Automatic Awe Generator

I'm sorry, there isn't a new holiday in the blog today.

 

I had a notification in my Gmail account telling me that one of my photo's had been 'Auto Awesomed'. Apparently, not only do all photos I add to my blog end up in a picasa album, but they're linked to the Google+ account Google makes you have.

I decided that since I put all this stuff publicly on my blog anyway, this wasn't really something to become bothered about, also this picture from Lithuania looks pretty cool with snow effects:

Lets all just enjoy the falling snow.

Being Turkish

For those of you who haven't yet worked out the pattern, 2013's Summer holiday was to Turkey.

The pattern wasn't intentional, but it happened - From 2010  with our Summer holidays we have been moving East one country at a time on alternating years. Starting in Portugal in 2010 we moved East to Spain in 2012, Starting in Greece in 2011 we moved East to Turkey in 2013. I don't mind that we now have to go to Italy later this year, but I'm not really looking forward to Syria next year, things are a bit tense at the moment... Might have some nice wild hamsters though.

Specifically our holiday took us to Alanya near Antalya and significantly...

This was the first time in 5 years that while in a different country I was sporting face furniture.

Apparently the most interesting thing I can ever think to tell the world is how hairy my face is at any particular time. There is at least one post in this blog pretty much dedicated to it - This one - We were on holiday, surely there is something else I could talk about?

Well there is, for example, there was a big long walk up a hill to find a castle. I just couldn't find it here, where the hell is it?
This walk was followed by a meal at the top overlooking the harbour and a similar (but reversed) walk taking us back down to the bottom.

I'm pretty sure hill walks have featured in this blog before as  well, but I'm not going to go find that one - Was moving on to activities really worth it? I bet you wish we were back on beards now don't you? But no, that's it, Beard time is over, you've ruined it now.

After we had already checked out on the last day  we were waiting outside the apartment building for a coach to arrive to take us back to the airport.

This cat walked over and joined us on our little couch, we had seen him (I will continue assuming the cat was male, so I don't have to refer to him/her as an it - I'm sure he/she won't mind) about while we were eating or swimming on previous days, but it was the first time he actually came and sat next to us. He may have been wild, but he could just have easily have belonged to a neighbouring house.

He was wary of me at first, but after I tickled him he decided that I not only wasn't a threat, but that I was a friend that he should curl up on and make himself comfortable.

He stayed there for quite a while, until we actually got up to leave - at which point he seemed quite put out. Hopefully he forgives me.

That's all of the holidays up to date now, future holidays will be added with the normal irregularity that they occur. The next one will be Bratislava, so if anyone can work out the pattern that goes:
Germany
Ireland
Lithuania
Slovakia

That would be very useful to help work out where we'll end up going next year.

There's also now a pins in a map page to go along with this blog which I'll continue to add to.

Back in the (former) USSR

Snow can be nice. If we look past the cold and wet and forget about all the disruption, then I think most people can enjoy a bit of fluffy ice - Even if you don't want to go outside, build snowmen, have snowball fights or slide down a local hill on your favourite bin lid, you can at least look at it and admit that it makes the world look like a postcard... Until it all turns brown or it melts and floods your house - You're allowed to be bored of it then.

I like that really satisfying crunch when you first step into a particularly deep bit of snow, that’s good, unless your foot gets wet.

In Lithuania, during the winter, you have a very good chance of snow, usually between November and February it is a guarantee - 2013 was definitely no exception when our plane tickets took us all the way to Vilnius.

- Infrastructure will be marvelled at in the following paragraph

The first thing you are (ok, I am) likely to
notice is how much everything just keeps on going with all this snow. Back home, I remember a time when it was snowing for a week, no-one could get to work, the roads were unusable and the entire country ground to a halt. Here, it just didn't, nothing stopped, it was just normal, this was just how things were. It probably helps that they have snow for a 3rd of the year, for us its so rare that it just causes the councils to curl up into little council balls and weep their council sized tears... Which does nothing for the subsequent flooding issues.

I wonder if anyone marvels at the way Britain just copes with the near constant rain? Probably not, its not that impressive really... and the fact that we're currently so close to losing Somerset probably doesn't fill the rest of the world with awe.

It was so cold on this holiday, even the trees were wearing jumpers! Temperatures were in the early minuses, but it was pretty manageable as it wasn't windy... Except that one day when there was a street market going on, that one seemed to challenge the stall holders, so I don't think that’s normal weather.

And the crowds gathered to watch the giant man dive into the small pile of snow, secretly hoping that the horse would butt him in first... If I actually looked things up, I wouldn't have to make things up - As good a reason as any to never look anything up.

We could not go to Vilnius without visiting the bust of Frank Zappa, because it is just so odd, he is not from here or has even been here, but they have a statue of him, apparently a group of artists petitioned the government after the fall of communism, presumable just to test how much of a democracy they now had. Apparently enough to get a Frank Zappa bust on a large metal pole.

We were in Lithuania for almost a week, we accidentally stole breakfast, we learnt we liked Lithuanian food and we came home with an ocarina and a set of matryoshka dolls. All in all a successful trip.

Port of Adventure

We go to Alton Towers at least once a year, usually by saving up coupons out of the Sun newspaper - Unfortunately this means we have to buy The Sun for a few weeks a year, but it is worth putting ourselves through that to get our tickets. Plus the rabbits don't really mind what we line their house with. They might seem a bit angrier with us, but that is most likely just in my head.

The point is theme parks are fun, especially the rides - Wait the rides ARE the fun part, I don't think anyone goes to stand in queues and eat overpriced food, I can do that at home, I just need to go to Marks & Spencer close to Christmas.

Ooh penny arcades, they have them too, they're good! That reminds me of something else that happened in Ireland... But we're not on Ireland now, that was the last entry, now we're in the summery part of 2012 and we're building a holiday based around the enjoyment of roller-coasters, we're going to Port Aventura in Salou, Spain.

As it turned out going to a theme park didn't constitute a complete holiday plan, so we decided we would spend a few days in Barcelona before continuing on to Salou, now Barcelona has a really good public transport... wait I think I've covered public transport systems once before.

It rained a bit while we were in Barcelona, which dampened our enjoyment a little bit (no pun intended), but we still managed to get around to see all the important bits, like the Sagrada Família, will they ever finish this thing?
And this giant glass penis, that’s one of Barcelona's main tourist attractions right?

After a few days of drizzle and phallic buildings, we felt we had seen enough of this historic city and it was time to move on to the 2nd part of the holiday, we took the train to Salou, where unfortunately it was also raining, absolutely pouring down, you could barely look outside without getting soaked. On the end of that first day, it seemed like it was never going to dry up, it looked like Port Aventura was going to have to wait.

The light seeping in around the curtains the following morning told a different story though, it was glorious and clear, like the rain had never happened, so after a chance discovery of the children’s cartoon Phineas and Ferb, this would become day 1 at the theme park.

Probably the highlight was the new ride 'Shambala' which is meant to be like the Himalayas, so is an up and down sort of roller-coaster, the most interesting part being the first time we went on, we sat down, this little disk came down over our laps and we wondered where the rest of our harness was, the bit you normally have over the upper part of your body, making you feel safe and secure, what the hell were these?

What was quite nice was they had all the halloween stuff out, so there were giant pumpkins, skeleton horses and costumed characters all around who walked through the park in a halloween parade at the end of the day.

After the 2 days at Port Aventura, we had few more days in Salou, where there was sunshine, a bit of seaside and a load of bats.

We're almost up to date now, the next holidays to write about took place in 2013, maybe I'll be able to properly remember them. Lets find out.