Backpack Storybook

Kilkenny, Ireland - Kilkenny is a great town. It had an upbeat, lively feel to it, helped in part by the number of pubs in the town. One for every 300 inhabitants apparently.

After arriving in the town the previous afternoon, we walked around a bit before our thirst got the better of us and we ended up at a somewhat touristy pub with a live band playing semi-traditional Irish music.

You could tell it was packed with tourists even from the outside as you could hear the swish of Goretex rain jackets and the squeak of brand new hiking boots.

We got talking to two blokes who were a great double act. The first thing Willie, the shorter of the two, asked me was where I was from.

"Australia," I replied.
"Good," he said with relish, "we hate the English!" And he threw his arm around my shoulders and steered me to the bar so he could buy us a drink.

Willie and his mate Derek were great value. They were passionate about their country, saddened about its past and optimistic about its future - representative I thought about the Irish as a whole.

Kilkenny was our last destinition in what had become a too-short visit to Ireland. But we certainly made the most of our time in town. I tasted perhaps the best beer in my whole life, a pint of fresh Kilkenny at Mike the Millers pub.

We took a guided tour of Kilkenny castle, which guards the town from its position high on the hill overlooking the river.

And we spent hours walking through the maze of alley ways, past olde pubs, around frightening gothic churches - all that make this place so special.

Labels: Ireland

County Kilkenny, Ireland - After a hearty Irish breakfast of bacon, sausages, eggs, grilled tomatoes and homemade bread, Jacq and I squeezed ourselves into the hatchback for another day on Ireland's roads.

Our route took us south east to the coast at Arklow. Here we found a gorgeous stone harbour with sailing boats sheltering from the howling wind and high seas.

A quick spell on the motorway got us safely from Wexford to Waterford in the south east corner and then we found the coast again at Dunmore East, another delightfully historic fishing town with a harbour out front and thatched roof cottages along the main street.

Like Wicklow, the south coast was another highlight of the trip. The coast road took us high along the cliffs and then down steep hills to the sandy beaches below. Just past Annestown we spied a tiny, isolated anchorage with boat ramp. A few boats crowded into the lee of the harbour walls. It was one of the prettiest places I had visited.

It was soon after Annestown that we turned north and set the compass for Kilkenny, our destination for the night. We had wanted to go all the way along the coast to Dungarvan, or even Cork, but our progress on the curvy Irish roads was slower than I had expected.

We had probably only covered 80 or 100 kilometres but with stops for photos and lunch it had taken us well into the afternoon.

Jacq was doing an admirable job of navigating too. Although she did take a little while to warm up to it. On the first day, as I was driving us down the motorway at 120kph, holding the steering wheel with white knuckles while trying to work out what the road signs said and which exit we should take, I asked Jacq anxiously "what did that one say? Should we take it?"

"Oh, maybe I should start paying attention," she said leisurely before reaching down to pick up the discarded map from the floor.

And it was the prevalence of place names starting with Glen or Bally or Kil that had her stumped. She often couldn't recall the name of the town where we had been, or for that matter, where we were going. Only that it began with a Kil something. Kildare? Killarney? Kinsale? Kilkenny?

Labels: Ireland

County Wicklow, Ireland - Sometimes you get a real sense about a country as soon as you arrive. Like when the heat and smell hits you like a wet punch in Bangkok. Or you see the the stark trees and brown houses of London in winter.

Ireland wasn't like that. Bombing down the M50 motorway past Dublin in our little green rental car felt like driving on any city highway in Australia. Generic roadside shrubs. Wide lanes, crazy drivers.

But just a few kays from the city outskirts it changed. We started the ascent into the Wicklow Mountains to the south of Dublin and almost immediately found ourselves on narrow country lanes. Ancient stone walls surrounded us either side, the trees arched over us in a rich green canopy, the hills rolled away into the distance.

Wicklow was a highlight of our flying three day visit to Ireland. Unsure how far we had to travel to reach our accomodation that night, I put my foot down and zoomed past many of the sights I now realise we should have stopped at. We saw black-brown hill sides scored from centuries of peat farming. Alpine flowers in white and yellow swayed in the breeze on long, lonely stretches of road out on the top of the mountains.

On the otherside we came down into Glendalough (pronounced Glenda-lock), a valley of twin lakes that was the site of a monastery built in the eight century. Just before the rain set in for the afternoon we toured the ruins and I composed a couple of photos of the famous 110 foot-high round tower, built about 1000 years ago. The valley, the lakes and the stone buildings all combined to make Glendalough quite a special, picturesque area and I got a real sense that we really were in Ireland now.

The rain continued for most of the afternoon but we didn't mind so much as it seemed to add an authentic edge to our Irish holiday. We sped through the winding roads, me occassionally wrenching the wheel to the left when surprised by an oncoming car. The roads really were narrow and it seemed that having two wheels on the roadside vegetation was the only way to pass by safely. Well, 'safely' in terms of avoiding a head on collision.

It was at Avoca, population 500-odd, that Jacq and I experienced a B&B for the first time. We were rapt with the hospitality that Jackie at Ashdene provided during our night there. Within minutes of arriving we found ourselves in her sitting room, drinking tea from a china cup balanced on a saucer on my knee. It was very civilised. And Jackie didn't seem to mind that I as clashing rather badly with her tasteful furnishings with me in my torn jeans, trucker cap and home boy-style rain jacket.

With the rain and polar-like temperatures getting worse, there was nothing for it but to head down the hill to the pub. Fitzgeralds offered a warm atmosphere and cold(ish) beers. Like all good Irish pubs, it was not just a drinking house but a loungeroom for the locals to meet and have a chat.

But geez it was small. Standing at the bar waiting to order my first ever Guiness the punters could barely squueze past me and my camera bag. Bloody tourists eh?

Labels: Ireland

London, United Kingdom - This evening I had planned to catch up with my mate Andy for a beer somewhere in London. Last night he emailed me to ask if I was up for something a bit different. I said I was. And that's how I came to be riding past Buckingham Palace on a purple ladies bicycle with a couple of thousand other cyclists.

Critical Mass operates in cities all over the world. As you might know, the basic idea is that a bunch of cyclists get together (usually the last Friday of the month) and ride through the city. It's been described as an 'organised coincidence', a protest ride or just a good bit of fun.

It's also controversial as the procession of bikes often holds up traffic in the city in the middle of peak hour. But as the London Critical Mass group says, "we aren't blocking traffic, we are the traffic".

This Friday's ride was a big one as earlier in the week the police had a win in the courts, overturning an early ruling that said the ride was legal. The new ruling found that under the Public Order Act of 1986, organisers of any procession must inform the police six days in advance of the date, route and name of the organiser of the event. If they didn't they'd face prosecution.

The only problem is the ride doesn't have an organiser.

We set off from London Waterloo around 7pm and followed a meandering path over the Thames into the city, past Trafalgar Square and on to Buckingham Palace. The route is decided by whoever happens to be at the front at the time. Hence the lack of an organiser.

I spent most of the ride in open mouthed amazement. For the first time in four months of living in London I was able to properly take in the sights, the buildings, the streets, all without being stuffed inside a red bus or dodging pedestrians on the footpaths.

The pace of the ride was leisurely enough that there was plenty of time to stop and take in the atmosphere. I took photos from the hip. Tourists and students on the footpath took photos of us.

At the palace we rode around the giant roundabout for a bit and then continued down to Westminster where we stopped outside Parliament, completely overtaking the normally busy traffic square with cyclists. There was much bell ringing, hooting and hoisting of bikes in the air. This seemed to be the most provocative, protest-orientated part of the ride.

I couldn't be sure, but it also sounded like a car was trapped in the sea of cyclists somewhere down the front. There was a horn sounding and then the revving of the engine, rising to a fever pitch. More cyclists crowded over to the scene, meaning what little chance the motorist had of escaping in his car was now gone.

The interactions with motorists was perhaps the most entertaining part of the evening. At the first roundabout a cyclist rode provocatively in front of a black cab and stopped him from going further, allowing us to ride past in one long group.

This scene was repeated continuously throughout the ride. Police or a cyclist would stop in front a line of cars and hold them. Often you'd hear the cyclist calmly saying "just wait five minutes and we'll be out of your way". Typically the taxi driver or motorist would be half out of his window, face beetroot red, screaming something in return.

But without driving over the cyclist there wasn't much they could actually do about it. As Andy said to me, "cars are pretty useless in situations like this".

As if to prove his point, we soon rode past a jet black Lamborghini Gallardo stopped in its tracks. A £100,000 car capable of 0-100kph in four seconds that wasn't going anywhere. Cyclists had crowded around it take photos and jeer at the driver.

After the second lap of Trafalgar Square it was definitely time for beer and Andy and I peeled off towards Old Street on the east side of the city. We passed a long line of traffic that was being held up by a group of cyclists dressed in traditional cricket creams bowling a few overs in the middle of the street. As we passed the batsman hit a ball way up in the air and it was caught by a passing pedestrian.

We rode on with the sound of an enormous roar from the crowd at our backs, propelling us into the night.

Labels: UK

London, United Kingdom - I think the fact that I voluntarily spent almost a whole day at the markets today says something about me being at loose ends on the weekend now that my two favourite past times of surfing and watching rugby league are temporarily unavailable here in London.

Nevertheless, it was another great day over on the east side (see last fortnight's entry on Brick Lane here). After a week of coldish, overcast days the sun shone and and the sky was mostly blue.

I chaperoned Jacq and my newly arrived sister through Spitalfield markets and then we continued on to Brick Lane to have lunch at some of the fantastic food stalls in the undercover market area.

Later we bought large cans of Red Stripe beer from the off license and stood on the street and watched a band and then drumming-tap crew perform.

More photos can be viewed at my Flickr page.

Labels: UK

Sharm el Shiekh, Egypt - This is my first package deal, and I am a little on the apprehensive side.

Sharm el Shiekh is a tourist resort town on the Egyptian coastline that meets the Red Sea. I knew this. However, nothing could have prepared me for the extent to which this region is developed for tourism.

The entire culture, landscape and authority changes for Sharm, to enable tourists to visit in the manner to which they are accustomed. For example, you don’t need a visa within Sharm. You can drink alcohol despite this being illegal in Egypt. You can wear as little clothing as you like, or nothing if you please, despite the religious requirement for modesty. And lastly, there are no women living here. The men commute to Sharm for work.

Having said all this, Sharm is constructed in such a way that you would be struggling not to enjoy yourself. Everything is opulent. For five nights and six days, I did not have to think about food, drink, water, entertainment. The package deal takes care of everything.

There is something luxurious about being the tourist lazing by the pool, stretched out on a sun lounger, sipping a tequila sunrise. At 11am in the morning.

I have always laughed at such travellers. Held them in that place in my mind reserved for naïve teenagers and pompous affluent bourgeois aristocrats. Well, count me in.

Just around the bay from infamous Naama is Shark Bay, a sandy stretch of beach speckled with grass umbrellas, soft round pebbles, sun lounges and shiesha bars; where the crisp blue of the Red Sea meets desert cliffs descending steeply to coral reef. This is some of the best diving in the world, and it lives up to reputation.

You can’t help but breathe in really deeply. And relax.

Contrast this with a camel ride through desert like no desert I have ever seen. A light brown coloured dusty landscape that is arid and vegetation free. Absolutely flat ground is disrupted only by steep, jagged dark brown and black rocky cliffs that rise ad hoc like sentinels marking fallen soldiers in an ancient battlefield. It has not rained here since 1997. At all.

My week in Sharm el Shiekh was one of the most relaxing weeks of my life. Not such an enriching cultural experience, but a beach resort holiday, for the first time affordable on a backpacker's budget.

Labels: Egypt

Sharm El Sheik, Egypt - For the first time in a long time, the core two-person Backpack Storybook team of Jacq and Rhys split up for solo adventures.

I stayed in the UK and navigated my way through the perils of working in London's depressed inner south while Jacq escaped to the Red Sea for some sun, sand and camels.

Photos by Jacq (Fuji disosable camera) and John (Konica Minolta DiMage).

Labels: Egypt

Paris is a difficult city to explore in just three days.

I naively thought we'd have time to see all the major sights as well as take some kick ass photos and spend long, long afternoons at cafes getting drunk and talking existential shit.

But man, it's a big city. Just walking from the Eiffel Tower across to the Arc de Triumph and then down that famous causeway known as the Champs Elysees to the Concorde and then beyond to the Louve took the best part of an afternoon. And we didn't even stop for food.

We thought the Eiffel Tower was best climbed first thing in the morning, but most of the other long weekend tourists had the same idea and large queues had formed under the giant structure long before the 9:30am opening time.

Once we did get to the top I was buffeted all morning by ruthless Chinese tour groups. The only clue they gave of their impending stampede was a faint rustling of their beige nylon jackets and then they were upon me, all sharp elbows, squawking voices and blinding flashes as they hurried to the guardrail.

The narrow streets around St Germain and the Latin Quarter on the Left Bank were a personal fave, although it was hard not get a feeling that tourism had irreparably altered what once made these suburbs interesting.

But I felt a sense of delight at seeing the cafe chairs arranged side by side in pairs facing out onto the street, something I had seen in guidebooks long before this trip and always thought of as typically French. As Jacq said, sitting on the footpath is all about seeing and being seen, so the French are just making it easier for this to take place.

I thought the area around Republique, where we were staying, was a neat little place. There were some tourist hotels about but it seemed quite French, more authentic.

Next door to our hotel was a little bakery that had apparently recently changed ownership. The young baker was hosting an opening party one evening and as we walked past he invited us to try some bread. His guests were aghast when Jacq said she had a gluten intolerance.

We got talking to one girl, in English, who kept asking what Jacq could eat.

“No bread?” she asked.
“No,” Jacq replied.
“But croissant, yes?”
“No.”
“Baguette?”
“No, no bread.”
“No? But what is there left to eat?”

Labels: France

Paris, France - It came to me as we sat at our table on the footpath, side by side French style, enjoying an evening drink.

Behind us in the smoky cafe the music had been switched off and the TV turned on, showing a news channel which was broadcasting the latest results from the French presidential election. Parisians walking past would stop in their tracks, peer into the cafe to see the latest vote count, shake their head and walk away.

Minutes later, when right wing candidate Nicolas Sarkozy had been declared the winner, the first of the police vans speed past on the road, sirens shrieking, stuffed full with tough looking riot squad police.

The French weren't having it. They were showing their disgust in Sarkozy's plan to do away with the 35 hour working week and bring France into line with Britain and America by taking to the streets (in fact, just two blocks down from where we sat), looting shops and throwing rocks at police.

It was then I realised the French way of life was worth defending If that meant tying a bandana around your face and acting like a hooligan, then so be it.

And if my magnificent honey glazed roast duck with fried potatoes hadn't just been served up in front of me, I probably would have run down the street and joined them.

After three months doing hard time in England, it was a rewarding feeling to go across the ditch to Europe for a three day weekend. The mainland had been enticing me since I arrived in London. The UK was exciting, sure, but it was a similar culture to Australia. I felt like I had stopped travelling.

Getting to Paris was a doddle. Early on Saturday morning we caught our local train up to Waterloo station and then hopped onto the Eurostar. Two and a bit hours later we pulled into Gare du Nord station in central Paris and we were out onto the streets to find our hotel.

At first glance Paris seemed like London, or any other big city. It had the regulation busy roads, roaring traffic, grimy sidewalks, endless shop fronts and above them, apartment blocks.

But after just a few hours of walking around I realise the French do things a little differently, and I liked it.

The emphasis on good food was awesome to see. They apparently bake bread four times a day in Paris and not once did I see an empty patisserie. There was always a line at the counter for a crusty baguette or something sweet. Supermarkets and convenience stores were scarce in the inner city. People bought their food from individual stores and it was fresh and it was good.

If not buying food they were chatting at cafes. I can't recall seeing one person rush past gulping coffee from a styrofoam cup, London-style. And why would you when you can take a break for 30 minutes and enjoy a a shot of coffee, or a glass of wine if it was past 11:30am, and some unhurried conversation with a friend?

The city and its residents were aesthetically pleasing. The terraced apartments with their tall windows, petite balconies and white shutters gave the streets a sense of openness and softness. So pleasant compared to the squat, mean brown buildings of London.

Parisians sashayed past me like they had been dressed by a stylist. Nothing over the top, its just that they wore clothes that were effortlessly stylish. The people who squeezed into too-tight black jeans or, god-forbid, fleece jackets, were tourists. And those wearing fanny packs were American.

As I chewed thoughtfully on my roast duck and watched Paris go about its business from my table, I wondered how anyone, including a hard nosed politician, would want to change a thing about this place?

Backpack Storybook tip: We stayed at Hotel American on Rue Charlot right next to Republique metro stop. It was walking distance from Gare Du Norde and a 20 minute hike down to the Seine and the centre of Paris. Newish rooms and nice staff. Highly recommended.

Labels: France