Category: Travel

After my recent post that suggested that Melbourne was perhaps a worrying place to be, I’m delighted to redress the balance by referring you to this post over at Cosmic Variance. The Edge sounds like a terrific experience. Of course, for those of us with vertigo (e.g. Martin), the word "terrific" takes on the original overtones.

 

So, Mary and Katy – have you tried it?

David Byrne travels through the USA. It makes me remember echoes of Umberto Eco…

While Hollywood trots out tired old stereotypes, Parisian Ad agencies come up with illustrations of certain people’s fantasies. And before you jump to conclusions; they are not mine, but I can certainly understand the frisson.

I had a day out yesterday. An old colleague was retiring and I was invited to his farewell party in The Hague. So it was an opportunity to see him and the old firm, as well as a chance to browse around the bookshops.

 

It takes about 2½ hours by train to get from the depths of the countryside (here) to The Hague (there). I couldn’t help but reflect that the closer I got to The Hague, the more the quality of the air visibly deteriorated, and the cause was equally obvious – lots of people living and working in a relatively small area. Whole tracts of what used to be open fields, even in my memory, are now built up with factories and housing.

 

Still, I enjoyed my day out. It was good to see lots of familiar faces at the old firm, although many of them, like myself, have also retired.

 

I also had a good bookshop browse and picked up a few bargains. And I found a brand new cookshop in The Hague’s newly restored Passage. DOK Cookware is a veritable Aladdin’s cave. Had I not been on foot and already carrying two bags of books on a hot day, I could have cheerfully stocked up on cooking paraphernalia from there. As it was, I couldn’t resist a cook’s blowtorch. Crème brûlée, here I come!

Improbable Research draws our attention to a travel risk likely to be encountered by those wishing to enter the US and who happen to have a particular medical condition. Don’t, unless you have a strong constitution, click on the perianal sepsis link…

Pruned draws our attention to a somewhat bizarre holiday experience, and then riffs on how this might translate to other venues. Me, I thought Paintball was stupid. I’ll stay at home, thanks very much.

Nothing to See Here has a good entry on Tongland Dam and the hydro-electric power station that was built in the 1930s. I’ve seen the outside many times (it’s just outside Kirkcudbright where members of my family live). But I didn’t realise that you could get guided tours around the inside of the station as well. Something to do the next time I’m in that neck of the woods…

Neil Gaiman points out that the US Government’s Transport Security Administration, while banning things such as toothpaste, shampoo and lip gel, allow airline passengers to carry personal lubricants such as KY Jelly. Well, that’s a relief, then. Clearly, terrorists don’t use such stuff.

When we went to visit Zutphen a few weeks back, we travelled on the local train. This being The Netherlands, the trains have a space that can be used for bicycles. On that day, my attention was drawn to a bicycle that was occupying the space until the owner got out at Winterswijk. It was a recumbent bike, but of a design that I’d never seen before. The label on the bike said Flevobike, so I guessed it was a Dutch design (Flevoland is one of the Dutch provinces).

I’ve now done a little scouting around the web, and the bike was one of the very latest designs from Flevobike – a Green Machine. I have to admit that it looks very stylish, and I wouldn’t mind trying one out. It turns out that there’s a dealer (ACE – Advanced Cycle Engineering) in Winterswijk, so I should go along one day and take a closer look. It’s possible to hire a recumbent bike for a day from ACE to try out.

Mind you, if I do fall in love with the Green Machine, it could prove very damaging to the wallet. The bike costs a cool 3,420 Euros. Gulp.

There are many things that come from the Isle of Man about which I can feel proud of, but I regret to say that I think the Peel Trident is not one of them. Oh, hang on, perhaps I can feel proud of the fact that it has just been voted as one of the five worst cars ever made…

Er, everyone??? But I don’t have a gel-filled bra… Does this mean that I can’t travel anymore? Perhaps that’s not such a bad thing.

This is a breathtaking shot. Look at the original version to see the full glory.

Brian Sack is in Las Vegas. Right up there with his despatches from China in the morbid fascination stakes. It certainly brings back memories to me, shudder.

Idle Words has an entry on Tierra del Fuego with an arresting image of a piper and a penguin. The words are interesting too. Although, I don’t share his enthusiasm for Bruce Chatwin, who always struck me as a monstrous carbuncle, feeding off his friends and family. Read Nicholas Shakespeare’s biography of Chatwin to understand why I feel this way.

Brian Sack (Banterist) is visiting China at the moment. His impressions of the country and its culture are being captured in a series of dispatches. Well worth reading – particularly the guidance for using the squat toilet. Brings back memories to me of a trip through some of France’s camping sites about 20 years ago…

We had (for us) a heavy snowfall last night, so I went out this morning to take some shots of Gouda. It was eerily still, only later in the morning did the town seem to come to life.

 

 

 

Here are some wonderful photographs of landscapes in Guangxi Province, China. I wonder how easy it is to live off the land, though. Those terraced rice paddies look fragile to me, clinging on the slopes with their fingernails.

 

(hat tip to BLDGBLOG)

Gizmodo trumpets the eZee Quando – an electric folding bike – in glowing terms. "Maybe you… like the idea of a bike that can be carried around under your arm… you’ll get a kick out of the eZee Bikes Quando". All very nice, until I read the next sentence: "this bike weighs 57 pounds".

 

A kick? A hernia, more like. Clearly, the writer has never actually tried to heft 57 pounds under his arm. Thanks, but no thanks. I’ll stick to my trusty Brompton – a folding bike that is well designed and weighs (depending on options) between 20 and 28 pounds (9 Kg to 13 Kg).

Maastricht is a city worth visiting. I see that there’s a new hotel opened there that might be also worth a visit (if we can afford it).