a bit of spain and london!

here are some pics of madrid, one of the island off alicante because i forgot it before. me in earls court, our local pub in chiswick, a sculpture near the tower of london, us looking pissed and portabello road.

spain - alicante/last day in madrid

jjj

spain -valencia1

valencia photos

spain - valencia

oranges, cathedrals, old city gates, icecream, beaches very very weird looking science and art centres, fosters ...they've got everything in valencia. they also are fans of 'horchata' - a flavoured soy milk drink thing that is all the rage and which i had the joy of sampling due to my 'eating things that i havent tried/not sure what they are' philosophy. i guess it could have been worse.
(for example, i didnt try the bull testes on the menu at the fanciest restuarant we went to in argentina (seriously)).

oley! more pics from spain

these are from our first days in spain - in madrid

salvador and rio

here are a few of our photos that we hadn't got around to posting from our last days in rio/salvador and one from arrial...sigh

just call us londoners

howdy,

firstly, we have had really fantastic weather for our first few days in england!

we set up base camp in earls court (unforgivably cliche? but very convenient and relatively cheap i think (emphasis on the relatively though)). spent a pretty interesting day yesterday looking for temporary accommodation. when househunting goes well i think i will do it some weekends just for kicks...it's so interesting getting a sneak peak at how others live their lives. mostly i do it under pressure and hate it.

every place we visited was so different - places with indians, australians, kiwis and japanese - no englishmen though!

the first place we went to (in eastern london) the guy told us how he made a point that people in the flat have to observe the others right to privacy - not ask questions etc...seems he had observed this rule a bit too keenly cos he spoke to us nonstop for about 1/2 an hour! stories about prostitutes moving in..being intimidated by pimps etc...we decided not to stay there but it might have been interesting?

anyway, we have chosen to stay in a semi-detached place in chiswick park. it is short term - til september. the place has internet access (and a washing machine, tv, kitchen, backyard (ok, a sorry excuse for a backyard)) so we should get organised to send some more photos v. soon.

watch this space.

thud...

well here we are back in the real world (ouch!). london to be exact. post terrorist attack...and it is rather calm (considering) and hot?! and rainy?? the best of both worlds. it is nice though to understand stuff and be understood again.

time to find jobs, places to live and all that fun stuff... i keep saying hola and gracias to people...they probably think i am being pretentious. i think gracias is nicer than thankyou, but then it also sounds like 'grassy-arse'...

we spent our last days in spain trying to soak up as much of that harsh sun and working on our tans (ok, maybe not but you can let me dream...and i am slightly brownish (tinted) rohan of course looks like a native spaniard) before heading to london. our last night in spain was spent at a gay bar (rohans choice)....just kidding, i was knackered after a trip from alicante to madrid that took 8hrs instead for 5 cos the bus broke down. we were wandering around new territory and looked at the menu (looked fine) and i decided i wasnt wandering anymore (maybe a slight tantrum!) so we went in and there were larger than life statues of naked men holding up the roof....ahh funny. the music was awful but the food was ok.

and now we are in london desperately trying to find accommodation at a reasonable price.
any hints/advice anyone??

hello all,
just to let you know we are in spain (not london for those of you who were wondering (sad news)). london is next week...although we may stay here a while longer now?

we are in valencia at the moment - the home of the orange (and yummy agua valencia - OJ + champange + vodka). it is beautiful. spain is alot easier to travel around than south america, but we feel less special! been seeing some cool stuff, eating good food and trying to avoid the piano accordian players on every corner. they have an awesome central market around the corner from us (alot like the one in adelaide i guess) which is fun to walk around checking out how they do things differently.

went to the science/arts centre (weird otherwordly architecture) and rohan spent quite a bit of time fascinated with a fire hydrant (he thought it was a display!) he will kill me for this. but it was funny.

congratulations to liz and jerry on getting hitched (9/7).

love to you all.
ainslie

From Dad

Arraial Dádjur























Sorry about the delay, I didn't realise the zipped picctures
had already been squished. Here they are, I will have to
go to Brazil, looks lovely.

You had a lot more water at Iguazu than when I was there,
the water looked clear then. I guess the drought in Brazil
is over.