On Other People

I probably haven't written anything on this before, but Lucy's sister is married to a pretty talented guy who works on special effects for major blockbusters (he has done kick-ass and The Sourcerers Apprentice). I probably haven't written anything on this because I am mildly jealous.

He video calls with major Hollywood directors once a week, I have weekly conference calls with engineers working in the sewage treatment industry.

He took his fancy pants DSLR camera with HD video function on our recent Lebannon trip. Only the first third or so were the bits I was at, but its a pretty good video (though there are too many shots of him with his top off for my liking). It gives you a feel for the craziness of Lebanese weddings.

Famous Borders

In 'the village' we crowded into a sweaty minibus and headed toward the border. We had decided after a little deliberation, that there was no real risk and it should be ok. After a 10 minute journey and one downhill bump start we made it.

The border between Lebanon and Israel was not how I expected it to be. In my mind I saw a desolate strip of wasteland between two huge wire fences. In reality the fence was small and on the other side were the green irrigated fields of Israel and a rather pleasant looking village with sunbaked red roofed houses. A couple of workers were planting next to the fence and though there were a few soldiers and a big white UN tanks, there was nothing that inconspicuous about the scene.

In fact I found it very peaceful. No traffic (its seems to be pretty hard to avoid the traffic in Lebanon, particularly in Beirut), no hustle and bustle - some nice looking villas and a view of a wide valley. Its hard to believe that only a few days before, this very area (a spot no more than a mile or so away) - was the subject of international media coverage, due to this unfortunate incident. The serene fields which filled my view, had actually, in recent years witnessed large tank battles.

The reason for us being at the Lebanese border last week was for the wedding of Lucy's brother to his Lebanese girlfriend in Beirut. Her family invited us out for a day trip to the village where her father was brought up close to the border (you need to show your passport to get into the village). We had an amazing reception from all of her relatives who still lived in the mainly Christian area which was the brunt of a fair bit of military action in the 2006 war. Everywhere new houses were being put up in the place of old, abandoned shells, including a rather majestic looking villa being erected by the bride's father. 

The views were fantastic, though I was told that I couldn't go wandering in the hills, as is my want - for there are still a few land mines around.

Beirut - where we are staying, is now a favourite city of mine. Its a city - full of contrasts. It appeared a playground for rich Arabs, but was also full of culture and history. You are never too far away from a soldier on patrol, a wal full of bullet holes, or the burnt out shell of the old Holiday Inn tower block. 

Beirut is a real party capital. We spent one night partying till 6am with a 3 litre bottle of vodka to keep the 10 of us going on a rooftop club full of rich socialites. You could only get into the club if you booked a table - and you could only get a table if you spent an obscene amount of money on spirits. We did both.

During our days, we took a trip to see impressive Roman ruins in Baalbek (which put the Hadrians Wall to shame), and went to the craziest (and most expensive) beach I have ever seen (where waiters bring you drinks, and there is no sand!).

Lucy at Baalbek

But the whole point of being there, the culmination of the week - was the wedding. The wedding was something out of this world.

For starters, it was in a 5 star hotel, the likes of which I have never seen before. All gold plating, crystal and glass. The kind of hotel which I wouldn't pay for, even if I was a millionaire (the rooms ran from $400 to $20,000 a night).

There were violinists and fire spitters to start us off, then the bride appeared on a balcony high above the crowd, and the music began. Th bride disappeared as the groom entered complete with 4 professional dancers who glided around him whist fireworks threw sparks over the edges of the stage. All credit to the groom - he took it in his stride with no complaint!

And then there was food and free drink all night...

No stuffiness and formality - jost a lot of good food and rum! It was an excellent all round experience.

The Bride and Groom

Big Red

On Heros and Twits

There is a fine line between being a hero and being a twit. A very fine line indeed. 

Simple acts of heroism can be converted into twittishness in the highest order within seconds. Not just twittishness though - extremely embarassing twittishness, which is worse.

Take for example the time my friends and I cycled over Holme Moss in celebration of the Sergeant Major's birthday (lord knows why). We must have been around 11 years old and we slogged our way over the top of the sweaty hill to a long gratifying free wheel on the other side. In order to cool ourselves down, we took a dip in a nearby river - parking our bikes up some way down the road and walking the last bit to a suitable pond.

The Sergeant Major's Dad then came wandering along afterwards in order to enact repairs on the Sergeant Major's broken bike. A gentle type, he got on with his work quietly. Until disturbed by some bruiser of a man who was playing at being a hero.

The man mistook the intentions of said Dad for those of stealing bikes from poor 11 year old kids. He decided that the most heroic thing to do, was to punch the poor Dad in the face in order that he would be forever put off from his thieving ways. Unfortunately, the hero spotted his mistake very shortly afterwards and was forced to beat a rapid running retreat when threatened with the police (we thought this event was hilarious at the time, but I am pretty sure that our friend's dad did not). 

An embarrassed twit, right?

Last week I went on the annual holiday with my friends in a town called Coimbra in Portugal (and once again I came back sick). On one of the nights we encouraged some unfortunate passing Japanese tourists that it would be a good idea to engage in some drinking games with some hardened British drinkers (I am referring to my friends, not to me!).

The game in question was Fu's phone. Its rules are simple. My friend is called Fu. He has a phone.  On that phone is a randon number generator (sometimes known as a stopwatch). He reads numbers out which correspond to numbers pre-allocated to our drinkers. When their number is read out - they have to drink. Simple but effective.

Anyway after playing said game for quite some time with our new friends the highly bemused (and rapidly deteriorating) Japanese tourists we all decided to go to a club.

The clubs in Coimbre, however are a massive pain in the arse. 

Basically the way they have it set up is that you get a card on the way in and every time you order a drink, the barman stamps said card and you pay for your drinks on the way out. Saves time right? 

Wrong. For all that they do is to ensure that every single person in the club has to queue up to pay at the end of the night and tempers flare as people just want to go home. This plays havoc with my mild self diagnosed claustrophobia. There aren't even fire escapes you can break out of - which is worrying.

So, there we were in the club with some inebriated Japanese friends. They seemed to be having a good time when we were in there. Only when we decided to leave we found that one guy had left (we found him wandering the street near our hostel later that night), one guy was sitting in the street with his face in his hands, and the girl that they were with was unable to leave the club as she had lost her card and had no money to pay the extortionate 50 euro fine (incidentally we decided later that if such clubs existed in the UK, everybody would go in drink as much as they could and then 'lose' their card and pay 50 euros to get out).

But more than that, the manager of said club was being rude to the poor upset girl, demanding that she find the money. She came up to me and told me he was making racist comments to her and that he had made some less than above board suggestions as to how she might pay her way out.

That was enough for me. Hw dare he make such suggestions! I got my nearest friend (the Lawyer) as back up and squared up to the manager, aiming to give him a piece of British what for! 

...then I realised who I am and where I was - so I just gave him 50 euros instead. 

The only thing is, that when I woke in the morning (read afternoon) with a light feeling in my wallet, I re-assessed some of my key memories. Memories which were substantially impacted upon by Fu's bloody phone. 

I had gone to bed thinking I was some kind of knight in shining armour to that poor girl. 

I had woken up realising I had just been done over 50 euros.

Of Iron Roads

As we got higher up the mountain, we nervously ploughed into thigh deep snow, putting into practice some of the winter skills we learnt during our course, but this time without the comfort of having an experienced guide directing our every step. We weren't quite sure what to expect and whether the going would get tougher, the snow drifts deeper and the danger or falling down the mountainside on our left, even greater as we wound our way upwards.

The guide book gave directions based upon landmarks, but we must have gone past several, a signpost here, a memorial plaque there, a fork in the road. They were supposed to be ten minutes apart, but it was hard to know what ten minutes should be, being as our progress was much slowed by the snow. Round the corner to fantastic views down the Lake Garda, the guide book said. We could just see grey sky.

The cloud began to lift as we were closing in on our first bit of Via Ferrata. Descend 200m into a large bowl, but be warned, this may contain some snow early in the season. Some snow! It contained massive bloody sheets of ice! It was only on the good advice of the chap in our local outdoors shop, that we even took ice axes. It would have been very difficult without.

The Nurse followed as I chopped steps down the mountainside to the first wired section. 

Via Ferrata routes are essentially long sections of wire attached to steep bits of rock, to which the quick fix climber can attach himself using a specifically designed lanyard. They were initially built in the Italian Dolomites to assist soldiers in the first world war by helping them climb quickly to great height without the use of ropes. This route was considerably newer than this (or at least I hoped so), and I am presuming just set up for sport.

When we got to the bottom of the bowl, we put on our harnesses and lanyards and began our ascent. The first section was a fairly easy chimney, up which the Nurse led the way. 

We then hit a massive patch of snow which was concealing all of the cables into which we needed to clip. The next clipping in point was visible about 10 feet away from us - the only problem being the traverse unprotected accross an icy slope with a massive drop on one side. We decided a much better idea was to spend 20 minutes furiously chopping through the snow to get to the submerged cable. Neither of us was prepared to stand on a slide away to nothing, without at least being clipped on somewhere.

The next pitch up a large crack was a little more challenging. It wasn't quite hard enough for me to think I was going to fall off, but still hard enough for me to spend my climbing time thinking about what the concequences would be, if I did fall off. 

Place hands, place feet, haul self up, look down, remind self never to look down again ... and repeat. It was a fair distance to the top crawling over the edge and making that final clip with no small sense of relief.

'The final pitch climbs at an easier angle', said the guide book. It didnt seem much easier to me with tired arms. The water cascading down the rock didn't assist slow progress, but did add to the adventure.

Wearily we drew ourselves over and walked the short distance to the top of the 2,200m peak. We opened the metal box which contained a climbers log. The last entry - October 2009, meaning we were the first climbers of the season. Something to be proud of I feel, and perhaps this explains why we were wading through virgin snow  the whole way up the mountainside. One thing was for sure, the second group of climbers of the season would have a much easier job digging those blasted cables out. 

We thought to rest until thwarted by an act of nature. 

We looked each other tentatively up and down. Two lonely souls on the highest peak on the range, caught in a thunderstorm! Luckily we had long metal sticks in our hands to ward off the bad weather. 

It was back down for us through hail and snow to sun-burnt girlfriends, cheap red wine and pizza.

We had a number of good little adventures on the trip. But I will save something for future posts!

Curved Ridge

Last week there was a sad story in the news about a couple of climbers who were killed on the descent from Curved ridge in the Glen Coe area of Scotland. I have linked to the story here.
The scary thing about that story is that we were on the exact same ridge on day two of our winter mountaineering course!

When we were on our way down our guide warned us that you should never take the route we took when there is an avalanche risk. When we were there, it was mainly ice with little loose snow layers luckily.

We slid down on our backsides (I managed this video of Andy). The guys who died were on the ridge to the right trying to avoid the avalanche zone:




A few days later we were emailing our guide and recieved this message:

A big dump of snow again last week has made everything really dangerous. You just can't get into anything. The zig- zags on Gear Aonach that we did on the last day is about it, unless you want to get killed. An instructor and client were killed in the Coe on the Buchaillie on the way down having completed Curved Ridge. The corrie we slid down was correctly avoided, but even on the ridge on the right as you look up, which is considered a safe descent, avalanched. A friend of mine was guiding his own party just a few paces behind the others when it happened. Fractured right in front of him, Just a small slide 4-5m wide and only 150mm deep but enough to carry them all the way down the mountain. A real shock to the mountaineering/guiding comunity.

It just kind of proved to us that you cant mess around with mountaineering. The danger is very real.

Fear

On the fourth day of the mountaineering course, our guide thought we were doing pretty well (as we all have a bit of experience in rock climbing) and agreed to let us try one of the most famous winter climbing routes on Ben Nevis, called Tower Ridge. Andy, one of the guys on the course with me had been keen to do it right from the start.

We were joined by a second guide on the day, and being as Graham had retired on day two (due to a sprained ankle on the walk-out), we had three of us to two instructors.

We started early and ascended the side of Ben Nevis towards the start of the route where we roped up. I was on the end of a rope of three (our guide, The Nurse and myself) with Andy and the other instructor following behind. We donned crampons, harnesses, helmets, extra layers and armed ourselves with our ice axes. The weather was good and it was 9am, leaving us plenty of time to tackle the route.

The climbing was not too hard, though I wasn't fully used to jamming axes into cracks and putting my full weight on them and there were a couple of hard bits of climbing near the beginning. All in all we made pretty good ground up until about midday or so.

The View from the Bottom of the Second Climbing Pitch

The difficulty then came that we got stuck behind a really slow moving group of four and as there was no option to overtake on the route - we had to queue to climb the different sections behind them. We must have waited nearly two hours to complete a traverse and a climb up to the top of the 'little tower'. 

The traverse was scary - I had previously thought that I wasn't at all scared of heights up until that point. But with just a few crampon points separating me from a couple of hundred feet of drop below me - I was more than a little nervous. Here is a photo of the traverse courtesy of a photo stolen from the internet (spot the footprints):

Then it all started to get a little worse. The party in front of us held us up so much that our guides told us that we would have to walk down in the dark ... then they told us we would have to finish the climb in the dark. All in all - we climbed for over 3 hours in the dark!

Just Before We Crossed Tower Gap - The Nurse, and above that - our guide

The hardest point of the tower ridge route comes near the end. Basically you have to cross an extremely narrow, extremely exposed walkway into a hole known as the 'Tower Gap', before climbing out up to the top.

The issue here is that I was roped to the back of a group of three, so I couldn't move forwards until The Nurse in front of me was able to move up enough to pull the rope tight. The Nurse spent a total of 10 minutes navigating the Tower Gap whilst I stood with my feet together and my knees shaking on the narrow walkway ... in the dark. Here is a picture of the walkway in the light that I managed to steal:

Although I was roped in and safe - the fear was pretty much building in me from here. Next I had to climb down into the gap and back out of the other side. It would have been a tricky climb in the summer with a pair of climbing boots and the sun-shining. In the dark - it was much worse. Especially seeing as just as I was climbing into the hole - my head torch broke! 

I kept having to take my gloves off (which were essentially ice-balls by this point) to press the button to get the torch to work again and as soon as I put them back on again, the torch would switch off.

I swore ... lots. At one point the head torch went off as I was straddling the gap with one foot either side and one glove half on trying to hook my axe onto a piece of rock quite far above my head. I can honestly say thats the most scared I have ever been. I cacked myself.

I finished the climb short roped to the nurse (about 1m behind him) so that I could make use of his head-torch light) and we walked 2 hours bac down to the car - to get there for about ten o'clock.

It was a brilliant experience though. While I was climbing, all I was thinking was 'mountaineering is crap!', but afterwards - the feeling was pretty great.

A Hughes in Australia

I am just about to set off up to Scotland for the winter mountaineering course I have been harping on about. I have various kinds of implements for bashing holes in the ground, a zillion different types of 'warm layer' and took a wicked trip to the supermarket in which I tried to buy all of the food that had the highest calorie count per gram I could find!

Anyway the upshot of this is that I wont be blogging for a while until I return (hopefuly with some good photos). So in the meantime I leave you with the third video installment of 'Pillock Conquors the World'. For parts 1 and 2 see here and here.

4 Boasts

What an absolutely crappy week this has been. I have been sinking beneath an ever growing mountain of work with a constant stream of people hassling me for things I haven't managed to do yet.

On Tuesday morning I came down stairs to find a magpie on my living room. Bloody big thing it was! The cat was chasing it around to no avail (being as it was bigger than the cat). It must have got in through the cat flap. I finally managed to get the thing out of the patio door (but not before it shat down our curtains) after about 10 minutes of struggle - and get myself off to work.

Lucy informed me that it is bad luck to see a lone magpie (something I was not aware of) and this rang true the next day when I crashed my car on a roundabout I have crossed a thousand times (incidentally, for the last 18 months I had been referring to it as 'the roundabout of death'). Then I spent the whole morning trying to figure out (via about 10 phone calls) who the bloody insurers were for my company car (even our finance director didn't know) as it had just changed the previous week.

But hey, I have managed to line up quite a few interesting bits of time off in the next six months. Each and every one of which I am excited about for different reasons.

In February I will be undertaking a 5 day winter mountaineering course. I recently sold my kidney on eBay to pay for boots, crampons and goretex jackets and am very excited about putting them to good use! I got the following email through from the course instructor today:

"Tower Ridge is a route that I would choose for the course but its a long route, so you will need to still be fit enough by day 4-5 of the course in order to go for it. Try to do as much airobic training bettween now and your arrival." I was hoping to get through it on strength of mind alone. I didnt realise I needed fitness!!

I was seconds from posting up a picture of Tower Ridge and then realised that both my mum and Lucy read this blog and after viewing the pictures - If I post them up I may not be allowed to go!

In May I am heading to Lake Garda and the Dolomite in Italy with Lucy, my friend The Nurse and his other half. He is my regular climbing buddy and we are going to tackle some via ferratta routes before retiring to the lake for some relaxation (and maybe a visit or two to Milan / Verona / Venica)

The best way I can describe Via Ferrata is that its like mountaineering or climbing but with fixed wires and ladders. We did some of it in a past visit to the Tatras in 2007.

In July we do the Hadrians Walk in aid of the Joseph Salmon Trust. I have been enstrusted with preparations and leadership of Team Bandicoot. We are going to be a small team (I am hoping for between 12 and 15 people), but we should get on great and there is nothing I love more than romping through the countryside in the sunshine. Conversely to the Pennine Way last year - we will also get some good nights sleep in hostels rather than tents which will be welcome for most (though secretly I would rather camp).

In late July / August, Lucy and I will be heading to Lebannon for a week - for a wedding in Beirut! This is somewhere we would probably not have chosen to visit (as there are so many places in the world we want to go), but I am really looking forward to it and it will be really interesting to get an inside view of such a different culture.

Apparently we will be spending some of our time in a small border village where we have to get signed in and out. The hills are supposed to be amazing here too, but the warnings about land-mines have kind of put me off somewhat.

So really I cant complain.

Also I just spent half an hour blogging when I was supposed to be working.

A Hughes in Iran

Ok, so my blog posts appear to be following a bit of a theme (you can see the last post on the subject here), but I really like this bit of the film, with the red bus traveling across all kinds of dangerous mountain passes. It seems to pretty much capture the spirit of the adventure.

Plus I got 7 comments on the last post, which is pretty spectacular for me, given that I pretty much never post comments on other peoples blogs (though I do read them!). I am one of those annoying people who sneaks silently through blog posts, keeping myself informed, but never giving my hand away (or at least thats how I like to think of myself).

Blogging time is going to be pretty short in the coming weeks, given that I have just worked all weekend and am most likely going to have to do the same next weekend. I have some good stories all banked up in my mind that I want to transfer to paper, but am having trouble finding time and motivation to spit them all out.

Also, when is a guy supposed to climb god dammit!

Anyway, here is the video. I particularly like the bit about leaving the engine of the bus permanently running to stop diesel and oil freezing.

p.s. For information Clive, mentioned in the first sentence is my uncle.

A Hughes in Afghanistan

I haven't had much time for blogging recently as it has been a pretty hectic Christmas travelling all over the place from Solihull to Holmfirth to Leeds to Sheffield back to Holmfirth and to Sheffield again. Coupled with a couple of trips out and some nightmare new year sales visits to the hellish shopping centre just a small trip from the house. If only I were XXL or XS I would save so much money.

All in all its been a good Christmas I have to say. I have had some excellent climbing sessions and got the opportunity to try out my new crampons in the snow on Mam Tor in the Peak District and went walking with friends and an excellent night out in Sheffield for new year. Maybe Christmas isn't so bad.

One of the things I got from my Dad when I went up to see him was a working DVD (I previously had a faulty one) of 'Pillock Conquors the World', the story of how he travelled on a double decker bus from England to Australia with 9 guys who formed the band 'The Philanderers' when he was younger than I am now. You may have heard me mention it previously.

The footage I find most interesting in the film is the bits where they are traveling parts of the world which would be completely un-crossable in todays political climate. Such as eastern Iran, Afghanistan and the infamous Khyber Pass

At present the Khyber Pass is an area of conflict between the Taliban and the Pakistani Government. The Philanderers drove straight through it in a bright red bus!

This little piece of video shows the passage of the group through Kabul. A prize (consisting of respect) to any non-related person who can identify my dad.

Adirondacks

As mentioned in my previous post, I managed to sneak away for the weekend to Lake Placid in the Adirondack Mountains following a trip to a factory I am working at, close to Montreal.  

The trip basically consisted of me, delayed by an hire car employee who had lost his keys, and by US customs, arriving at the mountains at around midday, and then trying to rush round what was a pretty arduous route as fast as I could in order to make it back before sunset (as I had pretty much no equipment/compass/torch etc).

When I arrived I tackled the Algonquin peak, which at 1,500m above sea level is actually higher than anything we have in the UK (though it didn't feel like it as I think I may have started a little higher than you would do with, say Ben Nevis). Due to the time constraints it was pretty thigh busting on the way up (as I had accidentally chosen the steep side for the ascent), and ankle-breaking on the way down. 

After staying in superb(ly cheap) hostel type accommodation in a local lodge with a random party of 50 year old birthday revellers, I managed a quick ascent of mount Jo the next day before a little shopping in Lake Placid and a the long journey back to the UK.

The amazing thing for a European in New York State in the Autumn, is most definitely the colours. Although I was probably two weeks early to get the full brunt of the autumn reds, There were still some amazing opportunities for photography. Though I felt I never managed to nail that killer shot (considering the scenery around me), largely due to the fact that much of the walking was in heavy bush, I was still fairly proud of these ones:

The View from Algonquin Peak

Outside the Lodge at Heart Lake in the Morning

The View from Mount Jo (if someone could have just cut that damn tree down...)

Heart Lake ... Again

A Chipmunk Near Charleston Lake in Ontario

I am not a great lover of photoshopped photos (bar a little colour enhancement), probably due to the fact I don't own a copy or photoshop (or know how to use it). But I did a little tinkering with a couple of photos I wasn't quite happy with in iPhoto:

Notes from a Small Island

We got back from our Cyprus adventure last night (or early this morning). I am not a massive fan of Cyprus I have to say. 

Due to its colonial past there is a very large British ex-pat population mixed in with the Greek and Turkish residents and large swathes of the coast are covered in concrete apartment blocks, partially completed luxury villas and strips of cheap restaurants and bars. 

Though I don't doubt that there are other aspects of Cyprus we were unable to see, those parts which we did manage to get to within a few hours drive which were not covered in concrete monstrosities were also very touristy though with a little more authenticity and intrigue.

All this, however didn't stop us having a great time as we were also bombarded by the exceptional generosity of Lucy's parents who were out there with us, and paid for a pretty huge villa for the week, and we managed to get up into the mountains which was pretty cool.

I struggled a little with photography, partly because the sun was always so high in the sky and set very quickly, meaning that interesting light was hard to come by, and partially because it was so hot that I couldn't be bothered to exert myself for good angles for photos.

However I did manage to take a few nice ones of Lucy during a sunset at the villa:

This one was taken at the 'Tombs of the Kings' in Paphos, which was pretty spectcular:

Other photos should be available on Flickr shortly (when I get around to uploading them).

On Latvia

I have just got back from a 5 day trip to Latvia and am now in recovery mode. At the moment this involves trying to de-tox by drinking water and eating celery, though this is not working so well...

Riga is a brilliant city however - full of contradictions. On the bad side, the influx of stag-do's into the country as assisted by Ryanair's cheap flights (I may prepare an entire blog post about my feelings for Ryanair) has meant that the city is full of sleazy joints where attractive women feign interest in you to trick you into buying £500 bottles of champagne. The hostel I stayed at has a whole list of clubs and bars that 'you cannot go into or you WILL be robbed'.

This has led to a bit of bad blood between the Latvians and the English and we struggled a little bit to get to see the real city. We weren't helped by the fact that there were seven of us, and we were drinking, and we were loud!

I have kind of decided that I will try to veto foreign stag do's arranged by my mates, as I really think it can affect a place.

On the good side we did managed to do some cool things, like get ourselves into a Latvian nightclub on the 6th floor of some old soviet bloc concrete building, we had some great food and managed to get out of the city to some of the beach resorts which were absolutely fantastic. And unlike when we went to Prague 5 or so years ago, we managed to completely avoid the stags (except in the airport), and by Monday the stags had all disappeared. So it can be done!

Riga is beautiful and boasts some of most beautiful people you will ever see anywhere (and I've been on a fair few different continents). Just don't go where the stag do's do.

Its Cold in Canada

This afternoon I got off work a little early. The client I was working with persuaded me it would be a good idea to drive north to Ottawa to go and see Parliament Hill being as it is the main (winter) attraction around. I am in a very tourism oriented little town on the edge of lake Ontario so there are a few things to do around here. Unfortunately the fact that it is below -20 outside puts a bit of a spanner in the works when considering taking a little boat out onto the lake.

So I thought it would be a good idea to go and take a few photographs. I was hoping to get there by sunset so that I could get some good light. It was a beautiful day today.

So tonight I drove the hour and a half or so north and pitched straight into Friday night rush hour. Coupled with the fact that I left my map at home and I drive (even more) like a granny when forced onto the wrong side of the road – the one and a half hours took more like 2 and a half hours.

Parliament Hill is actually quite spectacular in the snow and with the setting sun behind it. Illuminated by the red sunset and by artificial lights it would of cut a fine picture … only my camera didn’t work as I forgot to charge the batteries. The image, however is burned in my mind you’ll be glad to know.

I basically had to run around parliament hill, as with the wind chill I was absolutely frozen to my core. I have made four trips for work so far. They have been in February twice, in January and in December. I have never really seen Canada above 0 degrees!

But, I am told that the weather is especially cold here at the moment, even by Canadian standards. Yesterday evening, the temperature hit -30, without wind-chill! The funny thing is that the cold is all that people talk about. They say things like ‘Wow its really cold outside, hey?’. I feel like replying ‘You live in Canada!’.

It’s a little like when I get into work in Leeds and people say to me; ‘I can’t believe how much it’s been raining recently!’. I wonder if nomads on the Sahara desert say ‘Boy its dry out there today isn’t it? I am working up quite a thirst!’ to one another while tucking into their camel steaks.

Flashbacks

I wanted to post something up about it being 2009 - a whole brand new year. But I am a little too late on that one.

I have a bit of a hectic post new year time of it, flying out to New Brunswick in Canada on the 2nd for work for the next few weeks.

My enjoyment of travelling for work seems to have diminished for the time being.

This may be because I have taken an absolutely ludicrous number of flights in the last twelve months, and have begun to develop an ingrained hatred of airports. This hatred added to an existing hatred of North American airports that I had before. For some reason being a forgeign passport holder in North American airports means you are subject to a 'guilty until proven innocent' type approach by the (somtimes pretty rude) customs personnel on a power trip. In the UK the staff dont really care about their jobs so much (most of them are temps) which makes getting through a much easier process.

My enjoyment may have decreased because I am working on my own this time, and have nobody to talk to for most of the day (particularly since it is the weekend and I havent started the project yet). I dont mind going to restaurants on my own, but for some reason this time I can't really be bothered.

It may also have decreased because I have stayed in a ludicrous amount of hotels in the past 12 months. I am not a big fan of hotels. I am particularly not a big fan of housekeeping. Surely the aim of a hotel is to make you feel as at home as possible? Well at home I use the same towel for a week, leave it wet on the floor and change my sheets about once a month - so stop bloody waking me up at 08.30 in the morning to clean my room!

No. I jest. The real reason I am not enjoying my trip this time is because going away without Lucy and spending large amounts of time on my own reminds me of my big trip away last year. It reminds me of how hard I found it being apart from her - and in truth it makes me feel a little guilty that she is forced to rattle around our house in Sheffield on her own where she doesn't have very many friends.

Morocco

Its been a while since I have posted up here. Christmas has been and gone, family arguments have emerged and then faded away again. I am a little more tubby and a little more grumpy than I was before. But all in all, fun was had.

Last week I was in Morocco where we stayed i

n an amazing Riad just outside of the Marrakech city walls. Marrakech is essentially one massive maze of small streets and souks (covered marketplaces) which flog a mixture of tourist tat, Moroccan crafts and items for the locals. More often that not when you buy anything from these places you get massively ripped off, but after a while (and much shopping) you begin to understand the value of things and learn to offer a quarter (or less) of what they are demanding. 

The formula seemed to work well for us. Lucy proved herself to be an excellent bargainer (I am particularly poor, being too polite for my own good).

I thought I should post up  a few of the better photographs from the trip. Morocco is a photographers dream, vivid colours and unusual people are everywhere. You can spot snake charmers, storytellers and street apothecaries in the main squares at dusk, and during the day the sunlight breaks through the rough souk roofing an casts all sorts of interesting shadows.

Only one thing prevents the photography -  it is nearly impossible to take photographs of people because they will either a) become offende

d, or b) demand some money. therefore the majority of my photos are of places, animals or of people I have bought something from.  

The Berber village we stayed at, in the High Atlas mountains for one night whilst doing a bit of walking:

The football pitch below is approximately 2300m above sea level. The local kids hike up 

the mountain to the only bit of stone free, flat land available. I just wonder what happens when they lose the ball down the hill.

A couple of mules that we saw on a tannery trip in Marrakech. I guarantee to you that the one on the floor is alive as it lifted up its head about five seconds after I took the photo. I was unsure of its health though as I was for a number of other animals we saw around the city:

A very colourful orange cart:

The main square in Marrakech at dusk. Street performers and street food everywhere:

One of the more interesting souk shop-fronts in Marrakech. I spent about half an hour standing outside it as my mother bartered hard for an amber necklace across the road:

If you are interested, want to see the photos without the sides chopped off, or are a stalker the rest of the photos are on my Flickr page linked on the right. If you have any advice on how to display photos without the sides chopped off. Please let me know at the usual address.

The Land of the Long White Cloud

In an hour I will be setting off back to the UK. I am currently staying with friends in an apartment overlooking the beach. I contemplated doing a run or taking a walk on the beach in my last hour. But eventually settled on writing my final New Zealand blog post.

I recently learned that when the Maori settled New Zealand, they named it Aotearoa. This can apparently be translated into 'The Land of the Long White Cloud' and its easy to see why they chose this name.

As we were driving back towards Lake Takepo on our second to last day, we experienced the Long white cloud in all of its glory. Coupled with the fresh snow on the ground everywhere, it was majestic:

We took another couple of photos from the road:

Our last night we spent in Lake Takepo which is close to the site where the New Zealand Prime Minister's hiking party recently had to give unsuccessful CPR to one of her close friends in a remote mountain hut. There were film crews everywhere.

In the morning we drove up to the observatory on the hill overlooking the lake:

Two Days Two Sounds

Milford Sound

On our second full day we drove the five hours past some amazing scenery to Milford Sound. According to Wikipedia Rudyard Kipling named the Sound (although it is actually  Fjord and not a Sound) the 8th wonder of the world and it is easy to see why. The Maori used to visit the area for fishing in the cold winter months, and European settlers have always been attracted to the area. However it wasn't until the 40's that an easy route to the Sound could be built.

This is because Milford sound is pretty darn remote. Over two hours drive from the nearest petrol station, you have to be careful what to take (snow chain and fuel being essential). The drive takes you over some mountainous terrain and over a pass culminating in  a long tunnel that delves beneath the mountains. I spent some time reading about the construction of the road which was in itself no small feat and took many men, many years.

The beauty of our trip was that because it was midwinter (and around 0 degrees), there were barely any other tourists (as with the Routeburn track) as they were all up at the ski fields in Queenstown. But the scenery is perfect in any weather (provided you have the right clothes), in fact changes in weather made the scenery even more amazing and the trip even more exciting!

Here is a photo of a rainy clearing in the forest on one of our short walks (there will be more up on Flickr when I can get them to upload):

And the Sound itself when the clouds finally cleared:

Lucy chilling out:

But alas, we were unable to go on a boat trip out to the sound, just after taking this last photo, we were informed by the tourist office that the snows were closing in and the road would close at 5pm (40 minutes time) with the potential for being closed for s few days. We had to high tail it out of there.

Lake Manapouri and Doubtful Sound

We were so taken with the sound that we decided to drive as quickly as we could to Lake Manapouri (the gateway to Doubtful Sound) that afternoon. Lake Manapouri is in itself serene and beautiful. I took a nice shot in the morning:

To get to Doubtful Sound from here we had to take a 1 hour boat trip across the lake to the beginning of the Wilmot Pass (a very high pass created during the construction of the nearby Hydro Power station and not connected to any other roads!). And it snowed. And it snowed some more. And we were in a coach (albeit fitted with snow chains). And the road had some of the steepest roads in New Zealand:

From the other side of the pass, we caught another boat for a 3 hour trip around the Sound. We did see some seals, but couldn't see a lot due to the severity of the snowstorm. the captain said that he had never seen snow so far down in the Sound.

But it was beautiful to see and we were visiting the Sound as it is usually seen (it rains 2 out of 3 days there). I took this one of an extremely blue looking little boat against an extremely white background:

Another Slide Show - You Lucky People!

Lucy and I just got back from our whistle-stop tour of New Zealand, we spent most of our time down near Queenstown around which a large part of the Lord of the Rings was filmed (mostly the scenes that involved the Misty mountains and Gondor).

It is absolutely spectacular!

I would like to say that I managed to take some excellent photographs during the trip - but the truth is that the photographs took themselves - I was just pushing the button.

Every drive we went on, everywhere we stayed we saw scenery that we didn't think actually existed. New Zealand is now officially my favourite country ever.

And now for the slide show...

View of Mount Cook

On our first day we set off in our hire car from Christchurch to Glenorchy (1 hours drive north of Queenstown). After a couple of hours driving we passed lake Tekapo and Lake Pukaki. the greenish stones in the lake give it a turquoise hue and the water is the clearest your will ever see. This picture is of Mount Cook as viewed from the opposite side of Lake Pukaki.

The Routeburn Track

On our first full day we drove from Glenorchy and hit the Routeburn track. The full trail was closed to us due to snow and avalance risk, but we did the first day. 

A rockfall at part of the track had removed some of the trees and enabled us to get a good view of the surrounding mountains.

More to follow...

The RouteBURN

I am in New Zealand at the moment. Did I tell anyone I was going to New Zealand? I can't remember, everything has been such a confused mess of activity over the last week or so.

Its Tuesday morning. We spent yesterday (our first full day) doing the first 8 hr leg of the Routeburn track (allgedly one of the top 10 walking tracks in the world). The scenery is like nothing I have ever seen before. It is literally like walking through middle earth!

I can't upload any pictures as yet, but here is link to some (entirely random) photos of the region.