So I made it home. It was a great trip, I met so many amazing people, did so many amazing things, I'm sure it's something that's going to stay with me forever. Now I'm home though which is kinda nice too. I just need to decide where to travel next!

You can always get me at phawker[a]gmail[dot]com.

Posted on August 25.

Sorry for the lack of updates. I haven't really been doing anything blogworthy since Cornwall. Well until I came to Germany I guess.

So.

I flew out of England on the 19th flying into Frankfurt. I came down to visit my friend from high school, Isabelle, who lives in a place called Giessen. Isa was nice enough to come and get me from the airport and take me back to her parent's beautiful house.

Giessen isn't really all that pretty so the next day we went to see a city called Marburg instead which is pretty close. We got to wander around for a little while and Isa took some pictures. I'll need to get those off her because I've lost the charger for my camera. I might be able to get a few more pictures out of it but I'm not sure.

Isa had to go down to Switzerland on Thursday (the 21st) to take a Spanish exam (she's been in Peru for the past 6 months working on her Spanish) so I decided to come with her and visit a friend of mine who was living in Zurich. Also her Dad was driving her down in his Porsche. That may have influenced me as well. He's got a convertible Porsche Carrera S (really fast) and we went REALLY fast. It was pretty cool.

It was fun to meet Anna (my friend in Zurich) but I wasn't very impressed with Switzerland in general. People weren't very friendly and it was really expensive. Like prohibitively expensive. Also less pretty and less mountains than I expected. I was only there one night though so that was ok.

Yesterday, we went wakeboarding which was a lot of fun. I've been wakeboarding in Canada before (Wakeboarding is to waterskiiing what snowboarding is to skiing). In Germany though, the lakes aren't big enough to take a bunch of boats out though so instead they have a cable that goes around a circuit and you're towed on a course by a rope attached to this cable. It's kinda weird. Fun though.

Today I hitchhiked up to Berlin. It's nice and cloudy here right now but by tomorrow it's supposed to clear up. I've got a couple days planned here then it's back to Giessen to visit Isa for a couple more days then back to Wales. I've decided I'm ready to come home and my ticket is booked for September 6th.

See you soon!

Posted on August 1.

So on Tuesday (the 29th) I hitchhiked down to Penzance in Cornwall. Viv dropped me off at a gas station outside town and I started hitching from there. It took a long time to get going but I lucked out and got a lift all the way to Exeter (just over 100 miles). It took me two lifts (one with a millionaire (seriously) in a fancy Lexus and one with a Scottish Air Rescue helicopter pilot) which got me to Saltash, about 60 miles from Penzance. The train was only going to be £4 from there so I had a nap on the train.

I arrived in Penzance to a break in the clouds and beautiful sunshine. Within 20 minutes though it had clouded back over and started to drizzle. I met up with my couchsurfing host, a really nice guy named Flinn and we went out to meet up with some of his friends. The group "hangout" is in one of his friends' conservatory where I spent a lot of my time in Penzance (it rained most of the time).

The rain was ridiculous too. It seemed to switch between the standard constant English drizzle and almost sub-tropical torrential rainshowers. I can now see how it's so green down there. I got soaked mutiple times.

A group of Flinn's friends were going to a fancy dress music festival (eh?) and there was a Japanese theme. One guy had decided to dress as a samurai and the others had decided to band together and go as Pearl Harbour (they had a girl dressed in white with pearls and stockings with ships on them and the rest were dressed as Japanese airplanes). I spent a few good hours drinking and helping craft and paint airplanes out of cardboard.

I didn't end up doing that much sightseeing (and therefore didn't get many pictures, oops) because of the rain but I did make it up to St Ives which was really beautiful. Even Penzance itself was really nice though I think it might be a bit of a place that's nicer to visit than to live.

All in all though, I saw a lot of pubs, drank a bunch, and had a great time.

I've got a friend in Germany I've been trying to visit for ages (she's been in Peru while I've been here) and she comes back next week so I've got booked my tickets today to head back to Germany (Aug 19th). From there it's either Sweden or Italy (probably Italy first) and then, to be honest, I'm contemplating coming home. Don't get me wrong, I'm not really homesick but I'm kinda feeling like I'm ready to get on with my life.

Ah well, we'll see how things go.

Posted on July 21.

Things have been pretty quiet in Portsmouth, hence the lack of updates. I got a job bartending at a nightclub downtown called Route 66. It's pretty fun, the hours take some getting used to though. I don't get home until 4:30 or 5AM so it makes sleeping difficult.

I've decided to hopefully start traveling again sometime around mid August so I've given up on getting another job. I'm doing about 20 hours a week at Route so I can still make a bit of money and travel a bit around the UK perhaps before I hit Europe again.

I still really want to see Sweden, Italy and visit a friend in Germany so we'll see how things go.

Right now I'm planning a trip to Cornwall for next week. I hear it's pretty nice. Time to try hitchhiking the UK!

Posted on July 10.

Sorry it's taken me so long to update, as a result this post may be long. Be warned.

So.

I spent a good week in the UK resting up before heading to the festival in Belgium. I dropped off a few resumes and (hopefully) got some interviews lined up now that I'm back.

Thierry and I made shirts for the 4 of us coming from Portsmouth (Me, Thierry, Simon, and Colin). On the front they said "Got Tent?" with a picture of a tent (a parody on the old got milk ads) and on the back it had our names, country flag, the couchsurfing emblem and the saying "Making Werchter a better place, one tent at a time". This came from the couchsurfing saying "Making the world a better place, one couch at a time".

On July 2, I headed off with Thierry and Simon (both couchsurfers) to roadtrip to Brussels. We drove from Portsmouth to Dover then took the ferry to Calais. From there we drove on to Brussels to stay with some friends of Thierry's for the night before heading to the festival.

We did some shopping to provision ourselves for the following 4 days (8 crates of beer between 5 and some food) and then headed out to the festival. The festival was being held in a small town about 40Kms East of Brussels called Werchter. It's been going on for 35 years now or something.

We arrived and met up with some of Thierry's friends and a bunch of couchsurfers and proceeded to set up camp. All in all there were about 40 of us which was pretty cool.

The festival itself was amazing. There was music from noon until about 2AM over two stages, a big stage for the larger bands and a smaller marquee for up and coming bands. There were a few conflicts deciding what you wanted to see but overall it wasn't too bad. Drinks were reasonably expensive at the festival but if you collected 20 plastic glasses you could trade them in for a free drink so I did a lot of collecting.

A couple bands I would recommend that you may not have heard of:

The Editors - From England I think, check out "Munich" and "Bullets"
The Kaiser Chiefs - One of the best bands of the show "Ruby" "I Predict a Riot" "Everyday I love you less and less"
Kate Nash - Not normally my kind of music but look at "Mouthwash" and "Foundations"

There was lots of dancing, lots of drinking and lots of people! I made my way up front for Radiohead (arguably the biggest band that played there) until I was 3 rows back from the stage and I can see how people die sometime at these types of things. It was honestly so packed I couldn't move. If I had wanted to get out I wouldn't have been able to. There was a girl next to me who fainted and I had to get some guys to help me lift her up so she could be crowdsurfed out. It was crazy. It got so hot that security started passing out waterbottles that were passed back to hydrate people. When the band played you didn't really dance yourself so much as the crowd danced and moved you along with it. Which was kind of a cool experience too I suppose.

It was seriously awesome overall though. All too soon it was over. It would be easy to get used to going to concerts everyday. Monday morning we packed up and headed back out. I had planned to catch a ferry from Le Havre (in France going directly to Portsmouth) but wasn't going to be able to hitchhike all the way there in one day so I organized to spend one night in Paris before going to Le Havre on Tuesday. It's weird to think of Paris as a city and not as "Paris" if that makes any sense.

En route from Brussels I got a ride with a really cool couple who were shooting a documentary. They'd been in Algeria the day before and had driven all through the night to get to Brussels. The man had been doing all the driving though because the woman only had her learners license. She had been driving for the last 20 Kms though and when she pulled in to get gas, hit the curb and got a flat tire. When I asked if I could get a ride with them the man asked if I knew how to drive and when I gave him the affirmative handed me the keys and went to sleep in the back seat. So I drove 200Kms to Paris.

Tuesday I hitchhiked to Le Havre and took the FIVE AND A HALF hour ferry (ugh) to Portsmouth. Wednesday was spent sleeping and recovering because I think I'm getting a little sick. Today I'm going to print off some more resumes and go job hunting again. I think. I might put it off until tomorrow.

Lots of new pictures up HERE.

Posted on June 26.

I know, I know. I've been getting lazy with posting pictures. But now I posted some! So no more complaints.

You can see the new pictures on Facebook or HERE.

Posted June 23.

So my plans changed a bit. It turns out the ferry was going to cost £78 and flying back to England was going to be 50 Euros. Hmm...

I headed up to Mainz on June 18th and got to see Frank and Charlotte (they both stayed with me in Canda with some of their other friends). I stayed at Frank's parents house and was a little spoiled by his mother (she did my laundry).

I explored around Mainz, drank lots of German beer, and relaxed. It was nice.

Saturday we went out during the day, played some squash in the afternoon and then went back to have a traditional German asparagus dinner. It was excellent. I was leaving Sunday so we went out Saturday night as well. My bus was leaving at 3:00AM so I stumbled to the bus stop from the club and groggily got on the plane. You develop a strange sense of humour when you're exhausted (and slightly drunk) which you'll see when I get some of my photos uploaded.

I made it back to Portsmouth at about noon on Sunday (still with no sleep). Viv was having a little party at her place so I socialised for a few hours before going upstairs to put on some sunscreen. I sat on the bed and promptly fell asleep until 7:30. This turned out to be good though because a new episode of Topgear was airing at 8 so I was just in time.

I get to relax this week and get prepared and then next week it's off to Belgium!

Whoo!

Posted June 17.

So from the limited response I've gotten from my email campaign, my visa doesn't help me and I'm limited to 3 months.

Shitty.

Anyways I successfully hitchhiked from Wageningen down to Heidelberg in Germany (about 500KM) on Friday. I met some pretty cool people all along the way. I got picked up by a Polish truch driver who barely spoke English for a little while. He pointed to the radio and said "Polish techno" and we sat there and listened to Polish techno for half an hour. It was fun though. Then on the completely opposite side of the spectrum, I got picked up by a CEO of some German company in a BMW M5 (expensive car). He took the car up to 250km/h to show me that the Autobahn can be exciting.

There's a strong CS community here in Heidelberg so I've spent a lot of time hanging out with them as well as my host, Clarissa's, friends. It's kinda like Lisbon where we've been drinking in the streets except in Heidelberg it's so expensive to drink that only people with careers are out. Which is too bad. And bad for the budget.

Last year I had a bunch of German couchsurfers come and stayed with me (5 of them arrived in a van). I got to meet up again with one of them, Uli, who's studying in Heidelberg. Hopefully I'll get to another one, Frank, tomorrow as well.

I've been wanting to find a music festival to go to for a while and I finally decided on one in Belgium called Rock Werchter. It's in the beginning of July and costs €165 (about 230). Which is expensive. But it's 4 days long and has a great line-up. You can see the site HERE . It should be fun.

I think I'm going to head back to England for a few weeks to get prepared for the festival and to "save" some Europe travel days. It will be nice to stay in the same place for a few days as well.

I haven't really taken too many pictures but I'll try to remember to take some more. It's hard playing tourist.

Thursday I need to make another 500Kms hitchhiking. Wish me luck.

Posted on June 12.

I found a place in Amsterdam for 2 nights and went up there on Tuesday. My hosts were great and I got to explore around Amsterdam for a couple days which was nice. Hitchhiking there I met two conspiracy theorists who drove me quite a ways (though they refer to themselves as "truthists"). They were pretty cool and tried to convince me that the moon landing and 9/11 were all fabrications. I got driven the last 30KM by a guy who was going to Amsterdam to take his vintage Porsche on a marathon for 5 days. Unfortunately he picked me up in his shiny Volvo rather than his vintage Porsche. Ah well.

Amsterdam has a lot of canals. It has more canals (I'm told) than Venice. Go figure. Amsterdam was tremendously touristy. Usually there is a tourist core to most big cities but Amsterdam was touristy through and through. It was nice though and I got to see some really cool stuff. In Amsterdam, squatting is legal (but there are rules). The house needs to be unoccupied for at least 1 year and you need to APPLY to SQUAT a house. ...?

Anyways, my hosts in Amsterdam were members of an anti-squatting organization. House owners hired the company who in turn found people (in this case my hosts) to stay in the house so that squatters can't live there. When a house is available they'll call you and give you 10 minutes to decide if you want to live there or not. Then you have to move in the next day, sight unseen. And if the owner wants his house back for whatever reason they only need to give you 2 weeks notice that you need to find a new place to live. Cheap rent though.

I went to the British Consulate twice while I was in Amsterdam trying to figure out my visa question. The first time the Consulate was closed (It's open from 8:30-12:30 then from 2:00-3:00). And the second time I was informed that the Consulate will only help British Nationals (my visa means nothing, which I kinda figured) and the visa office requires an appointment with a 5 week waiting list.

So I gave up and found a computer and sent off half a dozen emails to various offices trying to find the answer. So we'll see. On the plus side I had a nice walk through a huge park trying to find the Consulate. That, on the other hand, was quite nice.

Today is my last night in the Netherlands because tomorrow I've decided to press on to Germany. I met an American couchsurfer in Paris who lives in Heidelberg, Germany so I think I'll go see her first then perhaps head up towards Berlin.

We'll see.

//Edit

I forgot to mention this part. Feel free to ignore this if you like, it's about the Dutch education system and it's a bit of a rant.

The Dutch are very liberal about a lot of things (drugs, alcohol, prostitution, hitchhiking, etc) so this strikes me as weird.

At the end of Primary school in Holland you take a series of tests. Based on the results of these tests (and the recommendation of your teacher) you're put in 1 of 4 different secondary school curriculums. The lowest curriculum is taught mainly practical skills. Skills that use your hands such as woodwork, metalwork, cooking, etc. Very little math, language and such. As you get to the higher curriculums, you get less practical skills and moe theoretical skills (Maths, etc).

Also the lowest curriculum is 4 years long whereas the highest is 6 years long. To me it seems like the smart kids get the best chances and schooling and the less intelligent kids don't even get the chance to better themselves and are stuck in a labour job. Also vice-versa if there is a smart kid who really likes doing woodwork he isn't able to. To make matters worse, each curriculum has 4 "profiles" which is the set of classes you take. You have the option to take a few electives (like in Canada) but nowhere near the flexibility that you get in Canada. You choices are things like "Economy" (lots of math), "Culture" (lots of history) and things like that. In the end you've only got 4 types of students and very limited diversity. You wouldn't be able to take both Calculus and Cooking.

From what I've been told, the students also don't really associate with students in the other curriculums. They are all segregated to their own curriculum and they move through their classes together. Also the better teachers, naturally, teach the higher levels and the poorer teachers teach the lower levels so not only do the lower levels get a more basic education but they get a poorer one as well.

And now for the kicker, SIXTY PERCENT of Dutch children take the lowest level of education. Only 10% take the highest level.

I'm sure someone smarter than me designed the system so it must make sense but honestly looking at it from the outside it seems like a really fascist, segregationalist and stupid system.

Anyone have any ideas?

New pictures are up HERE.

Posted on June 9.

So it turns out that the Netherlands is 238 times smaller than Canada. I mean I always new it was small but it's SMALL.

On Wednesday I recovered from the night before and had a nice relaxed day. I know all my days are precious but at the same time it was really nice to be able to have a day to just relax.

On Thursday I decided to head to Den Hague to ask some visa questions. My problem has always been that I can only travel within the Schengen Union for a total of 3 months within a 6 month period. So for me this means I can travel from for a total of 90 days between April 29 and October 29. Which sucks

I found out though that if you have a work visa for one of the Schengen countries the rules are different. Now I have a UK visa and the UK isn't actually part of Schengen but British people don't have the same Schengen restrictions either so I thought I may as well ask. My plans will be entirely different if I can travel for longer than 3 months.

So I hitchhiked to the Hague (in the rain) only to find that the British Embassy was there but not the Consulate. Bah. So I wandered around the Hague for a while, hitchhiked the Rotterdam and spent an hour or so there before hitchhiking back to Wageningen. Such a small country!

While traveling in Portugal, I met a dutch woman named Carolina so on Friday I went to visit her in her little town of Ammerstol (between Utrecht and Rotterdam). I spent a couple nights there and she took me to see Rotterdam (cool and very modern looking, it was bombed during the war and rebuilt very modern-y) and the Hague (we went to the beach where it was warm but foggy, really weird).

I'm having trouble finding a place to stay in Amsterdam but I'm hoping to head there tomorrow (if I can find a place). Afterwards perhaps on to Germany? I'm not sure. I guess it kinda depends on how things go when I go see the British Consulate in Amsterdam. Wish me luck.

I'll see if I can put some more pictures up tonight.

Posted on June 4.


My last few days in Paris were really fun. The weather got a little better as well which always helps. On Friday, I met some fellow Canadians and wandered around with them for a bit. It was nice to talk in English for once! Afterwards I met a Parisien girl for a coffee and had some great conversations. This is what I love about couchsurfing, you meet so many cool people!

On Saturday an American girl living in Germany, Clarissa, came to stay with my couchsurfing host. My host, Norbert, had a friend who gave city tours so we went out and got a brief history of downtown Paris which was really interesting. That night we went out to a concert (small one) with Clarissa and had a great time. I spent too much money though, as I said before Paris is a little pricey. Sunday Clarissa and I explored around Paris seeing some of the big touristy stuff I hadn´t seen yet and just enjoying ourselves.

On Monday I hitchhiked to Lille (north of France) with the intention of heading through Belgium the following day. After, the plan was to go on to Holland where I have a friend I wanted to visit. I got a message from Ernest, my dutch friend, though suggesting that I come earlier because they were having a huge party. So I figured why not? Lille was kinda cool but I didn't really have much time to spend there and set of early the next day for Holland.

I arrived in Wageningen (small dutch student town) in the afternoon and was able to help set up for the party. The house where Ernest lives is really neat. There are 9 roommates in a big old house but it's more like a little family than just living with other students. They frequently eat together, there are photos of the group of them all over the house and they act like very family-like towards each other. I was almost a little jealous.

Man though, Dutch people know how to party. We had about 60 cases of beer (24 beer in a case), 100 bottles of wine and a cocktail bar. They had put up advertising around town and had rented music equipment, lights and all sorts of stuff. Before the party actually got started, all the neighbors had been invited over for a free drink in hopes that they didn't call the police. It was cool seeing a little 80 year old woman show up with a bottle of Czech alcohol as a present, have a beer and talk chat with the young people and then head home to try and sleep. Hah, good luck.

People started showing up around 9 and the party went until probably 5:30 or so. I've never danced to much in my life. Naturally though, this morning there was a bit of cleaning up to do.

Today I'm going to take it easy, relax a bit and hopefully figure out my plans for the next week or so.

For now though I'm hungry...


Oh, new pictures can be found HERE.

Posted May 31.

So I spent a couple days in Bordeaux with an awesome couchsurfing host. He was really laidback and we got on really well together. It rained most of the time I was in Bordeaux which kinda sucked but it was still a really pretty city.

On Wednesday I headed to Paris and hitchhiked the whole way! I was quite proud of myself. My hosts here so far have been great and it was actually sunny one day!

On Thursday I went to see the Louvre (very, very big) and the Mona Lisa (very, very small). I ended up meeting an American girl and we explored around Paris, got a bottle of wine when it started to rain and enjoyed it under a tree in the park.

It IS really expensive here though. For example, a CAN of coke in a cafe will cost you about 5CAD. Ugh. Wine is about the only inexpensive thing.

I'm thinking of spending the next couple days around here then heading towards Belgium on Monday.

We'll see.

Posted May 25.

So I left Andorra on Thursday and made it to Toulouse that afternoon. My hosts in Toulouse, Guillaume (nicknamed Mouts from his last name Mouton (Sheep)) and Bea, were awesome. They're planning to leave in the next 4 months or so to take a 10 month trek through the Americas (plural) so they have huge maps all over the walls detailing their proposed journey.

Friday, I went to take a look around Toulouse and met up with a Couchsurfer from Colombia named Martha. We toured around Toulouse, got crepes and enjoyed the sun. I went out with Mouts to a poker night Friday night and lost 5 Euro. Saturday it was raining but another Couchsurfer I had contacted, Emilie, had offered to take me to see a castle (Montsegur) south of Toulouse so we went to do that. It was a bit wet and very foggy but we got a guided tour and it was really interesting. It was too bad the fog was so thick because it would have been a great view otherwise (it's on top of a mountain, 1200m up) but was cool nonetheless.

We had a little party at Bea and Mouts' Saturday night and Sunday I left for Bordeaux. I hitchhiked all the way here and it worked out really well! I met some cool people and saved money. Awesome.

Current plans are to stay in Bordeaux til about Wednesday then head to la belle Paris!


Couple new pictures up on Facebook and HERE

Posted May 22.

The circus we went to in Reus was actually Trapeze artists from all over the world who came together in this tiny town in Spain for the weekend. Some of them were really amazing but they were hard to take pictures of because they were moving so much. I think I got one or two though. I made it back to Tarragona and wandered around there for a bit the next day before catching the late train to Barcelona.

I didn't meet my host in Barcelona, Frederic (from France), until late and we started having a great chat. He had to leave for work at 7AM so when we were still talking at 5AM we decided to make it a night and went for a walk in the early morning. After Fred went to work, I went to talk a look around Barcelona. I was pretty tired though so I decided to walk towards a park which was recommended to me as having a nice view. It wasn't far on the map but it took over an hour to walk to. Ugh. But I made it and had a nap. I completely forgot to take a picture of the view though. Oops.

I made it to the bus station and was all ready to head to Andorra when I got a call on my cellphone from a couchsurfer named Juliane. She offered me a couch for another day if I wanted and, since I hadn't really seen ANYTHING in Barcelona yet, I decided to go for it. So I changed my ticket and met up with her that afternoon. We had lots of fun, I got to meet some more couchsurfers and see a bit more of Barcelona.

Tuesday, I left for Andorra on the latest bus and didn't arrive until 11PM. Even at night, Andorra is really pretty. The country is only 400km^2 and it's nestled in the Pyrenees. You could almost argue it's a city-state because the space between "towns" is so small. Andorra's economy relies mainly on tourists. I really got to see that yesterday when I went to look around. The capital, Andorra la Vella (Andorra the old), is mainly one big outdoor mall. Mostly they sell booze, tabacco and electronics. Just about everything is duty-free so it's pretty crazy.

For example, you can buy 4.5L (LITERS!) of decent vodka for €25 (about 35 dollars). The bottle is so big it can't really be practical. You can get a carton of name-brand cigarettes for €15. Cheap cigarettes they practically give away. Electronics weren't that cheap, compared to Canada but compared to the rest of Europe they were have the price.

Today I'm heading (finally) to France. I really wanted to hitch-hike, I had my signs made and everything, but the roads in Andorra are practically impossible to hitch-hike on and I missed the bus that goes to the French border. I can still catch a bus directly to Toulouse (my first French destination) but that's nowhere near as much fun. And it's expensive. I'll have to try again once I make it to France.


You can see my last Spanish pictures HERE

Posted on May 17.

So it's getting harder to get time to post but I'm doing my best.

So.

First some observations:

1) Wine is everywhere. At times it's cheaper to buy wine than it is to buy water. How weird is that? And it's not "bad" wine either. You can get a 7 year old bottle of wine for less than €10. Because of this you drink wine with lunch and dinner. I almost feel bad asking for water because it might have cost more.

2) Spanish people are labelled as lazy. They aren't. When they work they work really hard. They just don't work as often as most other people. I am undecided as to whether or not the intensity of the work they do do equals the amount of work a North American person would accomplish in a full day though.

3) In Miraclcamp (you'll read about it in a few minutes), they play some music that you can hear over the whole village when someone dies. It's a sad song in Catalan and then they announce who has passed away. Since it's such a small village, generally you'll know who the person was. There have been quite a few deaths recently and people are a little down.

Ok now what's happened in the past week:

I ended up staying in Salamanca for 5 days (longer than I expected). The weather was so-so but I was having a lot of fun with Vlad and Sara so it was ok. It was kind of funny though. During my stay in Salamanca I barely met any Spanish people. At the CouchSurfing meeting there were mainly international people and only one Spanish girl. And she was only there because a Mexican guy brought her as a friend of his.

Tuesday, I headed to Valencia. I stayed with a great guy named Alberto. Alberto was just finishing his studies in Architecture so we didn't have much time to hang out but I still had fun talking and eating with both him and his German roommate, Dominik. Alberto lived near the old city centre (which used to be surrounded by a big wall) so I got to spend some time wandering around there.

On Wednesday it started to rain so I went for shelter under the back of what I thought was a museum (I'm still not sure what it was). I met some Dutch girls also hiding from the rain there (Jennifer and Karen) and spent the rest of the day exploring Valencia with them. Thursday we headed to the beach which, even though it wasn't very sunny out, was still nice and warm. I had a good sleep Thursday night and then hopped on the train to Tarragona Friday morning.

Unfortunately, coach (called Turista) was full so I ended up paying €55(!) for my 2 hour train ride. Stupid trains. Now my budget is all thrown off for the week. I did get a meal, more comfortable seats, and a movie ( Bee Movie in Spanish) but I would have rathered saved the money. I met the members of the band "Reverendo Moe" though which was cool. They had just won a Spanish American Idol-type show and were heading to Barcelona to film a music video or something. They couldn't have been too famous though because they were pretty nice.

I arrived in Tarragona, took a look around town for an hour or so then headed to Miralcamp, a small village of 1000 people where my host, Anna, was going for the weekend. Most of her family didn't speak English but they were very nice and cooked Escargoch for lunch which (you guessed it) is snails. Snails taste kinda like chicken. No I'm kidding they don't have much of a distinctive taste that I could tell, but they have an interesting texture. I ate lots of them though.

Today we're going to hang out around here until 18:00 then head to a place called Reus to see an outdoor Circus then back to Tarragona for the night. Tomorrow I'm heading to Barcelona, I've got half a day to look around then I'm off to Andorra.

The plan is to be in France by Wednesday but we'll see how it goes.


You can see new pictures HERE.

Posted on May 10.

On Monday, I met up with a couchsurfer named Vera for a coffee. We got along really well and I ended up staying with her. We cooked vegetarian food (which actually wasn't that bad) and watched an American show called Weeds. It was pretty funny.

I spent the next couple days exploring Lisbon but didn't do many of the "touristy" stuff. On Wednesday I went to the Castillo de Sao Jorge but that's it. I'm finding that I'm enjoying meeting people, trying to learn the language and learning about the culture than being a tourist. Ah well.

On Wednesday I was pampered by a couchsurfer named, Margareth. She picked me up from the train station, cooked a huge dinner, and packed me a lunch for the train ride the next day. She was very sweet. I took the train to Salamanca on Thursday and to my chagrin the train left at 4PM (I thought it left at 11:30AM and had arrived at 10:30AM) and didn't arrive until midnight!

The train ride itself was actually a lot of fun. I chatted for the first hour with a girl who was going to a horse show and to play her viola. But she was a law student. She was really nice though. I was later joined by a Canadian couple from Toronto (originally from France and Italy though) and they helped entertain me on the rest of the train ride. They had done a lot of traveling and had some great stories to share so the time went by fairly quickly.

I was picked up by Vlad in Salamanca and went to bed. Yesterday Vlad (a photographer from Russia) and I went out in Salamanca for a bit and met a Brazilian girl for coffee and the afternoon. Vlad had some amazing stories to tell about his travels and has a really cool story about how he met his wife. It shows that when things are meant to be, they will be. That night we (Vlad, Sara (his wife), myself and some friends) went out to learn some Spanish dancing. It was fun even though I wasn't very good but I blame it on my shoes not being able to stomp satisfying enough.

Today it's raining but there a Couchsurfing gathering tonight so that should be fun. I'm thinking of spending the weekend here and heading on to Valencia next week.

You can see new pictures on Facebook and HERE.

Posted May 5.

Friday morning I headed out with my couchsurfing host, a couple other couchsurfers and friends to see a Convent on a sera (I think, it means more than a hill, less than a mountain). Regardless of what it was the view was amazing. It was sunny enough out to be warm but with a bit of a breeze to keep the temperature comfortable.

Maré (my host) had a friend that worked at the convent otherwise we wouldn't have been able to see it. Though not closed to the public it is very difficult to be allowed to go see it and I was extremely fortunate that I was able to.

The convent was built in the 12th century, the 14th century and most recently in the 16th century. I have no idea how it was built that long ago. It was a large inter-connected set of white washed buildings overlooking the ocean and the monks that used to live there would live lives of silence and chastisity. I wouldn't have lasted long.

Saturday I came to Lisboa (Lisbon in English, the capital of Portugal) and after dropping my stuff off went to look around. Lisboa, like any large city, looks fairly modern. Broad streets for the most part in the newer section of town, tall buldings and, for some reason, banks EVERYWHERE. Saturday night there was a Couchsurfing meeting so I got to meet the Lisboa Couchsurfing community (about 30 people) and then we went out to enjoy Barro Alto, the party part of the old town. Here the streets are very narrow and the bars are so small that you go in to but a drink (1€ for a beer) and then bring it back out to the street to drink it.

There were people selling drugs everywhere, usually standing in the middle of a street intersection. If you make the mistake of making eye contact, they'll come up to you and say "Coke, Hash?" When you say no, they don't pursue you or hassle you but they're very open about what they're selling.

I'm going to be in Lisboa for the next couple days then I think I'll head into Spain.

There are new pictures you can see HERE.

Posted on May 2.

So. I flew into Faro on Tuesday to glorious sunshine. I was met by my couchsurfing host but he had work to do so I went and wandered around the city myself. Faro is quite nice, but very touristy. Most signs are in English as well as Portuguese and there are tourists EVERYWHERE. I went around with my host (Jose) in the evening (went to the beach and stuff) and his mother cooked a wonderful homecooked Portuguese dish with cod (and I don´t even like fish).

Wednesday I took the train to Lagos (the the west of Faro) and there you can tell why people come to Portugal. White sand, emerald water and sun sun sun. I needed to make it 300 km north to a place called Setubal by that night but I didn´t have quite enough money in my daily allowance left for the bus. I decided to try hitch-hiking a bit of the way to make the bus cost less. I got picked up a few times but in almost 3 hours I really only made it 60 km east and not north at all! I ended up catching the bus from Abufeira (which cost .50€ less) and made it to Setubal alright.

Yesterday a bunch of couchsurfers and their friends came to Setubal to go on a dolphin watching expedition. It took us a while to find the dolphins (called golphinos in Portuguese) and I was resigned to just enjoying the sailing but it was such a treat to find the dolphins. They danced and played around the boat and I got lots of great pictures. I´ll see if I can get them up this weekend. When you have a big enough group in Portugal you can make a deal with a restaurant to set a rate for each person and they´ll let you eat and drink as much as you want. So for 10€ the group of 18 or so of us got to eat and drink (water, pop, booze) until we were stuffed. After we headed to the beach and played some volleyball and relaxed before heading home.

Today we head up the mountain (well more of a hill really) to another beach and a convent (or something).

I got a new Portuguese number so don´t try calling my old on, it won´t work. Not sure what the new number is but when I figure it out I´ll post.

Posted April 27.

I set off for Higham's Park, London (where my cousins live) on Friday. I was very proud of myself actually, I navigated the train, underground, more trains and made it all the way to their place without getting lost.

Friday night I was taken out for a pint or two with my cousin (Third cousin or something? We share a great-great-grandfather), Rob. Of course it never ends up being a pint or two and we were taken home at about 3AM.

Because of that we ended up leaving a lot later than we meant to the next morning (regardless of the fact that the sun woke me up at 6AM and I couldn't get back to sleep). It turns out that everyone decided to play tourist for the day so five of us set off for London proper (Me, Rob, Chrissy (his sister), Frankie (his mother) and Terry (his father)).

We got into London at about 11AM and set off towards Tower Bridge. We went by the Tower of London across Tower Bridge and set off down the Thames. I took lots of pictures and it was nice and sunny. Once we were across Tower Bridge a tail ship came by and the bridge had to raise. It seemed a little silly to make everyone wait for this one fairly small ship but no one complained.

We got to see some living statues which were pretty cool. They seemed to make a lot of money though. I kinda wanted to see someone grab some money out of the hat so he would get tackled by a living statue but didn't happen. Damn.

We stopped at a pub for lunch and the prices were absolutely ridiculous. I was a bit spoiled and my cousin's treated me to lunch. It was great that they did though because all I would have been able to afford otherwise was a coke (which was 6 dollars by the way).

Afterwards we headed back across the river and towards St Paul's Cathedral. We took a quick look inside but were running short on time and had to hurry back towards the London Eye. It didn't really seem to matter though because even though we'd purchased our tickets online (I was treated to that too, I was starting to feel a bit bad at this point, as I was ALSO treated to my day pass for the trains) we still waited for over an hour in line (or a queue as they call it here).

They wouldn't let me take my multitool on the Eye. I wasn't sure what they where afraid I was going to do but is owned by British Airways so perhaps they consider it a type of plane? The Eye was pretty cool though, great place to take pictures from (man I sound like a tourist, don't I?).

After we came out we headed back down the river towards the Parliament Buildings, Big Ben and Westminster Abbey. It was getting late by this point so we headed towards Buckingham Palace and then home. We encountered 8 policeman arresting one drunk guy (even though he wasn't disorderly at all) and some guys dressed up as cows with a cowboy.

Tired, we all headed back home to watch a movie and head to bed. Today, Terry was heading towards Portsmouth so they dropped me off back at Viv's place. I was still exhausted so I made some lunch and took it easy. I went to Paula and Del's for a lovely dinner (man that was REALLY British wasn't it? Good thing I'm leaving soon) this evening and to put my London pictures up before I forget what they're about.

Tomorrow I clean up Viv's place, get some last things together, and pack up again before I'm off to Portugal on Tuesday.

You can see London pictures on Facebook or

HERE.

Posted April 25.

Yesterday was a nice lazy morning. I went to the library, ran some errands, did my laundry and then headed downtown to meet one of the girls I'd met last week for the afternoon.

We ended up having a great time and went for a long walk along the waterfront. She was a really good impromptu tour guide and I got to take some pictures (I'm getting better!).

We ended up back at a pub for dinner and were joined by the rest of the O'Neil (the store I originally met her at) employees when they got off shift. We had some drinks and some fun and then I headed home to pack for London.

I arrived an hour or so ago at my cousin's (I think) house in London (which I found myself I'm proud to note) and decided it would be a good time to upload some pictures.

New pictures can be found on Facebook and

HERE.

Tomorrow I'm off to explore London! I'll try to take more pictures.

Posted on April 24.

Cardiff was awesome.

James (the couchsurfer I was staying with) met me and took me back to his place. He was living in student housing (I'm feeling more and more at home in them) and I dropped off my stuff before we went exploring.

It had stopped raining by this point and we walked through a place called Bute park on the way to Cardiff Castle. It was nice to have some greenery for a change. Wales is much greener than the part of England I've been to so far. It's not the same green as Canada (no coniferous trees) but I was surprised at how much I missed it.

We went into Cardiff Castle and walked around for a few minutes before being kicked out for apparently not paying. Oops. It ended up being pretty expensive so we decided that we'd seen enough even though I forgot to take pictures (I'm trying hard to remember though!).

We went by the Millenium Stadium, walked by some nice churches and decided to see how high we could make it in the nearest tall building. Apparently the ground the floor was too much for us as there was a guard/receptionist at the door and he didn't believe that we were there to meet my mother on the 15th floor (turns out it was unoccupied, I think I need to do a bit more research if I'm going to be more successful at this).

We went shopping and made LOTS of pasta for dinner. We ended up feeding the flat above James' though as well so it turned out ok. We went out to the Student Union club (not pub like in Canada but huge club go figure) and had a great time.

The next day (Tuesday), I went for lunch with Jackie (my cousin?) and Michael (her grandson, who was my age and my 3rd cousin once removed. I think.). I had Cawl Pot pie (it was supposed to be Welsh) and then went to Pontypridd (where my grandfather was born). I got to see some nice sites around there, hear some family history and take some pictures.

We also got to see the outdoor Welsh history museum which has lots of old historic Welsh buildings which was kinda neat. After Jackie dropped me off I met up with the 3 German couchsurfers that I was staying with Tuesday night (Karen, Linda and Steph).

The three of them had essays to work on so we had a quiet night at their place (I needed on at this point). I went shopping, cooked a nice dinner, and corrected their essays before going to bed.

I'm back in Portsmouth today, doing laundry, some errands and meeting the girls I had lunch with last week this afternoon/evening. Not sure what the plan is yet.

I'm off to London tomorrow and back on Sunday sometime.

Posted April 21.

I made it to Wales! But I'm getting ahead of myself...

Saturday night Katerina (the couchsufer who showed me around Bath during the day) gave me a call and invited me over to her house for dinner. I went over there are was introduced to her 7(!) other roommates.

It's a little ridiculous if you're a student in the UK. Housing costs are so high that even with a huge number of roommates it's expensive living. And you wouldn't be able to afford to just have a couple roommates, you'd need at least 4 or 5 to get a house.

We ended up getting a call from another couchsurfer (from the Czech Republic but studying in Bath as well) and went out for a drink and dinner with her. It was really interesting to here about the Czech Republic, as I don't really know much about it at all.

I was complaining about the hostel and as we were leaving, Katerina offered to let me sleep in the spare room at their flat so I decided to do that instead of spend another uncomfortable night in the hostel.

The next morning I got a text message from yet another Bathian couchsurfer, this one from Estonia, (I had asked her a couple days prior if she was available to suggest some sites in Bath or get a coffee but she didn't get back to me until Sunday) so Katerina and I set off to meet her. Veronika (the Czech couchsurfer) joined us and we had a great lunch. I also learned a lot about Estonia, you don't realize how ignorant you are and how many countries there are in Europe until you meet people from them and realize how different they really are.

I went back to Bristol Sunday afternoon and spent the afternoon with Emily and her flatmates. We went out to a pub in the evening for a pub quiz (like music trivia but just general trivia. A british thing? Maybe I just don't frequent the right pubs in Canada). We ended up coming back reasonably early though (after placing 3rd to last) because they all had class in the morning.

I took the train in the rain to Cardiff today and wandered around until I found the library. They are currently building a HUGE new library (opening 2009) so the library is set up in a temporary location with murals of books to hide the fact that it's a temp building. It's kinda neat though.

I'm meeting a couchsurfer this afternoon named James. Tomorrow I'm seeing Jackie for lunch or something then I'm meeting a different couchsurfer for a place to stay tomorrow night.

Hopefully the rain stops so I can take up some pictures.

Posted on April 19.

So I got up nice and early (well for me) and caught the train to Bristol Friday morning. The train takes about 2 and a half hours and you pass a lot of sheep. If you enjoy sheep I would suggest taking the train from Portsmouth to Bristol. Or heading to New Zealand.

Anyways I arrived in Bristol around 1PM and was met by a couchsurfer (Emily) at the train station. Emily is in her first year in Animal Conservation at Bristol University and lives in a mixed student dorm (shared kitchen and common room with 4 roommates). She took me back to her room so I could drop off my bags but was heading out to the Bristol zoo where she volunteers.

She didn't want to leave me adrift though so she introduced me to a friend of her's who decided that showing me around was more fun than revising for exams. I headed out with Jaleh (Emily's friend) and she showed me around Bristol city centre. You'll be happy to note that Jaleh also prompted me to take plenty of pictures so I'll have more to post once I have a computer that I can hook my camera into.

I'll be honest though, Bristol was pretty gray. Some points of interest though:
- Part of the University used to be a fort. Part of England surrendered to another part of England in the Civil war there.
- There is a place called Cabot tower that has fences all around it and signs that say it's about to fall over. Nice View though. Actually it would probably be cooler if it had fallen over.
- There's a bridge with horns that look like Shrek. Or possibly fallopian tubes. Depends who you ask.
- There is a giant disco ball that apparently has a planeterium inside.
- There are steps with a fountain running down them (make a lazy looking waterfall). It makes them less useful.
- Like any large city there is construction EVERYWHERE.
- There are lots of hills and when it rains a lot some roads are inaccessible because they also become waterfalls. But not on purpose this time.

Jaleh decided after an hour or so that she should probably do some studying after all (either that or I scared her off, both are possibilities) so I decided to do some more exploring on my own. I went to the museum which was free but fairly boring. It had an Egyptian exhibit and a bunch of old paintings. To be honest though, I was actually more interested in the dehumidifiers they used to keep the rooms with the paintings climately-controlled than the paintings themselves. Ah well.

The central University building was really tall and looked castle-ish so I decided to see if I could get high enough to take some pictures or get on the roof. It's amazing how far you can get just by looking confident and pretending you know where you're going. Eventually I ran into a campus security guard who told me that my Malaspina student card wasn't valid and kicked me out. It was fun while it lasted though.

When Emily made it back from the zoo, she was embarassed to tell me that she had actually gotten the week wrong and her friends were going to Bath the following weekend. I debated but decided that since I already had a reservation at the hostel and wanted to see Bath anyways that I would go myself.

I got into Bath late last night, checked in, met a guy from Victoria who was doing his own 3 month Europe trip, had a beer with him and then had a restless night on a squeaky cot.

Today I got up much too early, had some toast (free!) and set off to find a computer. It's cold and raining here which I suppose is England showing it's true colours. I'm supposed to meet a couchsurfer later today who said she'd take me around to see some places in Bath. Hopefully there will be an actual bath because I didn't shower this morning.

Wish me luck.

Edit: New photos are up on facebook and here.

Posted on Thursday, April 17.

Wednesday I had plans to go to the Isle of Wight and do some touristy stuff. I forgot though that Wednesday was also going to be my laundry day so I didn't actually have any clothes to wear. Ah well.

Wednesday was instead spent taking it easy doing some small errands and watching TV while my clothes washed and dried.

Wednesday night I had been invited to go out with Mark (my cousin Steph's husband) and his friends for a pub crawl and then curry. I didn't eat before we went out because assumed we'd have a couple pints, get some dinner and then get a few more drinks. I was wrong.

7 pints later on an empty stomach and I can't see straight. I left for some fresh air and decided it was a good idea to catch a cab home. I txted Mark to cancel my order and made it home alright.

Ugh.

Tonight I'm going for dinner with Julie (another cousin) and then tomorrow I'm off to Bristol. I got a hold of a couchsurfer in Bristol who is heading to Baths for the weekend so she invited me along. I'll be in Baths Friday and Saturday night then back to Bristol to stay with her for a night or two and see Bristol. Tuesday I'm off to Cardiff (hopefully) for a day or so and then back to Portsmouth.

We'll see how things go and wish me luck on my first *real* traveling.

Also check out the flash map of my trip Ben is making at http://www.petedoeseurope.ca

Monday morning I was feeling significantly better than Sunday morning so I decided to be productive (It didn't work but I had good intentions). I went down for my daily fix of internet at the library then headed down to get some insoles for my shoes. My shoes have been great but I was pretty sure I would need some more support to trek Europe. I also picked up some groceries and made it home in time to catch some Topgear before going out again.

I had plans to see my First Cousins Once Removed (I think) Mary and Charles. I had a nice afternoon with them and they dropped me off downtown at about 5:30. I had plans to see a movie with Colin (the couchsurfer I met the other day) at 8 so I had some time to kill.

I made some calls home then decided to find somewhere to eat. It was about 6:30 by this point and most of the shops downtown closed about 7. I devised a plan to see if I could make some friends to get dinner with so I wouldn't have to eat alone.

I wandered around until I saw some suitable looking girls in one of the shops (It's a lot easier to play the Canadian card wit girls than it is with guys) and asked them where I should go to eat. We started chatting, they closed the shop up around me and took me out to a nice student pub for dinner.

I had to sprint back to the theatre to make it in time for the movie but it turns out I needn't have bothered. There are about 10 minutes worth of commercials before the movie starts and then plenty of trailers. We watched the movie "21" though and it was actually pretty good. I would recommend it.

The night ended uneventfully (Colin and his friends needed to work Tuesday) so I went home and went to bed.

Tuesday, I awoke to the first clear skies I'd seen since arriving. Really! Clear skies in England! I made my way to the library as is becoming the norm, went downtown, got a new card for my camera (the one that I brought with me kept corrupting pictures), got a business card holder to hold my business cards, looked around a bit and then headed back to Paula and Del's for dinner.

I've heard from some couchsurfers in Bristol (available this weekend or so), Brighton (available sometime in the next while) and in London (available next weekend, 25/26) so we'll see if I can make some plans work.

Oh and I put some pictures up. You can see them both on Facebook or here http://picasaweb.google.ca/phawker/Portsmouth .

Oh boy.

So Saturday night I got a text message from a couchsurfer I had contacted before I came to Portsmouth. He told me that he (along with some friends) were planning on heading out to a club that night and wanted to know if I wanted to go out.

I, of course, agreed and so Paula and Del dropped me off at his house later Saturday night. The couchsurfer's name was Colin and he was from France but had recently completed school in Berlin and moved to Portsmouth to work. We hung out for a bit at his place while he had a late dinner and got to know each other over a couple beers.

We headed out to meet another friend of his (Thierry, a pharmacist from Belgium who had just worked a 13 hour day) and then headed down to the club. The club "Jongleurs" was a comedy club in the early evening (which we missed) and a night club later (when we arrived). The place was HUGE (at least compared to anything I'd seen in Nanaimo and Vancouver). Which really isn't much but whatever.

We met some more friends at the club but they left early and we decided to stay and have some more fun. We headed back to a house party when the clubbed closed (they close at 2AM like in BC which apparently is really early compared to the rest of Europe) and hung out with a bunch more people there.

But 5AM when we left the club I was smashed. We went back to Thierry's place for another beer and to listen to some music. By about 6 I was ready to call it a night so Colin and I headed back to his place where I had left my stuff. He made "an english breakfast" (means it had breakfast stuff and then beans), which we ate then I caught a cab back to Viv's house.

I tried to sleep but woke up 3 hours later because all the redbull and vodka's I had had were making me vibrate. I decided to get some fresh air so I went for a walk around the shops and received a call from Paula and Del asking if I wanted to go see a car show.

They picked me up and we went to see a vintage car rally which was pretty cool. I was feeling less sick by this point but more and more tired. We went for a walk by the water but I was absolutely exhausted and had them take me home by about 5PM. I made some calls and then collapsed in bed and was asleep in no time.

There's a market in town today which I'm going to check out, I'd like to get some insoles for my shoes (the ones I have are *ok* but I could use some better ones), I'm going to see Mary and Charles Hawker (more cousins but older) and then I'm going to see the movie "21" with Colin. Wish me luck.

Yesterday I hopped on the bus which ended up taking me downtown Portsmouth. I chatted with an elderly lady at the bus stop (trying to figure out how much the fare was going to be) but she ended up being quite talkative and directed me down to Gunwharf.

Turns out Gunwharf is down at the Portsmouth Harbour and has lots of touristy stuff. I had the option of looking at some old ships but they didn't look that interesting and I decided to avoid them.

I did however go up Spinnaker Tower which is a 110m tower shaped like a sail on the harbour. It had a great view and I got some neat pictures standing on the glass floor, I'll see if I can get them online in the next couple days.

I looked around Gunwharf but it was mainly expensive shops and expensive restaurants so I left quickly. I hopped on another bus which ended up taking me along the seawall. I met a nice Polish girl on the bus who suggested I check out the D-Day Museum which was along that way. I had a look around there for a while and learned some neat stuff. It's kinda cool getting a different perspective on the war than the Canadian one.

I was running out of time so I headed back uptown to Viv's house where I got picked up by Mark (my 2nd cousin once removed (I think) Stephanie's husband). He took me out for a couple pints and then we picked up some chinese food to take home for dinner. I had a great time visiting with their family and got to meet their 7 year old daughter, Connie (my 3rd cousin once removed? I don't know).

Today I've been out with Paula and Del (cousins again but I'm not sure how exactly) and we've been for a walk in Bosham, lunch in Emsworth and then back to their house so I could get my internet fix for the day.

Honestly it's hard being so disconnected. I'm actually contemplating getting one of those cheap and small eePC laptops like my Aunt and Uncle took travelling with them. We'll see.

So I finally collapsed last night after being awake for 30 hours or so. I slept until about 4 in the morning and then woke and made some calls home. I wasn't sure if I would be able to get back to sleep but ended up falling back asleep until 10 AM. Go figure.

It's threatening to rain today but I suppose it IS England so I better get used to it. I got a SIM card yesterday, my number is 0753 025 2996 (but you dial 011 44 753 025 2996 to call me from Canada). It's free for me if anyone wants to call but it'll cost you whatever it costs to call the UK. Just remember that I'm 8 hours ahead of you.

The plan today is to get a few things I forgot yesterday at the shops (I keep calling them stores but everyone else calls them shops, I guess I should catch on), get some lunch and then take a bus to what I *think* is downtown. We'll see.

Oh and update on my plan to wink at strangers. Apparently I forgot in my sleep-fogged state that winking doesn't have much effect when you're wearing sunglasses. I've taken to smiling politely and nodding at anyone that makes eye contact when they walk by and doesn't just stare at the ground. There aren't many of them but the ones that do just give me surprised looks. We'll see how it develops.

I made it!

Exhausted (19 hours of traveling and 23 hours awake will do that to you) but I needed groceries for tomorrow so I thought I'd make a quick post. My first post abroad!

The ferry, plane and train rides were all fairly uneventful. I made friends with a girl named Laura (who, it turns our happened to be on the same flight as me, and looked lonely sitting by herself in the restaurant at the airport) before the flight. She was from Sheffield and was in Vancouver for a Stargate Atlantis convention. I thought she'd get along well with you Ben. On the flight I made friends with a guy name Naude (pronouced "No idea") who was from South Africa. He was in Victoria visiting his Canadian girlfriend but was on his way back to England (where he worked and lived) to apply for his Canadian work visa. He was a really nice guy and helped me get through the airport terminal and make it to my train on time.

England is really cool so far. I knew people would drive on the wrong side of the road but it's a lot stranger seeing it in real life. They also drive really fast. Jerks.

People don't seem as friendly here as Canadians, as I'm walking down the street no one makes eye contact and no one smiles. I've started winking at random strangers to see if I can elicit a response. I'll update if anyone notices my advances.

Anyways I'm off to shop and see if I can find a SIM card for my cellphone as well as a calling card in case I need to call home. Wish me luck in both cases and hope my money holds out. Everything over here is EXPENSIVE.

I'll update more when more happens.

Peter