The Hills are Alive....

Today was a glorious day in Salzburg. The sun was shining, the birds were singing and you guessed the "Hills were alive with the Sound of Music". As our tour bus drove along the winding mountainous roads the drive was accompanied by the sound track from the movie and us tour goers were encouraged to sing along. What a hoot. I think the bus was about 75% full of Aussies, not sure what that say's about us.

We got to see some lovely scenery as well as -

The Mirabel Gardens (used when Maria teaches the kids to sing Doe a Deer)

The Mondsee Chapel (where Maria and the Captain got married)


Simon standing by the tour Bus (edited out of the Movie)


The Gazebo at Hellbrunn Palace (used in You are 16 going on 17, and I Must Have Done Something Good)

And Leopoldskron Palace, which was the rear of the house in the Movie and used in scenes such as, were they fall in the lake after singing Doe a Deer.


The little gnomes that the kids danced around when singing Doe a Deer, and here's a photo of Simon singing with one of the gnomes.

We also got to see Wolfgang Lake, which is where the mother of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart came from and she named him after the lake. It was very pretty.

Yep, now that we've done the tour we need to watch the movie again - anyone want to join us?


Salzburg itself is a very pretty town, we got in early yesterday morning (and I mean early) and here's a couple of shots of it from then.


Me with the Salzburg Castle in the background.

Arrivederci Roma, Guten Morgen Salzburg

Well we've had a lot of fun since our last blog post. We're currently suffering from a lack of sleep as we trained it from Rome to Salzburg last night. We got in at 6.56am, and we left at 7,10pm. Yep we're tired. And this bloody key board is really giving me the irrates as the Austrians have decided that the keys need to be moved around - (I feel better now).

When we've had some sleep we will do a full post (including photos), but we figured we would just let you all know where we were. Anyway we're now off to have some strudel and tomorrow we are doing the Sound of Music Tour - the hills are alive........

Adios Barcelona - Ciao Roma

Today is our last day in Barcelona as we´re catching an overnight ferry tonight to Rome. We get in tomorrow night. Then we need to sort out the rest of our trip. But so far it´s all going well. We love Barcelona. But we´re also ready to move on.

The Ramblas are amazing. So much life and entertainment put into such a small area. We´ve walked a lot of the streets and seen most of the sites.

We´re even happier now, as we´ve just discovered that the weather should be fine in Rome. Last night we had an amazing thunderstorm here, where the windows of our hotel room were shaking from the thunders. Was very cool. I can´t upload any photos at the moment, but I did get a shot of the lightning. I´m sure you´re all waiting to see that shot :-)

Anyway we´re about to head off and find something to spend our time doing between now and when the ferry leaves.

A quick photo update

As we haven't used as much down/upload as we thought I get to upload a limited amount of photos. So enjoy!

The view from our hotel room in Barcelona. Not bad huh?

The rain soaked roads of Barcelona - the motorbike rider almost stalled his bike but just made it.

Gaudi house in Barcelona.

Hmm, can't seem to remember where this place was - Paris somewhere I think :-)

The Rain in Spain falls mainly on us!!

We arrived in Barcelona early Sunday morning. We caught the overnight train down from Paris, traveled first class and it was great. Mind you I didn't get much sleep, but we were comfortable.

The hotel we booked for Barcelona was advertised as being 1/2 price, and it's pure luxury. We're right by the cruise ship port and have ocean views. We're on the 5th floor and it's lovely. We braved it up to the top floor this afternoon to see the view and it was pretty amazing. Photos to come as we've got an upload limit with this internet access.

Anyway today we rambled along los Rambles, had lunch in the plaza and then decided to look in El Corte Ingles (a department store). The weather had been beautiful - warm & sunny. When we left the store it was absolutely pissing down with rain. Total thunderstorm. Roadways were being covered in water, we got drenched even though we were hiding either in shelter or under umbrellas. It was amazing. Then as quickly as it started it stopped. Well the rain has, but the lightening and thunder is continuing.

We're staying in Barcelona until next Monday when we'll be heading off either to Italy or back to London, we haven't really decided yet. Either way we're half way through our trip and we're loving it.

Tomorrow it's off to see some more sites of Barcelona - probably something by Gaudi I think.

Viva La France

Today we say goodbye to the UK and head east to France - yep we're going by train. We've been spending the last few days in London doing the touristy stuff like St Pauls, Westminster Abbey, watching a show in the West End (Wicked is well worth watching).

Our hosts Mark and Joanne have been fabulous! We feel so at home and comfortable here. It's a little sad to be leaving. But we're already discussing where we want to go next time we're over.

Yesterday we had some amazing weather. It was hot! Well in truth it was humid, but the bloody poms have the heating on in the stores - because it's now autumn you need the heat.

Anyway that's it from us till we hit France. Au revoir.

We're Back in London

After a couple of days where the electrical gods were working against us, the laptop decided that it didn't want to work (but now it is thank goodness), and then Simon's camera has decided to go AWOL. After much searching through all our luggage, we decided that it's definitely MIA and we bought Simon a new British Camera (well it was purchased here so it must be British right??) So anyway now you're getting a compilation of our photos in a random order.

A plaque we discovered in the National Railway museum

York City Walls

Simon walking the York City Walls

Gateway into York

The remains of York Castle

York Canal

The Ruins of Whitby Abbey

Us at the Ruins of Whitby Abbey

Whitby Abbey

The cute little hotel we stayed at in the northern Lakes Districts.

View from Stirling Castle to the William Wallace Memorial in the background

View from the wall of Stirling Castle

The bridge we termed "Death Bridge" as it was a narrow single lane bridge that from either direction you couldn't see if there was traffic coming.

A random picture of somewhere in the Lakes District.

Simon at the Housestead Fort Roman ruins.


More of Simon and the Ruins.


More roman ruins

A Black Hairy Coo

Art - Silver Horses near the Falkirk Wheel

Stirling Castle

This is Simon and I freezing at Stirling Castle. Notice how I've managed to dress in grey to match the sky.

The view from our window in the B&B that we stayed at in Stirling. Was really lovely. The night before it started raining and we couldn't see the hills in the distance - we have photos to prove it, but won't bore you here with them.

The Little Nissan Note we hired. We did over 1300 miles in this little beastie, she managed to get us up the Pennines and from Edinburgh back to London via the myriad of towns and cities that we decided to visit.