Back in Regina now. We had a rather long but fortunately uneventful flight back from Amsterdam on Friday. I'm still getting used to the time change - finding it hard to stay awake in the afternoon and seem to be waking up at 5am and being fully awake!! I could get used to that.. Now if only I could learn to get up and make the best of the time between 5 and 8am.

Kelsey and I suffered from culture shock a little while in Europe, especially with the population density. I now realize that we live in the least populated province of the country which boasts one of the lowest population density in the world. We were a little shocked by having to cram our bodies into the tram or subway.. Guess we're just not used to having people in our "personal space" - reminds me of the Sienfeld- Close Talker episode..
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NGVSIkEi3mM




Cheers, R

We are doing well in Amsterdam :-) This is a city that I could get used to as people are friendly and cycle everywehere. someone should try to replicate this in North America to see if it would work. The city of the future is 1500 years old!!






The garbage workers are on strike so there are piles of garbage everywhere and lots of floating rubbish in the canals everywhere but I still love the city and just have to imagine that the garbage doesn't exist and that there are flowers everywhere.













So far while in Amsterdam, Kelsey and I have seen many many sights including a the Van Gouh Museum, the maritime museum/science center, lots of sight seeing and a canal tour. Today we plan on renting bikes and touring around a little more.













The people here are great, the food is amazing and I love the progressiveness of the city.

More pictures at

http://s817.photobucket.com/home/tritaniumr1

The 3 words that best describe Paris are as follows and I quote: "chaotic, expensive and selfserving"

Don't get me wrong, we enjoyed our time there very much, but found that an overall sence of confusion everywhere twinned with an overtone of "it's not my problem" and backed with a feeling of "every man / woman for themself" feeling.

It was interesting coming from London where the tubes are very well organized and easy to follow to Paris where the traffic patterns within the public transit are not intuative and in my opinion are not well engineered.

OK enough with the complaining and on to the good stuff.

We saw so much culture, art and architecture that we quickly hit overload. We went to the Muse de Louvre on our first day out. There are no words to describe the Louvre and it something that everyone should experience at least once in their life. We spent quite a bit of time in the sculpture wing. I am still in awe that we were standing a mere foot away to sculptures that were carved 3-5 thousand years ago!!!

The Eiffel tower was very impressive, especiallysince it was build 125 years ago.

We spent quite a bit of time walking around the canals and around the city admirring the city itself.

On our last day there we walked the champ elysse from Le Grand Palais to the Arc de Triomph (sp). Then spend the rest of the day shopping in the area. I had to use the toillets in the afternoon but couldnt find one, then finally, I saw 'the sign'. It was a beautiful pink sign that said 'WC" with an arrow. we followed the sign for about a half km, but when I finally reached what was to be my destination, I looked in to see a designer bathroom shop. I must have looked confused and perplexed when the tall french woman asked if she could help me; I replied that I needed to use a washroom. Her response was "well of course sir, the cost is 2 euros and you can choose whichever designer you wish". I gave her my 2 euros and chose the Yves sait laurent designed decor for my stay.

First day in France

Our first day in France was fantastic! However our first night here was absolutely, positively not a good experience at all. we got off the plane at Charles De Gaul airport lastnight just after 9pm and everything was closed inthe airport. There were 2 people at the info desk whoi gave us a map and showed us how to find the station from the airport and then we were on our own. These guys were very helpful but that's where it ends. By accident or by miracle, we got on the right train and headed towards our hotel. The directions are so poor that you need a degree in map reading just to figure out what all of the notations are. It seems that each train is owned by a different company or has a different logo on it so that when you look at the information on a map, it doesn't correspond with the information at the station or what the people have told you as instructions.

We travelled on the train for 45 minutes, walked about 15 minutes in the dark to our hotel... THANK YOU GOOGLE MAP + GPS SATELITE LOCATION!!!

The Hotel... We find this place, walk all the way around it to find the entrance, we go in and there is nothing there. Its just like the front entrance of an appartment with some sort of vending machine by the door. You have to know your reservation number, know that you have to put your credit card into the slot in this yellow vending machine and punch in your reservation number. If the two match, the machine spits out a receipt with 2 numbers. Then you have to know to read teh receipt for your room number and the code to open the door. Im sure it is all very well explained somewhere on the internet, but if you have been travelling for days, are sticky, smelly, tired, not sure about the language, and just want a shower and a bed, finding the right information to get into your room is not the first thing on your mind. We asked a man that was standing by the front hall for help; he was watching us and clearly could see that we were having issues understanding this system. He was on his cell phone walking around the small entranceway, when I asked him for help, he reluctantly told us the procedure and watched us some more. After a while he came over to help and it turns out that he was the ONLY employee at the hotel that night but it was much more important to continue talking to his girlfriend than it was to help a customer. We finally made it to our room and, as we were exhausted, were able to manage to fall asleep in our shoe box sized room. No electricity, no television, no bathroom, 1 towel and a sink, 2 single beds with JUST enough room to walk in between. So small in fact that Kelsey and I could not stand up in the room at the same time. One of us had to be on the bed.
We woke up inthe morning and immediately walked to the hotel next door and booked a room for tonight. It's not much bigger, but has a tele, electricity, free wifi, a bathroom with a shower, and is much more like a hotel room than a couple of cots thrown in the back of a pickup box.

OK then, enough about that. Today we visited the Louvre and meandered around the city a little. Our impressions of the city and the Parisians were greatly improved and became better as the day passed. The Louvre is simply undescribable and EVERYONE should see it. Period. We saw artifacts that were 5000 years old and looked like new (no..not walmart new, just in perfect condition). I was also very impressed with the museum itself, the architect, the doors, the ceilings, the marble work on the floors and columns, etc. Fantastic service, friendly people, well organized and clean bathrooms.

After being on our feet all day, we decided to go see the movie Iron Man 2. Robert Downey Jr., Gweneth Paltrow and Scarlet Johansen, explosions, actions and Scarlet Johansen. Oh did I memtion Scar.... Oh yeah, I did.
The night ended with a 20 minute train ride back to the hotel and a long overdue and appreciated shower. AHHHH!!!!
It's almost 1am as I write this, so its time I get to sleep..
Bonsoir tout the monde.
R

Here are a couple of pictures from our last day in London

Finally managed to upload lotsof pics

We managed to find a charger today and loaded a bunch of pictures to interweb. I uploaded them to my (Robert's) Facebook account as it was a lot faster.. Go take a look there :-)
Tomorrow we will check out a mesuem or two then head off to Paris on a 7pm easyjet flight.

Cheers
R

More fishy pictures

Here are a few more pictures and a video from the Georgia Aquarium but only because I cant transfer pics to the laptop without the PS2 - it is dead due to a missing charger. (I hate proprietary products....*Ahh..AHH-Sony!!*) We managed to take about 120 pictures today but cant get them off the Sony camera....AARGH!

We had a great day, starting with a long sleep in to avoid the jetlag, then toured the city on a double decker tour bus, with our first stop being the London Eye. The London Eye is a ferrys wheel on steriods; it has fully air conditioned pods instead of seats. We got a fantastic vantage point from the top and planned out our day from there. After walking around a bit and ducking out of a rain shower by zooming into "the Zen Cafe", we jumped on a tour boat (included in the deal with the tour bus) travelled down (up?) the thames to the Tower of London. This is where the royalty of the 13th century beheaded and tortured the citizens and future aires to the throne for doing things like speaking to the wrong people. The most loved characters on the premise are the royal ravens... it's true, look it up!

We ate dinner at the Sherlock Holmes Pub after walking around a bunch more, then back to the hotel for the night. On the way back we noticed that the Musical "Wicked" is on right next to Victoria Station and that they may have tickets for tomorrow night. We will check at 10am as they release 25 front row tickets on performance day at 10am for public purchase @ half price.

Un-Scientific Survey
bathrooms:
The ones at the tower of London are 800 years old and are in need of updating and cleaning, just up the hill, you can pay 50p to pee in a really clean "pod" but it suck if there is no toilet paper...

Commencials:
mostly cleaver, a few cheezy *american*

Food / Menu:
Although Btitish food is not known as being very tasty, we have had fantastic fish and chips, shepeard pies, hotdogs, sushi, and italian aranicos. OK prices

Service / Kindness
We have yet to meet any unfriendly people and in general everyone seems to be very smilling, pleasant and helpful.

Public Transit:
Super!! Love the tube, but "mind the gap", clean, easy to navigate and pretty cheap.


That's it for now. more survey notes later.
Cheers

Tourist day!!

We are having a great time and haave seen many touristy sights today. eye of london, tower of london, tower bridge, and lots more. tonight going to the sherlock holmes pub for dinner and maybe catch a movie after.