My European Adventure

thursday i didnt really get up to much, headed in to the city at around lunch time and decided to go to the natural history museum in south kensington which was pretty cool, i was particularly excited about the dinosaurs and their bones etc that was really cool! i have pictures but ill put them up when they are uploaded!

after spending a few hours checking out the dinosaurs and other creatures in the museum i then headed off and was planing to go back in to piccadilly but on my walk to the tube i came across the victoria and albert museum, which i would have to say aside from the tate modern museum this was my other favourite, mainly because there was a big surrealism exhibition on featuring alot of savador dalis works, though it was mainly a surrealism design exhibition so it was all designs of chairs clothes etc!

once i finished checking out the museums for awhile i ended up jumping back on the tube to piccadilly and took my self out to lunch in an italian restaurant in leicster square, it was so nice... very romantic... all on my own... how sad.... haha if only i was with someone!

i then decided i should probably get home as my cousin and i were heading out for dinner and cocktails and then moving on to the walkabout in sheppards bush so i had to get home and make my self look semi decent...

when i eventually got back home, kristy followed not long after so we made our selves look beautiful and i curled her hair and then we were off again! we first went to B @ 1 a cocktail bar in hammersmith that has happy hour 2 for 1 cocktails from 5 - 8 pm so we hung out there for a couple of cocktails then we went next door to a restaurant for dinner,which was nice though we were both really tired and felt like we were going to fall asleep in our dinner... had no idea how we were going to make it through the rest of the night but some how we managed.... after dinner it was back on the bus again and off to the walk about... was a bit disapointed in the walk about that night wasnt as good as the first time i went.. wasnt as much dancing and stuff and there were waaaaaaaay to many sleezy ment there but i guess its to be expected... dont get me wrong there were a few nice guys just alot of sleezy desperados!

we stuck around at the walkabout right till the very end and then got on the night bus home... we were absolutly stuffed! came home stopped off at price cutters and got some food then off to bed! we needed to get lots of sleep ready for our big kath and kim party the next night!

friday i didnt really do a great deal! i was so tired from the night before so i had a bit of a sleep in then i decided to get dressed and head in to piccadilly for the last time so i could go to the post office to get supplies like bubble wrap etc for all my breakables so i could start packing ready to fly home sunday ... after getting all my post office needs fullfilled i then headed to good old tesco to get some groceries for my attempt at cooking an aussie bbq for me kristy and reg that night though its a bit hard when the only sausages they sell are pork.... what australian cooks pork snags on a regular basis at a good ol' fashioned aussie bbq? none that i know of.. what ever happened to beef?! so anyway after my whinging about the beef i then got over it and went to pay.. and for the first time out of the whole month and a half i was there i got asked for ID... in a grocerie shop of all places.. there was countless times i went to night clubs etc never asked once... yet i get asked at a grocerie store... what the? then back off home i went.. the next two hours was fun.. trying to figure out how in the hell your supposed to light a coal bbq when the only bbq's i have ever lit were gas bbq's!.. lets just say there was alot of smoke and not much fire there for a while haha.. buti eventually got the hang of it after about 15 fire lighters (your only supposed to use 4.. supposedly.. but hey who reads instructions...) once i got the bbq going it was great! yumo reg kristy and i then settled in for a hillarious night of kath and kim... well actually we saw 4 episiodes then decided it would be more fun to go in to the kitchen and get on our hands and knees and get each other to poor a mixture of magners and rose wine in to our mouths two bottles at once and see how we would go.... we i have quite a few incriminating pictures from that evening.. and unless you were there and know the story behind it i think you would be afraid... though unfortunatly they arnt with me at the moment so i cant put them up just yet.. thank god... it was pretty funny though a bit of a you had to be there moment!

once we decided to finish our kitchen shenanagans we headed back to the lounge room in an attemtp to watch more kath and kim but then janette and her boyfriend andrew came home and we had a bit of a chat to them and then when they went to bed kristy reg and my self decided to have a d & m which was interesting to say the least... we then headed off to bed at about 2 30 am.. which was a bit stupid since we had a huge day a head of us (me finishing packing and sending stuff home in the mail) then all of us off to the O2 Wireless Festival in Hyde park....

i woke up at about 9 am.. i should have gotten up earlyer since this was pretty much my last chance to finish packing plus i had a heap of things i needed to mail home... i finally got it done and headed off down to the post office to mail my stuff back i mailed back 4 boxes of stuff... i didint realize i had bought so much untill then itwas quite scarey it didnt look like alot but apparently it was! i decided to have to sent home on a boat and see it in 2 months rather than have it flown home because it being flown cost like three times the price of it going on a boat, and ever still it was expensive but hey at least it will get there... i hope....

then had to rush home get ready and leave by 11 am as we were meeting reg and his mates at marble arch by 12pm so we could go out somewhere for lunch then head to the festival...

we ended up going to an italian restaurant having some good food a good laugh then it started to pour down bucket loads out side so we wanted to go find somewhere to buy a poncho.. we came across primark which had them but unfortunatly it seemed like the rest of london had the same idea and the line up to pay was terrible so we just gave up and off we went!

when we got to hyde park we had to walk for a while to get to the entree gate (i so never realized how huge hyde park was it is ginormous!) and in we went.. first stop was the bar and then when bands began playing we just rushed straight to the closest tent to get out of the rain and watched a band called the soho dolls, they were pretty good i have never heard of them before but they were definatly someone id like to hear again they were awsome!
after the soho dolls we headed for the main stage where we pretty much stayed most of the day even though there were six stages but pretty much all the bands we wanted to see was on the main stage and plus we wanted to get in a good position for when daft punk came on about 5 or 6 hours later (there was like more than 20,000 people there) ... by the time daft punk came on hours later, we were having agreat day though i wanted a pint of pims.. which cost 9 pounds... very very very expensive drink but i have to say was worth it.. anyway back to daft punk.. oh my god they were incredible even though i almost got killed in the mosh pit.. i was really close to the front.. im not much of a fan of mosh pits though people jump all over you and throw their drinks on your head but dispite that it was great... they were so so so good.. i even spotted kira knightly on the big screen who was just a few meters in front of me bopping along to good old daft punk... all in all it was an awsome day and sadly the last day i would see reggie! =(.. once the concert was over everyone was still buzzing for hours about how great daft punk were we all decided to head to the tube... kristy reg and i said our good byes and kristy and i got on a train to hammersmith as our line was down (stupid weekend tube) but just as well we did because kristy decided to take me to get something to eat as we were both starving we ended up going to the jumbuck, an aussie themed pie shop with the nicest pies omg they were sooo good... we then had to jump on the night bus and munched on our pies and then we were finally home... where we walked in to a party in our living room (aka my bedroom lol) a couple of the girls we live with was having a singstar party... it was tradgic since none of them could sing haha but it was fun to listen to and at least they were having a good time!

but i was absolutly stuffed and after having a shower to wash all the sticky beer off me people decide to throw everywhere in music festivals i was straight to bed and asleep within minutes!

we had a bit of a sleep in sunday morning and then rose at about 10 30 to get ready to go out for breakky before i had to fly out, kristy, myself paula and janette and a couple of their friends who stayed the night we all wandered down the main street of chiswick to find somewhere to go.. we ended up setting for giraffe where we had the biggest feast for brunch ever.. none of us could hold our stomachs in walking home... each of our feasts contained pretty much this...
toast, sausage, eggs, bacon, potato wedges (apparently they eat them with breakky over there) baked beans, mushroom, tomato and im surethere is something else i left out but god it was so good!... after brunch it was then back home where i had like half an hour to get my self organised then it was off to heathrow we went! but before then stupid me decided oh yeah i have half an hour lets try and burn my 1500 photos to disc now... though obviously having so many photos ment it would take a couple of hours to burn so all i came home with was one disc of a few photos and i have to wait for the rest to come in the mail in the next few weeks!

once i got to heathrow i had to go and check in and put my bag though... and i was freaking out because my bag was way way way overweight and i was expecting to be charged some rediculous ammount to get it on the plane (concidering it is 20 pounds per extra kilo) but i was lucky i got a nice person who served me and he just laughed at the weight of my bag and let me through (thank god!!) phew!

then i had to say good bye to kristy and then off through security and immigration it was for me...
its pretty funny the fact that when i arrived in london coming out of the airport their was no security, customs what so ever liek they were there but they didnt do any thing i pretty much just got straight of the plane and walk straight out in to london and thats it but when i was leaving wel that was a different story... going through i had to show my ticket pass port take my shoes off empty my bag have everything scanned then they had to magic wand me (you know them security things) and then pad me down and then i was finally allowed on the other side where i had about 2 hours to spare so i wandered around the shops for a bit then headed upstairs to a bar and had some lunch before my flight and my last pims in london! then it was just about time to head to my gate and jump on the plane!

the plane ride from london was pretty smooth only an hour and a half long if that though it was a pretty scary landing i pretty sure he forgot to put his foot on the break or something because i almost flew through the chair in front of me and i hit my head! once in frankfurt airport i had like 2 hours to kill so i wandered around a bit then headed for my gate and met some nice aussies there who i hung out with for a bit then it was back on the plane for us! the flight from frankfurt to singapore is the worst and so boring as its the longest of the 24 hours flight but i made it through alive! i had to say the flight going home from frankfurt to singapore as opposed to coming over from singapore to london was much better as i wasnt cramped in the middle this time with no room!

when i got to singapore airport i had 4 1/2 hours to kill but then mu flight was delayed so i had another hour on top of that so i met back up with the aussies i met in frankfurt and we wandered around singapore airport for a bit checking out the shops then i discovered a stage set up in my terminal where jet were coming to play that night.. i was so excited then i looked at the time.. an hour after my flight would be leaving i couldnt believe i was going to miss a free jet concert i was devostated! how rude i thaught lol. i eventually got over that then me and the other aussies parted ways as be both had different flights at different times they were going to perth and i was off to sydney and still had another 2 hours to wait after they left so i went and found somewhere nice to have some dinner then i went shopping a bit more in the airport! singapore airport has some cool stuff and so so so cheap! woo hoo i was loving it!

then it was off to my departure gate to get on my plane where i met somemore really nice aussies.. i tell you what some of the nicest people i met in travels was people in the airports strangely enough!

i was flying with singapore airlines from singapore to sydney and i love flying with them the plane is way more comfortable plus they have tv's to keep you entertained! the flight from singapore was a breeze it went pretty quickly which was good and before you knew it 8 hours later i was back in aus where i had to go through passport controll customs etc when i got to customs they were filming a tv boarderline security which thank god they ddint get me on tv because i looked like crap obviously i was going for comfort not style in my choice of clothes that morning.. but come on it was only 6 am! once through customs i got to meet back up with the family! was really good to see them again i missed them heaps though i wasnt so happy to be back home i missed london so much!! but then again who wouldnt miss it when you have been away a month and a half not working and having a great time!

then back home for me it was!

well monday i did absolutly nothing... no wait i lied i went to the grocerie shop! i spent the whole day at home i was so absolutly stuffed from my huge weekend in paris so i vegged out on the lounge and watched telly allday! was so good! then that night kristy, me, paul and patrycja and magda went to the tapas restaurant up the road from our house, which is a spanish restaurant where you paid ten pounds and sould eat as much as you want each person orders three things at once and you share (obviously they were very small servings) and between 4 of us we at 28 dishes... how shocking haha by the way yes i can count... magda never arrived till we finished.. just so you know!

though i had a shocking migrain all the way through dinner and that night even though i had fun i have to say i couldnt wait to get home my head was pounding!

tuesday i had a great day i headed out around lunch time i went straight to the tate modern art gallery to see the salvador dali exhibition! i think i spent about 2 hours in that one exhibition it was incredible and so exciting to see these art works which i have studies over the years! i then went to another exhibition which featured works from a new modern artist from brazil whos name i have for gotten but om sure ill remember soon!

i love the tate its so good!

after spending a very long time at the tate i then headed for leicster square to check out prices for theatre tickets for wednesday night we wanted to see either mumma mia or billy elliot!

i spent an hour or so in the city looking around for a bit then headed home to beautify since we were going out for dinner again at our local the hart with kristy reg and patrycja, was so much fun, though we always have fun together we are a crack u... well to our selves atleast anyway!

then headed home off to bed!

wednesday i didint do much at all i had so many plans but none of them worked out.. i wanted to head to portobello road markets in notting hill again and then to a gallerie but unfortunatly i spent most of the day chasing the tickets for tonights show though i must say my god it was worth it... i would have to recomend for everyone to go and see billy elliot down the west end, it was incredible i have never seen such talented kids... the kid who played billy was 12 i have never seen anything like it, it was also really funny and just entertaining it was awwwwwsome!
such a great night!

but before me and kristy, paula and reg headed off to billy elliot, kristy myself and reg went to an italian restaurant in victoria for dinner was really nice! i love going out with them two they are a crack up!

woo hoo off to the walk about again tomorrow night cant wait!!!!

Paris was so incredible i dont know where to start it literally l was breathless!

I had to get up very early friday morning to make it to the bus station by 6am so i had to get up at 4 30 am.. which nearly killed me since i had a very late night thursday night (not the most sensible move but i had fun!) so i made it to the bus station bearly alive in victoria and got on the bus where i slept for two hours from london to dover where we had to get the ferry across the ocean to calais- france

the white cliffs in dover are absolutly beautiful something everyone needs to see! especially beautiful when coming from the ocean on the ferry.

so once we made it to calais on the ferry we were back on the coach and on our way in to old paree, from calais to paris took about 3-31/2 hours good drive though i slept though most of it exept for about 5 minutes... but i must say most of the bus did the same thing!

i have to admit i was actually disapointed by paris to begin with as it wasnt quite what i was expecting how ever the first part of paris i seen was where my hotel was located which was on a long street very close to the red light district which was a bit of a dodgy area though it grew on me over the 3 days had some really nice restaurants etc so that was cool!

the first night we didnt really do much, i went out with two american girls i met from the tour i was on and we headed out to geta bite to eat and check out our street then headed back to our hotel room.
i was lucky enough to have a room to my self after some compromising... usually i like to share with people on tours like this so i get to know new people but i was so buggered it was so nice to come back to an empty hotel room so i could just chill out in my undies and t-shirt, eat dinner on the floor and watch telly (even though i couldnt really understand it, it was nice all the same...nothing like a bit of csi or how i met your mother in french!)... not very adventurous concidering i was in france but i was so tired and didnt get in most nights till so late from sight seeing i couldnt be bothered to go anywhere else!
after heading back to the hotel room for a while on friday night our tour guide and driver decided to give us a driving tour of paris by night... this is when i saw the real paris... the paris i alway pictured it was magnificent... only problem is pictures dont turn out so well at night but i got a few that give you an idea of how nice it was!

(unfortunatly i have now exeeded my upload limit for photos but i have uploaded some of my paris photos on to a web site ill copy and paste the link and you can view them all!)

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=6243&l=61177&id=674916072

DAY TWO:
woke up bright and early with the intention of leaving the hotel at around 8 am how ever i was a bit scarred of getting on the metro for the first time on my own so i waited around for some people before heading to the louvre though once i got on the metro it wasnt so hard at all it was exactly the same as the tube but in another language!

the louvre was great it is so huge! i couldnt believe the size of it i was told that if you spend one minute looking at each art work in the louvre it would take 2 months to see it all.. how nuts is that!

after visiting the mona lisa which i took a photo of and then got in trouble though everyone else was taking photos too! i guess like dad always says two wrongs dont make a right but i needed to geta photo of it!

i spent about an hour and a half at the louvre i could have spent all day there though with only one full day in paris to see everything i always wanted too i had to get on with it!

once i left the louvre i went out side and took some piccies and then walked to the arc de triomphe, which took me about an hour and a half.. shouldnt have taken that long but i was walking at my own pace checking out the champs elysees which was also very beautiful ut very different to what i expected it to be it was a very long street with the louvre at one end and the arc de triomphe at the other and lots of awsome shops inbetween including good old louis vuitton, before i made it to the arc i decided to stop off at a cafe for a baguette and then sat out side admiring the scenery! gosh it was so beautiful!

after my delicious baguette i kept on walking to the arc, it was also another incredible sight to see! check out that link for all of my photos i put on here, you will see it on there also!

after visiting the arc i decided to go for a wonder and find the eiffell tower i was going to climb it once i found it but the line was insanely long especially since it was about lunch time so i decided to hold off on climbing the eiffell tower untill about 7pm hoping by then the line would have died down a little by then so instead i decided to take a walk along the river in hope of running in to some other famous sights. on the way i decided to sit down by the river, the view was absolutly amazing all of these old buildings and behind me the eiffell tower, words cant actually describe how beautiful it was, its just something youve got to see for your self.

next stop was the grand palais and petit palais which i accidently stumbled across and both happen to be directly across the road from one another. from there i headed back in the direction i started to walk and across the bridge to the musee de l'armee, which is a museum for the army (if you didnt pick that up from the french name) i didnt go inside because there just wasnt enough hours in the day for me to visit every place in france so i looked from outside and took photos!

after checking out that place i went for a bit more of a wonder around the streets of paris and then decided to head back to my hotel to drop off all my shopping and freshen up a little i was starting to feel a bit gross because it was so hot!

i then headed back to the metro station and got the train to the champs elysees again to check out the shops some more and then off to the eiffell tower... i arrived at the eiffell tower at 7 pm (it was still bright and sunny the sun didnt go down untill about 10 45 pm its crazy) i was in line untill just after 9pm when i finally got to get on the lift and go up the eiffell tower! the view of paris was incredible, you could see everything it was so so beautiful! i really wanted to go to the 3rd level which was also the very top but there was another hour wait to get there and i was a bit worried about being out in the city so late since i was alone and had already had some interesting experiences with french men earlyer that day so i wanted to be a little cautious!

how ever i still didnt end up getting back to my hotel till about 11 15pm anyway, on the way home i wanted to go to a french restaurant and have a french meal but i was so buggered after my huge day i ended up just going to a chinese restaurant and getting take away and eating it in my hotel room, it was so great just to sit around in my hotel room eating and watching tv and just chilling out! i was absolutly stuffed!!!!!

i really had a great day i got to see so many sights i had been dying to see and even though i didint get to see everything i wanted to, at least its an excuse to go back again, which i definatly definatly will be!

DAY THREE:
we had to get up bright and early again today! as we were heading in to the town of versailles which was also much like paris very beautiful though it wasnt a city scene was quite the opposite of paris really!(if that makes sence...)
we went to the palace of versailles which is the hugest palace i have ever seen and the garden is absolutly magnificent it goes on for miles, its not suprizing the king who had it built back in the 1600's sent france broke from financing the palace, its huuuuuuuuuuuuuge... check out the photos in the link i posted up the top!

after checking out the palace for an hour or so i met up with some other people i met on the tour i was on and we headed down to the farmers market which was on and we bought some strawberrys and my god they were they nicest strawberrys ive ever ever eaten.... so good, then we headed off to a cafe and had a good old baguette, it was great relaxing in the sun with friends and chatting!

we then went back to the bus and drove for 3 hours to calais were we hopped back on to the ferry and my self and some friends i had made over the 3 days in paris headed for the food court and enjoyed dinner together and a glass of rose!
we were having such a good time and before long we were back in dover on the bus again driving to london!

i was really sad for the trip to paris to be over i had such a great time and will definatly be going back!!!

what a night.....

kristy, paula and my self went out for dinner thursdaynight and then they decided to take me to the walkabout an aussie themed bar which there is a few of all around london and england

had such a great night when we got there we ddint realize that it was hunks in trunks night.....what an experience....

it was a night where men had to enter to win as psp 2 and a bottle of sambuca and they had to get up on stage and model and have a special talent... some of their special talents worried me though haha

kristy and paula also made me drink a snake bite aparently its a tradition at the walkie... i wasnt a lover of it... it was ok but id prefer good old wkd's lol a snake bit is 2 different types of beer with a kind of juice added to it im having a memory blank and cant think of what kinda juice it is though

that took me like an hour to drink lol

after that we just danced the night away it was so much fun! had sucha great night so much fun that we are going back again this week yay!

decided to go and spend up big today... unintentionally of course!

i have heard all about oxford street and the huge big shops such as topshop so today i finally went there.. it is such a huge shop i got lost... i wish i had a spare thousand or two to fling around because there was so many cool clothes, shoes, accessories, bags etc i sooo wanted to buy

sorry this has been a girly blog so far but this stuff needs to be told... but yes it is a death trap because everything is so awsome there you just want to spend every cent or penny on you... which is pretty much exactly what i did!

thats pretty much all i did today.... after clothes shopping i headed to leicster square so i could get some prices on theatre tickets because we are hoping to go next week will probably see mumma mia or footloose or something should be pretty cool!

then just did some more souveneir shopping and then headed home and cooked dinner... and again....
HIT UP THE SINGSTAR... it seems like all we ever do but its so fun!

well thats all for now wil have amuch more interesting blog next week thats not all about shopping because im off to paris tomorrow! YAY!!!!!

ciao for now xox