New York

Monday 18^th March

It's not every day that you turn 30 and what better way to celebrate than going to New York! We made our way to Heathrow full of excitement; we had been waiting for this trip for ages. Hamish made the quickest purchase decision I have ever seen and bought his flash watch (courtesy of the Bennie's) and we were off.

We landed in a grey overcast JFK airport and made our way to Brooklyn (not the cool part as we were to find out but the ghetto part) to our "hotel". It took ages to find and when we got there we were not pleasantly surprised. It was meant to be a self-service apartment but it was a bedroom and a kitchen with no cooking utensils! And it was super noisy. But anyway we ventured out to this American BBQ place that Lou had read about using the subway for the first time. Incredibly straight forward system and the tubes are so big so you can fit way more people on them.

We got the fright of our lives when we got out of the subway and there was a huge snowstorm going on! We battled through the snow to this place called Fette Sau and got amongst the best brisket, pulled pork and craft beer served in jam jars. It was an amazing introduction to American food and a great place to celebrate Hamish's birthday.

Highlight: Fette Sau!!! And the snow! And Hamish is 30!

Lowlight: Our hotel was dumb

Interesting Fact: Brooklyn was an independent city until1898 and is now home till 2.5million people.

Tuesday 19^th  March

We headed to downtown again using the subway, although it was freezing cold and raining so we tried to do the inside activities. We found Grand Central station which was beautiful, so weird seeing places in real life that you have seen so many times in movies. It was built in 1913 and is so busy!

We also saw the Chrysler building and wandered down Madison Ave and 5^th Ave to get our bearings. We took some shelter in the New York Central library, and then found the Flatiron building that they always showed in Friends.

We had lunch at Katz's deli, which is famous for that scene in Harry met Sally. It was a bizarre place with photos of famous people with Katz himself everywhere. We had matzo ball soup (which is a Jewish chicken soup with a massive dumping) and pastrami on rye sandwich with a giant pickle. Hamish was in love. 

We walked the Highline, which is a 1-mile linear park built on a 1.45-mile section of the elevated former New York Central Railroad spur called the West Side Line, which runs along the lower west side of Manhattan; it has been redesigned and planted as an aerial greenway. Its so cool, loads of graffiti and outdoor sculptures.

That night Lou had organized tickets to the New York Rangers vs. New Jersey Devils ice hockey game at the "Devils Den" in New Jersey. We were really amped having never been to an ice hockey game before. The Americans take sport to a new level in terms of the entertainment available. It was a long long game though for Lou but she was happy with the hot dogs and popcorn.

Highlight: Hamish would say the ice hockey and sitting in the middle of a derby game listening to the chants…Lou would say the Highline

Lowlight: New Jersey is quite far away from Brooklyn when its late and you are jet lagged.

Interesting Fact: Ice hockey has 3 “quarters” which last 20 minutes.. without stoppages.

Wednesday 20^th March

We finally awoke to some sunshine so we decided to walk the Brooklyn Bridge to get some views of the city. Even though they were doing some construction on it, it was still awesome and a great way to see how big New York is.

We found City Hall and also St. Pauls church that is actually the church that backs onto the site where the twin towers once stood. Because of the location it turned into a refuge for the firefighters, policemen, and emergency support workers who were working to get people out of the rubble in the days after the destruction. It was really emotional and quite confronting; we both didn't really expect to be affected by it so I guess it was surprise more than anything.

We had a bit of a rolling lunch; first up we found our way into Chinatown where we sampled some dumplings at Shanghai Joe's. Amazing food and very authentic.  Next up was a slice of pizza in Greenwich, just like in the movies….

Central park was our destination, again so weird seeing a place you are used to seeing in movies. Because it was the end of winter there wasn't much to see in terms of trees and flowers etc. but it was a beautiful park and New Yorkers seem to make good use of it too.  There were some lovely little spots including the Alice in Wonderland statue that was made for the children of New York who lost parents in the Twin towers disaster, and the rose garden that was planted for John Lennon by Yoko Ono.

Lou had booked tickets for the NBA; we were so excited to be going to Madison Square Gardens. It was such a cool venue right in the middle of the city. Lou got the biggest bucket of popcorn ever seen and was tempted by the candy floss and Crrrracker Jacks but resisted…the game was between the New York Knicks and the Orlando Magic. We didn't see any famous people but it was still amazing. And the game was short and sweet too! 

Highlight: Brooklyn bridge was a great free attraction

Lowlight: We underestimated how big everything was, blisters galore!

Interesting Fact: Central Park was opened in 1857 and is 840 acres big,

Thursday 21^st March

Another day, another list of things to see in the Big Apple. We headed back downtown to see Wall Street and the famous charging bull statue along with about 500 other people. 

We also saw the New York Stock exchange building, before getting in the security line for the World Trade Centre memorial. This was a very strange experience, as you essentially were queuing up to see an empty space where these buildings were, like it was theme park. There isn't much there obviously, apart from this water feature where all the names of the people that died etched onto the stone around it. And in classic American style you have to exit through a gift shop which sold some of the worst tat we had ever seen. It wasn't emotional and I think if you wanted to get a true sense of what happened, going to St. Paul's church was much better.

Battery Park is where the tours for the Statue of Liberty go from but we were really disappointed that due to Hurricane Sandy, you couldn't visit the Statue of Liberty or Ellis Island so instead we took advantage of the free ferry from downtown to Staten Island which gives you great views of the Statue. Always up for an experience, we thought we might hop off the boat on Staten Island and have a look round (most people just stay on the boat to go back to New York). We realized after about 10 minutes why most people go back….not much to see but suburbia! 

We plodded up to see Times Square, which is such an assault on the senses. Noise, lights, people, everywhere! It was quite cool just to stop and look, but then you got grumpy people pushing you out of the way.

We then treated ourselves to a Magnolia bakery cupcake. This wee shop was made famous in Sex and the City and the line around the block was worth it. Hummingbird bakery doesn't even come close…

We were shattered after 3 late nights out, so we went for an early dinner at famous Asian fusion restaurant Momofuku for some delicious noodle soup.

Highlight: Times square was something else!

Lowlight: Stupid Hurricane Sandy

Interesting Fact: The Statue of Liberty was only open for one day after years of restorations before Hurricane Sandy hit.

Friday 22^nd March

We got up especially early to get the subway to the lower east side which is where the famous Clinton Street Bakery is. Renown for the most amazing pancakes in New York City. We arrived 30 minutes before they even opened and there was already a line round the building. But it was worth it! Lou had banana walnut and Hamish had blueberry (with a side of bacon of course!) and we were in pancake heaven.

Still massively bloated we waddled to the Empire State Building as the sun was shining and we were waiting for a good view. It is super cool up there, the views were incredible and they do the whole tourist experience thing really well. But man it was cold!

Next up on Lou's foodie tour was the Corner Bistro, an old man's type bar that only did burgers and fries and beer. But man they did it well.

Next we went and did some window shopping in FAO Schwarz which is one of the world's most famous toy stores. It was epic, any toy you can imagine you could get, and it's also home to the floor piano and the Zoltar fortune teller from the movie Big. 

We then trekked through the park to the Museum of Modern Art, but after seeing the entrance fee and not really being in the mood for interpreting modern art, we were content to browse the gift shop.

We were craving more BBQ, but the only place around the Rockefeller was this massive chain called Virgil's. We went the whole hog (literally) and feasted on burnt ends, collard greens and baked beans, followed by peanut butter cheesecake….Americans have the most amazing ability to make everything available in peanut butter flavor. Much to Lou's delight. 

We wanted to see the New York skyline at night so we chose the Rockefeller Centre as the way to do it.  It was so pretty! Although Lou succumbed to the cold and watched Hamish take photos through the glass wall. We caught the subway from Times Square and got to experience Times Square at night, just craziness. 

Highlight: Today was definitely a good eating day

Lowlight: We wanted to buy all the toys but no one to buy them for L

Interesting Fact: You have to line up and pay to go on the floor piano….not cool

Saturday 23rd March

We had heard that Brooklyn was a great place to browse the flea markets so we took the short subway ride to Williamsburg. This is a really funky part of New York, loads of vintage shops and cafes. We trawled the bins and Lou picked up an old Fleetwood Mac vinyl record for 10 bucks! Bargain.

We also went down to the harbor to check it out, unfortunately even though it was the banks of the Hudson, they hadn't really developed much of the area.

We had a drink in a cool bar, followed by some amazing pizza….safe to say we were enjoying American food and drink…

Highlight: Brooklyn was a really cool wee area, definitely somewhere we want to live.

Lowlight: The weather….it was a bit rubbish again.

Interesting Fact: Fleetwood Mac is the greatest band of all time….fact (in Lou’s opinion).

Sunday 24th March

Sylvia's in Harlem was our breakfast stop today. This famous restaurant boasts Obama as a fan and is in the heart of Harlem. Which was a weird experience in itself? Being blonde and white, Lou got a lot of weird looks but Grand master pimp Hamish was there for protection. It reminded Lou of being in the middle of the Grand Bazaar in Marrakesh!

This place is known for its soul food and we got in the action. Fried chicken and waffles with maple syrup. Don't knock it till you try it! Because we were in the neighborhood we travelled to Queens to see Yankee Stadium which was cool although we couldn't go in.

We also stopped by the Museum of New York which had lots of interesting exhibitions, but most memorable was how small apartments are and how furniture can be made teeny tiny.

Lou wanted to experience some culture, and we found that the prices of the Broadway shows were so much more expensive than London so we thought we would give a Jazz show a go. New York is famous for its jazz clubs and one of the most famous is called Birdland, off one of the back streets by Times Square. It was opened in 1949 and since then has seen the likes of Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, Miles Davis, John Coltrane and many others.  We really enjoyed the show; the singer was just really really talented.

 After the show we ended up in one of our favourite celebrity chefs Guy Fiorelli's restaurants for desert, yep more peanut butter.

Highlight: The Jazz club, very unexpected but great

Lowlight: More walking…

Interesting Fact: Why chicken and waffles? One such theory is that waffles entered American cuisine in the 1790s after Thomas Jefferson’s purchase of a waffle iron from France. Recipes for waffles and chicken soon appeared in cookbooks. Because African Americans in the South rarely had the opportunity to eat chicken and were more familiar with flapjacks or pancakes than with waffles, they considered the dish a delicacy.

Monday 25^th 

We wandered round Bloomingdales and Macy's on our last day in New York, soaking up the shops and the madness that is New York.

And then back to the airport for a long flight back to London, landed at 6.30am and straight into work for a day – massive struggle!

Ice ice baby Nov 2013

Thurs 28th Nov

We wanted to see the Northern lights so we decided to wrap up in our thermals and journey over to Iceland, more specifically Reykjavik for a long weekend.

The excitement started early when we realised we could have a relaxed check in with our luggage as we were flying Iceland Air. It was a reasonably long flight but with no time difference we got to our hotel just after midnight and quickly fell asleep.

Friday 29th Nov

The next morning we awoke to pitch darkness, having thought we had slept in. However, given how close Iceland is to the Artic circle the sun doesn't rise until closer to 11am in Reykjavík and it sets about 3pm which is a very odd experience. 

We had breakfast in the hotel, which was a weird mish mash of Icelandic treats like boiled eggs stuffed with tuna, rye bread and waffles. With no real agenda planned we went for a wander. First stop was to the massive church right outside our hotel. Hallgrímskirkja is the largest church in Iceland and is quite dramatic in its shape. From there we wandered down the main shopping streets to the harbourside which was really pretty as the sun was rising. We explored the Harpa (the main concert hall) and the wee shops and cafes along the waterfront. Everything looked very festive with the Christmas decorations up.

We went up to the top of the church to check out the view, followed by lunch in a traditional Icelandic café (Café Loki) where we had smoked lamb for the first time which was nice. We then treated ourselves to an afternoon nap mainly because the weather had turned to cold showers and it was dark already.

For dinner we headed out in the awful weather and had a really nice meal at a local restaurant, and then watched a movie on the laptop.

Highlight: The view of the sunrise at 11am!

Lowlight: The weather – its called Iceland for a reason.

Interesting Fact: Iceland is the physical size of the UK but only has a population of 300,000 people – 200,000 of which are in Reykjavik!

Saturday 30th Nov

Today we decided to get out into nature abit so we had arranged for a day tour to see some of Iceland's best scenic spots. First up was a wee waterfall whose name escapes us, this was cool in the way that there was a man made ladder for the salmon to jump up to help them out. The next waterfall was the big one, called Gullfoss. It was pretty dramatic. Unfortunately this was the time that it also started to snow coupled with gale force winds. Lou had a quick look and then beat a hasty retreat to the café while Hamish braved the cold and took some photos. We had lunch there, where they served unlimited bowls of lamb soup and bread. Hamish took full advantage and had 4 bowls.

 

Next stop was the Geyser. This is the actual Icelandic name for these things so they don't need to call it anything else! The word made its way into common English. Again the weather was a pain but we saw the geyser erupt a few times which was pretty cool. On the way the driver pulled over so we could see the native Icelandic horses which were very very cute.

Last stop was the Thingvellir National Park. It is the site of a rift valley that marks the crest of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. It is also home to Þingvallavatn, the largest natural lake in Iceland.

Parliament was established here back in 930 and remained there until 1798. The Viking all used to sit around in the cold and chat about things every few years and make some new laws up. It was stunning scenery that reminded us of the West coast, but it was the coldest that Lou has ever been in her life.

That night we had a quick meal at a local Asian noodle bar and waited for our bus for the Northern lights part of our trip. Basically because the weather had been so bad we weren't expecting to see anything but the guide seemed to think we would. We drove out to the middle of nowhere and stood outside watching the sky for ages and not really seeming much apart from wisps of white/pale green clouds. Hamish managed to get some half way decent photos but we were a bit disappointed with the lights as it wasn’t what you imagined they would look like. Basically you need really good conditions to see the lights like the tourist photos with the naked eye.

Lou had a good nap on the bus however while Hamish again braved the cold.

Highlight: The waterfall and geysers were awesome, and the tour guide was actually really interesting.

Lowlight: Massive Northern lights expectation with little return.

Interesting Fact: Nearly all Icelanders can trace their DNA back to the Vikings and there is a set list of names that you have to chose your baby name from – it’s the law. This is to preserve the Icelandic culture/ language. Also your last name comes from your dads first name. So we would be Hamish Ronaldson and Louise Davidson. If david and Sally had named Louise Harley Hamish could have married a Harley Davidson!

Sunday 1st Dec

We didn't have much else to see on our last day in Reykavik so we had a late breakfast and wandered round the shops a bit more. Hamish bough a Viking drinking horn which he hasn't drunk out of yet but will do before he goes to battle. We made our way to the airport and the long trip home. 

We had a cracker in Krakow!

Friday 11 Nov

We had always really enjoyed our trips to Eastern Europe, and Hamish was craving some pork knuckle so we decided on our next trip being Krakow in southern Poland.

We arrived late Friday night after the usual mad dash from the centre of London to Stansted and a pub meal at the airport. We hopped in a cab to get to our accommodation and realised that the reception desk for our hotel was in a complete different building at the opposite end of the Old Town square, so we went for a wander and came across a lot of people enjoying the national drink – vodka. Everyone seemed to be having a great time and the main square at night was amazing.

Our hotel room left a bit to be desired but it was in a great location being 50m from the main square so we got over it pretty quick. Hamish discovered that the only English language TV channel was made up of one person doing the voice-over for all the characters in a film – male, female, girl or boy it made no difference - very weird.

Saturday 12 Nov

After a rough night's sleep we made our way to the other hotel building for breakfast. Breakfast was quite a good spread with the traditional polish sausage making a welcome appearance. 

We wandered round the Old Town square which included the old Cloth hall which now sells souvenirs, and the churches that surrounded it including St. Mary's church with its towers of 2 different heights. The famous bugle call is played from the taller tower while the church bell hangs in the lower tower. The reason for the differing heights, is this legend - under the reign of King Boleslaus a decision was made to add two towers to the body of the church standing by the Main Square. Soon two brothers embarked on the task. When the elder realised that his tower was much shorter, he murdered his brother out of envy, and the construction stopped. The murderer was wracked with remorse: on the day when the church was to be consecrated, he pierced his heart with the same knife he used to kill his brother, and dropped dead from the top of his tower to the ground below.

Everything was pretty peaceful and calm, and then all of a sudden we were confronted with this loud chanting and then the next minute about 15 police vans come screaming into the square and riot police with shotguns, riot shields and German Sheppard’s jump out and rush over to the corner. Being the fearless and intrigued tourists we are, we followed them of course! We quickly realised they were football supporters (Ukraine we think). It was incredible to see the police surround them and escort them through the city. We are still unsure who the police were protecting – us or them…

We decided on doing the obligatory walking tour, but Lou quickly developed a keen dislike of the tour guide and we snuck off after awhile. We ended up in Wawel which is a fortified architectural complex erected over many centuries atop a limestone outcrop on the left bank of the Vistula river in Kraków.

The complex consists of many buildings and fortifications; the largest and best known of these are Royal Castle and Wawel Cathedral which is the Basilica of St Stanisław and St Wacław). We also saw the Royal Sigismund Bell which was cast in 1520. It weighs almost 13 tonnes and requires 12 bell-ringers to toll it. It's rung only on special occasions, mostly religious and national holidays, and is regarded as one of the country's national symbols.

We finished our little tour of the castle with the Dragon on Wawel castle, that had little flames coming out of its mouth, a cute little touch.

Next we had a much needed lunch stop at this cute little café that served up traditional Polish food, we had dumplings and pork steak and of course beer all for like £7!

Although it was now late afternoon, we felt a trip to the Jewish Quarter and Schindlers Museum was in order. Fortified by an amazing piece of cake (the Poles love their deserts), we headed south of the city. This area was much more run down and poorer but it had some really cool and interesting design shops and interesting bars. We walked to Schindler's factory but when we found that we had to pay to get in, we passed. As Lou said "that’s the equivalent to 4 beers!".

We headed home and had a quick nana nap before our big night out.

Lou had booked a restaurant through a Trip Advisor recommendation and we turned up and had a brilliant 3 course meal, Lou had the rabbit and Hamish had the pork knuckle of course. The best thing about this place was the numerous shots of homemade flavoured vodka (we had to try all the flavours! Cherry, raspberry, blueberry, pear, hazelnut) and a couple of pints and the bill was £38…unbelievable.  

Highlight: Dinner! and another beautiful town square.

Lowlight: The tour guide was really bad….and it was cold!

Interesting Fact: The Wawel Dragon is a famous dragon in Polish folklore. His lair was in a cave at the foot of Wawel Hill on the bank of the Vistula River. A popular version of the Wawel Dragon tale takes place in Kraków during the reign of King Krakus, the city's legendary founder. Each day the evil dragon would beat a path of destruction across the countryside, killing the civilians, pillaging their homes and devouring their livestock

One day a poor cobbler's apprentice named Skuba accepted the challenge. He stuffed a lamb with sulphur and set it outside the dragon's cave. The dragon ate it and soon became incredibly thirsty. He turned to the Vistula River for relief and drank and drank. But no amount of water could quench his aching stomach, and after swelling up from drinking half the Vistula river, he exploded. Gross.

Sunday 13 Nov

We had a really early start this morning but the vodka didn't seem to affect us too badly. We were picked up by our tour leader along with about 8 others. We were being driven to the Nazi concentration camp of Auschwitz about an hour out of the city. While we were driving through the countryside the driver put on a video explaining about the camp and the atrocities that went on there throughout the Second World War – it was very graphic.

When we arrived the sun had started shining and the day was really beginning to warm up. We had a new guide for this part and he showed us the original part of the camp which was a Polish army base before it was made into the camp, this is where they did a lot of the scientific experiments and held prisoners. They had turned some of the buildings into exhibits, one that was quite shocking was the hair that they kept from shaving the women's hair, and all the children's shoes. It was shocking how “efficient” the camp was in all aspects. For example, the hair was shaved and then sent back to Germany for textile manufacturing.

At least 1.1million prisoners were killed in Auschwitz throughout the war, and about 90% of them were Jewish.

We then went over to the Auschwitz II–Birkenau. Birkenau was where the majority of the prisoners were kept in wooden barracks, which are mostly destroyed now except for the brick chimneys. The camp was such an enormous space yet hard to believe how that many people could have been imprisoned there. We saw the ruins of the infamous gas chambers and also came across big school groups from Israel who, we suspected, were on a pilgrimage type thing.

We were then piled into the van and given a packed lunch to eat enroute while we were driven to the Salt Mine called Wieliczka. This Salt mine reaches a depth of 327 metres and is over 287 kilometres long. The rock salt is naturally grey in various shades, resembling unpolished granite rather than the white or crystalline look that many visitors may expect. But if you tasted the walls it was definitely salt! 

The Poles had built a type of health retreat over the top of this mine as the waters were meant to have age defying powers, kind of what they do in Rotorua. The caves and religious monuments that were really amazing, but they did get a bit samey after a while.

It felt like a really long day by the time we had got back into the car to be taken straight to the airport. We then had all this money left over that we didn't know what to do with (silly Poland not being on the Euro) so we ended up buying vodka and chocolate, result!

Highlight: The big church under the salt mine looked really awesome, people get married there and everything

Lowlight: Seeing what disgusting things people can do to each other like in Auschwitz

Interesting Fact: There is a legend about Princess Kinga, associated with the Wieliczka mine. The Hungarian noblewoman was about to be married to Bolesław V the Chaste, the Prince of Kraków. As part of her dowry, she asked her father for a lump of salt, since salt was prizeworthy in Poland. Her father King Béla took her to a salt mine in Máramaros. She threw her engagement ring from Bolesław in one of the shafts before leaving for Poland. On arriving in Kraków, she asked the miners to dig a deep pit until they come upon a rock. The people found a lump of salt in there and when they split it in two, discovered the princess's ring. Kinga had thus become the patron saint of salt miners in and around the Polish capital.