mattjo

Well Amsterdam was a real eye opener, and Im glad we had only 1 day there. From Amsterdam we head off to Germany. Just a simple day driving taking in the sights of the picturesque European countryside. The Neitherlands is nearly all flat and most of it is about 6m under sea level. So its weird actually driving up to the ocean.

Our tour director told us a story about one of his friends (a couple) who visited Amsterdam and decided to taste a magic mushroom. So they shared this mushroom and then proceeded to walk around the city and makle their way back to their hotel. It just seemed like a normal day in the city – however when they woke up the next morning in their hotel room – they looked at each other and proceeded to ask each other what happened last night. They both remember that on their way home they saw a Leprechan and they surprising managed to catch it and bring it back to their hotel. Looking at each other they realised that Leprechans don’t exisit and remembered that they locked it in their hotel bathroom. So gathering up the courage they opened the bathroom door and found a 7 year old girl. They had some explaining to do with the police.

We crossed into Germany and started out way into the Rhine Valley. We stayed at St Goar, which is just a small viallage town on the Rhine. Its known for 2 things – Beer Stiens and Wine. Its is such a random stop on our trip, but is a good change from seeing cities all the time. We went wine tasting in this old wine cellar. The owner gave us 4 diferent types of wines to drink. And we had a nice taste of an Ice Wine. This wine is made through 8 – 10 days of continual frosts just near harvest time. What normally takes 1 bunch of grapes for 1 bottle it takes 8 bunches of grapes to make one bottle of this wine. As the frost crystalises the sugar in the grapes the Ice wine is really sweet and due to its prestigious nature its $150 for a 500ml bottle. it's like drinking liquid sugar.

Today we head off through Germany for Lucerne, Switzerland. It good being on this tour as we don’t have to think about where we are going too much. All we need to worry about is making sure we have our cameras ready and we get back to bus on time.

We arrived at the Contiki headquarters (royal national) hotel in London on Wednesday afternoon – and the hotel is pretty ordinary to say the least. It was only one night – so we just sucked it up and slept!

That night we cruised on down to the local Laundromat to catch up on some of our laundry. After starting to plow through a Ben & Jerry’s ice-cream tub with the smallest little plastic teaspoon possible a semi-famous actor walks in to use the Laundromat. Im not sure of the actor’s name – however he is the fat guy in the movie with Heath Ledger “A Knights Tale”. Very cool!

The next morning we arose around 6am and raced on downstairs to get on the Contiki Tour bus which will be our home for the next 17 nights. We drove on down to Dover (The White Cliffs of Dover) and took a short ferry ride to Calais France, in which it was back on the bus for a few hour drive into Brussels Belgium. Here we walked around the streets with our new found friends on the tour and tasted ‘real’ Belgium chocolate, waffles and of course a local Belgium Beer. The architecture was extraordinary. Last night we stayed just outside of the city in a nice hotel and sat down for a nice 3 course meal.

This morning we had a great European breakfast with Nutella and salami’s, hams, cheese (I mean really good cheese) and some cereal – oh it was good! Then a short drive into Amsterdam. Amsterdam is a cultural mess of a place. Many people come to Amsterdam for two things – Marijuana & Sex. Certain Cafés openly sell in their menu Pot food and smoking delights and if you’re lucky you can also pick up some magic mushrooms. There were even signs saying buy 4 mushrooms and get 1 free! It was good to walk around and just be wowed at how up front it all is! We didn’t walk through the red light district – but we heard of some seedy stories from some of the other people on the tour that ventured in that area.

Tonight we head off into Amsterdam again for a nice meal and a canal cruise – should be fun. I’ll keep you posted!

We are in Dublin Ireland!

very thankful that we are here, after the USA - Ireland is an awesome place. Much like Australia in that we speak the same language, drive on the same side of the road and eat the same food. Glorious!

We have been eating at pubs all over Dublin - nice quaint spots to enjoy a Guiness and listen to the Irish sounds of then.

Managed to get a lost a couple of times walking on the streets. Not as easy navigating the streets as it is in the States. All the roads used to be horse and cart trails - apparently horses don't like the grid system - too confusing!

We went to the Dublin Zoo yesterday and caught up with all of Jo's friends (only kidding). There was this cute Jaguar that spoke to us and we thought he wanted to 'play' - probably just was putting on a cute face to get us to jump the barrier so he can have an 'easy' meal.

Jo has been taking thousands of photos of the doors of Dublin. All old Georgian Architecture around this city. The weather has been nice the last couple of days - so we have been enjoying just walking everywhere.

Look forward to your comments

Matt & Jo

Yes we are in Boston!

Believe it or not - the New England accent has similar tones to that of us from Australia!

The hotel we are staying at is very close to MIT and Harvard University - so somehow or another we felt some amazing urge to go to the bookstore (Borders) and buy some reading material to expand our craniums. Jo is right now laying on the bed and reading her new found non-fictional book "Now Discover Your Strengths". She is feeling all inspired to work out thyself! She will probably realise that everything that I've told her about who she is - is true. Good things - its all good.

We had enjoyed our stay in New York. The culture and sites are definitely worth seeing. The ques to see the sites are not worth waiting in however. Yesterday we took the subway down to Battery Park to catch the ferry over to Ellis Island to see the Statue of Liberty. The que for the ferry was a mile long. However you should of seen the line to get a ticket, unbelievable! It was a beautiful sunny day, so we got our zoom lens out on our trusty Canon digital camera and took a great photo of the statue of liberty and Ellis Island from the mainland. It sure beat standing in line for 4 hours. We went to Ground Zero and walked around Wall Street for awhile and suddenly Jo's stomach decided to cave in so we headed back to our hotel for her to catch some rest. Must of been the New York hotdog we had in Central park the day before.

Over the next couple of days we are catching up with friends in Boston so hopefully we will get to see the city from how the locals view it!

I'll keep you posted.

Jo should be updating her myspace for photos soon, so check on there for some New York and Niagara photos.

Well he are here in New York New York!

After being delayed for 6 hours or so from our connecting flights from Spingfield - Chicago - New York due to tornados in Dallas - NEw York has been worth the hassle.

The first day we arrived it rained all day, so we went out to see the Natural History Museum and drove around Uptown and saw the sights of Harlem and Central park. THe following day we went up the Empire State building and I (matt) was doing my nut as the lines were ridiculous and we were supposed to skip the lines with our 'New York Pass' - might save you money but you still have to line up and get a ticket! The view on top of the Empire was spectacular. We then drove all around downtown and then went back up to Midtown and stopped off at the Rockerfeller Centre to see the ice rink and then walk back to our hotel.

It as been quite cold with temperatures in the negatives and under 10. This weekend the weather has been amazing with blue skys and sunny days.

Friday we flew up to Niagara Falls for the day. It snowed there about 2 days before and it looked like a 'winter wonderland'. The Falls are always impressive, especially crossing over to see them on the Canadian side. Jo was so stoked that she was playing in snow - she really didn't take much notice of the Falls. I think she managed to take about 300 photos of just snow. Most of the attractions were closed due to snow and ice so we went to see downtown Buffallo - save the trip is just another city centre! Lots of buildings!!! We tought we could catch an earlier flight back to New York so we arrived at the airport at 4pm (our original flight back would be 7pm) and we checked the monitors and alas our flight back got cancelled. They rebooked us on the next flight - which was due to leave at 8pm but we didn't leave the airport until 10.30pm.

Yesterday we slept in after only arriving at our hotel at about 1am. The day was beautiful and we did the NBC studio tour and saw the sets of Conan O'Brien and Saturday Night live. It was very impressive. After that we walked down to Macy's. They have an amazing flower show on in the store with such extravagant displays. Of course the store was packed so it was constant pushing and shoving just to see a blasted flower! We then walked back up Time Square where we had a bite to eat and saw the movie - Horton Hears a Who.

Today we are going to go to Time Square Church which is David Wilkerson's church (Cross and the Switchblade), and then walk around Central Park. It is such a lovely Sunday - so we intend to enjoy it.

Happy Easter to everyone