The kids jump into bed and they are out to it. Tomorrow we plan to have a quiet morning before trying to get in to see the catacombs after lunch.

Inside the Musee D'Orsay

At Le Bouledogue

Paris by night from Montparnasse Tower

Paris – Day 18

This morning the weather is cold and overcast. We want to go up the Eiffel Tower today and unlike our last holiday, this time we are going to the top. Our tickets for the open top bus tour have expired so we decide to walk to the Eiffel Tower. It is a fairly straight forward walk, it just involves walking a few km’s. We start out at around 9:00am in the direction of the Louvre. Once we get to the Louvre we continue on through the Tuileries Gardens. We have no idea what time it is except for the fact we know its cake time so we continue on over the Place de la Concorde onto the Champs Elysees hoping that there will be a nice patisserie along the way. We take a side street which has a patisserie and we stop for our favourite, the Citron Tartelette. We eat and walk as we head down another side street that takes us back to the Champs Elysees. When we reach the Arc de Triomphe we jump in line for a ticket. The Arc de Triomphe is one of my favourites and it is reasonably priced with the kids getting in for free. We take the 284 steps to the top and the views are awesome. We wander around at the top taking photos before deciding on going back down and having some lunch. We find a seat on the path alongside the Champs Elysees and pull some rolls out of the backpack. What a place to eat lunch, watching the world go by on the Champs Elysees in Paris. We finish up and continue on down the road to the Eiffel Tower. We pass another patisserie and it reminds us that we are hungry for a cake. This patisserie has a line so the food must be good. We queue up and get our citron tartelettes. We continue walking while scoffing these cakes toward the Esplanade du Tracadero which is the perfect place to view the Eiffel Tower. When we get there we get mobbed by the African dudes with their bunch of Eiffel Tower statues shouting “one euro, one euro”, it’s worse than being in Bali! We make our way down to the Eiffel Tower ticket queue and I’ve promised Kristine that this time I’m going to the top. While we are making our way to the ticket window a man who had just bought 2 tickets asks us if we would like them because he and his wife don’t have the time to go up. Bit weird but cool, free tickets, that’s a €30 saving. We get to the window and we only need to buy the kids tickets now. We make our way to the lift that will take us to the second floor which is 128m up. The lift up to the second floor is a dodgy one. I remember last time we went up it was dodgy and it isn’t any better this time.  It feels weird and I’d much prefer to take the steps but the lift takes about 30 seconds and walking takes......forever. So we go up the lift and I’m starting to feel queasy. We get to level 2 and once on the deck it’s much better until I look up and see where we still have to get to. We have a quick look around before making our way to the queue for the lift that will take us to the top. While we are queuing I’m starting to pop bricks out my rear end. Tyler is in tears next to me saying to Kris “I don’t want to go up”. I was starting to wish I was 11 years old so I could start crying but I’m also thinking, yeah this is my way out, I’ll just use Tyler as my excuse.  Kris promises Tyler a reward if he gets to the top which brings him around and my exit strategy from this nightmare has just disappeared. My sphincter is working overtime as we get closer to the lift. Kris can see I’m packing it and she’s laughing at me and by this point the kids are both joining in. We get in the lift and the ride is pretty good. I just keep looking at Mia because I don’t want to look out the window. We get to the top safely and I was expecting it to be all open but it is enclosed with windows around the perimeter. This makes me feel better because it is cold and blowing a gale today and the thought of being stuck up there having to wait to get back down didn’t sit well with me before going up. There are some stairs leading up to an open deck above so we venture up and I look out and god damn we are a long way up. The floor slopes outwards so you feel like your leaning toward the guard railing. It was a fantastic view and the kids were loving it. We did the walk around the top of the tower but it was so windy we went back down to the enclosed deck before joining the queue to head back down. We are all very proud of ourselves as we make our way down and we decide to get off at the second level so we can take the stairs to the first level and then to ground. Last time we were here the first floor was great. There was restaurant and a cafe where you could buy food and coffee but this time there is a lot of construction going on and the first floor is pretty much a construction site. Ground level is pretty much the same and we are so glad we have seen the Eiffel Tower before without all this mess. For those people seeing it like this is unfortunate for them as they may not ever see it in its best form. We get to the bottom and decide we need a victory cake so we walk through the Champ des Mars on our way to track down the patisserie we found the other day. We find it without a problem and stock up on cakes for dinner. Just down the street is a bar we are familiar with from our last holiday so we stop in for a drink. While we are relaxing we decide we are done with walking and we should give the Metro a go to get home. I pull out my phone and realise there is a metro stop just down the road and it will get us pretty close to home without having to change lines. We make our way to the Metro, get some tickets and jump on. It’s a rough old ride but we get there in one piece. We surface from the Metro and a 10 minute walk has us home. It is about 6:30 by now and it has been a long day. The walk to the Eiffel tower was around 9km and the walk from the Metro to our apartment another 1 ½ km (map of our walk). To make things worse our bakery downstairs was closed so Tyler and I had to search for another one that sold baguettes which led us on another 1 ½ km trek. So that’s it for us today, we are spent. The kids have been fantastic today walking those long distances and we have not had one whinge. It’s been a great day but we call it quits.

Walking along the Champs Elysees

 

The view from the Arc de Triomphe

 

Eating lunch on the Champs Elysees

 

We made it to the top of the Eiffel Tower, yay!

 

The view from the top of the Eiffel Tower looking past the Champ de Mars

 

The victory lemonade for beating the Eiffel Tower

 

and the well earned drink

Freak Watch Update

We have come across some freaks on this holiday so far but none as good as the ones in Paris. Here is a small selection.

Ummm.....ok.....................................nope, lost for words.

Rabbits on leads??? WTF!

Now either this guy chose to sleep there or he rolls around in his sleep heaps and found himself up against the curb......or he's just a knob!

Paris – Day 17

Today we were expecting rain again so when we woke up to blue skies we thought it was a bonus. We had our brekky and packed our backpack and started the walk to the 1^st stop of the Montmartre bus route. The first stop is a bit of a walk, just near the Louvre and it took us a little while because we kept getting lost. There are so many intersections in Paris where there is 6 or 7 streets shooting off in all directions so it is very easy to get disorientated. We finally get to our bus stop and get on the bus. We jump off at the stop just past the Moulin Rouge so we can take the walk to the Basilica of the Sacré-Cœur. Even though we have done this before it is a great walk up the stairs to this amazing church. The queue to the church is huge so we continue on to Montmartre to get some lunch. We wander around for a while and decide to eat at one of the restaurants and we take a seat outside. The tables are separated so we rearrange the joint to suit ourselves and then we have a look at the menu. We notice a 330ml (or as they show it in Europe 33cl) can of lemonade is €3.90 (AUD$5.60) and the food prices reflect the lemonade prices. We pack up our stuff and leave thinking this is ridiculous. No can of lemonade is worth $5.60. We head down the road and by a couple of made up baguettes and some water and eat it on the curb like poor people. Just as we start, out of nowhere, it starts to rain....hard, so here we are trying to eat our lunch up against a wall for shelter with our umbrellas up. Had we not been so cheap we would have been toasty warm in that restaurant. After we’ve eaten we decide to bight the bullet and purchase some raincoats. We have seen some people getting about in these cheap nerdy raincoats for a couple of days now so we buy 2, one for Kris and one for me. As we exit the shop the sun comes back out and we don’t need them. We continue on back down to the Sacré-Cœur and we pass a guy near the entrance roasting peanuts in some sort of sugary syrup stuff and we can’t resist, the smell was too much. We buy a bag for €5 and scoff the lot. We head inside and look around for a while and when we come out it’s raining again. We battle the rain for a little while until we decide it’s time to put the nerdy raincoats on. Just as we get them out the sun comes out again. I’m starting to think these raincoats are some sort of secret weapon against the nasty weather. We keep walking and head down the street that takes us back to our bus and we jump on and continue the route. Along the way Mia spots a beggar with a difference on the other side of the road, he has his cup on the end of a fishing pole. From the top deck of the bus I start taking some snap shots of him and he spots me. He starts yelling out to me and motioning for me to throw money into the cup. I motion back to him that if he’s fishing he should cast the cup into the bus so the guy gets up and starts walking through the traffic to get to me and he hoists his cup up to me. I had to give him something after that. When we get to the end of the route we decide to grab a coffee, something we have struggled with since being in Paris. We walk into the closest cafe and the waiter shows us to a seat. We sit down and check out the menu and the first thing we see is lemonade at €6.50 (AUD$9.30) for 330ml can! And an orange juice was €7 (10 bucks). Now I don’t care where you come from, that is taking the piss!!! So, we walk out. We start walking to a bus stop at the Place de la Concorde because we want to go back up the Champs Elysees, 1) because we love it, and 2) because they play this song in the head phones that has got stuck in all of our heads and we love it. We actually found a wind-up music box in Montmartre for €9 that plays the exact same song, The Champs Elysees, so we bought it. Anyway, we jump on the bus and turn the corner into the Champs Elysees; the song blaring in our ears and bang, the driver has crunched a car next to him. They pull over and there seems to be a commotion between the bus driver and the driver of the car but we don’t care because we are all singing the song like nerds. A woman eventually comes up to the top deck of the bus and tells us we need to transfer buses. Luckily one was not far behind us and we jump on and continue singing. As we get further along the route it starts raining again but this time our secret weapon is powerless and we look at each other and........oh no, we have to actually PUT THEM ON! We looked like nerds, but we were dry. We complete this route back at the stop closest to our apartment and we jumped off and walked home collecting the usually bread, groceries etc on the way. We have some dinner with the idea of heading back out after dinner to check out some of Paris by night. We head out about 7:15 and its blue skies again even though half an hour earlier it was pouring. We walk past the Mairie de Paris which is on the way to the Notre Dame area. I take a few photos and we continue walking over the Seine toward the Notre Dame. As we do it starts to rain....again and hard and it’s freezing. We are right next to a coffee shop so, we stop for a coffee. The waiter shows us to a table and gives us a menu. We have a look......€6.90 FOR A COFFEE!!! These idiots don’t even know how to make coffee. It is pouring outside but I aint paying no €6.90 for a coffee so........we walk out. We wander back home the long way and Paris is dead. The rain must have driven people away because it’s only 8:45 and most restaurants are closed or packing up. We stop in at the supermarket and grab a box of 4 magnum ice creams and a family bag of M&M’s, all for the grand total of €6.65. Yay, now that’s more like it and at that price the magnum tasted even better.

Our beggar walking through the traffic

After he has his collection

***BEEP BEEP BEEP "NERD ALERT, NERD ALERT" BEEP BEEP BEEP***
(The one on the left of course....the guy on the right looks cool!)

Paris – Day 16

We wake up today and the sky is blue and it is a fantastic day, a complete contrast to yesterday.  We are going to do the open top bus tour today so we make our way down to the bus stop near Notre Dame. We purchase our “2 day” ticket and jump on board. We make our way around the Place de la Concorde and along the Champs Elysees toward the Arc de Triomphe. It’s easy to understand why this is one of the most amazing streets in the world. We continue on to the Trocadero where we jump off so we can walk down to the Eiffel Tower. We soon notice that something is going on down at the Eiffel Tower and when we get down there we see some sort of massive female fun run going on and the Eiffel Tower is the start line so the place is jam packed. We were going to do the climb tothe top today but decide to leave it for another day due to the huge crowds of people. I’m pretty happy with that as it gives me another couple of days to do what Mr T would suggest, “get some nuts”. We continue walking along the Champ de Mars and through the back streets behind the Eiffel Tower dodging fun runners as we go. We are getting a bit peckish so we are on the lookout for a bakery. We come across this bakery and there is a line of people queuing out the door and along the footpath. We decide to join the line. We get inside and the cabinets are loaded with colourful cakes and I am salivating. We get to the front of the cue and all of a sudden you are under the pump to order. The French locals know what they want so they are in and out in a jiffy but with our indecision coupled with our nonexistent French we feel like we are being rushed. Luckily we get some assistance from a local man who translates our requests into French for the lady behind the counter and we get our goods without too much drama. Kris and I had a Citron Tartelette which almost made me cry. We also brought some almond biscuits which tipped me over the edge and I think I did cry. This was by far the best cakes we have had in Paris on both holidays. We continue on and reach the bus stop that will take us on the St Germain tour. This will get us to the Luxembourg Gardens where we want to spend lunch. When we arrive, we find it hard to track down somewhere close selling made up rolls but we eventually come across a bakery. We buy one made up baguette and then we decide just to buy plain baguettes. We get a couple of them and we make our way to the park and while we are walking we are all just eating one of the plain baguettes straight from the bag like homeless people. We find a spot in the Luxembourg Gardens and we just dine out on the rest. After that we wander through the gardens. The Luxembourg Gardens are spectacular and being a Sunday it’s packed. We leave the gardens and walk up to the Pantheon which is just up the road. We sit outside on the steps of the Pantheon, about 20m from the entrance, waiting for the kids to finish their icy poles when we get asked to move outside the gates by an official, this just happens to be around the same time a person walks inside the Pantheon with his dog! No, can’t have any icy pole drip on the stairs out the front but dog shit inside is ok!!! We eventually make it in and it is very underwhelming to the point it just looks like a big hall. We head downstairs to the crypt and the area is huge, and virtually empty, where’s all the dead people we’re thinking? Not much going on in there at all so we walk out and make our way down the road about 150m to a church, the Saint-Étienne-du-Mont. There are not too many people bothering to enter this church but we go in anyway. We get inside and wow wee, this place is 100 times better than the Pantheon with some amazing gothic style architecture. We spend a bit of time walking around inside before deciding to get back on the bus to take us to the Jewish district so we can walk back down Rue des Rosiers again. We get off the bus and walk through the Place des Vosges and today it is chocablock with people. The roads have become malls and it ends up being a great walk. We continue on and stop off at a corner bar just down the road from our apartment for a drink before buying some more bread and fruit and citron tartlettes and we head upstairs for dinner. It’s been a long day and we are buggered.

Familiar territory.....the open top tour bus

At the Esplanade du Trocadero overlooking the Eiffel Tower

Champs de Mars with the Eiffel Tower in the background

Cakes at Boulanger Patissier

More Cakes at Boulanger Patissier

Kris and Tyler back on the bus

Mia and me back on the bus

The bread.....traditional baguette.

The insertion......

The crunch......

Oooo Yeay!

Ohhhh MY GOD! I'm gonna need a cigarette after this.

Paris – Day 15

We get up late today and it’s drizzling outside. We decide the first thing we are going to do is head over to the other side of Notre Dame and get ourselves a crepe. We start wandering and the rain is getting a little heavier. Not too heavy but enough that we constantly need the umbrellas up. The two crappy umbrellas we bought in London are not cutting it so we stop and buy a couple of new ones. As if we didn’t look enough like tourists we are now poncing around with umbrellas with “Paris” written all over them. We finally make it to a window I am certain is where we got our crepes from when we were here last time and order four. We start chowing down while we are walking and we turn the corner and.....ahhh, that wasn’t the place, this is the place, bugger. The crepes we were eating were pretty ordinary and we all felt a bit crook afterwards so we won’t make that mistake again. The rain is relentless and shows no sign of easing up, our shoes are soaked and we need to find some raincoats. Tyler has a Celtic jacket he bought in Glasgow that’s working fine for him but the rest of us are struggling. We eventually find one for Mia but we can’t find one for Kris or me, or at least ones that don’t cost an arm and a leg or ones that make us look like dorks......ok, bigger dorks. So we give up and put up with the rain. We head back to the apartment for lunch and after that decide to continue on. It’s still raining as we walk and we find ourselves walking behind the Notre Dame church where there is a heap of small birds being fed by some bloke straight out of his hand. He motions to Mia to come and grab the bread from him so Mia does. All of a sudden this big fat pigeon fly’s up and sits on Mia’s arm and starts eating the bread. He was having a good old time eating from Mia’s hand but I think Mia was expecting the little cute ones would be there instead. We continue walking and we start a walk that will take us through the Place des Vosges and through the Jewish district. The Place des Vosges is amazing with the magnificent garden in the centre. We walk around in the garden for a while, in the rain, and continue on under the covered area of the buildings. We come across a trio playing Latin type music and hang around to watch. We end up buying the CD because the music was awesome. We keep walking making our way to the Jewish district and Rue des Rosiers. This is meant to be a very famous area and is always full of people. We get there and it is quiet, quiet as in dead, no one here, ghost town. Then it dawns on me, I read somewhere that there is one day in the week they don’t operate due to religion or something like that. We assume it must be Saturday. We head back to the apartment stocking up on bread, groceries fruit and veg along the way and we also grab a couple of bottles of wine. We get home and prepare dinner, open the wine and......no wine glasses. We can’t drink wine without wine glasses so I say to Kris that I’ll go over the road and see if they sell them in the supermarket. They didn’t but the wine shop next door did. Ha, 8 o’clock on a Saturday night and we can buy wine glasses over the road, this place is awesome. So we finish up the day with another bread and salad feast and a few glasses of wine while listening to the CD we had just bought. What a great to finish a day in Paris (except the CD ended up being crap).

Mia feeding the pigeon

The pigeon thinks he can take a better photo

Mia and Tyler in the rain near the Seine

Walking through Place des Vosges

 

 

Glasgow-Paris - Day 14

The alarm goes off at 6:30 again and we pack our gear, have a light brekky in the room and make the trek to the train station, next door. I booked the apartment next to the train station so we wouldn't have to walk far. We arrive there and within 15 minutes we are boarding our train. The train ride goes without a hitch and we depart at London Euston station and we need to make our way to St Pancras station to catch the Eurostar to Paris. We have a 1 hour and 20 minute changeover so the walk also proves uneventful. We board the Eusrostar and head to Paris. This also proves uneventful and we arrive in Paris at 5:47pm, on schedule. I call the dude who is meeting us at our apartment to let him know we have arrived and he informs us he will be waiting for us at the apartment. We jump in the taxi and make our way to the apartment which again was uneventful. We get out of the cab and go to the front entrance of our apartment and.....no one is there. We've just spent 7 and a half hours on a train and we are not in the mood for this. I call this dude again and get his answering machine. Ok, I'll give him 5 and call him back again. I give him 10 and I call him back. "I will be there in 2 minutes, please wait at the entrance" we'd already been waiting 30 minutes and it was another 20 minutes before this knobhead rocked up and he's all happy and waiving across the street and as he approaches us he's calling out "Bonjour, bonjour" and I'm thinking, shouldn't that be bonsoir dickhead, your running a bit late? But we all put on our "how ya goin mate" face and he shows us to our apartment. He actually turned out to be an ok bloke in the end. The apartment is quite small but very nice. It is very rustic and as you walk through the entrance hall you walk on a slant because the wooden floor is sloping quite badly. But everything we need is here and best of all, the bakeries, the fruit and veg shops, the supermarket and booze shops are right out the front of our apartment. After Mr Bonjour had gone we dumped our stuff and we head downstairs to get some supplies. First stop, the bakery. This is two doors down from our apartment entrance. We walk in and we ask for two big long baguettes. He bags them and these things are still warm like they only came out of the oven half an hour ago. Now, this is about 7 o'clock at night and we are getting freshly baked bread, amazing! Next stop, the supermarket. This is directly over the road. We stock up on ham and cheese and yogurt and then it's over to the fruit and veg shop which is next door. The fruit and veg is amazing, fresh, colourful and lots of it, still, at 7 o'clock, amazing! We go back up stairs and cut up the bread, the ham, the cheese, the tomatoes and we just eat. We all agree this is the best dinner we have had while we have been on holidays. The bread in Paris is the best. This is one of the things we have been looking forward to and tomorrow.....well tomorrow is crepe day. After a feed we head out to have a look around and the first thing we notice is how much this area has changed. There seems to be so many more restaurants and new pockets that we didn't notice before. We walk for a while before making it back to the apartment and call it a night.

Getting ready to leave our apartment in Glasgow.

On the Eurostar bound for Paris.

Inverness-Glasgow - Day 13

We set the alarm to get up early this morning because we want to get moving as soon as possible. We head downstairs and have brekky at the hotel restaurant, we then check out from our apartment and we are on the road around 8:30. Cheryl points us in the right direction and we follow Loch Ness to our first stop, Urquhart Castle. This is the first castle we have managed to see so far on our drive so we wander around the castle ruins for about an hour. The views from the castle overlooking Loch Ness are incredible. We continue on and the views on this road are amazing as we follow the edge of Loch Ness to Invermoriston. At this point we ask Cheryl to take us to Dornie where Eilean Donan Castle is. We get about 10 mile down the road and we realize this is about an hour’s journey. When you add getting out and looking around then the hour’s drive back there is no way we can get to Glasgow by 5pm to hand the car back. We umm and ahh and decide not to go. I'm guttered. This was one of the castles I really wanted to see and photograph but the fact is this drive is a lot longer and we are travelling a lot slower, due to the small winding roads, than I had anticipated. We turn off and take a road that leads us back to the road that followed Loch Ness. We reassess our drive and there is really only time to see one more castle, Kilchurn Castle. Kilchurn Castle is on the way to Glasgow but we do have to go backwards a bit, but I am determined to see this one. We look at the map and there are 2 ways to go, the A828 which will take us along the edge of a bunch of Lochs or the A82 which will take us through.....well, not much that I can see. Anyway, the A82 looks the quickest but the A828 looks the most specky. What do we do? We let Cheryl decide and she chose the A82. Bugger, I thought the other way would have been awesome but Cheryl obviously knows that's the long way. So we take Cheryl's advice and god damn did she come through with the goods. This was one of the best drives I have ever been on. The views were beyond anything that we had expected and we were blown away. Kris and I just kept saying "we gotta come back here again one day, this is incredible". Kris and I really didn't know that Scotland could have such amazing scenery. On our last holiday we took the bus from Thusis to Bellinzona and this was the best scenery I had ever seen. This drive from Fort William through the Ben Nevis and Glen Coe National Scenic Area came pretty close. After that we take the road backwards to see Kilchurn Castle. Just before we get there is starts raining, just as we get there it starts raining harder. This is a castle ruin so there is no shelter and it's about a 500m walk to get there. I get out of the car, take my photos, which will be crap because it was raining, the fog was thick and I get back in the car and Kris says "you weren't meant to see these castles Paul". I said "I know" and we drive off. This whole road trip was to see historic castle ruins and I'd take all these amazing photos......didn't work out that way. Nevertheless, we saw some of the most amazing scenery we will ever see and I was pretty satisfied. We eventually make it to Glasgow and we hand the vehicle back to Thrifty and ask them to call us a cab so we can get to our hotel. We wait about 30 minutes, in the rain, and finally one rocks up. He gets us to our hotel and we check in and head straight out to have a look around. It's a fairly unimpressive looking joint and we see a pub that welcomes families. Great, we think, let's go back and shower get dressed and come to the pub. We rock up there about half an hour later and walk inside only to be told the kids are not allowed in after 7. So we are back to this archaic law are we. There is absolutely bugger all around but we manage to find one place and we decide to eat there. While we are there we get chatting to the staff and they told us that restaurants we not allowed to serve alcohol after 10pm!!! Scotland is a strange joint. We take the dodgy route back to the hotel, past the nightclubs and strip joints (or at least we think it was the dodgy route, could have been the better route, Glasgow looks pretty rough) and hit the sack. We will be up early again tomorrow because we are catching the early train back to London.

Part of the Urquhart Castle ruins.

The kids doing their quiz at Urquhart Castle.

Urquhart Castle with Loch Ness in the background.

A happy snap from the car window as we drive alongside Loch Ness.

The kids building their own castle.

The view as we drove through the Ben Nevis and Glen Coe National Scenic Area.

One of the reasons the drive took so long. These two trucks were inching there way past each other.

Edinburgh-Inverness - Day 12

We got up early this morning to finish packing as we need to be out of our apartment to make our way to Thrifty to pick up the car by 9am. We were lucky to hail down a cab pretty much straight outside our apartment. The driver is an older Scottish guy and he is fantastic, asking us loads of questions and giving us some good advice about our road trip. We get to Thrifty and there is no BMW available. Instead, we are advised we are get an upgrade to a Land-rover Discovery, the Deluxe model with all the fruit, you little beauty! We pile our gear in the back and hit the road. We decide we will do the full route, that is, head to Stirling (to see our first road trip castle) before heading back through Perth rather than go the short way straight to Perth. This proved to be a big early mistake. When we got to Stirling it was pouring with rain so we decided not to get out of the car, a big wasted effort. When we get to Perth we grab some lunch and we realise time is already starting to get away from us and we need to get a move on if we want to fit everything in. We get back on the road and we take the route where the big green sign says "Inverness". Ummm, second big mistake, we are meant to be going to Inverness via Aberdeen. We open up our map book (that we purchased of £1.99) and we try and work out which way we should be going. We come to the conclusion we need to do a u-turn and head back to Perth. It gets worse, we don't know where the hell we are going by now and we find ourselves do circles around the perimeter of Perth for about 45 mins. It's at this point we decide to employ the services of Cheryl, the onboard navigation system. Our initial dealings with Cheryl were very frustrating and a lot of yelling ensued, mostly by me, actually all by me. This is how Cheryl got her name. I found it difficult to communicate with a machine so I needed to give it a name that aided my yelling of the words SHUT UP. So it became SHUT UP CHERYL. It was at this point as we were doing bog laps around Perth that we decided to alter our route and take the road to Blairgowrie. That was our next mistake because this road was a small winding road that took us ages to get there. Now it is nudging 2:30 and we've hardly gone anywhere. We stop in at the Blairgowrie tourist shop and a woman advises us that our best bet would be to take the M9 motorway straight to Inverness because we can't possibly fit in what we want to do. So We get back in the car and I give Cheryl instructions to take us to Inverness. I'm a bit dejected at this point as my whole first day's planning has gone out the window. The drive from this point on did prove to be very nice and the scenery was spectacular so not all was lost. We arrive at Inverness and check in to our hotel. The hotel is about a 10-15 minute walk to the city centre so that's the first thing we do. Inverness is only small but bigger than we had expected and it is a very pretty place. We spend about an hour walking around before heading back to the hotel for dinner. After dinner we head back to our room (which is a 1 room apartment) and we hit the sack. Tomorrow I want to be up early.

The rental car

The photo before "the pit stop"



The photo after "the pit stop"
(I promised Kris I would not show the photos I took of her with her pants around her ankles during "the pit stop")

 

 

Edinburgh – Day 11

Today we are going back to an old favourite, the open top bus tour. The open top bus tour starts from Waverley Bridge and consists of 5 different bus tours. We take the 10 minute walk to the bridge and buy our tickets and once on top and on our way it instantly gives you that “I’m on holiday feel”. Even though the open top bus tour is a little bit nerdy, it is a fantastic way to take in all the sites while sitting on your arse. The first bus we took was the Majestic Tour which took us down to the port area of Edinburgh and through Leith which was where golf was first played. This tour was one of those that had headphones you plugged in and i gave you some running commentary. The second bus was the Edinburgh Tour. This tour took us around the New Town, around Edinburgh Castle and past the Queens Palace and back through the Old Town. This tour had an old dude, Mike, who sat and commentated the whole way around. It is amazing what you learn on these tours and we don’t care how nerdy they are because we think they are the best value for money tour in every place we have visited and you get to go to places you wouldn’t normally know about and you get a real appreciation for the history of a place on these buses. Edinburgh is an amazing place with some amazing history. A lot of the history surrounds doom and gloom, wars with the poms, living in slum conditions and lots of royalty. The architecture is incredible and it’s just a fascinating place. It’s a shame we are leaving tomorrow because we have really enjoyed it here and feel we could have easily spent a few more days checking out some of the sights we didn’t get around to. Although, one of my learned friends did ask why I was staying in Edinburgh for 4 days, “you can do Edinburgh in a day mate” he said, not naming names (Steve Bowen). After that tour we ducked off for lunch. We thought we’d give the pubs another chance and saw one close so we approached the door. The first thing we saw was a sign “...children are only allowed in the restaurant area or outside and must leave by 3pm...”. What sort of draconian law was this? It is ridiculous because we can walk next door to the café where they sell wine, beer on tap and other alcoholic drinks exactly the same as the pub and stay until midnight! Yesterday during lunch Kris and I drank wine and beer while having lunch in a park. So a big thumbs down for Scottish pubs from me. So, I’m going to leave Edinburgh with not even having a drink in the pub, ridiculous! After lunch we took a tour through this old house, the only one of its type left in Edinburgh and it dated back to the 1500’s. It was another very interesting tour. We headed back to Waverley Bridge and jumped on the City Sightseeing bus and this bus pretty much just did the Old Town. That killed another hour or so before we made our way back to the apartment to get ready for our last dinner in Edinburgh which was fantastic. Tomorrow we are leaving Edinburgh and spending the next 2 days travelling to Inverness to the North before coming back down to Glasgow in our rented BMW 320. This is one part of the trip I have really been looking forward to.

Edinburgh – Day 10

Today we have decided to go and have a look at Edinburgh Castle. It is only about 400m away at the top of the street we are staying on, the Royal Mile. So we get moving around 9:30 at make our way up the road. The castle is enormous and it sits on top of a high point of Edinburgh so has incredible views all around. The castle proved very interesting and we spent a couple of hours wandering around within the walls. After we had seen enough we decided it was time for lunch. The weather was now starting to fine up as it had been quite overcast during the morning so we headed back to the cafe in the park we went to yesterday in the New Town. After lunch we continued wandering around Edinburgh before heading back to the apartment. One of the advantages of our apartment’s location is that it is as central as you can get in Edinburgh. So central that just outside our window and just outside the entrance is The Mercat Cross. This is where everyone in the city would come to here very important announcements and also to watch people get punished, beheaded etc. This is also the spot where a lot of tours start from, ghost tours and underground tours. We have decided to do the “Historic Vaults” tour which will take us underground. One of the disadvantages of being this central though is the noise. There seems to be a lot of these ghost type tours starting or finishing here very late and there is a lot of yelling and screaming all drummed up by tour guides. There is also noise right throughout the night. Last night there were people walking down the Royal Mile screaming and carrying on and I reckon it had to be 3am. Anyway, we pay our £25 and wait for the tour to start at 4pm. At 4:01 it starts to rain. Great. We are standing out in the rain for 10 minutes while the tour guide talks and Tyler whispers to me “Dad, doesn’t she know it’s raining?’ Haha, “Obviously not mate”. We eventually make our way underground and we are all pretty wet by now. It was a pretty good tour but I wouldn’t rave about it but the kids really enjoyed it. After the tour we get ready for dinner and being the adventurers we are we head back to the Italian place we went to yesterday. One of the difficulties when holidaying for an extended period of time with two kids is that you need to keep everyone happy when it comes to food. Sometimes it’s easier when you find somewhere good to just keep going back.

Pano view of Edinburgh from the Castle

Mia's mask at Dinner

Tyler's mask at dinner
The kids were given masks to colour in.
I made a bet with them that they had to wear them out of the restaurant and all the way home for the reward, a Mars Bar.
They did it!

Tyler watching the Ghost Tour which started below

 

Tyler's World #1

Tyler is an 11 year old boy who sometimes lives in a world of his own but always in a world of misunderstanding, miscommunication and misconception.

Walking up the mountain in Edinburgh today Tyler is complaining it’s too hard and Kris says "It shouldn't be a problem for you because you are fitter than we are".

Tyler responds with a confused look on his face "Wia.......who's Wia??"

 

 

Edinburgh – Day 9

We get up this morning without a plan. It’s a stunning day so we have brekky and decide to go for a wander and see what’s around. It is very nippy as we start walking toward the bottom of the Royal Mile. This is the end of the Royal Mile where the Royal residence is, where the Queen stays while she is in Edinburgh. We continue on and come to the base of what looks like Edinburgh’s highest hill in Holyrood Park and it looks awesome. At the top is Arthur’s Seat, 251m up, so we decide to do the walk. This ends up being a tough walk and it takes us about an hour to climb the hill. The hill has pathways and steps made from stones and once at the top there are amazing views over Edinburgh. We take an easier route down and walk back up the Royal Mile back towards our apartment. We already love Edinburgh, it has a real medieval feel about it with some amazing buildings especially in the Old Town. After a small break in the apartment we head back out looking for somewhere to eat for lunch. We head over to New Town on the other side of the rail line and we find this amazing cafe in the middle of a St. Andrew Square. The food was cheap and it was nice sitting outside overlooking the park. Amazingly, even though it was in the middle of a park in the centre of the city we were still able to have a beer and a wine! Yay for Edinburgh. We continue walking in the direction of our apartment and when we get back most of the Royal Mile has been closed off for a parade and it is chockablock with people. They have Scottish marching bands and a re-enactment of a battle with the poms that happened 500 years ago today. Apparently the Scots had their arses kicked and they celebrate it every year, so a Scottish guy on a horse was telling us and all these festivities were happening just below our apartment. Later on that night we went to a pretty good Italian restaurant before calling it a night.

Tyler doing it tough on the easy bit of the climb

Close to the top and Tyler is done

Our lunch spot

The festivities on the Royal Mile. Our apartment windows are the three at the top of the building on the left.