Good Day Sunshine

Start the day off with another walking tour - this time 'The Beatles' London'. The guide is obviously an absolute Beatles nut, rather than an award winning tour guide. Lots of interesting, and awe inspiring, sites across town and of course, a visit to Abbey Road and a picture on that crossing.
Later the weather turns, and after some exploring of the city by bus I head over to Church House, Westminster to spend the evening with Paul Boyd Lee. It's a great evening with lots of history - bought to life, I must say! I was particularly taken by the information you can glean from the ancient drawings...and their correlation with biblical accounts.

Paul BL

Unexpected Surprises

So Wednesday was the day I had planned to be in the capable hands of Paul BL, seeing all sorts of wonderful historic things in the west of England, but as already mentioned I instead found myself in London for a beautiful, although freezing day, with small patches of snow confirming that last night was not just a dream!

After buying a ticket for 'The 39 Steps' I decided to take a walking tour (with london walks, walks.com) of Hampstead...not too sure what to expect but it sounded good.

The guide was excellent, and the location beautiful. On the hills out of the city, along with a great mix of history and celebrity residents, it was a great walking tour. The cemetery around the Church was a highlight! Hundreds of gravestones in no order at all...and it was only afterwards that Mum tells me I have an ancestor buried there! Keeping him company is the real family around the Peter Pan story, among other notable names I don't recall.


Famous residents include a former house of Jamie Oliver, house of Ridley Scott, a couple of Spice Girls, a place owned by George Michael....etc! The village is just lovely, a really pleasant place to spend the afternoon. There is also the house that inspired the ship-like home of Admiral Boom in Mary Poppins.

Back in the city I stumble upon the premiere of the latest James Bond film, Quantum of Solace, and get the obligatory London star-siting with Dame Judie Dench.


And then the fantastic 'The 39 Steps': 4 actors play 150 roles (hmmm...more like 30 roles...) in an hilarious performance. The use of the 4 characters is brilliant, on some occassions having conversations with themselves etc, and the kind of humour is typically British.

Back to the Future and 76 Year Miracles

Tuesday was spent in Bedford -on broadly Church related activities - meeting the people involved with the current research into the Visitation including Justin Meggitt and Gordon Allen.

My host for the day, Gordon Allen, met me at St Pancras where we took an hour long train ride to Bedford, location of the Panacea Society. The day was very interesting and there was alot to discuss, although it was all too apparent that I was not Mum!

They are in the process of setting up a Museum (well, an exhibition), ideally located opposite the Bedford Museum and the John Bunyan Museum; which will include a room on John Wroe.

Coming home the plan was to catch a train out to the home of Paul Boyd-Lee. Unfortunately things got very complicated, the next plan was to catch a bus from Hammersmith, which after all our racing (on a freezing, cold and miserable night) I missed by a couple of minutes!

So I found another hostel for the night (Russell Square...terrible place).

But it all turned out for the best, because this is when the miracle happened:

If you can believe it, there was October snow in London! A beautiful site - and very welcome (for such a short period of time!). This explained the new level of freezing temperatures I had experienced during the day - and for the rest of the week.

All that Jazz

Abandoning my chronological (and probably tedious!) account of my London adventures, I am jumping straight to today's (and probably the week's) highlight: Chicago. This musical was absolutely fantastic, the script, the plot, the choreography, the actors, the music....the staging, the lighting, the sound, all of it!


Otherwise the day was spent at beautiful Greenwich and travelling back to the city by ferry - a fantastic idea :D taking in the view from the OXO tower and being very cold!

Either side of the prime meridian.

On the ferry ride to the city.

Not so Sunny Sunday

I wake up to Sunday sticking out its tongue, proving that the beautiful weather so far was too good to be true! I head out to Holy Trinity Brompton (the home of the Alpha course; on Andy's insistent advice!) and enjoy myself immensely. The worship leader here is Tim Hughes (eg. Here I am to Worship) which I didn't realise until afterwards.

Given the rainy weather, and my location it seemed like a good idea to check out the Natural History Museum or the Science Museum. Apparently every family in London had the same idea - so it turned out to be a bad idea! Instead I got some lunch and then headed over to the evening Hillsong service, for the fun of it!

This was some pretty lively worship, to say the least. There was a moving tribute to Gayle Williams, a volunteer killed in Afghanistan that week, who had been active in Hillsong London before heading over to the Middle East (see Link to BBC story).

After this I head north, to a trivia night at 'the Slug' with Pammy and her friend Lynette.

A New Love

Another beautiful day (although the pictures don't really show this), again starting out with a walking tour. This time the City of London tour, starting at the Tower of London and including St Paul's Cathedral, among other sites. Again, the guide was fantastic - very animated, very knowledgable! Let's see how many people we can fit in a telephone box:

The afternoon is then enjoyed at Camden Markets...where I buy a bag and jacket, some great food and generally enjoy the markets.

Next I head to the theatre - to follow everyone's advice and see a musical. After spending a small (Australian) fortune on a ticket to Phantom of the Opera, I am not too sure what to expect.



But boy was it worth it! Discovered a new love of live musicals :D

A Foggy Day in London Town

Start off today with a free 'Royal London' tour (with New Europe - excellent tour guides!). Thinking I was free of German speakers for a week...I manage to get an Austrian school group making up most of the tour group.

Unfortunately the Queen wasn't at home, so we had to be content with watching the Guards put on a show - the Changing of the Guard.


But the best part of the day comes towards the end of the festivities - the sun comes out and clouds all but disappear. Yes, blue skies and sunshine in London! (the age of miracles hadn't passed ;)

Lots of interesting places with lots of mostly boring history, although a few interesting stories from the very animated tour guides make up the rest of the morning. The re-enactment of the story behind Guy Fawkes Night was a highlight :D


Lunch and a chunk of the afternoon are spent at Covent Garden (and around that area), taking in some great busker performances while eating a potato with beans and cheese and drinking tea :D At one stage a tight rope walking busker just about kills himself, but walks away unharmed but very shaken.


A twilight walk around the Thames proces spectacular, on the way to dinner and an evening with Pammy (eating at Great Burger Kitchen - yum!).

The London Eye

High Ho, It's Off to London I Go!

An early start for my morning flight to London (Stansted). Seamless integration of Salzburg transportation - S3 to the Hauptbahnhof, from there Bus 2 to Mozart Airport. The weather was pretty dreary, a good time to be getting away!

The pre/post flight processes at both airports was pretty simple. The flight itself was on time, got a window seat and an empty seat next to me. Sat next to my new friend from south of Salzburg, Gabriele and spent most of the flight chatting.

Got some pounds out of an ATM (I wasn't prepared for just how quickly these would go!) and took the train into Liverpool St Station where I met my London guide for the day - aka Pammy! After a crash course in Oysters, Tubes and Coloured Lines we had some great lunch at the Slug and Lettuce. I was to discover that London has ..alot.. of department stores, that are all huge and all packed, all the time!

Thursday evening we found my host for the night, Oliver. Discovered Brick Lane and places around here along with some good Indian food for dinner.

Most exciting to actually understand the signs, conversations and media going on around me for a change! Advertisements seem to be jumping out at me after I've learned to switch off to them in Austria....and newspapars -- absolutely loving being able to read a newspaper for a week! (and the British journalist have a very entertaining way of writing, not like the good ol' SMH).

Somehow I ended up with no photos from today...but the next few days more than make up for that!

Almabtreib - When the Cows Come Marching Home

In my Lonely Planet book there is an interesting event in October to see - the bringing home of the cows in the alpine regions. Having no luck finding any information about where and when this will be happening I have given up hope of experiencing it, until late Thursday night. I get a reply from a tourism office, it is happening tomorrow at Koenigssee, at 10am. Having no classes I decide to give it a shot - although I have no idea where this place, and where at this place the Almabtreib is happening.

After an horrific early start (up at 6.30am...!) and a long train ride I get to the Koenigssee, near Berchtesgaden - where I am officially in Germany :D There are very few people around, and no indication that anything is happening. The fog is so thick that it is impossible to know there is a beautiful lake surrounded by massive mountains a few metres away.

By 10am a large crowd has magically appeared - all waiting for something...but we are not sure what. The word goes out that this Almabtreib is special because the cows are arriving by boat across the lake...and they are on the way!

Somehow they timing is perfect, and as the fog starts to clear the boat with the cows appears, making its way slowly towards the waiting family and excited crowd.

The cows are taken off the boat one by one, each given a beautiful headpiece made of flowers, paraded around a loop and given to a family member to control.


When all the cows have been done the family and the cows parade through the town..and then take the long walk home along the highway, with no regard for the traffic!

What a fantastic, quirky event! By now the fog has cleared to reveal the wonderful lake and mountains - and the gorgeous day, so I spend the rest of the day hiking.