Jamaica Inn (not in Jamaica...)

Wedesnday 19 August 1992, yes I'm back - a bit of an interval since my last episode but all to your advantage dear readers as we have been off once again "researching the world for future articles". Well - it sounds better than "on holiday"!

Jamaica Inn. Standing atop the windswept hillocks of Bodmin Moor it is the setting for the famous book of the same name - that is "Jamaica Inn", there isn't a book called "of the same name" as far as I know...

Here are Mum, my nephew John and Miss Franny who I wooed and wed after meeting her in an extremely low-cut dress... Right: now look, it was Miss Franny wearing the dress not me, ok? You can stop swamping me with emails now saying things like "At last, the truth!" and "I knew it!!!"

The sign above the door reads: "Through these portals passed smugglers, wreckers, villains and murderers..." All of whom would surely have fled at the sight of those yellow socks...

The Daphne DuMaurier room. She actually lived here and wrote her famous book about the inn and the wreckers, driving ships onto the rocks, smuggling the booty to the inn along dark tracks through the moors.

Our daughter Gill was actually halfway through reading the book at the time of our visit and was most put out by a huge spoiler in the shape of a placque on display inside the inn.

The inn served a decent pile of grub and no banging of bread disguised as biscuit to dislodge weevils, worms or squirrels (? well, you never know) was necessary. Gill looks a touch unimpressed - anything you'd like to express, Gill?

Cornwall 1992 Holiday Index

Corfu and Lunch at The Golden Fox

Sunday 25 August 2024. We are in Corfu for the day and have booked an excursion out into the beautiful Greek countryside with a meal and spectacular views.

The coach has some climbing to do before we reach our destination for lunch and passes through one village where the road between the buildings on either side is so narrow that it is traffic light controlled as two vehicles approaching head-on would have no room to pass.

This is the Golden Fox, a hotel, villa and studio complex as well as a restaurant. We are set four to a table and sit with an American couple, Terry and his wife.

The views are just wonderful and we are sitting outside on a terrace whilst a succession of waiters bring dish after dish of starters - far too much to eat as a full meal for which we have already made our choices!

The waiters cheerily take away dishes still loaded with food, though we have made valiant efforts. It is the Greek way and so more dishes arrive with the main course - equally as tasty and equally as plentiful as the starters had been. I'm banned alcohol these days but an ice-cold coke went down very well and Miss Franny and our fellow diners each got an attractive cut glass carafe of wine to wind their tonsils around.

We forego desserts in preferance for having a tub of ice cream later. At the end of the terrace behind me was a lower level terrace with a swimming pool.

Most of our fellow coach passengers were taking photos of the views from the terrace and chatting. I made sure I thanked the staff in the bar area and kitchen and we went around the buildings to an ice cream outlet in a side bar. Here we are, sitting on a bench by the road at the back of the restaurant / hotel.

Our guide for the day, dressed in a typical Greek-style long white dress chatting with some of our group. We got back onto the coach and our next stop was at a souvenir shop and bar. We had a quick look in the shop but then repaired to the bar where another coke for me and another glass of wine for Fran kept us cool and we found a table outside with some shelter from the sun.

The coach then returned us to the port, where we and the passengers from two or three other ships were battling to elbow paths through the security gates and x-ray machines before the walk along the pier to NCL Pearl.

We have joined so many ships here at this same pier in the past. Ocean Village and Thomson/Tui/Marella Celebration, Spirit, Dream and Majesty to name just a few. This current cruise was our 28th cruise. We'd love to notch that score up some more!

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The Sensational Krimml Waterfalls

Friday 18 August 2000. Our early morning walk before the coach is a slightly longer one as it will be our last. [sniff!]

We are heading for Krimml in the Hohe Tauern National Park. On the way we pass an old steam locomotive by the side of the road.

Now, never mind bright copper kettles and warm woollen mittens, waterfalls are one of my favourite things! England has some extremely pretty ones but nothing on this scale. I'd been looking forward to this visit since we booked the holiday! Please note: we start at 1100m above sea level. There is some climbing to do...

Krimml has the longest waterfall drop in Europe. It drops in three stages and we have arrived at the bottom of the final stage. In total it drops 380 metres (1246.72 feet) with the top and bottom drops being 140m (459.32ft) and the middle drop being 100m (328.08ft). That's just the difference in height. From top to bottom (or bottom to top) you climb the path for 4.2km (2.6 miles).

Pete and Derek from the coach left their wives below and went storming off at a rate of knots, determined to reach the top. The path zig-zags steeply up the hillside and few people were running...

We've climbed 70 metres vertically so far up the winding path. That's somewhere just over halfway up Blackpool Tower... There was a fair bit further to go yet though - we were only just getting going! My head knew that... My feet and legs were beginning to think I'm an idiot... The path is steep. In places it is as steep as the stairs in your house!

This is the top of the bottom fall and the middle fall can be seen above it. The stream does a graceful zig-zag from the middle fall to the lower fall.

Then on reaching the top of the middle fall, a swiftly tumbling stream came into view, leading up to the higher fall glimpsed between the trees. Yikes... that looks another long way up!

A bridge crossed the stream before we reached the higher falls. Very picturesque and an excuse to stop for a bit of a breather!

Who was this handsome devil leaning against the the bridge parapet and trying not to look as though he's gasping for breath?

Time was getting on. We wondered whether to carry on higher or to turn to be able to both eat and look at the souvenirs on offer back at the bottom. I wanted a look at the higher falls. I zoomed off ahead at a snail's pace... This was as far as we got - 1,330 metres above sea level, 230 metres (754.59ft) higher than when we set off. That means we have climbed the equivalent of one and a half Blackpool Towers!!! We wanted time to eat and also to just sit and watch the water at the bottom. Heck, we just wanted to stop shaking...!

By mutual unspoken agreement (we couldn't talk by now...) we turned and retraced our steps. Not much further down was a restaurant on the way down and we ordered wiener schnitzel each, having been told not to miss the chance of trying it. It was excellent and we both enjoyed a really great dinner. We were the only ones there apart from the staff.

We had ordered in German and after a while a waiter came in and rattled something off that I didn't catch. Presuming it to be "Is everything ok with your meal?" I just answered casually, "Ja, danke!" upon which he beamed and nodded, opened the windows, turned the stereo down and left...

On the way up we had walked past most of the viewpoints in order to keep going upwards instead of detouring. So on the way down we went to have a closer look at the falls from the viewpoints at frequent intervals.

Even though we had marvelled at the falls on the way up, the views from some of the platforms built as viewpoints were superb. Spray from the roaring falls filled the air around us, brightening the mountainside with unexpected rainbows. We were still quite high up here and had yet to make our way down to the bottom of the falls. We were at the top of the lower of the three falls. The rapid clomp of feet came behind us - Pete and Derek on their way down. They had made it to the very top but reported that the rains of the previous two nights had washed part of the path away and they had been forced to tread on the brink of the drop!

The rocks at the bottom of the falls gave us a natural seat and grandstand view. The spray dampened and refreshed us and apparently the water has taken such a battering by falling so far, it is enriched with negative ions and is very refreshing and a restorative for asthmatics!

We had around a quarter of an hour before we were due back at the coach and stood by the river which tumbled away from the falls in a cascade of white water rapids.

The water, when I tested it with a hand, was icy cold betraying its glacial origins. The spray too was cold and refreshing and it was only when we started off towards the coach park that we realised we were soaking wet...

Back at the hotel, we walked once again down to the lake at Zell-am-See for one last look. This time the weather was a little more kind to us! As we walked back along the lake there came a shout. Sarah was swimming in the lake, also having a last fling. Tomorrow will be the long trip through Germany and Holland to our overnight stop in Belgium.

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Later in Montmarte

Sunday 30 May 1999. Montmarte will remain for me one of the highlights of our weekend, though there were really so many things to enjoy.

As the coach took us towards the restaurant for our evening meal I snapped this out of the window, to remind me of the many apartments of Paris, where people live in the heart of the city. One of the things that also intrigued us a little was the habit of having external window blinds instead of them being inside.

There was a short walk to the restaurant where we had another superb meal, commencing with that great French favourite, onion soup! It came with huge croutons - in fact as I remarked at the time, it seemed ready dunked with chunks of bread and was delicious. Beef Bourgignon followed and then an apple tart, glazed and then with some spirit over it which was set on fire here. It flamed with a dull blue flame and the camera has not been able to pick it up - but take my word for it folks!

My friend with the clarinet and saxophone was playing again and had a friend playing that seemingly most French of instruments, the accordian. Not the piano variant but a true "buttons both sides" job. And very good he was as well!

Now you may remember me mentioning Edna a couple of pages ago when we were climbing to Sacré-Coeur. Edna was an absolute wonder during the holiday, always cheerful, always mischievous and just bursting with joy and fun. It was her 86th birthday and in came a cake with a firework on top and the musicians played Happy Birthday to her whilst we all sang and raised our glasses and cheered. "Well, I don't know!" she said, "I'm only eighty six!"

The coach made one stop before heading back towards Bougival, and that was back in Montmartre at the famous windmill of le Moulin Rouge. The dancers are mainly British and American these days. It was here that Toulouse-Lautrec fell in love, only to have his heart broken - yes... there's no time, Toulouse... The first fully nude striptease was performed here in 1896. The dancer was arrested leading to riots in which two students died. And no, I don't have a photograph of her...

Return to Paris and Versailles 1999 Index

Sur Les Pieds (On Foot)

Saturday 29 May 1999. Penultimate round-up of the day as we find ourselves out of the coach with a couple of hours to ourselves. We've already used a good chunk of it in a shop... So let's crack on.

We left the Galeries Lafayette and promptly got lost by coming out onto a different street than we had entered from! Well, not exactly lost, because all we had to do was circle the building, but a bit more of our precious two hours away from the coach tour was being eaten up. We found our way back to L'Opéra and made our way down the boulevards back towards the Louvre, which had been in silhouette when we were there in the morning.

Cafe de la Paix. We thought we had better wait until we were coming back to see if we had time left to lounge at a table with a glass, so we carried on walking. It took longer than expected to get to the Louvre and by then Fran's foot was sore. She thought her shoe had been rubbing but then found when she took it off that her sandal had left patterns of sunburn on her foot and the straps had been rubbing against that. She had seen a Scholl shop somewhere from the coach and has always liked their shoes but we hadn't been able to find the shop.

So we didn't exactly stay a long time at the Louvre. Just about long enough to take a quick photo and then we thought we had better head back, not knowing if Fran's foot would get worse and slow her down. We didn't want to miss the coach!

We passed this teddy bear, busily blowing bubbles, then Miss Franny saw the shop she had been looking for and dragged me in. Would my French be up to this I wondered... Fran found some shoes and I managed to ask if they had them in her size (which luckily she knew, continental sizes being nothing like our modest numbers).

So I ordered what to me sounded like a pair of clown-sized shoes and was told "Assayez la," which I knew meant either "wait" or "sit" over there so we waited for a bit then - oh no! She came back with a different pair! But my thanks to the lady on the ice cream van for reminding me of the word for "same"!

I probably mixed up my verbs a bit but, "Ces n'est pas la meme," elicited another look at them from the sales assistant, who drew a breath and tutted at her own mistake and she tootled off and brought back the pair Fran wanted. Phew! Success!

I felt ridiculously proud of myself, Fran acted as though it was nothing at all and she knew I would cope (huh???) and she changed into them straight away and by the time we were back at the hotel preparing for our evening out for a meal and night-time coach excursion she declared herself fit for a marathon.

Refreshed and changed, we got back on the coach and headed back into Paris for our meal, where we sat next to the resident musician. Now regular visitors to my site will know I play the odd instrument myself... So I know that playing to a totally unresponsive audience can be soul destroying and I made a point of applauding after every tune. Which was obviously appreciated and although he didn't speak English, I knew enough to get talking to him and we got on famously. I declined his offer to turn round and play the piano that was behind me as, although I play keyboards, if my left hand gets a rhythm going on piano, my right hand seems to want to play at windscreen wipers...

He played both clarinet and saxophone and was very good on both. I asked him how long he had played and he told me he had played since being a young boy. After the meal we parted with smiles and I even got the traditional French embrace and then a rather merry group weaved its way back to the coach to find Lucy and Elizabeth, two young girls on the trip who had not come for the meal, sitting waiting and tapping their watches at me with a huge grin on their faces - they had been 5 minutes late back onto the coach that morning and had a few comments from Les Miserables on the coach!

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Final Evening at the Harfenwirt

Friday 15 August 2003. It's our final night at the Harfenwirt Hotel in Niederau, Austria.

All ready for our last meal. It was taken by one of our waiters, who had taken to us after one night when I went to the bar to find him almost beside himself at a French lady who had bought a bottle of red wine and was demanding "Glass! Glass!" She was already holding four glasses and behind the bar the bemused waiter was shouting "You've got glasses!" "Non! Glass!" was the response. It twigged with me. "Glace?" (ice?) I said, "...pour la froid?" (for cold?) She turned with a dramatic gesture "Oui!" she said, drawing the word out to at least a dozen letters longer than it should have been. "Avec la vin rouge?" (with red wine?) I asked doubtfully. "Oui!"

Almost every night we had played a few games of rummy on the hotel veranda. After the event described above, the female members of the French party had taken to waving and cooing at me every time they passed. Very disconcerting... "Ah oui! Bon soir!" [nervous laugh]. Fran thought this hilarious...

Another of the British couples had thought playing cards a good idea to fill the night and bought a pack in Austria only to find there wasn't a single card with a value under seven... "Did the pack not feel thin?" I asked. "No," came the reply, "I just thought what a bargain they must be at the price!"

The waiters all made a fuss of Mum, possibly for the simple reason that her loud cackling laugh annoyed the French...

Night falls on Niederau and the Harfenwirt. It was a shame that there weren't more lights on in the bedrooms, it would have brightened the picture up a bit. Mum, Dad and Fran are standing near one of the lights but you can't see them. They are peering into the dark saying things like "Where's he gone???"

Return to Austrian Tyrol 2003 Index

Kissimmee Old Town and a Wild West Dinner Show

Friday 9 July 1993. We have booked to go to a cabaret dinner this evening so decide to have a lazy day. We visit the Mercado shopping mall and have breakfast at a cafe with a huge signboard describing all the different ways they fry eggs. Apparently we like them easy over and a little bit more...

After breakfast we had a look round the shopping mall and bought a couple of CDs of music that we were getting used to on the car radio whilst in America. I bought one by a hillbilly-looking outfit called The Cactus Brothers and it turned out to be excellent and a real foot-stomper. Then after a humble milkshake which made us stare in disbelief at a pint each plus a huge jug as top-up, we made our way to Kissimmee Old Town for a look round.

There was an Elvis Presley museum at Kissimmee and that had certainly made Fran excited about visiting. I like a lot of his stuff, but think it slightly weird the way he has been almost deified to be honest. He was however one of the originals and it's only right he should be remembered with love and respect. So we went round the museum that had a couple of cars, a large collection of gold discs, his pinball machine and some memorabilia of army days etc.

There was a large memorabilia shop themed around Coca Cola. I bought several postcards showing older advertisements and we bought some of the old original crimp-topped bottles of coke which at the time had disappeared entirely from UK shops. The place was fascinating to walk round and it was quiet enough for me to fall into a conversation with the guy serving behind the counter.

Then an afternoon of relaxing at the hotel before we headed for our dinner and cabaret at Fort Liberty, the home of Wild Bill's Wild West Dinner Show. We were seated at tables for around eight people and at each table one person was chosen to dish out the vittels. It fell to Fran to play the server for our table!

We were each given a cowboy hat adding to the atmosphere. They were made of straw... so it took a little imagination and suspension of belief (or disbelief) for this to work, but we were all looking forward to the proceedings so we went along with it!

The show had lots of music and a lasso-twirling rootin', tootin', ropin' cowboy! As the dancing girlies did the can-can you could see from her bandaged ankle that she had done it before!

Then a Native American Chief in full dress did a war dance and chucked a few tomahawks and knives around to great applause. When he finished he came down to our table to talk to us after hearing our accents. He was from Liverpool...

As the night came to an end Fran was presented with an Ornery Discharge from her duties as table monitor!

Return to Florida 1993 Index