Denmark - Copenhagen

Day 5

Another early start, the weather was cloudy and humid.  As the boat pulled into Copenhagen you could see it was a huge industrial city, nothing lke Oslo.  We were off the ship for about 8am and began the long walk into the city centre. The capatin said it would be about a 20 minute walk,  this however was totally inaccurate as it took more like a hour.

Anyway, the first sight was the little mermaid.  A famous statue that is situated in Copenhagen harbour.   I am not quite sure what  I was expecting, however, it was a quite small but quite pretty never the less.  After fighting through the crowds of tourists I managed to take a photo, and then we were on our way.

The amount of cyclist in Copenhagen was unbelievable, there were literally hundreds of them.  Every road had a wide cycle lane, often much lager than the pavement for the pedestrians. The cycle lanes even had their own traffic lights.  The UK should have a long hard look at Copenhagen,  I can honestly say that if Preston had the same facilites I would be out on my bike more often.

 After a long  walk through the backstreets we arrived at the Vor Frelsers Kirke, a large church in a area known as Christianshavn.  After paying roughly £3 each to get in, we climbed 400 steps to the summit (encountering many rude foreign tourists on the way. Who just barge past, no sorry or excuse me).  Despite wanting to throw a couple of rude tourists off the top of the tower,  I was more interested in my own safety.  I do not have a head for heights, so I clung to the inner sides of the tower and took a couple of photos before getting out of there!

The next stop was freetown, the centre of Christianhavn. This is suppose to be a hippy commune, and has tried to separate itself from Copenhagen.  The area has tried promote itself as a more liberated zone especially were soft drugs are concerned.  All the walls in the small section are full of graffitti (art!) and there is rubbish everywhere and lots of signs saying  'no phot'. The reasons for the signs became quite clear,  loads of people were smoking cannibis, with cakes of the stuff on the tables for all to see.  Rather than a hippy retreat, it looked more like a hangout for Denmarks most wanted .  I can imagine, it is not the sort of place you would want to visit after dark.

After a carlsberg (the home of the beer. ps, it tasted much better over here than in the uk), we headed back to the ship.  In the evening we went and had a delicious italian, and then back to the cabin because we were exhausted.

Norway - Oslo

Norway

Oslo

In the morning we all decided to play a game of deck quoits, basically you have to throw a  small rope disc into a circle.  This was suppose to be a friendly game, however some of the older generation, who have been on about a million cruises took it very seriously!  One woman in particular, seemed to be judge, jury and executioner in deciding who scored what, and whether or not a particular shot was a foul.  However, despite being a old dragon, she was particually good at this game and made it all the way to the final (i got knocked out in the first round, it was not my finest performance!). Despite her never say die attitude, she just was not up to the job and lost. She is now public enemy number one, well she is where deck quoits is concerned.

The boat trip into oslo was amazing we passed through STRAIGHTS which were littered with islands and amazing landscape.  I am not sure how a boat this size could even fit through some of the gaps, we were literally a couple of metres  from the rocks.

Anyway, we eventually docked in oslo and it was very humid.  After a quick look round the dock we headed into town, which was very beautiful and quiet.  There were plenty of old buildings, everything was tidy and the people were friendly enough.  It did not feel like a big city, it felt like a very relaxing place and nobody was in a hurry.  However, it was extremely quiet and that is despite the 6,000 tourists that had just descended on the place. After a good look around in the heavy downpours we went to the sculpture Vigeland Sculpture Park. The place was full of weird and wonderful monuments and was defintitely worth the effort of walking there.

Maybe Michael Jackson took some inspiration from oslo!

After several hours of looking around we went back to the ship and had our usual gym fix and then organised lunch with everyone.  After a good thai curry, we all went and played some cards and then Claire went to the roulette table and won all the money back that had been lost from the night before.

The Royal Palace

A Day At Sea

Day 2

Feeling very young!

After a good look round the ship,  I came to the conclusion that i must be one of the youngest people on it!  The average age range is between 70 to 90, most people look like they could keel over at any minute.  I expect the amount of people that start the cruise will be considerably higher than at the end.  This may explain why so many people were out on deck the previous day, waving their flags and drinking champagne as we left the UK, because I expect some of the people may never see it again.

Anyway, today was a bit of a lazy day, we all just chilled out, went to the gym and did very little.  In the evening however, it was a black tie night.  This meant we all had to get suited and booted to go out to dinner.  Prior to dinner, we all attended a dancing show.  To be honest it was not my sort of thing, apart from the woman dressed as G.I Jane (sadly no photo)!

Dinner was it usual high standard, however my dad had a bit too much to drink.  So there was a bit of a laugh at his expense as he could not find his key card to get into the room (you would have to be there to see the funny side).

After tea we headed to the casino, my Nan got very lucky on the casino table and practically doubled her money.  Unfortunately I lost most of mine, but at least I had some fun.

Azura Baltic Cruise

Day 1    Preston to Southampton

Bad Start

The day started very early about 0630 if my memory serves me correct,  after a quick shower we were up and ready for the taxi.  The taxi was due at 7am so we could get to the bus station for 730 to catch our bus down to Southampton.  However, as the clocked passed 0715 I had a frantic call from my dad saying that the taxi had not turned up and they had been given a lift with a next door neighbour  and we had to make our own way to the station.  I was not impressed, they had basically left us with no time at all to sort out alternative transport.  After a couple of phone calls, a local taxi firm picked us up and we got to the station just in time!  We were he last people on the bus, everyone was waiting for our arrival.  After a short walk of shame to the back of the bus, we soon set off and were on our merry way to Southampton.

After a 6 hour journey we arrived at the port, and i can not begin to tell you how big the boat is. As soon as we entered the ferry terminal we joined a massive queue,  after reaching the front we were all given cards and told to wait for the number on the card to be read out.  After waiting about a hour we joined another queue to check in,  then another queue to go through security and then eventually we made it on board.

Our suitcases were already in our room,  so we quickly unpacked and headed outside to see the ship leave Southampton harbor.  All the posh totti (i am sure they were 50 years ago) were drinking champagne and waving flags.

After a nice 3 course meal evening, we all went to the bar and had a couple of drinks and played some comedy pool.  The reason farcical pool play was because the ship rocks back and forth, which gives the balls a mind of their own.

Below, a picture of the room.

Cruise Tommorrow

I am off on a two week cruise tommorow, not just myself but the entire family. It should be a great trip, I will post a blog entry for each day of the journey. We will be visiting Norway, Sweden, Finland (one of my favourite coutries), Denmark, Russia, Estonia, Germany and Belgium! However, we start with a epic bus journey from Preston to Southampton on what is meant to be the hottest day of the year,  Cant wait!!

Germany - Cologne

Here are some pictures I took when I visited the world famous christmas markets in Cologne.

To the left of the picture you can see The Dom Cathedral.

There were a total of 7 christmas markets held in Cologne, below is a picture of the floating market.  If  I am being honest it was not the best, at least we got in for free!



Scotland - Edinburgh

Here are some pictures of Edinburgh, in my opinion one of the best cities in the UK

Monument at the top of Carlton Hill,

Here are some winter shots

This has to be one of my favourite pictures of Edinburgh



Spain

Barcelona

Sydney

Sydney is a brilliant place,  and definitely the best city I visited in Australia.  Below you can see two of citys main attractions,  the Opera House and Sydney Harbour Bidge.

Whitsundays

Fraser Island

The best place to visit in Australia

A Golden Orb Spider, the small spider at the back is the male!  Apparently he gets eaten after he has done his business!

Resident Dingo