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Roma
According to legend Rome was founded by Romulus when a bunch of birds almost shat on him and decided he should be the king of the new city. He had a bit of a blue with his brother Remus and ended up killing him, which was unfortunate as they were apparently nursed by a wolf after being sent down a river Willow style. They were shunted down the river by their mum, Rhea Silvia who got slipped a Roofie Collada by Mars in a forrest. That’s right: Mars, the god of War. In fact there was quite a bit of hardcore partying going on around Ancient Rome times. After a massive do the romans even managed to acquire a bucket load of women from the Sabine in what is unfortunately called the “The Rape of the Sabine Women” which is strange as no surprise sex went on at all. That’s the thing about Roman history: you don’t know where the truth ends and the legends begin. I like that. A lot. Sometimes it’s nice to have a bit of romance surrounding your history.
After all the interesting “legend” stuff of Rome is over though you kinda just end up with a big old city with a whole lot of history and no ice. I mean seriously: this place has no ice. They don’t understand the concept at all. Frozen water. It’s not that difficult. They sell fucking ESKIES but no ICE. How do people keep their fucking drinks cold if they don’t have ice? Not even the fish monger would sell me a bucket of ice. He claimed that if he sold me ice he’d have to sell everyone ice. To me that sounds like good business. Garr.
Madurodam
Kitsch is one of those words that is bandied about a little too freely. It has gone from being a word used to describe tasteless or overly sentimental “art” to becoming a label slapped on everything from stripper pens to pop art tissue boxes. Cheese on the other hand is, in my opinion, a much better word for describing these things. Pieces of work created with the complete understanding of their lameness are cheesy. The cheesy grin your sibling puts on in all your family photos is a great example.
When Martine and Marion took me into Madurodam the first word that popped into my head was cheese. The place seemed to be the biggest, cheesiest place I had ever come across. Opened in 1952 Madurodam is named after a Dutch war hero. It is a collection of models showing the major highlights of Holland in 1:25 scale. I looked down over the minature representation of Holland that spread before me and I could practically smell the mature cheddar that lay in wait. But then something magical happened. I fell in love with the place.
The closer you look in Madurodam the more you see. The detail that goes into every inch of the place is exquisite. Each building is absurdly detailed, right down to individual bricks. Trains run around and through the miniature country side constantly. Cars drive around tiny streets. Little figures engage in imagined arguments and ogle hookers in the itsy-bitsy red light district.
We spent hours wandering the park, finding new things to look at with every turn. I still marvel at the detail put into the buildings. If you didn’t know better, looking at some of my photos you would think I was standing in the streets taking photos of real places around Holland. Seeing them in real life just validates their accuracy. Check out my photo of the Peace Palace from my first day in Holland, and compare it to the shot of the miniature.
If you’re in De Haage, check out Madurodam. As I put in their guestbook, it’s: “The most fun you can have in Holland with your pants on!”
Busy
Some people have complained about my lack of updates of late, and they are perfectly right to do so. I have neglected the Odyssey. Normally brimming with new and exciting adventures, the site has become a stale backwater festering with a quagmire of posts about drinking and lame stories of dead dogs and rocky outcrops.
Writing on the road can be hard. It is often difficult to be creative and most importantly: interesting after a day of adventuring. Most often I pick up the laptop with good intentions but all I want to do is sleep. One thing to note is that, while my lack of updates may have fallen over the last week, my days have been plenty busy.
I am in Holland now, having arrived at Schipol on Monday last week. The weather that day was beautifully warm and sunny, especially compared to the misery that was London weather. The good weather hasn’t let up since I have been here, which I am told is quite strange. My first week in Holland saw my Dad’s friend Paul taking me all over the country to see various sights. Storm doors, places in my family history, beaches, famous cities and towns. We even rode a good 50km’s on a pushy. We caught up with Henk, Jenny and their daughter Jessica in Olddorp where I dunked my toes into the freezing north sea. I caught up with my Dad’s Nephew and his Aunty and saw the tulips.
On the weekend I attended a party for one of Paul’s friends birthdays and had a great time playing Wii with kids and old’s alike. I helped Paul look after a garden of one his friends and on Sunday had a drink at a restaurant with Marion and Martine near where I am staying at which Paul lost his camera. I met Paul’s son and his wife and I cooked schnitzel for the lot of ‘em.
This Monday Paul had to go back to work, so Marion and Martine became my guides. On Monday they took me to the wonderful Madurodam where I saw all of Holland in just a few short hours. Tuesday was Martine’s Birthday so the day was spent celebrating that in the sun. Wednesday we adventured to Amsterdam where I walked the red light district, attempted to apply for my Italian passport and did a little shopping. Thursday I relaxed, gave Marion a hand with getting some plants for the garden and had an icecream at Boskoop.
So as you can see I’ve been pretty busy. I’ll try to write up some articles about some of the more interesting things I’ve just mentioned so expect to see them in the next few hours. For now: enjoy some of the photos I’ve taken from around Holland!
Prior Park, Bath
It is very handy visiting a place where you have locals willing to show you around. During my visit to Bath, Lucy’s mum took us to one of her favourite places in the town, Prior Park.
Built by Ralph Allen, the local big shot, the gardens were important in defining the concept of the English Garden. Beautifully landscaped and maintained the site is something of a wonder. While Ralph Allen’s mansion is now a private school, the parks are owned by the National Trust. Its most striking feature is the Palladian bridge, which is one of only four left in the world.
I don’t know what else I can say about the Park, it was beautiful beyond words and I am indebted to my hosts for taking time out of their day to show me this little piece of history and paradise. Enjoy the photos I have attached in this gallery and keep an eye out for the 1800′s graffiti. Wild!
Bath Water
On Wednesday I caught the train for about an hour and a half to see Bath. There to greet me was Lucy, one of my friends from the Sydney Railway Square YHA.
Lucy proved to be a very capable tour guide, showing me around the sights of the town. Bath is most famous for, you guessed it: the Roman Baths that were built here over the natural hot springs. Suprisingly the baths were lost for a long time, only being discovered when the basement of a house built over the area kept mysteriously filling with water.
The complex allows tourists to examine the baths but, unfortunately, not to swim in the warm water. Restored to what is believed to be a pretty accurate representation of how the baths would have looked during the Roman times (except there was a roof over the baths) the site does a pretty good job of transporting one back to the heady days of the expanding Roman empire.
On display are artifacts recovered during the excavations and rooms upon rooms of the original Baths. After walking through the site and seeing pretty much all we could, I downed a cup of the water, said to have restorative properties. It tasted like mineral water and eggs, and was served at body temperature supposedly straight from the source. It didn’t make me sick, so the water couldn’t have been all bad. Kinda is fun to say I’ve drunk Bath water from the Roman Baths in Bath.
At 11 quid for a self guided walk around the Baths it was a little expensive for a povo traveller, but worth a look for all those interested in taking a glimpse back in time.
The gallery attached to this post includes some shots from around Bath, most notably of the Abbey, the Royal Cresent and the Circus.
Prime Meridian
In celebration of the UK entering Daylight Savings today I visited Greenwich to see the Prime Meridian. Adventuring to the southern end of London Daff and I climbed the hill to Royal Observatory and joined the masses standing on the line.
The Prime Meridian is the zero point for longitude. On one side time is GMT+11, on the other GMT+0. On one side you are standing on the western hemisphere, the other: the east. While moving from one side to the other achieves nothing in reality (unlike the international date line) it was still fun to see something that means nothing other than “zero”. Although the signage would have you believe you are at “… the center of all time and space!”
Oh and, this post also marks the return of the Odyssey Video Blog. Watch in awe as I take the Prime Meridian and make it my bitch!
London – innit!
For those keeping track, I’ve been in London a few days now, but I’ve been too busy and too sick to put up a post.
The flight here was fairly uneventful, apart from getting lost on the trains in Tokyo on the way to Narita and I arrived at about 5pm London time. I met my mate Simon at Covent Garden where I stupidly decided to take the stairs up from the underground. We’re talking nearly 200 steps, in spiral staircase fashion, and by the end of my power climb I felt like puking.
Simon and I had dinner at a local turkish seafood place, and back at his place I passed out on the air matress he had for me in the lounge. The next morning feeling refreshed I headed out to see London.
I walked a lot on Wednesday. Basically circling the center of London twice I took in the London Eye, Houses of Parliament, Big Ben, Westminster Abbey, 10 Downing Street, Trafalga Square, the National Gallery, the Thames, the Tower of London, the Tower Bridge, the Gherkin, St Paul’s Cathedral and everything in between. It was a packed day. Thursday saw me stay in sick with the flu.
I am liking London. It’s a pretty cool place from what I have seen so far. So much history. Beautiful Architecture. The next few weeks will see if it really works its charms on me.