Hugh Maclean

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Get Lucky

Published by Hugh Maclean

Beaune, France

Today we set off from Reims and headed south to Beaune in our hire car, which would take 4 hours as we set the GPS to avoid tolls. Unfortunately so did every truck driver who happened to be in our way on route to Beaune. So, a 4 hour anticipated travel time had now increased to 4.5 hours.
Before heading off we visited FNAC, which is the JB Hi Fi of France, to buy an iPOD connection for the car. Unfortunately in France, they do not start their day until 10am so no luck there, looks like France radio for us!!
First things first, we entered the hotel we were staying in into the GPS which came back as ‘not found’, great start to the day. Decided to enter Beaune and we were on our way. Whilst Hugh was much more comfortable behind the wheel, he still has a fascination with the right hand curb, so my nerves were still on edge.
Once out of the city of Reims it was smooth sailing on the Country roads of France. With both of us now settled in for the long drive it was time to turn the radio on. We had a choice of 6 stations and surprisingly most of them played English speaking music very similar to our music back home. The reason for the title of this Blog, was the fact they kept playing ‘Get Lucky’ by Daft Punk, which is a French band, on the hour, every hour on 2 out of the 6 radio stations. Now I like this song, but having heard it 4 times within 4 hours it was time to change to Gold FM. This station were happy to play ‘The Police’ every hour which suited us just fine. We managed to get through the trip knowing most songs with some French speaking comedy from the DJ’s in between.
For lunch today we actually bought an apple to go with our baguette, quite a novelty on this holiday. Whilst we have been eating fruit, it has also been ensconced in delicious pastry, so to eat it as a raw ingredient was actually a nice change.

Upon our arrival into Beaune we checked in, great place once again thanks to Hughy’s research, and headed to the Tourist Bureau. Hugh was keen to find a book on Burgundy wines so we were directed to a bookstore around the corner. As we started to leave a gentleman asked if Hugh was in fact Hugh Maclean. To his great surprise it ended up being a bloke Hugh used to visit as part of his job at Southcorp that owned Blackburn Cellars.
You travel half way around the world, and run into an old friend in a bookshop, in the middle of France.

We had dinner with Rob and his wife, Tina, swapped travel tips, and called it a night.
Great day traveling through some fascinating country side.
Another big day tomorrow.
“I’m up all night to get lucky…”, Daft Punk, ‘get lucky’
Mmmmm!

Champagne!

Published by Hugh Maclean

Reims, France

First things first. We solved the riddle of the pronunciation of Reims, which you would think was something like “Rems”, with a guttural “R”. But you would be wrong my friends. It is pronounced something like “Runce”, with the “R” swallowed! Go figure!

Twin beds, a great sleep in! Late start to the day. First call the patisserie for brekky, then off to book a champagne house tour or two. All good so far…..then we got our hire car!!! Wrong side of the road, have to look right to see the rear vision mirror, gear stick on the wrong side, crazy roads, one nervous passenger….NO GPS! Only had to travel 3km to Champagne Taittinger……40 mins, a gazillion wrong turns, and 21k’s later, and no frickin idea where we were but we ended up back at the car hire place, BY MISTAKE! Bloody hell, one wrong turn lead us up, and down, the garden path. To make matters worse, I seemed to have developed a crush with the roadside curb, hugging it like a new girlfriend. Freaking Rachael out. Threw map out, had lunch, went back to the hotel to get our GPS, and guess what? We got to our destination in 10 mins. Rachael, looked like she was about to have a stroke, so took a re-group over a bottle of water.

Our first tour was at G.H.Martel for a look through the underground chalk caves, a bit of history and a tasting. Not bad.

Next was Champagne Taittinger, which was a lot more upmarket, the underground caves spectacular, and the champers non too shabby.

It wasn’t all champers and skittles though…..we also dropped in on the Saint-Remi Basilica, so Rachael could light another candle. The Basilica was built in the 11th century in order to house the holy ampulla and the relics of Saint Remi, the bishop who baptised Clovis in 498. Clovis being a Frankish king who changed teams to Christianity, a bit like swapping footy teams in your 20’s, only bigger!!! Now this was a big deal back then, so they could’nt scrimp on the building, and they didn’t, it’s another huge cathedral. Unfortunately, unlike the Cathedral Notre-Dame in Reims, it is most certainly the poor relation.

The black sheep of the Catholic Church, if you will. You enter via a small side door, as the front of the church is rather drab, with weed ridden paths, and housing commission type buildings across the road to set off the vista. Inside is mammoth, but quite dark and ominous. Nice stain glass, and a tremendous candelabra hanging over centre stage. But it’s all a little depressing, the building was extensively damaged during WW2, and no one seems too keen to bring it back to life.

Oh, well….maybe a champers will brighten up the day….or maybe a meander along one of the Champagne tourist drives. Sounds great, doesn’t it, and it would have been but for the road works, and the diversions in place. Want to bugger up a GPS…..don’t go where it wants you to go. Every time we tried to get around the diversions the GPS had us doing u-turns, hook turns, 360’s in round-a-abouts, completed lost its marbles. So, as we had no idea how to get around the road blocks ourselves, we gave up, set coordinates for home….and went to the pub for dinner!

Now the night gets great! Every night during summer the city of Reims lays on an unique Cathedral lighting display at Notre Dame. As the brochure says, ‘an exceptional presentation’, and they are not exaggerating

It started at 11pm, and with a bottle of bubbles for company, we sat down to watch the most amazing light show against the facade of the cathedral.

It was unbelievable, and easily the best thing so far on this trip. What a great way to finish our long day in Reims.

From Paris to Reims

Published by Hugh Maclean

Reims, France

And so it is time to bid a fond adieu to Paris, but not before another run in Luxenbourg gardens, and a croissant. Plus one more attempt at a coffee……fail! We loved Paris, such a beautiful city. The buildings, museums, gardens, history, cafes, patisseries, shops, etc, etc…. You could spend a week just exploring the boulevards, and lane ways, and if you happened to be rolling in cash that would help!

Expensive place! Plus the beggars are a bit overwhelming, if only for their number, as they are mostly a very passive lot with their dogs by their side.

Still, time waits for no man, or woman, so off by train to Reims in the heart of Champagne. The train trip was quick, I got a window seat with an actual view, and we arrived right on time. Our hotel was just down the road from the station, and found without fuss. The receptionist was waiting for us, and was delighted to welcome ” Hoog” to Reims!! Reims, also spelt Rheims, and almost impossible to pronounce, is a beautiful town, right in the middle of Champagne. The main attraction in town is Notre-Dame de Reims, which is the seat of the Archdiocese of Reims, where 30 kings of France were once crowned.

The cathedral Notre Dame is huge, and almost as impressive as her namesake in Paris, and is the pride of the town. The old town is beautiful, except the main drag, Pl. Drouet d’Eron, which resembles a poor mans Lygon street. **** cafes and restaurants line the mall for 100’s of metres.

We thought this was it, but luckily got sent to a far better area to have our dinner, in a cool square (rectangle), with an array of eateries.

We also found our patisserie for brekky, so all good. We had a lovely dinner, and headed home for a quiet night, as tomorrow we are up and at ’em with champagne tastings, drives thru the vineyard regions, and an 11pm light show at the cathedral. Phew….exhausted just thinking about it.

Last Day in Paris

Published by Hugh Maclean

Paris, France

We headed off this morning with yet another attempt at finding a famous flea market in Paris. It was a beautiful day in Paris with a temperature of 26 degrees so on our way to the market we went via the Eiffel Tower to check on the queues.

As Hugh waited in line whilst I sussed out the situation it was evident that our time to strike the Eiffel Tower was now and not in the elevator queue but in the stair climb queue. It only took 40 minutes in the queue before we were on our way climbing the estimated 21 storeys to the first, then second level of the Eiffel Tower.

The climb was easy enough thanks to our Birdrock Challenge, but too many went out too hard too early and collapsed by the 5th storey……losers!!!!! Once at the first level the views were amazing and again at the second level even more so.

We managed to con a few people to take photos of the two of us before taking in the views and heading back down the stairs. As we started our descent it was tempting to tell people coming up that they were half way there when in fact they were almost at the top. The fact they wouldn’t understand me anyway made the joke pointless so we just descended the stairs and made our way to the Arc de Triomphe, missing the flea market altogether.

The Arc de Triomphe is a very impressive structure which gives you views all the way down the Champs Élysées to The Louvre. After the customary photos of each other we then headed down the Champs Elysse to take in the sights. Half way down we stumbled across a McDonalds and decided to take the plunge with a McCafe coffee. No surprise, we should have kept walking as the French insist on pouring the milk first and the coffee last, making for a pretty ordinary coffee but an improvement on yesterday’s diabolical attempt.

Next stop for me on the Champs Elysees was the toilet and was surprised to find it came at a price of €2. Not one for missing an opportunity to find out what you get for your €2, I paid my money and entered what can only be described as a shrine to toilets. I could buy an assortment of toilet paper, lids, dunny brushes etc in all sorts of colours. Not to be distracted I headed into my cubicle, once I was called, and discovered the pinkest, cleanist toilet I have ever seen. €2 well spent I say!! Dutifully relieved we then headed off to the famous Galleria for some shopping. This is where Hugh and I departed for an hour before meeting up again. I was looking for a trenchcoat whilst Hugh was looking for shoes. I found some of the most beautiful trenchcoats before discovering I was in Burberry and not being surprised at the €1000 price tags which is almost $2000 Aus dollars. Suffice to say I came away empty handed as did Hugh.

We left the Galleria and shopped at a couple of stores and finally found a pair of shoes for Hugh. These were not in the colour he desired but he settled for them anyway as they were on special for €90 and he was desperate for a new pair.

We headed home for some time in the apartment before heading out to dinner. On our way out we found a shoe store that stocked the same shoes that Hugh bought only to find they had the colour he wanted at a price that was $35 cheaper, argghhhhh!!! I know every girl out there shares Hugh’s pain.

As I dragged him away we found a lovely cafe to sit by the side of the road and enjoy our last night in Paris, people watching and eating the local fare. It is easy to distinguish the tourists from the Parisians as we dress so differently. After dinner we headed back to our room to grab the camera and a bottle of bubbles and head back to the Eiffel Tower to toast Paris for one last time.

Watching the Eiffel Tower as the sun sets amongst the many Parisians that joined us on the lawn was a truly memorable moment. As too were the many hawkers that continually passed by offering Champagne, smokes, beer etc ad nauseam. But wait, there’s more, as darkness descends upon Paris out come the illuminated Eiffel Tower replicas, just in case you missed being offered one during the day. For the last 5 minutes of the night the Eiffel Tower has a light show where numerous lights flicker across the tower and makes for a great end to a fabulous night.

Many cheers from the crowd at the end and the pace is deserted within 10 minutes. It is 11pm after all and we finally got to see Paris at night. Train ride home was bearable as the trains were not too packed and the photos Hugh took turned out great as you can see from the samples he has attached to this blog.

Off to Reims in the morning, Paris has been a wonderful city to spend the last 5 days in and we are very much looking forward to the Champagne District that awaits us tomorrow. Au Revoir xx.

Musee d’Orsay, Napoleon, Rodin, etc..

Published by Hugh Maclean

Paris, France

One of the mainstays of Parisian life is the regions weekly market, where produce for the week is bought. It is a must see to get a glimpse of daily life in this wonderful city, so…..
Of we set, in the completely wrong direction, to see the market of the 6th E…..walking, walking, walking.
Are we there yet? Are we there yet?
Bloody hell, can I just get my bearings in this town?
After turning a 10 minute walk into a 50 minute loop we still couldn’t find the market.
There it is on the map, here we are at said place on map….no market. F###!!!
Deep breaths, calm it down…..blame Rachael.
Next….
Off to the Musee d’Orsay, an magnificent collection of impressionist art awaits.
And magnificent it is, beautiful art in the old railway station of Paris, which is perfect to display art in.

Unlike the Louvre, which is overwhelming in size, the D’Orsay let’s you relax as you wander the exhibitions.
I must say, Van Gogh is absolutely outstanding. The museum has about a dozen of his paintings, including 2 self portraits a surreal cathedral scene, plus starry nights.
Monet had a brace of water Lilly paintings, plus much too much to mention here.
If you only do one gallery in Paris, do this one.
Next stop lunch in a little patisserie,with truly the worst attempt at a coffee we have ever had.
Still in coffee shock, we headed to the Musee Rodin, to see the thinker, and the kiss.

Set in a lovely garden setting to best show off Rodin’s sculpture, it was a pretty nice way to spend an hour or so.

Rachael happy, one of her wish list done!
Next door is the Musee de L’Armee, which houses the tomb of Napoleon1, plus one of the worlds largest military and art collections.

Really good!
Museums pass completed, all cultured out….which was lucky, ‘cos we made the fatal error of jumping on metro 4 to Montmartre, and Sacre Coeur.

The train was packed the whole way, choc-o-bloc!

The walk up the steps to Sacre Coeur was nice, the view good, the church itself, big and impressive….the rest, yuck!

Tacky. Touts everywhere, blacks selling Eiffel Tower miniatures ( are these guys everywhere, or what? ), Romanians selling god knows what? And very second person trying to sell you beer, straight out of the slab, which had probably been knocked off earlier in the day.

Just a grubby area.
So….back on a packed train home, crepes and beer for tea, and on other full day completed.

Along day planned for tomorrow, so off to bed.
Bonne nuit.

Louvre visit, plus more…

Published by Hugh Maclean

Paris, France

After a late night we didn’t awake until 8.30am so a very late start by our standards. Headed to the Luxembourg Gardens where Hugh and I ran/shuffled our usual 6/7km run. The gardens are beautiful and it was a fabulous place to run in Paris. Back to the room for our usual brekky overlooking the streets of Paris followed by a croissant as we headed out for another day of sightseeing.

Headed off towards the city, or so we thought, before realising we were heading in the wrong direction. Finally got to Saint Chapelle where the top floor of the chapel is wall to wall of the most beautiful lead lighting we have seen. Headed next door to ILE De La Cite Conciergie which had an amazing formation of arches so a good start to the day so far.
Next on the Agenda was Notre Dame so off we headed, in the wrong direction of course, but managed to not get too far before realising we were heading out of the city instead of further into it.

Part of the problem we believed was an empty stomach, so before heading into the Notre Dame we searched for a place that sold baguettes. Not too hard we thought, but bloody hell, in a tourist precinct it proved to be so difficult to find a place that didn’t welcome salmonella poisoning that I swear I was about to throw myself on the pavement and sook like a child when we came across a place which offered exactly what we were looking for.

Dutifully replenished we joined the queue and headed inside. First port of call was, of course, paying €2 to light a candle. We did a full lap of the Notre Dame, very impressive, took the obligatory photos then headed off towards the Louvre.

Instead of walking a direct line to the Louvre we decided to go around the long way, via a coffee shop to cure our headaches, and see what shops we could find for Hugh to buy some clothing in the Marais district.
Of all the districts we could walk through I believe we covered Womenswear, Jewellery, Food and banking, suffice to say we did not have much luck for Hughy, so onto the Louvre.
By the time we got there, through the secret doorway which has no queues, we were already buggered from the extra kilometres we had done getting lost throughout the morning.
First port of call, the Mona Lisa.

Fortunately there were only 200 people there and Hugh being as tall as he is, managed to take a clear shot above the 5 foot Japanese tourists, nice work Hughy.

We started to work through the map we collected on our way in and couldn’t believe after an hour we had only seen half of one floor and the Louvre has 4 floors and 3 blocks!! 2.5 hours later and Hugh and I were stuffed and could barely stand on our feet. We had seen enough statues, paintings, ceramics, Egyptian artefacts etc to last us a lifetime. It was 6.30pm and time to head home, it had been an exhausting day of non stop walking.

A small lane, behind huge wooden doors, in Paris

This lane is just off Boulevard St Germain, in the 6th district. Paris is magic!

Of course as we headed home we took a wrong turn and ended up walking back towards the city instead of our Apartment, good Lord when will we get our sense of direction back???
Fortunately we hadn’t walked too far before we realised we needed to be heading in the opposite direction. Grabbed some produce for our Ploughmans dinner, and a nice bottle of red and headed home.

The five floors of spiralling staircase to our apartment was the end of us, we collapsed into our room, ate our dinner, wrote this blog and will now sit back, enjoy the rest of the red wine before falling asleep and starting all over again tomorrow.
Au Voir xx.

Fat Tire Bike Tours

Published by Hugh Maclean

Paris, France

Very excited to be in Paris, so started with brekky in our room, with obligatory croissants.
Down to nitty gritty, and a load of washing!!! Running desperately short on jocks……just saying!
We have booked 2 tours with ‘fat tires bike tours’, one during the day, and a night ride which included a boat ride on the Seine.
First stop, the Eiffel Tower, past some very nice folk selling genuine memorabilia, then some more nice folk, and finally some of their cousins!

The Eiffel Tower is a very impressive structure, but more of that later.
Sized up for bikes, main dude Drew welcomed us, and away we go.
Biking is a great way to see the sites, which included amongst others the following,

Ecole Militaire, where Napoleon trained
Musee de L’Armee & Hotel Des Invalides, where Napoleon is buried
Place De La Concorde, where many lost their heads to the guillotine
Musee du Louvre, where the Di Vinci Code started
Arc de Triomphe du Carousel, the poor mans arc…but very lovely
Eiffel Tower, stunning

Very interesting 4 hours, with plenty of history, blood and guts, and a wee bit of exercise.
Home for some R&R, a ploughmans dinner in our room, then back for the night tour.
The night tour is more riding and a little less history, but the sights where still as impressive.
We rode to the Notre Dame first, stopped at Ille St. Louis for ice cream, very expensive ice cream!

Then off to the Louvre via the Pont du Carousel which is where everyone hangs a lock on the bridge as a declaration of their love for each other. In the city of
All a bit tacky, but hey, what’s good for the goose is good for the gander, so we bought a genuine Lockwood from the nice folk selling them, and shared our love with the world!
‘Love is in the air’…..

Na, just kidding, as I said, tacky!
We drifted slowly back down the road towards our river boat ride, (get it….’drifted?’) then joined the masses, i.e. Japanese tourists and school kids.

What I thought would be pretty dreary turned out to be great, especially as it got darker, and all the lights come out.

The Seine is a pretty dirty river, not unlike the Yarra, but what was interesting was the number of people who hang around it, drinking, socialising, play music….a very happy, social crowd.

The river was spectacular, and the Eiffel Tower even more so.
What a sight at night it is!
A couple of vino’s, squillions of photos later, the boat trip was finished, we’d ridden back to the depot, and we headed home via the metro.
12.30 am and into bed.
A huge day….very tuckered.

London to Paris

Published by Hugh Maclean

Paris, France

“Woke up, got out of bed, dragged a comb across my head…”, well, sort of!
After last nights pints, it’s shuffle time, do do do do: do do: do do…
Rachael run, me shuffle.
The good thing about having both a sore achilles, and an arthritic ankle is that, in theory, my limping on both sides should balance me out?! Yes-no?
Limp, limp, sweat, sweat…time for brekky.
We had a lovely stay at the Kennington B&B, and would recommend it highly, perfect.
Great location, comfy bed, lovely hosts. What more could you ask for.
Thank you London, we loved it, and will be back.
On London, a few points,
1. The people couldn’t be nicer, very helpful
2. The tube and bus system absolutely **** all over anything we have at home.
3. There is literally a pub on every corner. And most are called the Red Lion. And they are all dark and dingy.
4. The local beer is both warm, and flat
5. It truly is a most magnificent, spectacular town.

Off to Paris.
How odd it is, to leave one country, and be in the capital of another in 3 hours
I was so looking forward to the train trip over, looking out on the countryside as we travelled….only to discover that our seats faced a solid wall, with no window!!

Not happy, Jan!
Got to the Gare Du Nord station, bought metro tickets, and got monstered by security checking said tickets….purchased 2 minutes ago.
Welcome to Paris!
Metro to Odeon station, and found our accommodation 100 metres away, more or less by fluke.

What a place, in the 6th district, up 5 flights of very narrow stairs to a fabulous loft style room, right in the middle of it all.
Walked around, booked bike tours for tomorrow, had dinner on the street, bought a bottle of French plonk to drink in the room, and here we are!

Rachael is loving it, practising her French (more ‘ullo, ullo’ style than anything else).
Looking forward to an action packed day tomorrow.

Wimbledon (sort of) & A Chorus Line

Published by Hugh Maclean

London, United Kingdom

Up early, leisurely breakfast then off again. Our first port of call was the Imperial War Museum, which is a short walk from the B&B. This museum comes highly recommended…..and is closed till July! Bummer. Shopping time, off to Oxford Circus and Carnaby Street. Success for Rachael on the shoe department, success for us both on the coffee front. Found a great coffee shop in a lane off Carnaby…..at last.

Groovy spot, Soho. Carnaby St reminds me of a scene from an Austin Powers movie, very hip and paisley. Expected Elvis Costello to round the corner, bursting into song… Loved it. Had lunch in Leicester Square, which was very much a peaceful oasis in the middle of mayhem. Speaking of mayhem, and the bizarre, M&M’s have their own shop.

4 FLOORS of chocolate, merchandise fun and frivolity. The smell as you walk in is overpowering, sweet sugary yuckiness(?). Photo op, fridge magnet…..out of there! One of Rachael’s bucket list items was to go to a show in the West End, so off to half tix. “A Chorus Line” tonight. Another bucket…..Wimbledon.

So, off we go, tubing it to Southfields which is the nearest station to the tennis. Arrived at the non ticket holder entrance and was confronted with a queue the length of the Flemington straight!!!

Spoke with a lovely attendant who informed us it was one out and one in, that’s how the ‘tight ****’ process works, expected waiting time…….9 hours. NINE hours!!! Suffice to say we took the obligatory photo of Hugh and I at the entrance and proceeded to walk into Wimbledon Village which was 5 minutes away. What we didn’t realise was the queue we had seen was merely to get into the queue for the Wimbledon tickets. The entire length of the queue was actually 2km and that was at 4pm!! We put the whole experience down to a lovely day in Wimbledon Village enjoying a coffee and pastry with all the other losers.

Headed back to Central London for a quick bite and to watch A Chorus Line.

It took all my strength not to sit there and sing every word of every song but I felt Hugh was already suffering enough without my singing as well. I have watched the movie at least 50 times over the years on the VHS recorder to the point that the tape simply snapped and A Chorus Line was no more, family seemed pretty happy at the time.

After the show we ventured into Westminster to take some night photos and I must say Big Ben, Parliament and the London Eye look spectacular at night.

Our last item on our list of things to do was catch a London Cab which we did for a whole 5 minute ride. Got out at our local pub and decided to have a half pint of beer to farewell the city of London. What we didn’t expect was for the barmen to pour us 2 full pints of beer, which is the equivalent of just under a litre, which we knew would probably take us half an hour to drink.

The night was already getting late as we actually saw the sun go down for the first time whilst in London. Off home on a full stomach of beer with a promise to each other that we will be running in the morning!!

Oxford Tour

Published by Hugh Maclean

Oxford, United Kingdom

Another day another few kilometres of walking!! Today we met up with Mike, Dons, Charlotte and Harry at Oxford University. The train trip out to Oxford was pleasant enough, as it should be for $50 return trip.

The city of Oxford is beautiful and for once the sun was shining for longer than 10 minutes. As we approached the University we bumped in to Mike and Co coming out of the Tesco supermarket with their lunch. You gotta love families who travel on a budget, they introduced us to the the £3 lunch menu at Tesco.

Goodbye Pret-A-Manger and hello Tesco!!

After our lovely lunch in the grounds of Oxford University it was onto the private tour that Dons had organised.

The tour comprised of many references to Alice In Wonderland and of course, Harry Potter. Fortunately we had Harry and Charlotte to fill in the blanks of this tour as between Hugh and I we had only read 2 Harry Potter books and seen the Johnny Depp version of Alice In Wonderland!!

The buildings around Oxford University are extraordinary and a marvel to look at. The students are currently on their ‘summer’ break so we we were able to visit most of the buildings on campus.

Our favourite story about Oxford was the fact that Bob Hawke drank 2 and a half pints of beer in 11 seconds at a tavern down a small lane way near the University. Now if this is what it takes to become a Rhode Scholar then we all have a chance.

After the tour Mike, Hugh and I paid homage to Bob and had 1 pint of beer at the ‘White Horse’ over a bowl of hot chips but took a little longer than 11 seconds to finish it. Dons and the kids did a far better job over their soft drinks thanks in part to Harry’s excitement around the table and spilling these drinks everywhere. Thanks to Mike’s reflexes, and the fact Harry has done this more times than he cares to remember, not a drop of beer fell…..Phew.

On our way back to the train station we decided to visit every Varsity Shop that sold ‘authentic’ Oxford University paraphenalia in the hope of buying a momento of the trip. As Mike made the observation that the jumpers looked like Melbourne Grammar colours, that was enough to dissuade Hugh and he stopped looking, but I parted with a tenner and bought myself a cap which I will never wear and it will sit nicely next to my Yankees cap at home.

Managed to catch the 5.30pm train home only to enter the First Class carriage, as it had less people at that end of the platform, and had to then walk the length of the 5 carriages to find a seat in economy. As luck would have it we found 2 seats together only to discover upon departing the train at Paddington that they were Reserved. Whoops, sorry to whoever was looking for these seats but they were very comfortable!

Decided to venture out of Paddington Station to find something to eat for dinner only to return to the station half and hour later having found nothing. Caught train to Trafalgar Square, again proceeded to walk around finding somewhere to eat for dinner only to return to the station an hour later, still hungry, and almost walked off our feet. In the end we had dinner at a pub 5 minutes from our Hotel. Could someone in London please start up a Grill’d franchise for moments when all you want is a quick burger for dinner on the way home.
Finally made it home around 9.30pm, almost saw the sun go down and as usual fell in to bed exhausted from another day of walking and sightseeing.

Hugh Maclean

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Get Lucky

Champagne!

From Paris to Reims

Last Day in Paris

Musee d’Orsay, Napoleon, Rodin, etc..

Louvre visit, plus more…

Fat Tire Bike Tours

London to Paris

Wimbledon (sort of) & A Chorus Line

Oxford Tour