BACK TO 13/08/07 The Magic of Venice

On Monday the 13th of August we arrived in Venice after a long, hot journey on an unairconditioned train. But do not fear, Gelati is here to cool us down. And believe it or not there is a breeze off the canals. Our hotel was only around the corner from the train station so not too far to go with our packs! And we had a lovely little room with a balcony and free alarm clock every morning (the bells pealing from the church just across the canal around 7am).

On day 1 we caught a vaporetto down the Grand Canal (read boat/bus jam packed with hot sweaty tourists), sitting in the best spot out the back. We took lots and lots of photos and arrived at the Piazza San Marco with not a spare spot on the camera´s memory card.
Two disadvantages of travelling in August are that

A: the Italians all go on holidays too so many places are closed and

B: many buildings are covered with scaffolding and drapes whilst they undergo restorations

Hence the imperfections on the photo of The Basilica of Saint Mark. The queues were huge so we booked into a walking tour of Venice which included fast entry into this amazing church. Inside the walls and roof are covered with stunning mosiacs (lots of gold). Perhaps the most beautiful church Jane´s seen so far.

We resisted the temptation to do a Gondola ride due to the expense. Walking through the tiny alleys and catching numerous vaporetti was enough romance for us (plus we saved the money for future romantic adventures).

On Wednesday we visited the island of Murano where all the glass factory`s are. We watched a man blow a glass horse in about 2 mins! Ate lunch in a wonderful Trattoria whilst being serenaded. And Jane only bought 3 pairs of bead earrings! Good work Greg on restraining her. Its not only magpies that are attracted to colourful shining objects.

Overall we really enjoyed Venice and its unique canals however we were shocked at how expensive everything is. Our walking tour guide said the supermarkets add an extra 30 euro cents to all products in Venice. 300,000 Euros will buy you a tiny apartment which then ahve to renovate because its so old. And that`s a nightmare in itself because everything has to moved in by boat and there are no lifts.
12 million tourists visit Venice every year. There are 55,000 people who live here permanently and two thirds of those are over the age of 65. This tends to indicate Venice is a dying city. Its too expensive for young people to live here and with so many tourist around, its not somewhere to bring up a family.

We feel privileged to see this amazing and unique city whilst its still functioning and it will certainly be a tourist attraction for many generations to come.
We randomly found this chip (crisp if you`re English or Jane`s Mum) whilst sitting, drinking an aperitive in a piazza in the Jewish Ghetto of Venice.

BACK TO 9/08/07 A Wedding in Norway

On the 9th of August (yes, sorry it has been a while - we`ve been busy on holidays) we woke up at 4 am to take the plane to Oslo in Norway. One of Jane`s friends from college was to be married to a Norwegian girl. Despite the early start we enjoyed the hens and bucks parties that night. The boys went swimming in the local water supply, jumping off a 7m cliff into the water. Then they took the ferry to Sweden and came back after a 15 minute stop over (apparently what happens in Sweden stays in Sweden). The girls ate lots of prawns and played silly games long into the night.
The wedding ceremony was held at 1pm Saturday afternoon followed by drinks at the local soccer club, reception at a wonderful steak restaurant and finally, coffee, cake and dancing back at the soccer club. A great time was had by all.

Although we didn`t see a lot of Norway due to lack of transport we had a lovely catch up with a group of the Hildas people and met the newly wed`s beautiful baby girl, Isobelle.

Winding up our stay in Southampton

We apologise for the lack of Blog's this month. We've been spending all our time at the internet cafe booking hotels, flights and train tickets for our big 11 week holiday. We have only 2 more days of work at the Southampton General Hospital! On Thursday we leave England but you'll just have to wait to find out what happens next!!

The week after the Altmann boys came to visit we had another brother to show around Southampton (and that took 5 minutes ). We showed Jono Netley Abbey and he taught us plenty of new tricks on our camera. He's been pestering us about missing tacos at our house so we had to satisfy his craving (and he needs fattening up). Jane still remembers the days he ate 12 tacos all by himself. On Sunday we took Jono to the Purbeck Penisula. Despite the beauty of the area, now we know why Australia is known for its beaches and England is not. Sorry England.

Last weekend we decided to spend some time relaxing with the family. Charmian and Lovatt put us up at their gorgeous 600 year old cottage. We went to a neighbours art/photo exhibition held in their barn and ate a picnic in their field. On Sunday they took us to the best fish and chip shop in the UK. Situated right beside the nuclear power station. Don't worry, these fish didn't have 3 eyes.
Now its all go for packing up our little flat and squeezing into 2 hiking packs and a couple of boxes to leave in the car.

Getting Familyar with London

We've spent the last two weekends in London since we're now pretty familiar with Southampton and its tourist attractions. On the 7th and 8th we spent some happy times with the uni girls and their partners (especially loving this picnic spot right beside the parliament buildings). After trying to meet Sherryn and Tim for an hour amongst the one million people watching the Tour De France, we realised the two parties were meeting under different naked black marble statues with a sword in their hand. We gave up the rendezvous and just enjoyed the race from different sides of the track. Look how close we got! Brilliant timing with the out-stretched arm Greg! On Saturday evening we met Bron and Jerome at Shakespeare's Globe Theatre on the southern banks of the Thames (a reconstruction on the original site of the Globe, completed 1997). We missed out on the seated tickets and had to stand like commoners in "the yard". The bonus of these tickets is that you can take your wine in for the show and its expected that you make the most noise of all the crowd. And for only £5!We saw the first half of "Love's Labour's Lost". Three hours on the feet was just too much for us. After the performance we found an authentic Italian restaurant underground (a taste of the future travelling). This sign behind the bar gave us a giggle.On Sunday we visited the Imperial War Museum. Plenty of tanks and suspended aeroplanes but we were impressed and sobered by the Holocaust Exhibition. Neither of us knew the extent of the devastation to the countries surrounding Germany in the 2nd World War (particularly Poland during the time of the Death Marches).

Below is a picture of the Italian Human Torpedo. Used in the 2nd world war and carrying a crew of two, the submarine would be driven under the enemy ship, then detach it's warhead to be stuck to the vulnerable underside of the ship and the crew would return to base. The bomb deploys about an hour after detachment. Amazing (and horrifying) technology for 60 years ago.
The main aim of the weekend just gone was to catch up with 2 of Greg's brothers, Kevin and John. Spot the difference! It was great to have almost all the boys together again (we miss you Grant). The boys were at the tail end of their round the world, 8-week, holiday (also tagged as John's Extended Buck's Night). Jane managed to show them atleast 7 different lines on the tube (Whoops we got lost!) but we had plenty of time to hear about all of their adventures.
In case you were wondering the back of John's T-shirt says ("STAYS IN VEGAS").

On Saturday we had a romantic trip down the Thames to Greenwich where time began/begins. It was a sunny day and actually we did loose the romance in the CROWDS. My goodness Greenwich is a popular place in Summer!! Using plenty of elbow jabbing we got our requisite photo with a foot on either side of the Eastern and Western Hemispheres but felt it would require too much cropping to remove all the other tourists in the picture to include it on the blog.

The Painted Hall was a haven of peace (apparently the Meridian Line is much more popular with the tourists than stunning paintings. Sir James Thornhill spent 19 years as the soul artist of this masterpiece. It is the Mess hall of the Royal Navy College and Hospital.

Getting Clean with the Romans

As much as we love our jobs (especially the pay) and new friends in Southampton, we really needed to get away this weekend. So we drove to Bath. Its such a beautiful city even in the rain (yes it rained all weekend AGAIN). Lots of sandstone buildings and much, much more class than Southampton. We loved roaming the narrow alleys and there are plenty of places serving great coffee too. Perhaps we'll work here next. We didn't have a great deal of time to spend so we went to the Roman Baths Museum where parts of the baths have been excavated. The Romans began to build their temple over the heated springs here in the first century AD. Its a really peaceful place and difficult to explain over the internet. Its a must see in England anyway. See our pictures of the Gorgan's Head and some of the mosaic floor tiles.


We both really enjoyed the audio guides too. Bill Bryson (author of " A short history of nearly everything") has made comments. It would take hours to listen to all the knowledge they provide.
The water from the spring was said to have healing properties (apparently healed an emporer's leprosy). It contains 43 minerals and has a really strange taste. Plus its luke warm. Not really pleasant. Greg feels the same as he did before drinking the water.

Grey stones and Grey Skies

Sherryn and Tim, good friends from Oz, came and stayed for the weekend and we took the opportunity to show them some of Old England (in the rain). They also gave us the chance to test out our new car (actually older than the previous one but much much nicer). It 's a Vauxhall Omega (Aussie translation: Holden, something like a Berlina). Comes complete with seat warmers for those cold English mornings that we haven't really experienced yet! On Saturday after a late start we drove to Netley Abbey. It's the most complete Cistercian Abbey in Southern England and was built around 1239. It's also where we went to see A Midsummer Night's Dream performed several weeks ago.

We spent a good hour at the abbey experimenting with our new camera, a Canon EOS 400D. We can hardly put it down, although we have a LOT to learn. Perhaps there'll be a course we can do somewhere. We're hoping Jono will teach us some tips when he comes over to France in just 4 weeks!
This photo took a lot of work on Tim's behalf. He had to set the timer on the camera and then run 100 metres or so in 10 seconds whilst the camera counted down. We tried it 5 times with 2 different cameras before this photo happened.

On Sunday afternoon in the rain we visited Arundel Castle. The Keep is the oldest part of the castle (built starting 1067). It's full of all sorts of amazing funriture and decorations (a lion's pelt). The chapel was especially beautifully carved.
The current Duke and Earl of Norfolk live in one wing of the castle. It must be pretty chilly most of the time here. The stone walls are so thick I can't imagine what their heating bill would be like!

I promise I didn't write it!! But obviously a few other Jane's have added their score to the list (check out the lines below the name).

Last Saturday we finally went to visit Jane's great aunt, Aunty Betty (or AB as she's affectionately known). She has recently moved into a retirement home with a beautiful garden. We had a lovely picnic. She must have been expecting ten more people due to the amount of food that was produced from her TINY bar fridge. All her meals are supplied but she still ordered things from the grocer and made 3 different types of sandwiches on her bed (the only available bench space). Note greg's appearance in the next picture ("NO MORE FOOD!!")

Last weekend Rob, Bec and Sarah (friends from Melbourne) came to spend a day with us in Portsmouth. Portsmouth is about half an hour drive away from Southampton and its a maritime city. It's where the navy is largely based in the UK and it has an interesting Historical Dockyard Museum. We all realised we wouldn't cover all the sites in one visit so Greg and I will have to return some time.
Greg and I decided to dress as the locals do (well in Tudor times). Actually we were fascinated by the Mary Rose Exhibition. In the 1970's divers discovered the remains of a huge ship that had sunk in the 1500's during the time of King Henry the 8th (Tudor times). Over a decade they retrieved all sorts of artifacts from the sea bed inside the ship which had been really well preserved under the silt of the ocean bed. The things they collected gave real incite into the people of the time and day-to-day practises. Greg was especially excited by the massive bronze cannons and long bows brought to the surface. On 11th October 1982 the remains of the ship's hull were lifted from the ocean floor and now you can view the preserving of the ship in a big shed. Since then they've been working out how to dry out the ship without everything decaying. So they've been spraying her in this shed since 1994 with PVC (wax) so it penetrates into the wood fibres. next year they'll stop the spraying and begin to dry her out very gradually.

The dockyards also house The Victory, the flagship of Lord Nelson at the Battle of Trafalgar. We were able to walk inside and see what life would have been like on board a battle ship. Rob had to crouch the whole tour and we decided he was lucky he was army, not navy trained.

Rob stayed 2 nights in Southampton to collect some data for work. Some of the CT's that Greg has been doing will be used for Rob's research on Thoracic stenting. It's a small world! So to make him feel at home we made Chicken Parmi (actually it was turkey because that was cheaper!)

We also invited a good friend Paula from work to our Aussie dinner. She's a Scottish radiographer working with us at Southampton General but worked in Australia last year. She was a locum in Geelong earlier this year!!

Uni Friends in the Uni town of Oxford

This weekend we travelled to Oxford to catch up with 3 radiography girlfriends and their partners. The weather wasn't all that great but we did manage to visit a couple of colleges, museums and the Bodlian Libary and spend an afternoon punting on the river. Plenty of fun was had by all. Here we are in the Roman wall that surrounds the garden of New College (not so new: founded in 1379).

Everyone had a go at punting. Females must have designed these poles so they could just sit and enjoy the ride since they're too heavy to pick up, let alone push off the ground and use to actually move down stream.

Don't make it look so easy Paul!

This is a bridge that connects two parts of a college in Oxford. It is referred to as the Bridge of Sighs because it looks like a bridge in Venice which has the same name. It rained all day for us but we shouldn't complain. We've hardly had a rainy day since we arrived in the UK!
The previous day we'd climbed a 12th century tower in the town centre for a view over Oxford. It would have been a little disappointing if we hadn't arrived on the uppermost level to see the beginning of a plane stunt show, like the Aussie Roulettes (there was a big rowing regata on the river that day).

At the Natural History Museum in Oxford we saw some scary creatures. This isn't a real skeleton, but a plaster copy of the real thing. Very impressive! Wouldn't want to meet one on a sunny day, let alone a dark night!

This furry friend had a sign saying " Please Touch" which was a change to all the other displays. There were still plenty of kids squeeling with delight at the big dinosaurs, dispite not being able to touch.

Anyone recognise this building? Its the dinning room from the Harry Potter movies. And doubles as the Christchurch dinning room.
Christchurch College has a huge cathedral that's full of beautiful stained and painted glass windows. We learnt stain glass is made by mixing normal transparent glass with different minerals to give a colour and produce a pattern. Painted glass is just what it sounds like, transparent glass plates that have been painted. Light doesn't shine through painted glass nearly as well as stained glass though.