England has quite the collection of murals of horses on hillsides, and the oldest of these is the Uffington White Horse. No-one seems to know precisely how old it is, but Wikipedia puts it at over 3,000 years! We ventured out on Saturday with Julian and Shelley to have a close-up look at it for ourselves.

As it turns out, the close-up look isn’t quite as impressive as the Google maps top-down approach, but it does give you an idea of just how big it is. Pretty big.

Right next to the white horse is Uffington Castle, however this one is a bit of a conundrum. See, all that actually remains of the castle is the site upon which it was built – a huge circular landmass surrounded by a ditch (most likely an old moat). But, there’s really no signs of anything actually having ever been constructed there. What’s more, apparently it wasn’t even a castle, but instead just a hill fort!

Still, a huge ex-moat-like-ditch can be rather entertaining, as Julian proved to us. See, he has this great trick which you can use to traverse from one side of a ditch to the other, by simply running down one side as fast as you can, and then expending your built up momentum to effortlessly ascend to the other side. Sadly for him, the uphill journey proved slightly steeper than he had anticipated, which threw all of his calculations off, and saw him running face-first into the grass. Oh, if only I’d been videoing…

While we were in the area, we also took a short wander down to Wayland’s Smithy – two words which when combined somehow mean, “old tomb”. Apparently there were 14 people buried in there, but they’ve long since departed (heh heh) and now it feels more like a man-made cave.

Truth be told, it wasn’t all that exciting, but the walk in the sunshine and fresh country air was delightful! The company wasn’t too bad either, though we had suspected that would be the case when we started out.

At 294 metres above sea level, Leith Hill is the highest point in all of south-east England. And, at only an hour’s drive (or thereabouts) from Chiswick, it makes a perfect destination for a one-day adventure – so off we trolleyed with Julian and Shelley on Saturday to make the most of the beautiful weather!

At the top of Leith Hill stands the very creatively named Leith Hill Tower, which was apparently built in order to raise the top-most point of the hill to over 1000 feet above sea level. Yes, really. No, I don’t understand why either; but to be fair, it did provide a great vantage point for 360 degree views. Since the day was so clear, you could (barely) make out London City to the north-east in the middle of the top photo (the distinct shape of The Gherkin is the giveaway); and Gatwick Airport was a bit easier to see, at only nine miles directly to the east.

Unsurprisingly, the area is also littered with Geocaches; we managed to find In the Shadow of the Tower 2 which was a great adventure to find, and the very craftily hidden West Side Wandering, which I think was the hardest cache we’ve found to date.

Being a hill, and being in the forest, it’s also a very popular destination for mountain bikers. We (obviously) weren’t equipped with bikes, but that didn’t stop Julian catching some huge air over a jump on the way down.

Impressive!

With all the travelling we’ve done lately, we were very happy to have a low-key New Year’s celebration this year, and that’s exactly what we did! We started off by eating a massive bowl of home-made guacamole (roughly using the Chipotle recipe) while watching the finale and reunion show for Survivor Season 19. All accompanied by a drink or two, of course!

Ariella and Paul came over around 9 PM and we shared a Turkish dinner, played a round of Buzz, and then kicked off a game of Settlers. Why oh why no-one rolled a four is beyond me!

We flicked over to the Beeb just before midnight for the official countdown, and to watch the fireworks over the Thames. I must say, the ones that were fired off the London Eye were very impressive!

We finished off our game of Settlers, played another round of Buzz, then called it a night at around 1 AM. We started the New Year on the right foot by sleeping in until 10 AM, two coffees, and the most delicious pancakes I think I’ve ever eaten.

2010 is going to be awesome!

Back when we first visited Ben and Michelle in London, one of the places they took us to was Somerset House.

Back then, we had no real idea what it was, other than a building that had an ice-skating rink out the front. But oh my, how times have changed! Now, not only do we know that it’s a building with an ice-skating rink out the front, but we also know that it shows movies during the summer months! Yes, this really is about as far as my knowledge extends, but I’m sure that if I were to actually click on the link that I’ve so helpfully included in this article, I’d be bombarded with loads of uselessful information on the place. But alas, I don’t really care all that much; I’m happy just knowing that it’s ice-skating-come-movie-cinema building place thingy.

Anyway, Aubain and Ingrid asked us aaaaaagggesss ago if we wanted to hit the rink with them during the between-Christmas-and-New-Year’s lull, so off we went tonight to give it a whirl. London did its best to discourage us with fairly heavy rainfall, but to be honest, I didn’t even notice it while I was out on the ice – it was only when I came back in that I found out my jacket was soaked!

Ice skating was a weird sensation coming only two days after skiing – the skates just felt all too short, to me! However after a cautious few steps at the start, we all managed to find our feet (some more so than others; turns out Aubain and Ingrid are both quite good!). Even better, we managed to make it through the whole hour without a single stack!

We polished off the night with a few well earned cups of mulled wine, in the little bar overlooking the rink. Ahhhhh…… this is what winter should be all about.

As you’ve probably guessed, we joined Kirsty’s posse in Düsseldorf last weekend to celebrate her 30th birthday. Note here, it was Kirsty’s birthday, not Kristy’s birthday. Lots of people seem to get them confused, though I have no idea why. For further visual clarity, I have included here a photo of the two of them – my wife, Kristy is on the left, so by a process of elimination, that makes the other bird on the right, the lady of the hour Kirsty:

Oh my, Düsseldorf was cold! We managed to leave the warm comfort of John’s apartment for a walk around the city on Saturday morning. I can see how it would be quite a nice place to be in summer; however we could barely stand still for more than a few seconds to enjoy the scenery! Instead, we mainly spent our time scurrying from restaurant, to cafe, to bar – basically, anywhere that was heated and indoors!

In the afternoon, we took a train to Köln (“Cologne”), to check out the Christmas markets under the magnificent Cathedral. With dusk settling in, the Christmas lights coming on, and the smell of mulled wine and roasting pork in the air, it was quite the feast for the senses! (Well, not so much for poor old “touch”, as Köln was even more freezing than Düsseldorf!).

Probably the best thing about the Christmas markets was that Kristy was finally reunited with Kartoffelpuffer – deep fried potato pancakes covered in apple sauce. She’s been raving to me about these things ever since I’ve known here, so I was pleased to finally see what all the fuss was about. Just look how happy she is!

I have to admit… they were gooooooood.

We hit up some of John’s recommended evening hang-outs when we got back to Düsseldorf. Well, not all of them – the bouncer wouldn’t let Roland or I in at the first club that we went to (Roland since he was wearing cargo-pants, and me because I wasn’t wearing dress shoes). Still, there were loads of places that were happy to take our money, so we went to them instead.

One thing I really noticed in Germany was how profuse smoking is. Worse still, you’re allowed to smoke inside certain restaurants, so when you come out, everything wreaks of smoke. When you’re not used to it, it’s amazing how annoying it is! Still, it didn’t tarnish our otherwise good night out.

Unfortunately for us, it snowed heavily overnight, and the snow continued for all of Sunday. Going by the beer-bottle index, we got about 6 to 8 inches.

And, as you’ve (possibly) read, this meant that all flights out of Düsseldorf were cancelled, so we were stuck there for one more night. I won’t go into the details about how terrible it is – frankly, it could have been a lot worse (like the people that got stuck on the Eurostar in the channel tunnel for 16 hours) – but suffice to say, we were pleased when our rescheduled flight at 7:30 AM the next morning had taken to the skies.

I think Kirsty enjoyed her 30th celebration, and it was great to be part of “the crew” that helped her celebrate!

A few more photos in the Dusseldorf album.

Not only has the £5 breakfast challenge been a huge success (we probably wouldn’t have bothered to try all the breakfast places without it – and we still have two to go!) – but now we’re actually getting requests to be reviewed! So, even though it was outside the “rules” of being a £5 breakfast place along the high road, we decided to overlook it just this once, for breakfast at the very exclusive Monkey Inn.

Firstly, it must be noted that we weren’t allowed to pay cash for our meal; instead, we had to work to be fed! See, our hosts had thrown a foosball party the prior evening, and we ended up sleeping over – so in the morning we were required to help fold the gaming table away, and then reassemble the dining room furniture, in exchange for breakfast. Actually, I really liked this method of payment, and the cafes on the high road would do well to provide this alternative!

Once we were seated, head chef Suzie served up an amazing breakfast of a fried egg, bacon, sausage, mushrooms, organic baked beans, wholegrain toast, and orange juice. And to top it all off, sous chef Nick served up a lovely red bottle of tomato sauce, which was placed in precisely the perfect location on the table to account for each patron’s relative desire for ketchup. Absolutely, the pièce de résistance!

Kristy and I were well impressed at the layout of the restaurant. The dining room table was strategically placed in the centre of the open kitchen, so that the chefs could converse with the patrons during cooking, and then join them for the meal. They told us how they only believed in serving the absolute highest quality of food – in fact, their eggs were so free range, that the chickens all enjoy six weeks paid holiday per year, in Hawaii! Simply amazing.

The meal itself was a perfect portion – for the first time I wasn’t overloaded with bacon, and everything (well, except the beans and a few stray mushies) fitted perfectly on my single slice of toast. Best of all, the package included free, unlimited refills of orange juice!

The Monkey Inn is a bit of an exclusive club – breakfast is strictly by invitation only, but if you do manage to make it onto the guest list, you’d be doing yourself a favour by accepting. gerrod.com rating: 10/10.

We drove out to Canterbury on Friday night after work, to spend the weekend in Emily’s hometown. It poured down on the motorway; the rain was so thick in parts it was quite difficult to see where we were going!

Thankfully, things were looking up on Saturday. We walked from our hotel down to The Goods Shed for breakfast; ironically, we walked straight past Emily who had just started a driving lesson. We pretended not to watch her driving past us down the street, but we couldn’t help but notice what a fine job she was doing .

The Goods Shed has a rather novel breakfast menu – you pay a £2 cover charge, and then 50p for each item you want. Such a great concept! As Krsity pointed out, that makes it very difficult to complain they don’t have exactly what you want (though as I pointed out, they didn’t serve pancakes). Win-win! We liked it so much that we went back on Sunday, too!

After breakfast, we headed into town to see one of Canterbury’s main attractions: Canterbury Cathedral.

It was nice enough – big and church-like, really. Two things struck me as unusual about the cathedral though; firstly, real-estate for the dead seemed to be in popular demand. I’ve never seen so many plaques on a cathedral wall – all quite morbid, really!

The second thing I found odd was the money. On one wall, there were donation boxes set up for Christian Aid, with various brochures advertising how even just a little bit of money makes a huge difference. However on the other wall, you could help donate money to the cathedral, which apparently costs £12,000 per day just to keep running; not to mention the £50 million “conservation and development project” it’s currently undergoing! Call me cynical, but something there doesn’t add up.

We met up with Emily and Matthew after grabbing a quick bite at the Boho cafe. Emily was nice enough to take us for a tour around her hometown, starting with a climb up The Westgate. There was a great view of the city and cathedral from the top!

We went from there to the other end of town, where we walked along the city walls, and through some of the ruins. After a hot chocolate, our tour finished with a wander through Westgate Gardens, which led us to The Parrot – an eclectic little pub (complete with parrot) which made a perfect stop to share a bottle of wine. We had a delicious dinner at Cafe des Amis, and then made our way back to the hotel at the very respectable time of 8:30 PM. We were so exhausted from our day of wandering that we were fast asleep by 9 PM!

Unfortunately, today we weren’t so lucky with the weather. After breakfast, Kristy and I drove out to Margate and got our coffee fix on the waterfront, at the aptly named Cafe G. After heading back, we picked up Matthew and Emily then went for a Sunday Roast lunch at The Old Gate Inn. We stayed there most of the afternoon, and our time flew by trying to work out the rules to Backpacker – a card game which Mel and Ben graciously sent us for our birthdays. It’s complex (but fun)!

Overall, it was a great weekend, and that’s one more of England’s towns we can tick off the “to see” list. A huge thanks again to Matthew and Emily for showing us around!

Mel and Ben are in the house! Well, they were on Friday night, anyway – we caught up with them, as well as Jaimee, Pat, Matthew, and a few of Ben’s friends, at The Two Bewers on Monmouth Street. It was a lovely evening, and we stayed until the bartenders would let us stay no longer.

As accommodation at the Barbeque Chicken Hotel had been pre-arranged, we all trundled back to Putney, arriving here sometime after midnight. That seemed like a great time to start playing Buzz, so play Buzz we did! We turned in around 1:30 AM.

Needless to say, Saturday was a late start. After a fry-up, we headed up to Portobello Road markets to try and find a birthday present for Ben’s Mom. Much as I like outdoor markets, I do not like massive crowds, so it was a bit trying at times!

There’s a lot of fun to be had at Portobello Road though, like walking into the antique clock store and asking, “excuse me, do you know the time?”; or asking the staff at the Everything for £5 store, “how much is this t-shirt?”. Instead, we settled on some delicious desserts from Gelato Mio – Kristy and I shared some strawberry and mango sorbet and it was amazing!

We farewelled Mel and Ben at Notting Hill Gate, sad to see them go, but happy that we got to spend our day with them!

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Most people wouldn’t have believed that young Nick would ever make it to 30, but on Friday he proved the critics wrong and celebrated in style!

His super-duper uber-organised girlfriend – Suzie – arranged for a gaggle of his friends to stay with him at a beautiful old house (built in the 1500’s!) in Bedfordshire. It was massive!

It was easily the coolest house I’ve ever stayed in! There were lots of crooked hallways, winding stair-cases, rooms with views, and extremely low ceilings – people in the fifteen hundreds must have been very short. It’s a good thing no-one bumped their head too hard, otherwise there could have been some terrible injuries!

Everything required for an awesome weekend was there – great company, and loads of food and drinks. The meal highlight was definitely Saturday night, for which Suzie had organised a massive BBQ of marinated chicken, burgers, sausages, corn, veggies, bread, and salads. Being the only Aussie in the group, I proudly stepped up for the position of of tong-master.

One of Nick’s friends – Ray – had brought along a bunch of sky lanterns, which are basically mini hot-air balloons. The idea is that you write messages on them, light the fuse, then send them off on their merry quest for the heavens. This seemed like a fantastic idea – and it was – however, a few of the balloons didn’t have the greatest of starts, and got caught up in the trees around the house. Depending on who you ask, this was either “unfortunate”, or “it almost burned the house down”. I’m more on the former side, but I’m glad that we managed to escape without incident!

Overall a fantastic weekend away, and also a lovely test for our new car which drove four of us there, and five of us back, effortlessly!

Nick decided to tail us for the our second two weeks in Australia, so he could see what all the fuss is about. We decided that the best way for him to overcome his jetlag was to immediately get him out and about, so we took him for brunch in Roma Street Parklands, lunch in New Farm Park, then a drink at Riverside at dusk.

He managed to make it until about 8 PM on his first day; an admirable effort after 24 hours in transit!