The Silver Bullet of Indecision

We made the bold decision to drive around England, to explore the county at our whim. Before departing Australia we ordered a small, four door, automatic, hatch-backish, chick car to support our adventure. Something economical and manouverable for the narrow winding roads. By a chance of dates, we collected the car on the Tuesday after a long weekend. As a result, the car dealer had run out of what we ordered, and gave us the next best thing. A silver, Mercedes C Class!

While not considering myself God's gift to the roads, I would like to think that I am an accomplished driver, with the ability to work out how to operate most machines. It took the two of us 10 minutes to work out how to use the car at the car yard, and a further 10 minutes at our destination to determine how to engage the hand break. We thought it prudent to spend another 20 minutes before departing for Stratford-Upon-Avon going over the ins and outs of the vehicle.

The car is very pleasant to drive. It is smooth, responsive, quiet and comfortable. There are however a few quirks that are rather irksome. The indicator for one. As if being on the left hand side of the steering column isn't bad enough, it is concealed behind one of the steering wheel outer rim to center shaft supports. This is further exacerbated by the "faux indicator" stick that has been place where you would expect a left hand indicator to be. We are not entirely sure what the faux indicator does, but it can't be important as we have employed it on many occasions to no effect. (It might be the "snooze control"). Further more, once having located the indicator (by now already half way through the emergency lane change) we discover that it has a hair trigger. When trying to cancel a signal, we often engage the opposite signal. Trying to cancel this accident in turn re-engages the now redundant signal. Repeat. It has happened to both of us.

Despite the car's quirks, we are finding the driving better than we expected. Our friend Tom (aka the TomTom) has limited the navigational disagreements, allowing us to focus more on the beautiful country side. I would certainly recommend traveling England in a car (so long as you have the GPS).

The Bard's Birds

The geese here in Stratford-Upon-Avon are confused. They moo!

The Electric Shower

Having stayed in many hotels throughout my life, and even more in the past few weeks, I think I have seen a fair variety of bathroom amenities. Up until this morning, I thought I had seen it all, but nothing could prepare me for what I woke up to in York.

For the first time in my life, I found an electric shower. From my limited scientific knowledge, I know that one should really not mix water and electricity, especially if one intends to remain un-charred, and continue living. So there I was, gingerly stepping into the small glass box, faced with all manner of dials and knobs. I looked around for scorch marks in the shape of human feet, had others done this and survived? Had I stepped onto the set of the movie "Hostel"?

After closer inspection it became apparent that there were two main dials, temperature and water pressure. The granularity of these knobs appeared to be rather high, allowing one of four settings for the pressure, and 8 for the temperature. Images of me doing the scorched white man dance of Santorini came flooding back as I tried to determine how best to proceed. But there was one thing missing. Nowhere was there a valve or tap to actually commence the water flow. After some frantic grappling of the white wall mounted control box, I felt a plastic mound, with faded lettering, "S T A R T". My heart sank, my throat went dry. I tried to scream but nothing came out. Was this a...a...a...a....a Microsoft shower!! Thoughts of the shower hanging on me, or me hanging in the shower, the shower blue screen of deathing on me filled my mind.

After taking a few moments to regain my composure, and assure myself that others had done this and survived, I bit the bullet and pressed "START". The dials and knobs gave me too many options, so like most over featured devices, I ignored them, and plowed ahead.

Just for the record, once the water started flowing, it was a delightful shower. The temperature was perfect, no adjustment required. It did not 'lose' hot water, nor was there the scorched white man dance. If they could facade this with some old fashioned taps, I would install it in my house without a doubt.

The Quest for Vivoli

When I was 14 my parents took me on a European trip, which included a week in Florence where we stayed with my brother who was living there at the time. One evening during my trip my brother took me to this fantastic gelati shop which had lots of unique flavours. The name of the place has always stuck in my head, Vivoli.

So prior to my recent return to Florence I attempted to get the location of Vivoli so that I could once again taste its ice cream delights. Unfortunately my brother could not remember the exact location so I was left to attempt to find it myself.

Well having been here only one and a half days in Florence I can proudly state that I found it! All I had to go on was a vague recollection of the shape of the intersection near Vivoli and that it was near Santa Crocè. After a few false tries based on similar looking intersections on the map, I was about to give up in disgust. I turned to Andrew with a look of despair on my face and said "I don't know where it is." Then I looked up and my face began to glow with joy. There, right in front of where we were standing, was the glowing neon sign "Vivoli".

Needless to say, Andrew and I treated ourselves to some delicious gelati :-) Andrew had chocolate an strawberry (made from real strawberries), and I had melon, banana(with real rockmelon and banana) and chocolate. Yummmy!!!

Amalfi, My Head, and the town of Owww

So here we are, Amalfi. Some of the most spectacular coast line in the world. Wandering around the streets of this quaint seaside town, Rebecca and I were absorbing the ambience.

Having reached the end of the main drag, we decided to return via a "side path", that led through a series of arched caveways. As we ambled back, my eyes were distracted by something, a staircase. I would like to say that there was something special, or noteworthy of these stairs, original or different, just something that would make me blog about them in their own right. Alas, this is not the case. They are the standard, humdrum, one step two step variety we have back home. So having finished looking at these mundane stairs, I returned my head back to the forward facing, upright position, just in time for my forehead to smack with full force into an unforseen obstacle. For some strange reason, just after they had built a set of distracting stairs, they decided to lower the arched ceiling, by about 2 feet, just the height of Andrew's scone.

The force of the impact was so great, a spine tingling "CRACK" could be heard. My head was pushed back, my jaw snapped shut (yes, I bit my teeth), and my neck manouvered in to a strange contorted position. Writhing in agony, holding my beloved, once normal shaped head in my hands, Rebecca swings around, only to ask the obvious "What did you do?". As I tried to utter the occurances that had taken place, a huge grin grew accross her face. This rapidly progressed to outright laughter, and was shortly followed by, "may I take a picture?".

My memories of the most beautiful coast line in the world are not all they should be. Not only have they been erased by blunt force trauma, but now, whenever I hear or think about Amalfi, my forehead begins to throb. It really really hurt!

Two nuns and a leprechaun

In the city of Rome it is not uncommon to see nuns in various places all over the city, but the last place I ever thought I would see them was serving dinner at a restaurant.

Tonight Andrew and I had a latish dinner (for various reasons) and decided to try one of the restaurants near our hotel.

After looking in the window and finally finding the "A La Carte" menu we decided to go in and get a table. -Side Note: The set "Tourist Menu" was displayed prominently in an attempt to convince you that it was all that was on offer-

Standing in the door like stuffed dummies for serveral minutes, we were finally addressed by the man behind the counter. This man was wearing a green suit jacket, was short in stature, and had very leprechaun like ears. For a moment there I had to look around to convince myself that yes I was still in Rome.

The man showed us to a table and handed us two menus (the set menus). Luckily we were able to grab the "A La Carte" menu from a nearby table.

Next we were waited on by the women of the establishment. Now, although I doubt that these women have actually taken their holy orders, they certainly looked like nuns. Their uniforms looked like a light blue version of a nun's habit, minus the head piece.

Their service style was rather interesting to say the least. After ordering a Spaghetti Arrabiata (spicy sauce) and a Ravioli al Pomodoro (tomato sauce) one of these women came over to lay the cutlery. She literally tossed two serviettes on to the table and dumped the cutlery on top.

We had also ordered 2 cokes to go with our meals. Instead this woman returns with a single 500mL can of coke (can't say I've seen that size in Australia) saying that this can would do us both.

Finally our dinners arrive. Andrew's spaghetti arrabiata was not arrabiata at all, just a basic tomato sauce. My ravioli has somehow turned into a tortellini which this nun woman insists is ravioli (despite having called it tortellini when she first set it on the table). At least it tasted alright.

Unfortunately that ends our time here in Rome, we are off to Sorrento tomorrow. However apparently I will be returning to Rome one day as I have tossed my coin into the Trevi Fountain. Ciao

A Bus Too Far

One of my first impressions of Santorini was that transportation was well thought out, and would make our stay very simple. The bus escort from the air craft to the terminal door showed a level of consideration that I have never come across, and set high expectations for the remainder of our stay. As a largely tourist destination, making it easy for guests to get around and spend their money should be a top priority.

Having read all of the reviews on the internet of our accomodation, and researched how to get there, Rebecca and I felt confident we could navigate this small island. All we had to do, was walk outside the terminal, board the bus to Fira (the main town), and change to a bus for Oia (pronounced eeya). So that is what we attempted to do.

We waited for the bus, and we waited for the bus, and we waited still. I went back into the arrivals hall and checked the bus time table. At first it looked like we missed the bus by 2min, and the next one should be along in 30 min. Half an hour came and went. "Maybe it is a little late?" I thought. After nearly an hour of waiting for a bus, I decided to do the unthinkable, talk to the locals. By now, everything had closed with the exception of one hire car outlet. Much to my delight I learned that I had not missed the bus, nor would I, as none was coming. The time table on the window mentioned nothing of a bus strike, driver shortage due to the surge in driver demand at the airport, or any such exceptional circumstance. But alas, I had it all wrong, for the buses only venture to the airport in "high season", of which this is not. Fortunatly the man behind the counter organised a taxi to Fira for us, where we could catch the bus to Oia.

That would have been fine, were it the end of the story. As it was not high season, the buses required an extra siesta between each journey. During the heat, the crows, and relentless twang of the American accent of high season, these buses are able to soldier on like little diggers. In the sholder and "off" season, they need their nanna naps, or, at least the drivers do. A 30 min wait with American cruise ship tourists was enough to test the nerves of even the most seasoned traveller, but the best was yet to come.

We managed to board the bus, after all of the cruise ship folk had pushed to the front and secured themselves a window seat. We were thankful just to be on the bus, so standing wasn't an issue....yet. What I hadn't realised about the trip to Oia is that the roads are similar to those of the Great Ocean Road (GOR). They hug the mountain side, high above the sea, winding their way through otherwise impenitrable terrain. Soild rock face on one side of the road, sharp cliffs on the other. They do, however, have their differences. The path to Oia is about twice as high as the GOR, and the road half the width.

As I mentioned in previous posts, safety is not at the forefront of the Greek's mindset. I am not convinced there is a speed limit on any of the roads in Santorini, or, if there are, the drivers are unaware of it. Our big 50 seater coach was HOONING around the curves at a pace unseen back home. Standing in the aisle of the bus, seeing the sharp drop on one side and the not so soft rock on the other made my stomach churn. Then, out of the blue, as our bus hurtled around a blind corner, coming in the opposite direction was is another bus, of similar size, speed, and disregard for anything safe. Our two buses missed colliding head on by only milimeters!! The sudden jolt of the bus was matched by the equally sudden need for me to change my pants.

Were I not in such a state of shock at the time, I would have found the ensuing events even more comical. There was no way known that the two buses could continue to pass each other, one had to reverse to allow the other to pass. The jostling of each driver to get their vehicle through the tight squeeze still amazes me to this day. The events replay in my mind, and it is a miracle that the little Toyota Echos following either bus weren't bumped off the cliff in the process.

As much as I dislike taxis back home, I made myself a promise. "When we leave this island, it will be alive, so no more buses. When we leave, it will be by taxi!!".