Rory's Bimbles

Trip to Belgium

2011-06-04T09:20:00.001+01:00

It's been a while since I have gone anywhere, so I think it's worth mentioning my trip to Belgium. Even though it's only round the corner really (3/4 of the trip was going from Barnstaple to Dover). Proudly I didn't look at a map during the journey at all! only hard bit was navigating Brussles really.

Bideford - Brussles

I guess it's only worth mentioning as I did it on my motorbike (and it didn't blow up). Was rather harrowing driving back, as it rained very hard for about 3 hours, which drenched me through my leathers, meaning I was driving along at 70mph with wet clothes on (cold!). After a bit of hyperthermia I was fine. Going by bike does make a journey feel 3 times further in my opinion, so I don't think I will be doing any epic travels on one, hitching is cheaper and less knackering.

The roads in Belgium are terrible, deep pot-holes on the motorway, which could have easily have made me crash, so had to be very vigilant.

cupping a lions balls.

As for Brussles, "meh", smelt of poo and was so-so, would have prefered to go to Italy again. The best bit was probably cupping this lions balls, and the weather.

Me in Hotel room.

For accomidation I managed to sneak into Holly and Tim's room at a lovelly hotel, which is lucky. Otherwise I would have found a hostel for the first night then couch-surfed I think.

All in all I managed 1000 miles (there and back) for approximately £135 (£35 ferry), Should have hitched really, as would have been less than £30!

Remove the Lastfm Bear

2011-04-30T09:05:00.001+01:00

Lastfm nagware.

Fed-up of the nagware on Lastfm.com?

"are you still listening?" ... "yes. yes I was, now I'm not as I am reading your nagware"

The goal is to conserve bandwidth and make you pay for a pro version. So here is a perfect work-around!

To remove:

Install customise your web addon for firefox (if you don't use firefox, then start)
Import my auto-clicker.
Fall asleep listening to good music!

Hot new motorbike

2010-12-09T00:52:00.001Z


New(ish) Yamaha Virago xv 250cc

I have finally passed my bike test and have collected my motorbike from Bournemouth. Nearly ready for a road trip!

The bike is in amassing condition and is a pleasure to ride. It has only done 11,000 miles, still has all the chrome and double the power of my last bike. Just hope I don't screw it up!

My open art project

2010-11-20T18:10:00.001Z

A view of the Drawsum canvas.

A project I have been working on for a long time now is finally nearing completion, and I would like you all to see a preview!

The idea is that anyone can come along and draw anything they like, it's basically a huge wiki-style canvas.

please have a look, and give it a thumbs up if you use stumble :)

The website is called DrawSum.com

Leaving 'nam

2010-02-26T06:15:00.000Z

This post is rather lacking in photo's due to me stupidly letting a kid play with my camera, they formatted the card, shame, had some great photo's of me climbing up a small waterfall and driving my motorbike on the beach.

I am finally returning home, I have had a really great time and met great people, as you would expect. Think I might have even learnt something!

In a lot of ways I will be sad to leave 'nam, as it's a lovely place and the people are so wonderful.Some of the best people I have met have been via CouchSurfing.org which I recommend to anyone that likes bimbles.

Over all I have stayed on budget, possibly minus the plane to Mongolia, Mainly as it is so amasingly cheap to be in South-east Asia, I mean to the level that I can hardly believe it.

I shall be home by the 1st of March, should be good to see people :)

I will continue to post up any amassing bimbles I partake in.

More from 'nam

2010-02-13T09:38:00.001Z

Relaxing almost to much....almost.

Love the general attitude here, everything is pretty relaxed and people are quite straight with you, for example if you are buying something at a shop and you are too annoying they tell you to get lost and refuse to sell you anything! which I love.

If it ain't broke don't fix it, if it is broke fix it with duck tape! everything in Vietnam has broken at least twice and been taped up, melted back to shape or just ignored. Love it!

Was having a good time on my bike, but it eventually got to the point that it was almost not worth fixing anymore when I had broken almost every part, the easiest way to explain is I had broken the engine away from the frame twice and got it welded back in! and both the front and back brake were fixed with bungy cord! that's only some of it, it is easier to list what still worked than what was broken by the end *grins*.

Been Couch Surfing a bit, and have had a good time (except one person), and met some lovely people. Thanks guys :).

anyway, going to go back to the real world. Too lovely outside.

First few days in 'nam

2010-01-18T11:20:00.005Z

not sure if I can describe Vietnam to someone that hasn't seen it, but I will give it a shot, but it's probably best to look at the pictures. The countryside is beautiful, the people are very welcoming to the point of wanting to marry you, everything is bodged to the point of having live wires in shower rooms with just a bit of tape round, and the traffic doesn't remind you of traffic at all, it's more like people walking down a street, as you can go any way you like, for example over-taking someone on the wrong side of the road on the pavement wouldn't be that bad or going up the wrong way on a one way street is normal.

5 million Dong and our motorbikes.

on the train down from Nanning (China) I met Amanda who was also planing to travel around Vietnam, I said I was going to buy a motorbike and she liked the idea and joined me. We bought 2 big old Russian Minsk's, was extremely amusing to get 5 million out to pay for them, each of the notes in the photo is 100,000 dong.

the view from the top patio of the people we stayed with and a road we drove down.

for the first few days we stayed at a couch surfers house, full of nice people by the way. went out with them for a few nights out, which was great fun, but I didn't drink much as I had to drive us back. While we were there 2 more couch surfers turned up (Table and Max) and we hung out with them around Hanoi until our bikes were ready.

a standard bear hut.

Heading off on our bikes was a lot of fun, and we encountered plenty of drama, falling off the bikes, breaking down, and crashing into things and generally not having any real plan for were to go. But luckily the bikes don't go that fast (60 at a push) and there are mechanics everywhere, which are master bodgers. and the views, oh my, wish you could see them yourself.

Thaun and friends.

Were ever you go you can easily make friends, as westerners are rare and everyone wants to hang out with you or marry you, which at first is a little odd, but you get used to it. And the best part is that if some one invites you over to hang out with them then they pay, it's like a rule, so I hardly ever pay to drink. So I definitely have been having fun! and that weird pipe is like a bong, but for their tobacco, tried it and was sure it was more than just tobacco, if I lived in Vietnam I would definitely take up smoking!

One great thing is the price of things, to buy a pint of beer you pay between 3p and 30p and a good meal is 80p! a cheap hostel can cost 1.20p. In Vietnam I am rich, which is odd.

Cam and his family.

While looking for a place in the rain and at night I met Cam and his family who nicely put me up for a couple of days. Everyone here is so welcoming it's hard to believe, makes me wonder how everyone can be so cold in the western world.

Oh and I ate dog for the first time, by accident I might add, I wouldn't recommend it. But snake is nice, tastes like chicken but better.

Leaving China for Vietnam

2010-01-17T05:22:00.005Z

R66 rotating restaurant. and the view from it at night.

Staying in Hong kong was amusing, as I couldn't afford a place (specially for new year, as everywhere was a lot more expensive) so I sneaked into Carl's room and kipped on the floor, but the hostels here are like fort-knox, they have security doors, and people roaming around the corridors watching for anyone on the steal, and cameras all around with it on a big screen at the reception of the hostel, so getting in each night was very tricky, but at least I saved a few bob, as my money is now hitting crisis levels, and am going to have to raid my savings now otherwise I won't make Vietnam, let alone home! We also had a meal in a rotating restaurant on the top of a medium sized skyscraper (62 floors) which was great as we got a good view of Hong Kong, and my favorite bit was it was all you could eat, so I gorged myself and didn't need to eat for a day after!

a real beggar, and a very annoying generator in China.

It took 3 trains, 2 of them being sleeper trains to get to Vietnam, also had to spend a night in an illegal hostel as I got in at 2am, which was a disgusting by the way, which from me is saying a lot! also I got woken up at 6 by the loudest generator I have ever heard, it was 2 blocks away and was powering a jack hammer, which I couldn't hear, that gives you an idea how loud it was, so all in all the trip from Hong Kong was long and tiring, but I did meet some nice Chinese people along the way. In Nanning I saw some of the most extreme begging I have ever seen, the guy in the photo above is lying on a wheeled cart and has many infected open wounds and is begging for enough money to go to hospital and feed his family (sitting next to him).

Amanda and the rubbish filled streams of Hanoi.

On the final train (China > Vietnam) I met Amanda (Sweden) and we decided to hang out for a few days, she had found a place to stay on couchsurf.org so that made my life a lot easier for Hanoi! The picture above shows some of the "beautiful" rubbish filled streams of Hanoi, one of the first things I noticed in Vietnam.

Map of progress through Asia

2010-01-02T04:49:00.000Z

Here is the progress through Asia so far, and the next few days of travel. so far it has all been by train.

I haven't combined the map with the Europe part of my trip as flying doesn't really count as bimbling, but also the scale ends up being huge, so you can't see any detail.

Done so far: Blue
Future route: Green

Down through China

2010-01-01T08:51:00.003Z

cool 2000+ year old clay stuff.

After Beijing I visited Xi'an to see the terracotta warriors (some young emperor more than 2000 years ago ordered everyone to make hundreds of clay warriors to guard his tomb, then everyone forgot about it until some farmer found them by accident 2000 years later). It was cool to see, but otherwise Xi'an was pretty rubbish, got a train later that day to Guilin, was a 30 hour hard sleeper. I stayed in guilin a couple of nights and saw a couple of touristy things, one being the weird mountains that are very beautiful and pointy, best bit is we went by raft down a river to see them, and we went on a bus to see the terraced rice fields, and some random village where they all had long hair (god knows why that counts as a tourist attraction in China)

pointy mountains.

terraced rice fields.

After Guilin we went on to Hong Kong for new year, as most of China only celebrates the Chinese new year, also there is a Vietnamese embassy so I could get my visa ready for the next country. Hong kong wasn't as I expected it, was even busier than London, and wasn't that pretty either. Looking forward to Vietnam more after hong kong! But we did bimble around a bit, sneaked up to floor 62 and got some good shots from some of the buildings.

clearly new year fireworks in Hong kong.

It's worth mentioning a couple of more food related things, saw dog on the menu for the first time, and a full snake in a massive jar of what tasted like vodka (but clearly more snakey).

dog and snake in a jar of Vodka. mmm snakey.

and just one more thing, I spotted the most out of place Mc Donalds ever, set in the beautiful mountains near Guilin and by lovely lake with a pretty bridge. Mc Donalds do know exactly how to ruin everything.

most out of place Mc Donalds ever!

Time in Beijing

2010-01-01T07:24:00.005Z

misc temple, near the sun temple I think.

Beijing was quite a change from Mongolia! for a start you can't go anywhere without someone practically forcing you to buy something super cheap, or experiencing a bit of mild racism, as they don't seem to like westerners that much except for their money, which is a bit saddening. The toilets are a disgrace to humanity, specially on trains, as it's just a hole in the ground, and in some toilets there is only a small wall that doesn't really hid much, so just imagine.

me eating a chicken foot. and a selection of weird food, scorpions and sea horses visible.

Wasn't as impressed by the food as I thought I would be, most of it is just odd and unexpected. When you buy something don't expect it to taste how you think it should, most things are a mix of different tastes that never go together in most foods normally. but I did try many usual things which you would never find in England or Spain, for example: scorpion, giant locust, sea horse, cocoons, chickens food, ducks neck and many other things I don't know the names off or didn't know what they were.

frozen lake. and a photo from the island in the middle.

We also went to the sun temple and the nearby lake was frozen over, so we walked across to the island in the middle, which was very awesome, specially as some guy was renting out homemade sleds.

Christmas meal. hostel Christmas party.

Christmas in Beijing was odd. for Christmas eve the hostel put on a xmas eve party, which was very bizarre, then we went out to a few bars, it was alright. For xmas day I was invited to go and eat a xmas meal, I almost didn't go as it was very expensive, but I am very happy I did, it was Delicious! and it was good to do something for xmas.

Train to Beijing from Mongolia

2009-12-27T07:54:00.032Z

I have enjoyed Mongolia a lot, it's a great place, mostly because you are rich if you have English money! Kinda went a little wild, never been rich before. was fun for a couple of days, better go back to being stingy if I am going to make it out of China.

stalactites from an air-conditioner.

I won't forget how absolutely freezing cold the Mongolian winter is, coldest it's been was -38! But being freezing has it's advantages; nothing smells for a start and after staying in Bilbao for ages that's quite a bonus, no dog poo's on the street, ice sculptures don't melt and everything is pretty with stalactites. Also you can skate alone the pavements as they are icy. Ok, fine there isn't many!

a pretty frozen river from the train.

You would have to see to believe what happens on the road, they have 4-6 lanes in the middle of Ulaanbaatar and people are doing U-turns and all sorts, people cross by running out and hoping. Quite a sight to see. Don't think they believe in safety here, there are open lamp posts with bare wires sticking out, and manholes with no covers. I personally like a bit of risk now and then so it's quite refreshing.

me and Carl taking photos from the train after Jimmying the window open.

The sleeper train from Ulaanbaatar (Mongolia) to Beijing (China) was totally worth doing as there was some amassing views, specially as we managed to jimmy open the locked windows in the cabin, knew taking my leatherman was a great idea! and also the changing off the wheels on the carriages on the Mongolia-China border was very interesting (they both use different gauge tracks, so they lift the cabins up about 6 foot with us in and put different gauge wheels on!)

Cabin on the trans-Mongolian.

While on the train I met a amusing group of travelers that were on a tour and had done the route from Moscow that I wanted to do, best of all I meet Carl who is also planing to go down to Thailand, so we may stick together, who knows. I shared my cabin with a girl from Manchester, which was certainly unexpected!

a view of the train from out of the window.

what else? mind has gone blank, saw a camel, and a guy cycling across a frozen lake, other things like that. going to go, dead bored of writing.

first day in Mongolia

2009-12-15T06:43:00.000Z

Parliament house (ulaan baatar)

after a rather harrowing journey I have finally arrived in Mongolia. was 3 flights, 12+2+1 hours, and many hours of waiting for transfers, I left Spain at 7am and Arrived 4pm one day later! so by the time I turned up I was very tired as I hadn't slept at all in 2 days.

Peace street.

It is pretty nippy here, about -35 at night and -20 in the day time on a warm day, which is pretty spiffing. there are many stalagmites of ice around as half the year it is bellow zero, so any ice doesn't melt for 6 months. While walking around you notice the cold quite a bit, every time I breath in the inside of my nose freezes, then defrosts when I breath out, which is an odd feeling. The food here is nice, and has millions of calories, as you lose lots of energy just being outside. Also I have seen a few people in traditional Mongolian attire and they look amassing, think I am going to try and buy a Chingis khan style hat today as I saw someone with one and I absolutely want one.

peace street again.

The first thing I did after finding a guest house was to go out drinking obviously, can't let the British reputation down! it was excellent, drink is extremely cheap, and the exchange rate makes anyone with pounds rich, which is nice. one club had bears and Sphinx's as wall decorations and 2 giant stuffed eagles, which I thought was very entertaining. Also went to a live music pub, which had great music, The music was mostly English, with some Russian and Spanish.

clearly a temple.

As usual I haven't really been taking any photos, and I have only wondered around a bit as I have only just turned up, so I will give it a go today and try to get a few great pictures before I leave. Shame I didn't take a photo of the amassing mountains, I might on my way to China.

Hanging with family

2009-12-03T11:26:00.002Z

a photo of Bilbao.

I am not going to lie, spending time with my mum's side of the family hasn't been the highlight of my bimble, if anything I am looking forward to continuing on my travels. At least it has given me enough time to organise the rest of my bimble, as visa's and tickets unfortunately don't sort themselves out, also picking the route took quite a long time too, as each country has different rules concerning entry and applying for visas, some you can apply when you get there, but most you need to spend days fighting the bureaucracy demon. But I have enjoyed bits, also learning Spanish is worthwhile.

Left: from my grans Balcony. not inspiring. Right: Bilbao's famous flower dog

Most of the time I have been staying with my Gran, which is about the most boring thing I could imagine! but at least I am getting to relax and recharge ready for the next leg of my voyage, and the weather has been pretty great too!

uncle's house.

I have also spent a couple of weeks at my uncles lovely old house in the country near Bilbao with my 2 cousins and his wife, my uncle is rather interesting, he's a conceptual artist (I personally don't like most of his work) spent a few days making him a website, which kept me amused, he lives in a cool mountainy place near Bilbao, problem is he has 2 children (cousins) that are now young teenagers and not interested in hanging out with there uncle (me) and wifey dislikes me a lot, so I have ditched hanging out with my uncle in favor of being bored at my grans (as I don't like imposing where I am not wanted).

Wobbley road ahead

2009-11-30T18:16:00.004Z

What it will be like in ulaanbaatar.

Off again in 2 weeks, done a bit of research finally, Mongolia might be a wee bit cold, between -20 and -35. So looking forward to making a snow man! Also might buy a stylish Mongolian coat.

now thats a firewall!

May have a huge problem posting any updates to this blog, as everything is blocked in China, been looking into it, and it is almost impossible to access anything that may possibly speak against the government or state, Facebook is blocked, blogspot too, pornographic material and pretty much everything really. also all your emails are read and many more creapy things as it is estimated that about 30,000 Chinese civil servants are monitoring Internet traffic and blocking content that is deemed undesirable. So if I don't post for a while it might not be that I am lost or kidnapped, may just be I can't get a signal out. If I brought my own computer it would be easy to do, but the problem is I am using internet cafe's to post this. To read more about it golden shield project

Hitching Gear

2009-11-19T16:22:00.004Z

new bag, 50 litre.

The trick to hitching is to not bring anything! as I can verify its knacking if you bring anything you don't completely need. Remember, if you really need something, you can probably buy it / find it / or often get given it along the way.

Essential (priority order):

passport and visas (goes without saying really)
30-50 litre rucksack
2 litres of water
Sleeping bag
Army poncho (groundsheet / tent / waterproofs!)
emergency food (high in carbohydrates is best, something like cous cous)
knife
perminant marker (a tip, if it dries out, soak up parfin to get it working again)
minimal toiletries (flanel, shampoo, toothpaste and toothbrush)
mobile (leave off)
spare clothes, minimum!

Optional:

1x camping saucepan (you can do without)
Firesteel and lighter
hammock (can come in handy!)
first aid (bit of savlon will do)
Torch / Lamp (I would say a lamp is more useful)
Bivvi bag
pad and pen is fairly handy
ear plugs and eye mask (try sleeping some of the places I have without!)
battery charger
Camera (if you must, best if it takes AA's)

Try to not take:

too many spare clothes (1x trousers, 1x jacket, 2x change of T-shirt, 2x socks and 2x undies)
anything electrical

budget and spending

2009-11-04T17:10:00.000Z

Thought I would take a moment to explain how much all my travels are costing, as it is a blog about me being a cheap-skate.

The first month (in which I hitched around abit of Europe and ended up in Spain) I did for about 3£ a day. Which was well in budget. I am planing to Stay with familly for 2 months, which I am spending about 2£ a day, which is awesome! Over all I am probably going to end up over budget because of my tickets to Mongolia and China, if I would have just stuck to Europe 3£ a day would have been easy to keep to.

The problem is I am forked-out for lots of tickets and visas which has totally screwed my budget, as you would expect! So I am hoping to not spend much when I get to China, as I will be there for 1-4 months (could stay 5 with the visas I have, if I go to hong kong in the middle, as have a double entry visa and hong kong counts as leaving, also they let you stay for 3 months without visa)

So to sum up, I will probably manage 6 months for under 10£ a day. Which is totally fantastic as I will have crossed more than 6 countries!

Trip to Barcelona

2009-10-26T12:33:00.008Z

Had much annoyance sorting out my Visa for China, so in the end I desided it would be easier to go to the Chinese embasy and sort it out there, so off I went to Barcelona. got a Bargain train there and back (400 miles each way).

nice pic of Barcelona.

Got there at night, checked out the embasy and it said it wasn´t open in the morning, so I spent 2 nights before I got to see anyone. second night was rather amusing, as I walked out of Barcelona (which is huge by the way) and strung my hamock up a tree, the night pasted very slowly as it was amasingly freezing also got woke up by a pack of wild bore twice, which I thought was pretty cool.

The great light-up colour changing giant fountain

When I actually got into the embasy it was all very easy as I had brought everything needed, so I had my visa done by the end of the day. efficient chinese. Then I got a ticket back for the following day, which ment I had another day to explore and also to find a place to sleep.

one of the many street performers. now that's good money scrounging!

I could tell you about all the great things in Barcelona, or you could go there yourself one day, so instead I will tell you of the amusing guy I met. After seeing the fountain (above) I had crossed the whole of Barcelona and was tired, so started looking for a place to sleep; while investigating a nice looking place I met another homeless guy, he showed me a great place to kip. He was from romania, didn't speak Spanish at all, and had got a super cheap flight for 15$ to meet a girl he liked from the internet (which wasn't into guys by the way), so he now lives outside her flat watching her window sleeping on a door and when he isn't doing that he begs for an hour or 2 to collect enough money to play world of warcraft online at one of the many internet cafes. So I guess the lesson is there is always someone less good than you!

Leg 2 plans

2009-10-19T19:09:00.006+01:00

I Have been Relaxing with my Grandmother in Bilbao, also My uncle and cousins just outside of Bilbao. But I have also been planing the next leg of my voyage!

I wanted to take the Trans-Mongolian Route to Bejing in China (via Russia and Mongolia). It would have been amasing doing the whole thing by train, but I had to many problems with the paperwork. So know I am just going from Mongolia to China by train, which will be the prettiest bit.

I now have visa´s and tickets, so I am definately going. Have changed plans ever so slightly to get round Russian paperwork, sadly this means getting a plane, not really the idea of the whole voyage but I tried my very best to go another way. Still going as I want to see Mongolia, China and possibly other countries.

here is the route so far and the next leg:

View total bimble in a larger map

Third week: Map of progress

2009-09-30T19:47:00.001+01:00

heres the map of where I have been aproximately. It doesn´t show per hitch, just the route I have taken. 4000km.

View Larger Map

Third week of bimbles

2009-09-30T19:46:00.005+01:00

The third week was quite relaxing compared to the first 2, as I spent 3 days doing the last bit of hitching to Bilbao (in Spain) where my Granny lives then I relaxed.

After a couple of days hitching without much effort I got to Vienne, where I desided to take it easy for a couple of days, was quite a nice French Town, nothing amasing to note.

The only thing worth mentioning was the lift I got out of Vienne, with a nice guy called Simon that worked most of the year with sheep as people did his head in, he lived in his clapped-out van and was very amusingly French. wish I was a good writter so I could conger up a vivid image of him, but instead you will have to fill the gap with something amusing yourself.

After that I spent a hard days hitching and got 8 lifts which managed to get fairly far and got me into Spain. Most memerable where: a guy in a campervan with a dog named after the hologram in quantum leap ("Ziggy"), and a guy that was drink-smoke-driving - with a can in one hand and a cigarette in the other! he was nice, gave me 10€ and a beer for the way. Also he drove safer than me so I wasn´t bothered. Oh, and a guy tried to get me to pay 20€ before I got into the car, clearly didn´t.

By the time I got into Spain I was fairly bored of hitching so spent a day bimbling arround monte blanco, and a good hour up a fig tree scrumping them all! after that I walked 40km to a service station while it was seriously hot as it was a terrible spot to hitch from. On the walk I noticed the differences between Spain and England, the biggest were the heat, the amount of scrumpable fruit and the difference in what you find by the road. In england its mostly mouldy rabits, maybe a badger. In Spain it´s dogs and cat´s and numberplates. And the bug´s are huge!

Second week of bimbles

2009-09-30T18:49:00.007+01:00

Once I recovered I tried to hitch, after a couple of hours of failing to hitch to a destination around the coast I gave up and tried to hitch to Paris, which was alot easier, within an hour I got a lift from 2 great guys from Taunton belive it or not! They were having problems using there GPS, so I helped them navigate and we got talking, turns out they we´re going to Italy, which I was well up for!

a hotel we stopped in.

when we went into the hotel (somewhere not special on the border with Germany) I think the receptionist thought I was a escort, as we asked for 2 beds for 3 people, Which was damn funny!

one of the million crazy corners.

In the morning we crossed into Switerland, which was amasing! beautiful mountains, glaciers, and amasing roads just like the ones in topgear. Many of the roads where shocking, only a peice of rope between you and certain doom! which makes a change from health and saftey britain. I can´t really describe how beautiful it was, if you care photo´s might give you a small idea, but it was far more shocking than they can portray: Bimble photos - try and spot the secret doors in a mountain, seriously.

a glacier. more pictures in my photo´s.

anyhow, After afew hours of amasingly winedy roads and amasing views we entered Italy, which was also amasing, as it was still surounded by mountains, but had Italian style houses etc.

Lynn´s castle. Spent a night.

When we got to the destination we were rather impressed with our accomidation to say the least! Was a fricken castle, ok a small one, but after spending most of my nights getting bitten by everything outside it was amasing! to get an idea of size it had 5 floors and behind of what you can see. Everyone there was very welcoming, and best of all, we got taken on a mad ride half way up the mountain the other side of the valley in the background of this photo, at great scarry speed I may add! the mountain was 2800 meters. The view from half way up was crazy, was like being in a plane. And the ride, we were sure this guy was 'the stig', there where real hairpin at scarry inclinations, I could not beleive it.

After all that excitement, we went and baught pizza´s, which as you can imagine where damn good being in Italy and all! In the morning I helped load the van, and we were off, more amasing views, amasing waterfalls, stupidly high road bridges, another glacier, beautiful clear bright blue lakes and many more lovelly views. After afew hours we went through the longest tunnel in Europe (monte blanco) which was someing impressive like 10 miles. And finally I saw my first hitcher! sure ain´t many. And finally I parted ways with Steve and Ray somewhere unimportant in East France. Had a kip in a wood, and in the morning I met a hitcher, was going the opposite way, but was exciting as he was the first person that was spanish, so we had a natter.

First week of Bimbles.

2009-09-17T16:15:00.018+01:00

Have had a strange time over the last week and have seen some amassing places and met some great people. I will do my best to sum up the best parts.

So to Start with I hitched down to London to The eco-village (land occupation) and had a lovely few days, was sad to leave. worth a visit, full of lovely people. After 4 days I had to head off before I moved in! so first step was hitching across on the ferry to Calais, which was surprisingly easy; found a German Lorry driver that didn't speak a word of English at a service station and I was across. Once in Calais I chilled out for a day and had a look around, got bored so hitched via 2 Lorries (a rather ridiculous route) to near Boulonge.

Where the policeman caught up with me.

This is where it starts to get amusing; the guy just ditched me on the motorway, which was pretty bad, specially as there was only on way out accross a slipway. so I waited for ages until it was very clear and crossed it, only problem was a Policeman spotted me earlier from the other dirrection so after 30min of walking away from the motorway he caught up with me and pointed his pistol at me, told me to drop my bag and searched me! then he told me never to go on the motorway and took me 5km into the middle of nowhere and ditched me there and told me to hitch from there! was rather fun if I am honest.

After that the weirdness didn't stop, as I didn't know where I was I thought it wise to hitch to Boulogne and start again, so I tried for an hour on this desolate road, eventually a girl picked me up that only spoke French and she misunderstood what I tried communicate by the biggest amount possible and dropped me at a homeless shelter, which I was hugely entertained by and thought I may as well give it a try, the suppricing thing was it was great! lovely food and a good bed; far better than most backpacking hostles! someone explained that there are a lot of n.f.a people in france so they even have a number to call anywhere in france where they come and pick you up and drop you at one of these shelters for free. They people have it good in France.

A castle in Boulogne.

I thought I may as well check Boulogne out, it was fairly rubbish, but I did meet an amusing fellow called Andrew I asked him for directions and we got talking, turns out his was vaguely travelling around France after doing the same in Spain for a year. He Asked me if I wanted to help him carry abit of metal that weighed about 30Kg for about 10km for 15euro, I thought it was a rather odd propositon but was intrigued. After I helped him do that we hung out for a day or 2 which was rather odd, finally I tired of Boulogne and hitched out to the nearest motorway Sevices. Which I later realised was a bad idea as I was ill for a day and a half and didn't enjoy myself a whole lot!

Left on Bimbles!

2009-09-11T16:39:00.002+01:00

I have finally head off! I am now in Boulogne in France, as I am taking it nice and easy.

I would love to write a long entry about all the strange things that have happened, but I have blagged the use of this computer so I can't stqy on too long, so the short of it is I am having a very interesting and strange time; I have spent about £25 so far and it has been over a week, so I am well on budget!

got to go!

Practise Hitchhike

2009-07-20T16:03:00.010+01:00

Kew bridge eco village.

I have recently got back from hitching to London and back via Bristol, and found it fun and fairly easy going, which makes me feel a lot more confident of my plans! (route).

The picture is of where I stayed, it's a land squat or "eco-village" as they termed it in Brentford south-west London. I also dropped by the Keen's house (the mp's house that got squatted over the expenses fiasco).

mp's house squatted over the expenses fiasco

I took a leisurely pace of 3 days there (stopping in Bristol) and rushed back in 8 hours, which is good time for 200 miles.