Oct 07

Hello peoples, It's Krystal typing. Just got back from our two nights of sailing up the Nile in a Felucca (tough life but someone has to do it)!

Sunday 21st October

Welllll stretching the memory a little here. What did we do this day...

We were up reasonbly early to try and beat the heat as we were heading out to the vallies of the kings and queens. Made it to the valley of the kings first, which was pretty impressive. Entry allowed us to go down into 3 tombs, two of which the tour guide took us down into, and then one we got to choose the 3rd. So we got to see one of the biggest tombs, which was pretty far under ground, took us about 5 minutes to reach the tomb. And also got to see 2 average sized ones. There wasn't anything inside the tombs, just the writings on the walls as everything was now in the Cairo museum or had been stolen by tomb robbers. There were heaps and heaps of tombs, we could have spent a few days there I reckon, well if you were keen! But 4 was enough for us, as we got the chance to go down into Tutanhkamoun’s tomb. We were pretty wrapped that we got the chance to do this, as our tour manager said this was the first time she had ever seen the tomb opened as it is nearly always closed because of humidity levels. (Not to say that it didn't feel humid down there!) We had to pay extra to go into this one, but although it was the smallest out of the lot we both thought it was the best. It still had all the colours on the walls and was the only one that had not been found by tomb robbers. Tutanhkamoun's sarcophagus was still in there, laying on his tomb bed made of gold. We got mixed stories about whether his body is still in that sarcouphagus, but we will find out for sure when we get to Cairo Museum I guess.

We then headed over to the valley of the queens, which is where the young princes and princesses also have tombs. Went into two prince tombs, and one queen tomb. They were no where near as good or as big as the king tombs. One had a baby fetus inside a glass box which was pretty cool to look at.

By this stage it was later afternoon and we headed back to our 5 star hotel in Luxour (we thought we were on a budget trip too???) This time we headed out to an english pub to watch the champions league. So happened that mine and Matts new adopted soccer teams were playing each other. Unfortunately Matt's team (west ham) won 3 to 1, but was only because Sunderland accidently kicked a goal for them. So guess you could say we drew since we both kicked 2 goals each???? Well that's my arguement!

Monday 22nd October

We were up early again today to catch a train from Luxor to Aswan. We had a little bit of free time to wonder and then had the choice of doing a tour. Matt decided it was too hot and hung around by the pool at our 4 star hotel over looking the Nile (loving the fact that we are doing a budget tour and staying in really nice hotels) with another guy. The rest of us made it out to see the Aswan dam and the wall which had been built to control the levels of the Nile to prevent flooding. We then took a boat ride out to Phile Temple. The temple was like an oridinary egyption temple, but what got me was the fact they had moved the site of the temple when they had created the dam so that it wasn't under water. They cut the temple up into a few thousand pieces and then moved them back into place like a huge puzzle. There were no signs of the fact that it had been moved. That was pretty cool.

After looking at the temple, wasn't that much else to do, plus the fact it was like 40 degrees, so headed to the cafe with a few others. Our local tour guide Mohammed joined us and told us how he just got engaged, was a pretty interesting story. His best mate had a sister that Mohammed hadn't met before. Anyway the mate was around at his house one day and said he had to go coz he had to let his sister into their house coz she was back from uni and had no keys. Mohammed rang a few of his friends to find out about this sister and then decided that night he wanted to marry her, without even meeting her! He rang his mate to ask her to see what she would say. She agreed, and then he had to ask her family. The family thought about it for a week and then agreed and set up a meeting. So yeh now they are engaged! They are only allowed to meet up if one of her family members is present, until the actual day of their wedding. He said he calls her on his mobile but said it's really awkward but is getting better. We were all saying how strange their engagement was and he said that this kind of engagement is very common.

We asked him what he thought about our culture, and he said he didn't like it at all. As he had watched some kind of ricki lake show on tv where all single girls get up on stage who have had kids to one night stands and try and find the father of their child. He thought this was pretty common among white people! But we set him straight. I seriously think that the majority (a very high majority) of the arabs in egypt just think we are sexed crazied animals or something.

Anyway headed back to the hotel to find matt a little churpie in the pool. We all got up on the deck above the pool to watch the sunset over the Nile. Was quite lovely, then headed into town for some din dins :P

(that's how a feclucca looks)

Tuesday 23rd October

Today we were up at 3am for a 3:30am departure to head out to Abu Simbel as it was a 3 hour drive out there and we had to get another convoy. Was either get that one and beat the heat and have the rest of the day free or the opposite. So yes... 3am get up. Nice.

The convoy was meant to leave at 4, but we are in egypt and we left at 5, who knows why! We arrived around 8am and had an hour and a half to wander around, which was more than enough time anyway.

Abu Simbel... wow, was really really impressive. It's a temple for king Ramsi II who was the most popular and successful egyption pharaoh. The temple was carved into the face of a sandstone hill, and showed Ramsi II during 4 different periods of his life. It was absoultely huge. And the even more amazing thing was that this temple and hill had also been sored up into thousands of pieces and put back together at this site because of the construction of the dam. Again there was no hint that the structure had been moved. You would have liked it dad.

After we got back from Abu Simbel it was early afternoon. We wander around Aswan for a little and got some lunch. Also got an Egyption sim card as Optus pre paid sucks overseas, but didn't have much luck with it.

That night we got a boat across the Nile to the otherside and went into a little Nubian village that was off the beaten track. The Nubian people are from inland Africa, maybe Sudan? anyway they are the darker skinned population that live in southern Egypt along with the Arabs. We were invited into a family home that was pretty much open to the sky and had some dinner there where we sat on rugs and ate off tiny tables. Afterwards they played some african drums and got us all up for a booggie african stype. That was pretty cool and it is making us want to go to Africa one day, yes add that to the list!

After being up for about 20 hours we decided to call it a night.

As you can tell from the title of this entry this is what we here everyday from every bloody Egyptian trying to sell us shit! As you can proberly tell its Matt typing this time.

Wednesday the 17th

This morning we were up around 8ish and got ourselves ready for a day touring around Luxor. This place is a really nice city to walk around in Egypt and is nowhere near polluted like Cairo. We headed off from the campsite about9 and made our way to our first stop Karnak Temple. Was a really impressive temple with massive pillars throughout the ruins that stand 40 odd metres in height and would easily be 8 metres to walk around the base of the things.

After here we headed over to another temple, Luxor Temple. I liked this one a little better but my knowledge on these are pretty darn bad. I just really admire how impressive these buildings would have been back in BC times and the difficulty it would have been to construct them.

Once we finished up at the temples we headed off for lunch and then to a jewelry shop where I bought a ring (For me for anyone who is thinking anything else!) and then we made our way back to camp.

As you are aware from Krystal's last entry we were treated to a great dinner of Pig on the spit. A whole 31Kgs of the bastard! It was a great feed and we all headed off to bed nice and satisfied with ourselves.

Thursday the 18th

This morning we were up nice and early for our morning drive to Hurghada. Hurghada is a town about 250 odd kms from Luxor that is placed perfectly on the Red Sea. This is proberly all the place has going for it as besides the Red Sea there isn't much else to do and it is very heavily populated by tourists. For some reason due to the fact there are so many tourists heading to Hurghada you have to be escorted by a police convoy to the place. There are 2 convoys that run a day, one at 8am and another at 2pm. If you miss the first one then you have to wait 6 hours till the next one arrives. Strange people the Egyptians are but I guess at least it gives them something to do with themselves!

We arrived at our hotel around 1ish and chucked our bags in our rom and headed off for lunch at a local bar. After lunch Krystal decided she needed to catch up on some sleep so me and another guy headed to the beach to have a swim and cool off a little. Stopped by another coffee shop for some Shisha and got back to the hotel around 5 to get ready for dinner. We made our way to a Cavery for dinner and had some great roast beef and chicken and washed it down with some beer and vodka. Headed back to the hotel around 12 and called it a night as we had a early get up the next morning.

Friday the 19th

Today we were off to the Red Sea for a cruise out to some reefs and a snorkel. We signed up for this extra a couple of days ago which was really good value for money. For 25USD (30AUD) you got a cruise which lasted about 8 hours, snorkel equipment, lunch, and drinks. Can't really complain about that!

We headed off around 8am and made our way to the marina to catch our boat. Once we got going it was a really relaxing ride which lasted about an hour or so. Once we arrived we dived into the sea and had 45 minutes to look at a pretty cool reef. The reef had a stack of coral through it and the colours of the fish were really cool. After our snorkel we headed back onto the boat and had some lunch before heading off to another reef.

We stayed at the 2nd location for 2 hours and had another snorkel and swim. This time we saw alot of the same things but also this massive dirty eel sliding through the reef. I reckon it was at least 2m long and due to my phobia of snakes, I was steering well clear of the thing.

Once we had enough we hopped back on the boat and made our way back to land to finish up for the day. We got back around 4:30 and went for a few drinks before having some dinner and heading back for an early night.

Saturday the 20th

We were up early again to catch the morning convoy back to Luxor. Got back into town around lunchtime and picked up my ring from the jewelry shop that i had bought the other day. We wondered around town for a while and then headed back to the hotel to head out for dinner. We had a quick bite to eat which was shit but was proberly the first ordinary meal we have had so far.

After dinner 75% of us headed to an Irish pub to watch the rugby World Cup final. I stayed to the end and was very happy to see the Saffa's beat the Pom's. No Aussie can ever barrack for the English. Krystal made it half way through the game so I am proud of her for that much at least. Had a couple pf night caps before heading back to bed to call it a night.

I must be off now but will write another blog very soon to get us up to date. Will also give you the list of Matt's top 10 random things about Egypt.

Until then bye to all, especially Ella the newest addition to read our blogs!

Matt

PS. Deano, for your info I have only been pissed once in the last 3 and 1/2 weeks.

Krystal typing again, Matt the slacker just jumped off the second storey balcony of where we are staying into the pool. One of the tour guides a while back did that and smashed his heals apparently. Going to kill him! Anyway he is on blog duty next entry.

Sunday 14th October

Yuck, early starts again! We were up early to start our Kumuka tour. First thing up we headed out to the pyramids. Today it was really really hazey tho, I think it was too early for the smog to have cleared. We had a local tour guy to give us some general info about the site and show us around. We got about 30 minutes free time to have a wander around, which was not much time at all as we were on foot and the site is pretty big as you can imagine. We were absolutely wrapped that we were suckers yesterday and did the camel ride, as the sky was so much clearer the day before and we had heaps more time.

After that we headed over to the pyramid named Katherine, which is the middle one of the three main. The three main ones were built for a father, a son and a grandson (being the smaller of the 3). So Katherine was the son's pyramid that we were headed for. We got to go down into the pyramid and see the tomb. We had to crouch down for about 25m where you got to a little room where you could stand up with a little tunnel heading off into another direction but it was blocked by a gate. We continued down a little further, crouching again until we reached the tomb. The tomb was completely emplty apart from a plain cut out box at one end where the body used to lie. Everything that was originally in there had either been stolen by tomb robbers or was now in Cairo Museum. Although there wasn't much to see down there, it was pretty cool to go down there and see what the tunnel was like. The sweat was abosultely dripping off us while we were down there, it was like a sauna. As we came up to the surface we thought outside in the desert was cool!

Next we went upclose to the syphix, and the building right in front of it where they actually prepared the mummies for the tombs.

After that we headed to the look out point where we got some awesome views of the whole site. I think we did yesterday perfectly as everything we didnt do then, we had done today. Would have been pretty annoyed if that was the only time we spent at the site, so yeh we were wrapped!

We grabbed some lunch and then we were on the truck headed for the western desert. And when I say truck, I mean truck. It's an ex army truck that sits up really high, has no air con but it's much more roomier than the contiki bus and actually feels like we're back packing around abit more. Matt was involved in the first drinking session on the bus. Would you expect anything less???? They have cold beer available in eskis on the truck. Matt is in heaven, although they did run it dry and we are yet to stock up!

Tonight we were to spend the night in the desert. We arrived after dark, so pretty much couldn't see a thing. We were off the truck and out came cookers and tables and all the rest to cook up a feed. They have a pretty good setup! After dinner we all sat around a camp fire looking up at the stars, never seen so many before, smoking a shiska which we shared around (flavoured tabaco smoked out of a massive bong)!

We then made it to our sleeping mats and stared up at the stars for awhile before falling aswell. Saw a few shooting stars aswell.

Monday 15th October

We woke up and it was like "suprise!" we got to see the site of where we had actually stopped at, as it was dark when we had arrived. The views of all the sand dunes with the sun making it's way up over them was amazing. Having gone to bed in the middle of the western desert with the stars and then waking up to that has been one of my highlights I think. Matt thought it was pretty cool aswell.

Out came all the brekkie stuff from under the truck and after eating (and a toilet stop behind the dunes) we were off again.

We travelled to the white desert, but stopped off at a 'mountain' type thing on the way. Turned out it was called crystal mountain and had crystals all over it. Do you have a mountain named after yourself???? Was pretty cool, and we might have accidently stole one of the crystals. Whops. Anyway made it to the white desert which used to be a sea a few million years ago. It's called the white desert coz it literally is white, the coral type bolders that you would find on the bottom of the sea where still there, giving it it's white appearance. There were all stray bits of coral around the place aswell. Was amazing to think that this desert, as dry as could be was one day the ocean.

Instead of spending the night there we pushed to our next stop, Dakhla Oasis to spend the night. At Dakhla there was an ancient mud brick village, they're not sure how old it is (I dunno how you couldn't work it out) but that is egypt for you I guess. Got a little tour of that as it was getting dark and then we headed back to our hotel. Tonight we spent the night on the roof top, again open to the stars.

Tuesday 16th October

We were up at 4:00am this morning. YUCK. And on the truck by 4:30am to try and make it to Luxor before it got too hot. After about 8 hours on the truck and stopping off at a modern art muesum we made it to Luxor by about 2pm. We were all stuffed and in desperate need of a shower. We hung around the hotel and Matt had a little dip in the pool. Smoked another shiska (apple flavoured) and then were in bed by about 11.

Wednesday 17th October

Brings us to today. Yay our travel blog is up to date! Well almost. Feels like we're back at school and we have homework due when we get far behind in our blog.

Anyway I'll let Matt fill you in with the details next entry I'm off to grab a cold drink before I pass out!! We bit hot! Might check on the pig that we are having for dinner. We're staying at a christain site tonight rather that a muslim place, so our truck driver (who looks and acts so much like you Nick it's crazy!) has decided to buy a whole pig for dinner and roast it on a spit. He has been looking after it all day. Pretty funny there's pork out there roasting and we're in egypt!

Will try and put some photos up for the last entries over the next couple of days, this computer is too slow to upload them.

Love yous all

K & M xx

Zai ark (Hello) everyone, it's Krystal typing.

Having a ball in the middle east, can safely say it is like no other place we have been to and far more different to what we imagined. It is crazy how poor these people are, worse than thailand, and the religious influences make the country so different to the west.

Anyway I'll get straight into it.

Sunday 7th October

The morning after Contiki we headed back to Olive's again to store ever more stuff! Picked up our air line tickets and we were off again. Had some Chinese that was actually cheaper than eating in Australian and wasn't dodgy at all. We're starting to think if we're half smart (which might be difficult for matt :p) about our money while in London should be able to save a little.

Next we caught the tube to the airport and were asleep on the waiting room chairs by 10pm.

Monday 8th October

Woke up early for our 6:15 am flight. Had to board at 5:30am but we both totally forgot it was an international flight and were still sipping our hot drinks at 5:25am until the penny dropped! We ran around like headless chickens pushin to get through customs but luckily our flight was delayed from bad weather. Pretty stupid by us!

While checkin in the couple in front of us was 55kg over on their check in luggage. At a rate ot 27 pounds/kg you do the maths! Crazy! We are not shopping!

Our plane landed in Zurich and because our flight had been delayed it was touch and go whether we'd make our connecting flight to Cairo. We sprinted from one end of the airport to the other and made it 5 minutes before scheduled departure. They let us board and 2 seconds later they said this flight would aslo be delayed as there were waiting for connecting flight passangers from Heathrow. Lucky we ran! (Yes you are a stalker Amy!) Thought holidays were meant ot be stress free?

A few hours later we landed in Cairo. First impression of Egypt was stench, heat and a sign saying drug offences result in death by hanging. Just a slight bit different to Amsterdam! We walked outside and were bombarded with taxi and limo drivers want to 'help' us out in anyway they could. We knew we were getting wripped but we jumped in a limo (oldish car with AC) and headed to Alexandria as we just wanted to get there before it got dark. Paid about 60 australian for the two of us. Still not bad considering it was a 4 hour journey.

We soon realised after about 20 minutes of being stationery that Cairo has the worst traffic in the world! After an hour and a half of moving 10km we made it onto the freeway where the limo driver (Abu) stepped it up a knoch. I have never feared for my life more!! The driver was driving without any lights darting in and out of traffic at speeds of 160km/hr + (in a 100 zone). Rest asure most of the time he only drove at 150km/hr tho! For 2 a half hours we listened to the sound of beep beep beep beep as he had his speed indicator set at 120km/hr. Go figure? We both arrived safe and sound thankfully and headed to our room for some room service and sleep! Think we will be looking at another form of trasnport for the return trip! Far too much stress for one day!

Tuesday 9th October

After a much needed rest we rolled out of bed and headed to the bank to try and get some US dollars for our tour that was begginning in a few days. I thought I better dress conservatively since it was our first day and didn't know what to expect. Had 3/4 pants on and a t-shirt that sort of dipped a little (not much!) at the front, and for some how I managed to feel like a tart! All the other girls were covered head to toe. And for some reason hardly anyone knew how to use the ATM, most needed help, I think alot of them can't read maybe? Anyway the bank manager spotted us and brought us round to the back of the tellers, skipping the really long lines and gave us all his attention like we were celebrities!

Next we wandered down the street to see what this place was about and grab some lunch. We soon realised after a couple of kms of walking that everything was closed coz of ramadam (to those of you at home we don't know much at bit either apart from Muslims can't eat or drink between dawn and dusk for approx 1 month). We finally found alittle mini market shop (if you could call it a shop) and stocked up on 2 minute noodles and headed back to the Sheraton to cook them in our room with the kettle!

While in town I had stray looks from everybody. Even a little boy stopped to stare his Mum had to pull him away! I think long pants and proper t-shirts will be my new best friend while in the middle east!

We had a buffet dinner at the hotel where we were introduced to some beautiful local food, the best being kofta (minced meat blended with herbs made into a roll).

Wednesday 10th October

Today we had another sleep in and then headed down to an internet cafe to get our blog ip to date. Internet was about 40 cents Australian an hour! Gives you an idea of how poor this county is.

We then headed to the mall, had to walk through metal dectors (our hotel also has some) to get it in. We went into the supermarket to get some drinks but all we could find was booze free beer!

After a little wander we headed abck to the hotel for dinner and then to bed for a movie, as there wasn;t anything else to do.

Thursday 11th October

Today we though we better actually do some touristy things rather than just relaxing. We hired a car with an english speaking driver for about 10 dollars australian an hour. Could have got a local egyption speaking taxi for much less but I was a little nervous as we seemed like a tourist attraction ourselves.

Went to the old light house sight which was one of the original 7 ancient wonders of the world. It no longer exists though, and instead has been replaced with a fortress, Fort Waitbey, which was built in 1480. Was pretty cool to be able to compare this fortress to the one we swaw in Dubrovnik. This one was much much smaller and the walls were only about 1.5 to 2m thick rather than Dubrovnik's 5m thickness. Was still pretty cool. The tourist police were nice enought to show us around (for a tip of course!)

We then went to the main mosque in town, had a little walk around the outside. The building was pretty impressive. AAlso went ot the Catacombs of Kom Ash-Shuqqafa (you know him? I don't!) which dated back to 2 century AD and would have held about 300 corpses.

We stopped at the Alexandria National Museum, which was okay, gave a little history of the place but the funny thing was we had to pay 15 times more than wat the locals do to get in! Was written clear as day on the sign at the entry.

After the tour we headed back to the hotel, Matt had a little swim and I sat fully clothed reading a book as wasn't that keen on getting into my binkis! We then walked across the road to the beach to watch the sun set. What a lovely beach! :|

Friday 12th October

Today we had to make it back to Cairo, this time we decided to get the train. It was only about 12 dollars australian for the two of us to ride first class, and took nearly half the amount of time the limo took. (and was a bit more on the safer side!) Made it to our hotel, which was a lot nicer than what we were expecting and had dinner there. Everything seemed to be closed again!

Saturday 13th October

Today we woke up with plans to buy some more tshirts by heading to the mall. But our dodgy cab driver convinced us the mall was closed (even pulling up to it and showing us). It was pretty believable since everything else in the last couple of days had been closed because of ramadam. Anyway he managed to convince us to go meet up with someone to talk about maybe doing a pyramid tour.

We got to the place and a guy came out claming to be from the goverment (obviously not) and said for us to come into his shop to see a map and discuss what we could do for what price. We walked in and he opened a big draw full of sand with 3 pyramids sitting on it. That was his map. I was biting my cheeks trying not to laugh in his face. Anyway after abit of disussion and barginning we decided to do a 1.5hr tour of the outside of the pyramids and look at some tombs. All by camel.

The camel ride was really really good, we got to go in to the site of the pyramids through the back entrance where there were hardly any tourists and see the pyramids as they came over the horizon. Was absolutely awsome, as you can see from the pic.

After going around the pyramids and jumping off for a touch the tour guide took us to the tombs. He lifted a barbed wire fence and let us in to the 'new excavations'. Some how I don't think we were meant to be in that area as while we were in the tombs he kept ducking his head out to see if anyone was coming. So yeh that was pretty cool to be able to see the tombs of the engineers and workers. Over 100 000 people died building the pyramids.

All of this cost us about 60 australian for the two of us inlcuding tips, and it was worth every penny. I thought we were getting ripped but I didn't care one bit, but as it turns out a girl on our tour paid about 120 just for herself! They are good scammers.

We asked our tour guide if the mall was open today and he said yes. So we got our cab driver (the same one as before, he had waited for us) to drop us there. The place he dropped us off at was a totally different place he had taken us to in the morning when he claimed it was shut. Dodgie little bastard! He also stopped off at a rug museum on the way saying he wanted to say hello to his daughter and said there would be drinks inside as we were heaps thirsty from the pyramids. Instead we had men trying to make us buy tickets to get inside, and no drinks! We asked the taxi driver what happened to saying hello to his daughter and he claimed she was busy! We had a little go at him, and he started to say he had to go coz his wife was sick (after we actually made it to the mall). Anyway he got no tips and we didn't pay him the full amount. He didn't seem to mind tho.

Made it back to our hotel and played cards for awhile while ordering drinks from room service on our balcony which over looked the nile. We then had our pre departure meeting for the tour, and headed out to dinner in town with them. This time EVERYTHING was open and there were kids on the street everywhere. Ramadam was over and it was like new years ever for them. Was a pretty cool atmosphere.

Matt typing again here

Thursday 4th October - Amsterdam

This morning we woke bright and early readyfor our drive into the Netherlands! We headed off around 7:30 and drove pretty well allthe way to Amsterdam only stopping for a quick bite to eat at one of Europe's wonderful Auto Grills. I can't reamember if we have spoken about these Auto Grills but they are pretty much randomly placed buffet restaurant's on the side of the Highways that are a complete rip off! I'm pretty sure the reason why we go there is because if 45 tourists all eat there, then the manager and driver gets their meals for free! Too smart on their behalf. During our trip we have been trying to share a plate due to the fact that its about 10-12 Euro per serving. 25 Euro everyday for lunch is far to much for the quality of food that we receive.

Anyhow, back to the journey. We made our way about 30 minutes from Amsterdam and turned off to go to a Clog and Cheese farm. This was pretty cool and we bought some nice cheese and mustard, but no cloggs cause i'm buggered if i'm walking round in wooden shoes! Once we finished we were given the option of either taking an included bike ride around the area of head directlyinto Amsterdam. Well i'm pretty sure you can guess the answer that the group gave! That and the fact that it was wet and raining but even if the sun was shining i'm pretty sure we would have had the same result.

We arrived at our hostel around 3 (smallest room ever) and decided that it would be a good idea to mail somethings back home. We went to the post office and got that out of the way and then got ourselves ready for the evening ahead of us in town. Our dinner was included tonight which was a buffet in the hostel and it was pretty good actually. We headed in around 6 and took a walk through the red light district which was quite an eye opener. In Melbourne they work on corners, where as in Amsterdam they parade around in windows! Once the walk was completed we were given 1 hour freetime before our evenings entertainment. 1 hour in Amsterdam means Coffee Shop time! After a few giggles we headed back to meet the others and all walked into the heart of the red light district for our Live Sex Show. Now for all you back home, i'm not talking strippers. I am talking you think it we saw it. Amy and Deano, pretty you would have had the same experience. 2 drinks later, and a very educational seminar we wereback on the streets of Amsterdam. We wondered around for a couple of hours then headed back to the hostel for an early start the next morning.

Friday the 5th October - Amsterdam

We managed to crawl out of bed around 9am and get our act together and out the door by 10ish. Problem with a complete free day to yourself is that you have no actual time to be anywhere or to get on the bus! We headed into town via tram (Melbourne is not the only city in the world with trams) and wondered over to Anne Frank's house. I'm sure most of you know of Anne Frank but i'll give a brief run down on her. Anne Frank was a 13 year old Dewish girl who was caught up in the Nazi Scheme during WW2. She, her family, and another family all went into hiding at the top of her fathers factory to try and avoid being taken by the Nazi's. She wrote a diary during the 2 years of their hiding and they were eventually caught and sent off to concentration camp, never to return. The only survivor was her father who found her diary and had it published. To this day this is still one of the most famous pieces of work regarding this era. After that we headed into a coffee shop for some morning tea (Space Cakes) and then wondered over to the sex museum. Was a bit of a laugh but i'm happy we only paid 3 Euros each cause thats about all it was worth. Then we headed to the Heineken museum which was also pretty crap but we got 3 beers each in the price so that made it a little better.

typical day at the coffee shop

This evening we had a river cruise through the city then off to dinner which was for some reason Asian food in Holland??? After dinner we all headed into the night spot of Amsterdam but I think due to the fact everyone had been going for 35 nights we were all pretty well done. We decided to call it a night so we grabbed a couple more muffins (Space Cakes) which were the best by far! Headed back to the hostel and called it an evening around 1am.

Saturday the 6th October - London

We were up nice and early and ready for our final trip back to London. I have nothing really to talk about here as all be done was drive from Amsterdam to Calais (Sorry we had lunch in Belgium) and catch the ferry across the channel to Dover. The White Cliffs again stood above us and we new that we were just about done. We had a couple more hours of driving and we were back to the Royal National Hotel where we began our journey. 10317Kms later, a couple more Kgs heavier and we were back there again! We had no accomodation booked for this night so we managed to do a shifty and get away with a free night. I slept on the floor of someones room and Krystal managed to get a bed by pretending to be another person. This person decided to stay in Amsterdam so Krystal got her bed. Nice work by us cause a free night accomodation in easily a $150 saving. We headed into the bar, had some dinner, some more beers and said our goodbyes to everyone. Hit the floor around 12 and slept right through to the next morning without too many wakes ups from the comfort factor.

Overall the last 37 days of our lives will live with us for ever and the things we saw in the time we had was unbelievable. Now for a few days rest and definetaly a few days off the grog!!

Gone for now, Matt XXOO