Europe Backpack - Paris

3-5 Sept 2010 - Paris

Traveling from Liverpool to London, storing our luggage , then taking Eurostar to Paris. By the time we reach Paris, it was already night. After settling down our hostel, we went out to visit Basilisque du Sacre Cuer, and enjoyed the night panorama of Paris - and also visited a sex shop we found on the streets.

Sacre Cuer at night.

Next morning we went to the Sacre Cuer again, which looks as nice as it is during the night. Next stop is Arc de Truimphe, where we went up to have a look. The arc is in the center of 6 roads with even angles. Here we also found out that as students(not expired), and since tomorrow is Sunday, most of the museums will be free for us! We also visited the Eiffel Tower and Napolean's Mausoleum at Musee de Armee.

Napolean's Mausoleum

After spending the time exploring WW1 and WW2 stuff at the museum, the next destination is the Notre Dame Cathedral. The mood inside is really solemn, and I decided to join the Catholic service which was conducted in French. (couldn't understand a word, but experience is quite unique) Feeling spirited, I joined my 2 friends to go back to Eiffel Tower for the hourly blinking and relaxing at the park nearby. There we gathered along with a crowd to listen to a street musician singing nice songs. Not expecting to go back too soon, we went on walking down champ de elyss to the Lourve, stopping to see Eiffel Tower blinking in afar. By the time we reach Lourve, it was already midnight... We called it a day.

The Lourve at midnight.

The next morning, we continued our visit to Versailles. After wasting 2 hours taking a long queue under the hot sun, we found out that we actually we can just enter the palace with our student card.. The palace was grand, and one notable piece of art there is the coronation of Josephine, although the real one is in the Lourve. Too bad the garden is closed; as it looked quite nice. After the Versailles, we rushed to the Lourve, hoping that it had not closed yet. Indeed when we reached there, the closing time is almost there; So we rushed around to see the highlighted arts, especially the Mona Lisa. Feeling satisfied, we randomly choose a place to go (la Defense) to hang around. Not expecting anything initially, we were awed by the structure of la Defense, and the cool architecture of the skyscrapers around. Tomorrow, onwards to Lyon!

la Defense with the backdrop of evening sky.

Last days in Liverpool

1 Sept 2010

As for the last few days in Liverpool, I realized that I haven't visited the museums at Albert Dock. Due to lack of interest in museums by my other pals, I decided to visit them ALONE. After visiting titanic model and learning a few gay words, I headed home, looking at Albert Dock one last time.

Liverpool dockside.

2 Sept 2010

Tomorrow would be the day me and 2 other friend head out to backpack for Europe. Before I leave UK, I wanted to see Merseyside more, especially Chester. But then, my other pals decided to go on nostalgia trip around Liverpool. I resolved to go even without them. (I usually go with the herd, which caused me to miss many things; but not anymore!) One-man trip to Chester!

Upon arriving at Chester, I took a map from the train station and started exploring. Chester was once a Roman fort named "Castrum". During that time, the town was a major trading port. It lost it's importance once the river got shallow. The town has one of the most complete roman walls.

Anyways, I reached a park full of squirrels, looking for something(?). One even climbed onto me. The large park feels nice and peaceful so I strolled around.

.. and found a partly ruined church(St John the Baptist Church), with bodies stored inside walls such as this:

Inside the church is interesting to see, as it is more than 1000 years old. Tombstones of important people and roman eagle standard can be found inside. And stained glass!!

Next point of interest is the Roman Amphitheater, which is situated at the main road, outside the walls. This amphitheater was discovered when upgrading the main road. It was lying beside the road all along! Excavations are still going on this site.

This is about what would the audiences see a gladiator fighting an animal from the seats.

And just right beside the amphitheater is the wall gate!

Finally, the main highlight of Chester. Inside the city I walked around the town looking at Renaissance buildings, visiting the Roman Museum, and walked above the walls to see the River Dee. I also unknowingly wandered into magistrate building court, which was once used by the Romans too. Unfortunately, I did not bring my camera and my smartphone ran out of battery. Therefore I missed a lot of pictures and memories :(

River Dee and the bridge built by Romans.

Roman lock.

What Chester looks like in Roman days.

After Chester, I visited other places such as New Brighton beach, to see the fort, then West Kirby beach, where I walked far out to visit an island only accessible during low tides. Ate a nice Fish&Chip dinner while enjoying the sunset. No photos!! :( By the time I got back to Liverpool, it was dark, and I found that my pals panicked because they couldn't contact me.. Being the last day in UK, I daresay this was the day I enjoyed most during all my days in UK, and comparing the trips I had: Crosby, Whitby, Chatsworth, London, and finally Ireland.... Bye bye UK!

Ireland Trip Finale

29 July 2010 - Galway

In the morning, we walked all the way to Doolin cave (5km!). We saw the largest stalactite accessible to tourist, and currently second largest in the world! (Largest is in Brazil) A generous Irish drove us back to the hostel later after the cave tour :) and off we depart to Galway, our final destination.

Galway is famous for horse races, their pub party is more orderly compared to those in Cork too! I love the night atmosphere, but my camera can't take the night views. We had a 14 euro chinese buffet (which is the most expensive meal so far) since it will be our last day in Ireland!

Horse race in Galway!

Cruiser in the port!

Early next morning we say goodbye to Galway and Ireland, for we are going back to Liverpool..

Ireland Trip 2

24 July 2010 - Cork

After the Guinness Warehouse visit, we went to Cork. Here we made a mistake of not prebooking a train ticket and had to waste more time and money. By the time we arrive at Cork, it was almost dark. We had the best Indian/Pakistani Buffet there, but quickly found out that Cork is not quite our place, since we don't go party, and it's quite chaotic there, with many people from all around the country to go there just for the pub (not to mention we almost spend the night on the street since most hostels are full). The report is slowing us down too, we had to stay late into the night at the hostel just to write our report.

25 July 2010 - Ring of Kerry

We found out that there is a day tour around Ring of Kerry based in Cork, and we were happy. This is because due to many difficulties, we had made a lot of last minute changes to our plan (canceling places, originally including Ring of Kerry).

Charlie Chaplin visited Ring of Kerry too!!

The view Ring of Kerry is so famous about.

26 July 2010 - Doolin

Late in the morning, we depart for a long journey to Doolin, which serves as a base to visit the Cliffs of Moher and the Aran Islands. The evening is not quite suitable for visiting the cliffs because it was very foggy, the visibility is less than 100m! So we stayed in the hostel for the rest of the day. The host there is friendly and helpful, though not our roommate... At around 8.30pm the host gave us a presentation of the Burrens(which is the whole area where Doolin is situated at). We finally completed our reports that night :D (actually I completed it two nights ago) Missed the Irish pub! Regrettable!!

28 July 2010 - Aran Islands, Cliffs of Moher

We rented a bicycle and off we go to enjoy Insheer, one of the Aran Islands. Straight coming back from the island, we took a 1 hour break at the hostel before staring our 10km ride to Cliffs of Moher.

Inisheer: blue seas, quite town, and some derelicts.

Endless road to Cliffs of Moher.

Cliffs of Moher: the picture is unappealing, you have to be there to see it's dramatic scenery!

More to come..

Ireland Trip

22 July 2010 - Belfast

In the end, there is only one travel companion to 7 days trip to Ireland. We fly from Liverpool to Belfast, our first stop. We arrived early at the hostel at about 9am, only to find that we can only check in 10pm, and that caused us to miss the hostel's own tour to Giant's Causeway. Having no choice, we took bus there ourselves. Although we have only about 1 hour there, we had fun nevertheless, and the view is breathtaking.

Dunluce Castle near Giant's Causeway.

Giant's Causeway

At night, we went out for Belfast's night view. Too bad my camera is not good enough to take pictures at night..

Belfast at night.

23 July 2010 - Dublin

We depart for Dublin the next morning, and found that Mary Gibbons tour to Newgrange is not as good as they say. Apparently, somebody made a booking on another time and came today, which means there is no place for us, so we took another tour there, luckily, there was just enough empty seats for us!

About the place, there are three mega tombs, Knowth, Newgrange and Dowth. Sunlight will penetrate through these tombs to their center, lighting up the whole chamber. This period is specific for each of the tomb. For newgrange, it's morning of the Winter Solstice, evening of Autumn Equinox at Knowth, and evening of Winter Solstice at Dowth. We visited only Knowth and Newgrange, because Dowth is not accessible. In my opinion, Knowth is more interesting since it features a lunar calender, and it has two access passages.

Knowth

Newgrange

Sadly, we did not make it to visit Dublin's night view because we had to do report given by our lecturer :(

But hey, we manage to visit Guinness Warehouse which is what Dublin is all about ;)

More to come...

Quest for Ireland

Well, I'm excited to go to Ireland, but there are many things to research. For beginners, we have to know whether we can be getting back to UK if we go out of UK. You see, it is not recommended but generally, tourists just go in and out of UK without any problems. My friends did it before, but I still have to find more info. Then, the places, the accommodation, the prices, budget, and traveling issues.

Crosby Beach

12 June 2010 - Crosby

Yesterday was a fine day for me, which is cloudy for most of the day. We planned this trip because we want to go to the beach. The main reason is that we are not sure if the beach is really a 'beach', that's why we are going to check it out.

We took bus 53 at Queens Square at £1.00 on a single way journey. The journey took less than an hour. And so we arrived. The first thing I noticed is the sand dunes stretched across the beach and a whole lot of iron men across the beach. Example:

The thing about the beach is no water activities allowed, because it's muddy and it seems that sometimes the waves are strong. After almost an hour having fun exploring on the beach, we decided to walk down the path that seems endless.

There are benches along the path with small memorial plates to the deceased people of the town. (we ate our lunch while sitting on those benches) We find that at the end of the path is a town called Hightown. Since the bus service ended long ago, we have no choice but to take train which cost us £2.80 back to Liverpool.

Some random photos of our little adventure:

A faraway town can be seen, I put my penny on New Brighton.

The view as seen on top of one of the sand dunes.

Windmills on the sea.

Rolling hills.

Liverpool

The flight from KL to Abu Dhabi was surprisingly more eventful as expected. After watching "The Last Samurai" on the plane, I got bored so me and my friends went to have a nice chat with the cabin crew. I learned quite some interesting tidbits(ok, I admit I'm quite ignorant); more significant ones are like age limits of air steward and stewardess only exist in MAS, not to mention better pays offered by other airlines, or all the food not eaten are thrown away every flight. I also got to know my neighbours, two business admin girls. (Somehow they ended being my neighbours again during the flight from Abu Dhabi to Manchester)

Nothing worth noting on the flight from Abu Dhabi to Manchester. I spent most of the time sleeping.

Being the first day at Liverpool, it was a tiring one. As soon as we arrived, we went out to explore the city while attempting to buy some necessities. More accurate description is that we decided to go shopping at Tesco without the knowledge of its location.

Reasons to Blog

I just want to write a journal on my travels :)