Where is Phil now?

OMG – Dead Flei – I was in photo heaven.

Day 274, Thursday 04 October 2012 – Spaar Farm, Namibia

Today was one of those days, when everything was awesome. I could have spent a day in Dead Flei alone, easy!

I took half a sleeping pill for the first time in a long while last night and slept like a dead man for six hours, fabulous ! Even with the pre-dawn start I still felt OK and was up and on the truck nice and early along with everyone else at 5:20 AM – we were warned in the pre-trip notes that there would be some early starts.

The reason for the early start was to get to Dune 45 for sunrise. Dune 45 is one of the larger dunes in the Sossusvlei in the Namib Desert. Dune 45 is the only dune open to the public to ensure the dunes are kept clean and tidy. There is nothing special about the naming of the dune, it is just the 45th one in the series. It is a magnificent dune !

The rising sun was pretty spectacular as we climbed up the spine of the dune to take photos. There were a large number of other people on the dune also watching the sunrise, including a very grumpy old man with a walking pole who would not stand aside to let people pass, forcing us slipping and sliding down the side of the dune, wrecking the lovely clean lines.

The dune was pretty special and the views were cool, but I just loved the trees the most. They are camel thorns, which are the only trees able to grow in the area, their roots go down as far as 80 metres to look for water. I took a lot of photos of the few trees scattered around the dune.

While we were yomping about on the dune Ibron was preparing the first cooked breakfast of the trip, there was bacon, sausage and eggs and coffee – lovely stuff.

After breakfast we made our way to the car park at Dead Flei to wait for the parks four wheel drive vehicle to come and collect us, it was a bit of push and shove to get on as there were a lot of people waiting and only a couple of vehicles. Our group had to do a gang charge on a vehicle just to get on ! A flei is a marsh, there is an underground river that surfaces every now and then and it used to pass by Dead Flei until a giant dune blocked its path and the river moved a kilometre to Soussusflei.

As the air is so hot and dry with a harsh drying wind to add to the fun there is no bacteria to aid in decomposition, the dead trees here are over 900 hundred years old. To say I LOVED Dead Flei is a massive understatement, it was absolutely stunning, the clouds above were amazing and the light was moody, perfect. I went straight to the far end of the flei and had to wait a bit for the more stupidly dressed (bright orange and red) people to leave before I took some shots. I was surprised to find I had a large chunk of the site to myself for quite a while, and shooting at 16mm meant I was up close to the trees. The trees are just so cool, I just loved them to pieces and the background was just superb, added with that moody light it was a photographers dream. Sadly I had a bit of crap on my sensor so all my shots have a dot on them, I have badly cloned it out on these ones.

I was dragged kicking and screaming away from Dead Flei and we walked on over to Soussusflei 1.1km away. Soussusflei was not as interesting, but the dunes were cool and the water allowed for some good reflections.

We were lucky in that the tractor and trailer arrived to take us back to the carpark soon after we were done otherwise it was going to be a long wait in the sun.

We went back to the campsite for lunch and to pack up the tents before heading off for our next stop in the ‘town’ of Solitaire. Solitaire is basically a petrol station and shop and a cafe run by Moose Macgregor. Moose has been here for many years and has been made famous on a couple of TV programs for his apple crumble. He bakes 100-150 kilos a day and it was damn good – as was the much welcomed coffee. Once you engage Moose in a chat, prepare to spend some time….

There is also a great collection of rusting old car bodies outside and I could have spent a bit of time there taking photos, it was a lot of fun.

An accidental hi-key shot, but I really like it.

I said it was a shame they had stopped recording the rainfall this year on Mar 27 – and was advised they hadn’t, it just hasn’t rained since then!

It was just a great place to walk around.

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On the way to our camp site for the day at Spaar Farm we saw a couple of road side ostriches so had to stop for a quick snap, not the best, but the first ostriches in shooting distance, and you never know there may not be another opportunity.

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We arrived in Spaar Farm late in the afternoon, we were originally scheduled to do a tour of the farm but it was getting late and the Nomad truck people were still on their tour and we ended up with a bit of time to ourselves so I wandered around and took some photos in the late afternoon sun before joining Will, our driver for a couple of beers in the bar.

The camp-site is great, there are only three camp spots and they are a reasonable distance apart, it was quite dusty on the site with a strong wind so we had to peg the tents down for a change.

It was such a good day !

On to Sesriem

I was slightly hung over when the sound of breakfasting people woke me at 5:00 AM, thinking it was time to get up I staggered out of the tent to find it was the Nomad truck people from the next campsite – I went back to bed for another half an hour before it was our turn to get up and start the day. I lingered as long as I could before dragging myself out.

Bizarrely, I found a group of young guys off of one of the other overland tracks applying hair gel in the bathroom – each to their own I guess.

We were on the road for 7:00 again, there was a long day of driving ahead and not a lot to see so it of was headphones on and head back for a doze. Once we clear of the more desert like surroundings and in to some quite well grassed plain lands we started to see quite a bit of wild life – sadly they were mostly too far away to photograph. We saw springbok, kudzu, dik dik, orix and some ostriches, awesome, just what I am here to see, it was very exciting as we spotted species for the first time, I only managed a fleeting shot of these springbok.

And these guys as we whizzed past in the truck. Donkey is quite a common form of transport here and the rear end of broken down cars and utes make for great carriages.

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The plains soon turned back into the moon like rocky desert and it was back to dozing again.

As we pulled into the small town of Bethanie for a coffee break the truck took a (slow) emergency stop, flipped a u-turn and headed back up the road in to the wilderness for a hundred metres before coming to a grinding halt. We were all wondering what was going on when we saw Will, our driver, come round the side of the truck with a small tortoise he had seen in the middle of the road and was moving to safety. We all jumped out and snapped a few photos.

After the excitement of the tortoise we stopped for an hour long coffee break in Bethanie, it was pension day so there was a number of people around waiting to get money out of the bank – and sadly in many cases go next door to the liquor store and spend it.

There was a cool little lizard hiding under a tree that got the full paparazzi attention.

The next stop was an amazing socialable weaver bird tree on the road side. The socialable weaver birds build massive joint nests in the camel thorn trees, I had seen a number on the journey and had wondered what they were. It was great to stop at a massive example and be able to taking some photos. The birds disappear as people first approach but come back fairly soon. I am not a birdie person but I could not help but get stuck in taking photos.

We stopped for lunch under a shade tree that is obviously used by a number of the tour companies on the journey through Namibia. I love these road side lunch breaks, I get to wonder around and take a few pictures as well as snatching a few moments of solitude. Some days I wonder if I take photos so I can disappear by myself for a while with the handy excuse of doing something creative.

It was a long drive to our night time stop in the “town” of Seisrem- basically three or four lodges and campsites on the side of the desert. I was really looking forward to the desert, two days of hilly grasslands with limited wild life had me edging for something different to see. An hour or so away from the camp site we entered a private game reserve area and started seeing springbok and oryx which we had seen before and had gotten a little used to. But, all of a sudden we saw a herd of something gathered in the plains and they were mountain zebra. Awesome in its awesomeness, for me this was the first taste of real wild Africa. Even with a 400mm lens they were too far away to get any detail – and way too shaky shooting from a truck – even if it was stopped. But wow – I am in Africa Africa now 🙂

Sadly we didn’t stay long before heading off to our night stop at one of the campgrounds in Sesriem, but it was great to have a shower. It is incredibly dusty here, thick sand everywhere – it was like Siem Reap in Cambodia – feet and legs are just going to be covered in dirt for a few days, before and immediately after a shower.

We went out for another sunset shoot, with Brett providing some great lessons to those in the group who are wanting to improve their technical knowledge of photography – tonight was a bit about white balance – something I do not worry about too much myself – and perhaps I should as I am not shooting raw at the moment. The sunset was not particularly spectacular sadly, but an ND filter would have been great.

Dinner was a fabbo pasta and Ibron had

made a very nice chilli soy option for the veges in the group, though I would have been more than happy with the beef mince! With a very early 5:40 am start tomorrow it was an early night!

Another day, another country.

Day 271, Monday 01 October 2012 – Orange River, Namibia

Another belated post, I had intended to type on the truck as we went, but the roads are rough as anything and typing is impossible, even photo editing is not worth bothering with.

I can see why the other truck was in bed early, they were on the road before 6:00! Compared to them we had a leisurely wake up of 5:30, I was mildly hungover after that combination of beer, red and white wine and whisky. A lesson learnt nice and early on the trip though one forgotten way too much!

I had a walk around as the sun rose and took some photos of the mist over the small river on the farm. I have decided to switch back to shooting JPEG, I have been using raw for a while, but having to do everything in a bouncing truck with little battery life was going to be a pain, though of course I lose some of the detail – a tough choice.

Breakfast was cereal and fruit and I had a great hot shower before pulling down the tents, loading up the truck and getting on the road again.

Our first stop was at the gas station at Bitterfontein, there is a weaver bird colony living there which was cool and we all stopped to take photos. I am not really into birds, but it was a good lesson in shooting moving objects with the heavy 70-200mm lens. I was not overly happy with the results, but the weaver birds have cool nests, so am posting a shot anyway.

There were road works off and on all the way to the Namibian border.

Over the morning the terrain went from rolling farm land, through mountain desert areas which were very much like the Desert Road are in NZ’s North Island – accept huge, and into some very arid and rocky areas. It was great watching it all roll by though we were all staring out the windows waiting for our first glimpse of wildlife. We saw lots of cows and sheep and goats until finally just before lunch we saw a small heard of oryx in the Goegap nature reserve. Yay – we were all massively excited to see them. Though it was another lesson in safari photography as they were quite a way off and shooting with the 2x extender on the 70-200mm was difficult in a truck with people moving around. I am going to have getter better at holding the lens steady. I learnt that the oryx is one of the most dangerous creatures in southern Africa – even though it is only an antelope. People think they are safe but they are very territorial and will defend if they feel threatened, and those horns are huge.

There was this weird old quary site on the road side, from a distance it was hard to work out what it was, it looked like some alien fortress.

Lunch was in the nature park, it was hot and dry and quite beautiful, I have fallen in love with Quiver trees and took quite a few photos of these awesome trees.

I spotted this guy on a bathroom window.

The town of Springbok was few minutes drive away and we had to stop here to change vehicles. A recent South African law change means that foreign registered vehicles cannot transport clients over the border into Namibia, so we had to unload all our gear and jump into the Bundi Adventures van for the trip to Namibia and onto our camp at Bundi. The journey to the border took almost two hours and was pretty hot crammed into the van.

The border crossing was fairly straight forward, though it was interesting that at the SA border police post, after immigration we all had to hand in our passports to the police and then were told to leave the room leaving the van driver alone with the police. Not sure what happened there ! We did get our passports back though.

The last trip the guys did through the border everyone had to unload bags and were sniffer dogged and searched. We were all praying it was not going to happen to us – it was just too damn hot to be hanging about.

The border between SA and Namibia is the Orange River, named after the Dutch Prince William of Orange – not because the river is orange. The camp site was on the Namibian side of the border and not too far from the border crossing. The site was packed with loads of kids and families – it is the first day of school holidays in SA.

After unpacking the van, reloading the truck and putting up tents some of us took a quick dip in the river, it is perfectly safe to do so, no crocs or hippos this far south.

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We all walked up a small hill next to the campsite for a sunset photo shoot, Brett our tour guide, is also doing photography lessons as part of the tour and held the first one on top of the hill. It was interesting listening in and Brett is a good teacher. The countryside is very bleak as well as beautiful, on this side of the river.

After dinner we sat around for a while waiting for the large group of people starting a five day river safari in the morning to clear from the bar area so we could go and have a quite beer and access the very slow internet. I managed to get to read a couple of emails, but the connection died before I could reply to any.

Brett found a small scorpion on the bench seat and grabbed UV light to show us how the scorpions glow under UV. The picture is crap, but you get the idea!

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Brett is a wealth of knowledge about the local environment as well as the beasts and flora we are seeing on the journey, we are lucky to have such a great tour guide.

Day 1 on the road, leaving the city behind

Day 270, Sunday 30 September 2012 – Trawal, South Africa

A very belated post, written five days later from some scribbled notes and photos and totally un-proof read as well.

I was up early, breakfast at 7:30 and packed up and ready to meet the truck and load up at 8:30 . Will our driver was also there to meet us, and we were picking up Ibron, our cook, at the supermarket up the road.

It was very cold, long pants, jackets and beanies were the order of the day and the polyprop stayed on until lunch time.

The truck is a Scania named Malakai and has seen a few years service on the over landing route. Africa in Focus only put a maximum of sixteen on their tours (unlike some who fit thirty!) though there are only twelve on this trip, so plenty of room. We have a side locker on the outside of the truck that Leonie and I are sharing and we have a smaller foot locker for cameras and laptops that also has a safe inside for each pair of seats. A-i-F take security seriously which is great. It took us a few days to work out how things best work with all the various lockers though. As I was one of the last on I ended up with one of the front seats, which have the least leg room – not bad though.

It was a very excited group that got on the truck ( we are not allowed to call it a bus) and we were on the road for 9:00 – on time!

The first stop was Table View, a small bay just out of central Cape Town over looking Table Mountain. The cloud on the top is called the table cloth by the locals.

The next stop was Bayside Mall and supermarket where we picked up a few last minute items and we were on the road for Highlanders wine farm our stop at the end of the day.

As we left Cape Town I noticed a large amount of hitchhikers on the road side from single men to small family groups, this was a feature outside all the towns we passed. It is a hard life in southern Africa. We were soon out into the rolling farm land hills and the atmosphere in the truck was excitable as we left civilisation behind.

We stopped for a roadside lunch at 1;00 and all stood around working out what the process was for assisting Ibron at lunch time and where everything lived in the vast kitchen store on the back of the truck.

Cleanliness is taken as seriously as security and we have to spray a detol solution on our hands everytime we get into the truck. At food times we have to have a soap wash, dettol wash and rince before touching the food.

We stop every couple of hours for a toilet and stretch break, Brett (out tour leader) wants to make sure everyone is drinking plenty of water so encourages lots of breaks so no-one stops drinking. Once we get up into Namibia the air is hot and dry and dehydration can be a real issue.

We arrived at Highlanders wine farm in Trawal late afternoon and had a lesson putting up the tents, which is pretty straightforward. They are four person tents though we only had two per tent, which was pretty comfortable.

Once tents were up and shorts put on as it had warmed up significantly we went up to the bar area for a wine tasting with Sparky the farm owner.

The three people in the middle were with another tour, couple of them were kiwi’s with really thick kiwi accents, funny.

The wines were Ok, I really liked the vermouth though and Leonie bought me a bottle for my birthday. I am going to have to say no-one makes a Shiraz like the Aussie’s though this one wasn’t too bad. I bought a bottle of the pinotage to drink with dinner.

After dinner a few of us chatted around an open fire and had a whisky or two, before heading off to the tents for some sleep. There were two other groups at the site, one filled with noisy young people, I was expecting for them to be partying into the night, but they were all tucked down before we were…

I am pretty sure it was the first time I was sleeping in a tent since my Europe trip in the 80’s!

Cape Town

Days 268-269, Friday-Saturday, 28-29 September 2012 – Cape Town

Friday passed by on the plane to Dubai, I am sure at some stage Saturday arrived and sadly I wasn’t asleep when it did. I am pretty sure I dozed a couple of times on the six hour fifty flight across Europe and North Africa. The flight was pretty good, seat was comfortable and the food OK, drinks were available on request but I didn’t have many as I had a couple of reds at the airport and popped one of my Vietnamese valium before jumping on board. I watched The Avengers and Safe and the rest of the time I spent staring vacantly into space waiting for the flight to end.

Dubai airport is MASSIVE. It was a fifteen minute bus ride from the plane to the terminal and a twenty minute walk to the departure lounge for the flight to Cape Town. The flight was slightly delayed and again the aircraft was very full. I didn’t sleep at all over the nine hours and was seriously bored for a long time, for some reason I did not feel like reading now watching movies, but after six hours I finally managed to stare blankly at a screen until we arrived, pretty much on time, in Cape Town.

Wow- I am in Africa – a new continent and a new adventure is beginning.

I was met at the airport by Stuart, an English guy I had seen on the plane as Gary the hotel owner was out moving his car. Stuart – and as it turned out, all the guests of the small Bellevue Hotel were on the tour. The hotel is in Sea Point, about a thirty minute walk from the main part of Cape Town, there are a number of small cafes and bars along the street so Stuart and I walked up the road for a meal and a couple of beers. The food was cheap and the risotto I had was excellent. We met Simon, who has just completed the reverse trip I am doing coming down from Nairobi to Cape Town. He gave us a few insights in to the trip which was great.

Leonie, who I met in Vietnam at my friend Dan’s wedding and hung out with in Ho Chi Minh City, decided to do the tour as well and flew out from NZ at a similar time to me though she did not arrived until late in the evening – and without her bag, though fortunately that turned up in the morning. We said a quick hello and I retired back to my room for my last night in a real bed for a while.

Saturday was a slow start, breakfast at eight, loads of cereal, toast and coffee. The weather was pretty feral, quite cold with a strong wind blowing, though fortunately not actually raining.

Leonie and I walked in to the tourist Victoria and Albert waterfront area of Cape Town mostly along a sea wall. It was a surprisingly rugged piece of coast line given its location to down town. I managed to pick up a couple of desperately needed pairs of shorts and a camping shop and then we went for a walk around.

We were trying to get to Table Mountain but it was heavily clouded and it just did not see m like it was going to lift, so we decided to do a new first and catch an open topped tourist bus for a hop-on, hop-off tur of the city. It was cold up top !

Downtown Cape Town is not particularly attractive or interesting, it does remind me a lot of Auckland, Sea Point was like being in Henderson! Though we did go to the District six museum for a look around. District Six was one of the central city residential areas mainly populated by African and mix raced people. It was forcibly cleared over many years of the apartheid era, with residents being forced into less desirable locations. Sadly a lot of the places that were cleared and the houses destroyed are still vacant lots.

We caught the bus to the Table Mountain cable car, but the weather was still pretty foul so we decided to take a couple of photos and then jump on the bus back to Sea Point and have a drink at the hotel.

There was a pre-tour meeting at five pm and we got to meet the rest of the group as well as Brett our tour leader. There are five us doing the full six weeks. Dave and Nancy from Canada and Bill from New York. The rest of the crew are Inga and William from Aussie, Stuart, Jackie and Carol from the UK and Sanjeev and Vaishally from the US. Most of us are forty plus so it is a good balance of age and everyone has travelled before, some with vast and interesting experience. It should all be fun!

Gary’s (the hotellier) son Tristian, who had a real fascination with our cameras.

Seven of us went out for a nice dinner at a local bistro before an early night, it was good to spend some time with some of the other folk on the tour before we kicked off.

It was an early night, and a very excited Phil went to bed for a last sleep in a bed for a few days.

To Africa !

Day 267, Thursday 27 September 2012 – Leaving on a jet plane.

Today is my last day in England and I have just realised it is also the nine month anniversary of when I left NZ for SE Asia, so a good day to fly to Africa.

I had a truly dreadful night last night, dropped off to sleep quickly but woke about 12:30 and was restless for the rest of the night. I was very tired in the morning and for some weird reason my shoulders ached, – I am wondering if I was really tense and didn’t realise it (I worked it out late in the day, my camera bag when full is heavy 🙂 )

My first stop for the day was Monument, a tower built in the 1670’s to commemorate the great fire of London. Until I walked past it yesterday I did not realise that visitors could climb to the top, and I was really interested in the view. There are 311 steps to climb, the view is fantastic, but the platform is surrounded by wire so photos were tricky!

From Monument I spent the rest of the morning charging around London looking for a pair of long pants, a collared shirt and a pair of shorts. Though I dress like a colour blind, tasteless slob I am very fussy when it comes to clothes – subconciously it is probably just purchasing avoidance. I really struggled today and didnt get any shorts, wrong season apparently. I will look in Cape Town.

In the afternoon I took the train back out to my uncles house in Dartford, packed up all my stuff for Africa and was surprised when it all went in my pack – maybe I should have packed more stuff ! And I even have a sleeping bag in there!

My uncle dropped me off at Gatwick airport and I am now sitting in the bar waiting for my flight to be called.

So, it is a temporary farewell to England and tomorrow it will be hello Cape Town !

I am assuming internet access in CT, but not much for the next six weeks. I will update when I can 🙂

Onwards to Africa !

Family, shopping, a cathedral and Africa tomorrow !

Day 263, Sunday-Wednesday 23-26 September 2012 – Dartford, Canterbury and London

I am rushing this post out as I have a burning head ache and I am not entirely sure what internet access I have once I get to Africa.

I am off tomorrow, my flight leaves at 9:15 PM Thursday – that is tomorrow, wahoo !!!

I stayed in Dartford over Sunday and Monday, good lie ins on both days and a general overall relax. On Sunday Jim took me down to the Dartford Conservative Club where he is a member and we had a couple of pints while watching the formula 1 and some football on TV. It was a good afternoon and we didn’t do a lot more than that, which was great as I finally caught up on blogs while waiting for the football highlights to come on TV.

I leave for Cape Town in South Africa on Thursday and I need to take a substantial sum of cash in USD. As my most of my money is in NZ I am going to have withdraw cash from ATM’s every day before I go to get enough. It seems that I will be getting most of it in 10 pound notes – almost 2 inches worth. Not exactly designed for a sneaky money belt!

On Monday I went to one of the local malls with my uncle, my English relations gave me a voucher for my birthday and I was off to use and start the big pre-Africa shopping spree. I am going to take my Canon 5dmk1 camera rather than the smaller GF1 and want to get a lens extender to try and get some of the animals closer and I need to get some legs for a tripod head I shipped out from New Zealand. I didn’t get any of those, but I did get a second memory card and a new nifty fifty – Canons awesome cheap 50mm lens that is a whole 99GBP, it is such a great lens.

After shopping I went around to see my late dads brother and sister in law. In was so nice to see them and it was very a pleasant couple of hours. I also got the address of my dad’s sister who lives in Canterbury as I am heading there tomorrow.

I have been suffering from a really sore ankle the past day or so, not uncommon in the cold and damp, but I didn’t think it was that cold, but it is quite painful.

I slept OK Monday night, I tried some herbal sleeping pills and they seem to work pretty well, lets hope that continues to be the case when I am the tour and sleeping in a tent for the first time in twenty five years! I did wake up feeling exhausted and with a sore lower back to add to the ache in my ankle, I am wondering, even hoping, it is just a side effect of the yellow fever immunisation I had last week. At least it would explain it all and mean I am not getting sick two days before getting on a long flight – I definitely do not want a repeat of Hong Kong !

Against predictions the day is glorious when I start walking down to the train station, though it is 18 degrees I am feeling quite cold, but turns to form later in the day with a few showers – I was glad I decided to chuck my raincoat into my bag, a very last minute decision.

It was a two change train ride from Dartford and Canterbury though only an hour and half ride. My main reason for visiting was of course the cathedral but I wanted to try and visit my aunt as well, though she was not answering her phone.

I really enjoyed the Cathedral and the town was pretty good apart from a lot of the old buildings have had their frontages changed into nice shiny new McDonalds, Starbucks or H&M. Guess that is progress.

The Cathedral is stunning, under a bit of renovation – seems to the e trend every where. But I still loved it, home to the tombs of kings and bishops over hundreds of years.

After the Cathedral I wandered up to the retirement home where my aunt is living and she had just arrived home with the other aunt i have not seen since the eighties so i got a two for the price of one deal. It was very cool to see them both, but soon enough it was time to get the train back to Dartford.

On Wednesday I went back into London to shop and change my pounds into USD. Shopping was only semi-successful, but I did get all the camera gear I wanted including some very groovy Manfrotto carbon fibre tripod legs, cool… Massive fail on clothes for Africa, but no surprises there – and I have the morning tomorrow. After shopping I stayed the night at Kevin’s flat, and here I am typing when I should be in bed resting my burning head.

A wee stroll in the sun – in London !

Day 262, Saturday 22 September 2012 – London

A much better sleep was had last night and I took the opportunity to doze for a little bit before having breakie in bed and a session on Skype with a friend back in NZ.

It is a lovely day today and with rain forecasted for the rest of the week ahead I took the opportunity to head out for the day with the intention to see some of London’s parks and meet Elias, an old friend from my Richmond days in the mid-eighties.

I walked down to Dartford town centre, past the local – I will try it out before I leave 🙂

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And then strolled through the market, it was busy but uninspiring – maybe an unfair call on Dartford market as markets are not my thing anymore – I have seen too many! The highlight, which I did not take a photograph of, was a stall blasting out and selling reggae CD’s, in a seemingly white middle aged suburb it was rather incongruous – good luck to them!

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I took the train into London, I was going to pick up a tube to Tottenham Court Rd and check out some of the camera shops for some pricing for future reference. However, the line was closed from Charing Cross so I alighted there and went straight to Trafalgar Square – which was on the plan for the day anyway.

What wasn’t on the plan was the National Gallery – it should have been ! I really enjoyed my time walking though the gallery – sadly no photos allowed, but I did sneak a quickie of Leonardo De Vinci’s “The virgin and child with St Anne and St John the Baptist” from 1500.

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Wow ! I have never been a De Vinci as an “artist” fan (ignorance ), much preferring art from the turn of the 20th century. However this drawing blew me away, the detail was stunning and I just loved it. Definitely my favourite piece from the gallery; a massive call given some of the works there. Another big call is – I enjoyed this more than the Louvre, it is smaller and simpler, but it does have a different focus so unfair to compare I guess.

What did I like? Seurat’s “Bathers at Asniers” – I love that painting, awesome to see it in the flesh. It was also great to see some nice Signac, Pissaro and Monet. My favourite Manet – “Execution of Maximilian” was here along with Renoirs “Umbrellas”. I am not a huge Renoir fan, but really like Umbrellas’. It is the same with Van Gogh, I have never been overly excited by his art, I do like “Van Gogh’s Chair” and Flowers is here as well, though that painting is all a bit ho hum IMHO.

I had an unexpected good time at the gallery – and it was a 4 pound donation, rather than a massive entry fee- good on you London!

This chewed up a chunk of my wandering around time, so I stopped for a sandwich and coffee in the sun on Trafalgar Square than walked through Admiralty Arch.

Past the stature of James Cook.

Round to the back of Horseguards Parade.

Past Downing Street.

And on to Waterloo station to meet my old friend Elias. It was great to catch up with him, haven’t seen him since 1987 when I left England. We walked along the South Bank of the Thames for a couple of hours and chatted about our lives in the past 25 years. We headed over to Embankment and had a drink before wandering back to Waterloo so Elias could make his next appointment. I strolled back over the Thames.

And got the train back to Dartford.

It was a really good day, the gallery was fabulous, the walk refreshing and enjoyable and it was great to catch up with Elias, we will meet again when I return from Africa for sure.

Yay – Castles !

Day 261, Friday 21 September 2012 – Rochester

Comfortable as my bed is here I had an awful sleep and ended up not dragging myself reluctantly out until almost nine am. Pretty much when we left to go to the supermarket for the weekly shop. I picked up a few things for my Africa trip as well as a couple of bottles of cheap red to sup on over the week. Back at Jim’s I had a late breakfast, soon followed by lunch – I so love eating!

It was a nice day in Kent, cool but clear and I was keen to visit castles so Jim and I visited the town of Rochester a few miles away. I am reasonably sure I have never been there before, though I am sure mum will correct me if I am wrong!

The castle was started in Roman times and was built on extensively until Norman times in the early 11th century until it was involved in a series of sieges and rebuilds up until the early 14th century. Being quite close to London it was the scene of a number of minor historical events until it fell into disrepair late in the 18th century.

It is quite cool that it has not seen much restoration.

From the battlements there was a great view of Rochester Cathedral.

The old part of Rochester town was quite nice as well and well worth a visit. Jim and I stopped for a cup of coffee, or in my case a hot chocolate as I am not a coffee drinker in the afternoon (or it seemed to my complete ignorance in the morning ) .

I was deeply tired with a cracking headache and yawned my way back to Dartford and had to go and have a lie down when we got home.

I cooked a basic pasta meal for dinner and we watched a bit of TV before I went to bed.

it was nice to get out into the Kentish countryside.

Back to London

Days 258/260, Tuesday – Thursday 18-20 September 2012 – London and Dartford.

I was a wee bit jaded when I got up on Tuesday morning, another early start as I wanted to say goodbye to Mel and Richard before they went to work and I was on the 9:30 bus to London again. I did enjoy the coffee and bacon sandwich at the bus station before though and, as always, uneventful journey into Victoria bus station.

The good news is I am not feeling any ill effects from my run, I do not have any aches and pains and apart from running out of puff halfway up stairs with my pack on my back I almost feel like I could nip out for a run. I was expecting day two or three to be quite sore as it is usually the case after a decent run. It must be a sign I should have gone harder!

For the next two nights I am staying with a friend near London Bridge station in Borough – about two hundred metres from the Shard, the latest tallest building in London. I met Kevin at Dan and Van’s wedding in Da Nang, Vietnam way back in April, Kevin is an old friend of Dan’s and has been living in London for many years. I arranged to meet him at McDonalds which gave me a good excuse to trough a couple of chicken cheese burgers!

Kevin lives on the twelfth floor of a twenty storey tower block and the views over Tower Bridge are stunning, especially at night.

Kevin and I spent the afternoon catching up and then went round the corner to a local pub for a pint or three, it was quite cool out of the sun, but a glorious day to be sitting in a garden bar. This area of London has really gone up-market since I worked around here in the mid-1980’s, lots of young white collar workers striding home from work, young hipsters with beards on single speed bikes, in the pub there was an actor who I have seen recently on TV or in movie, but I could not place his name damnit!

Early evening Kevin and I caught the tube to his partner Phil’s place in Kensington. Kari, a young Norwegian woman they met in India a while back is staying the night and cooking dinner. It was a good night, Kari cooked a good risotto and talked almost non-stop the entire time, it was very hard to get a word in, a very passionate woman.

On Wednesday, after a monster lie in and a massive breakfast Kevin cooked, I went for a walk out along the Thames for a bit. I had intended to walk down to Greenwich and back up again, but did start to notice the effects of the run, no soreness – just tired legs. I also planned on going to visit the Tower of London, which is one of my favourite places in London so needed to save some leg for that as there can be a bit of walking involved.

So, that was what I did next. The new quarter between London and Tower Bridges is quite stunning, all new glass and chrome buildings, but tasteful and heaps of open space. I really liked it, plus of course they left the access to the river bank.

It cost 20 pounds to get into the Tower, outrageously expensive IMHO, but it is a great place to visit if you are into castles and the old English history of kings and queens and battles and plots, which of course I am.

I visited the white tower and its massive collection of arms and armour – I have fond childhood memories of walking round the armour.

And then the crown jewels, my memory of this is massive crowds – not so bad today!

And a general walk around the site for a couple of hours.

Needless to say, I really enjoyed the afternoon, though I was disturbed by the amount of people who voted yes to this!

After the Tower I took a slow walk back along the bank of the Thames and snapped a few shots of the Shard – I just cannot help it, it does dominate, but it is a stunning building.

I had dinner with Kevin and Phil in the flat and for a change watched a bit of TV.

Thursday was a not quite so long lie, but I still didn’t rush out of bed. Today was shot day and I was off to the London Travel Clinic, for what turned out to be two rather than one shot. I was expecting Yellow Fever but I also need a booster for hep A and B, those along with 100 anti-malaria tabs meant it was an expensive morning. But better than being really ill in Zambia I expect.

I took a short walk around Borough market before heading back to Kevin’s and saying my farewells before heading off to my uncle Jim’s house in Dartford. It was great to catch up with Kevin and Phil again, I will probably stay there again the night before I fly out to Africa as well.

Dartford is 35 minutes away by train, conveniently from London Bridge station so no faffing about catching tubes between stations. Both my parents are from Dartford and I have visited numerous times over the years and have pleasant memories of Jim’s. Jim lives in the house he was raised in and I haven’t been here since my nana passed away many years ago. All my stuff had been moved there from my other uncle and aunts house so I spent the afternoon and evening chatting to Jim and sorting my stuff – there is more than I remember!