I saw something astounding on the side of the road the other day, something that stopped me dead in my tracks, and even if just for a second made my mouth drop straight open. Parked at the road’s edge just near work on St James Street, a Silver-Grey 1980’s Ford Granada, which while slightly smaller, bears a striking resemblance to my first car, the great cûn, my canary yellow XF Ford Falcon. Actually, it was more like a mix between an XD and an XE, but close enough to still bring a definite tear to my eye. Few moments have I experienced in the last 6 months or so where I was filled with both laughter, surprise and sadness such as this, and for that this momement will be long remembered.

The Ford Granada, similar looking, but far less manly

Why all the fuss over a Falcon clone, one may ask? It’s a sh&^ty Australian family sedan (saloon for those UKey’d), that like the plethora of other large 1980’s vehicles (such as the Kingswood, Monaro, first Commodore’s, Torana and other period Falcons), is destined to rust bucketry and crushing (if this has not happened already). And its long been known for being a taxi, bus, and caravan for a certain Australian minority. But it was my car, and my first one at that, and it had so much history. After being used in an armed robbery and stolen at least 3 or 4 other times, it was responsible for many a fun evening of laid-back, non jaw-dropping fun and utter destruction (mostly of the car itself). Yes, the cûn was a star and shall go down in history as a legend, at least in my eyes.

The Ford XF Falcon

The cûn and I had an understanding, I could treat her like shit, stretch her to her absolute limits and she would never actually stop running on me, apart from the occasional limp. No, she didn’t break down on me constantly (apart from running out of fuel due to faulty fuel gauge), or blow a head gasket, its features just occasionally stopped working as they should or fall off altogether, like the airconditioner, radio, rearview mirror, wing mirror(s), pedals, windows, doors, backseats and other slightly more valuable organs. And there was always the odometer that stuck at 110191km over 5 years before she was rolled out of the driveway destined for the crushing yard. But it just kept on running, and I appreciate that.I’ve always said (about 5 years ago), that when I’m old and rich, I’ll go back and find the last surviving mint XF and buy it to put next to the Bugatti, and while I adamently believe this will never happen as all will probably have been scrapped its nice to keep living the dream.

Here’s an ode, to my first car
You learned and taught me, like a training bra
For you are and forever will be the wonderous cûn
Even though you could seldom muster a tune

You, me and the H man had some great times
Like limping home all broken diffed after dimes
And yes I know, I treated you like shit
But as most who remember know, you were a smashing hit

P.S: The author reserves the right to hide the original nickname for el cûn-o.

This morning I was on the tube, and two seats clear up in front of me, so I sat down in one of them, and all of a sudden, I heard, “Excuse me, that’s my seat!”. Said a lady as she climbed passed about 4 or 5 people to get to seat next to me.. Without hesitation she proceeded to sit down and continue reading her magazine. Now from my point of view, this lady wasn’t old, she wasn’t disabled, she wasn’t obese and she didn’t appear pregnant. She would have been at most a 27 or 28 year old slim woman who just seemed to want the seat and believe it was hers.

Which got me to thinking, at what stage do I get to the age where I can start assuming a seat on the train is mine? When does it get to the point where I don’t have to worry about others who are standing around me and just sit, whilst the five 14 year olds chatter loudly whilst seated on the other side of the carriage? Not just that, and I’m going to get flamed for this, when is a pregnant woman, pregnant in the eyes of the public? If somene told me they were pregnant, I’d give up my seat anyway, but this shouldn’t be a free card, just because your a woman, and you can tell a white lie. Ya hear me?

I propose ACROD stickers for all people of priority on public transport. That’ll solve the issue.

Wear it proudly, you deserve it!

As it is, unless your old, disabled or pregnant you ain’t getting a seat from me unless you ask, but the nerve of some people on the train amazes me.

Update: This would brighten my day

We hired a car again on the weekend ready for another trip down to Cornwall, it’s a long drive, but as its been so long since either of us have driven I hardly noticed it. What I did notice, however was the difference in vehicles between the Vauxhall Corsa we got last time and the Vauxhall Vectra we got this time. The difference between the Corsa’s 1 or 1.2L engine and the Vectra’s 2.0L engine made all the difference, and made me feel like I was in a fast car. Which was entirely not the case, but its fun to dream.

People have always said to me, how much better driving conditions and rules are in the UK as opposed to Australia, that if your in the Right lane on the freeway (the inner faster lane for all you wrong-siders), going faster than the car in front they’ll move out of the way to let you pass. People in Australia, well Perth at least take is as their god given right to clog up the right lane on the freeway, and I often felt the need to high beam/horn until they moved into the next lane. What do you know, I’m a product of road rage, and shall teach road rage to my children.

I was told things would be better in the ‘K…. But they’re not.

Well not most of the time anyway. If you really come up behind someone fast, they usually get the picture and move over, but this is doing 90+mph when they’re doing 70 or less (come on people, this is a motorway), but I often had to employ the old flick of the high beam arm to get people to get a move on.

The problem is of course, that everyone wants to get where they’re going fast, so everyone plays what I will refer to as the Just One More game. Like any more-ish addiction, to food, drink, game, sex or substance, people just seem to feel the need to get that one more car length in front, despite the fact they’re holding everyone up in the lane behind them. It should be all about flow. I know this as I write the road rules, at least I should.

The Problem: Everyone’s addiction to the Just One More phenomenom

The first car pulls into the right lane doing 70, a few cars bunch up behind him trying to get a break so they can make the move back into the middle lane, now we have a cue of 5-10 cars who are all constricted to the same speed as those in the middle lane due to the tosser in his beret driving his MX5. As the cars bunch up more and more, it now takes several miles for the first car to pass one car, two cars (just one more damn it) whilst still travelling at his original speed. Now the congestion behind him all get the same idea, and one by one each car plays the game until they find a slot they’re happy with, and a few minutes later, and 10 miles down the road I can get back up to speed and continue on my way, until it happens again a little later down the track.

The Current Fix:

There are two fixes that can be applied to this situation that will work about 50% of the time. If there are only 1 or 2 cars ahead of you blocking the fast lane, the rapid approach can be deployed. By doing what the P-Daddy’s in the Porche’s, BMW 5/6/7 series and Austins do and travel in excess of the driver in fronts speed, that being 70-100mph, people usually get the message and move out of the way. If they don’t, a quick flick of the high beams usually sets them straight, but be prepared for the almighty finger as you drive by.. And Rage is born.

Note: Other methods can most definitely be employed, such as the left hand overtake, which is extremely effective, but highly illegal in some countries (or so I’ve been told).

My Solution to the Issue: Enforced Speed-Tiered Lane System

I propose this, and its not an original idea, I’m sure I’ve seen it in a movie somewhere, but have enforced/policed speed-tiered lanes. On a motorway there’s often 3, 4 or 5 lanes, which should range from slow -10mph range of the speed limit, through normal at the speed limit and the fast lane(s) for speed. Then a common courtesy could apply where if someone i going faster than you, you must move over for them. No If’s, no buts, no “just one more, even though I’m going far slower than the guy behind me”, you move. Of course this system would be enforced via the thousands of CCTV camera’s installed on the motorways and some nifty computer gear to work out who was screwing who. Failure to comply, would lead to a congestion charge of at least £10, for every time the offense occured.

I’d also like to conclude that contrary to our last car trip, involving an ignorant belief that UK Motorways are the same as a German Autobahn (i.e No Limits), no speed limits were exceeded by more than 20mph, and the top speed acheived on the journey was just under 100mph, as opposed to the 120+mph from last time. This not only meant a safer journey, but was the difference between a menial fine and license suspension completely for a year or more, and possibly deportation, though I’m not sure how driving offenses affect VISA arrangements.

Peace.

Brugge (Bruges) is to Brussels (Bruxelles), what hot is to cold, what rock is to pop and what heaven is to hell. Travelling from Brussels to Brugge is like a lovely holiday oasis in the middle of a desert, only a stone’s throw from Brussels (1hr by train), everything about it is like what you’d expect of a lovely holiday destination out of the big city.

Belgium’s answer to Venice

The second we dropped our bags, we raced straight down the local pub (next door to the Coin-Op we were washing our clothes at) and dug into some tasty Belgian beer. Belgium is to beer, what Australia is to wine (blasphemy I know, but I’m biased… France is great too) and I mean that. For 2.5 Euros, this place could buy you a pint of Quak (8% Belgian Beer that comes in a test tube), 9% Westmalle Triple or a Duval (arguably Belgium’s most popular export beer).

Quak - Killer Beer in a Test tube

Orval, another -10% (just)

A couple of these put me into a very happy place, you can imagine what I was like by the time our clothes were clean. After we finished with the laundry, we went straight back out to the local beer house recommended to us by Monique, the owner of the Bread and Breakfast we were staying in. It was called Cambrinas, and its specialty was over 400 different types of bottled Belgian beer. Yes, that’s right, 400 different ones, a beer lover’s heaven.

Cambrinas - Heaven in a Pub

Brugge has a lot of history, nice cobblestoned roads and a couple of fantastic looking main squares which literally laugh at that of Grand Place in Brussels. Some points of interest are the church containing the blood of Christ (apparently), Notre Dame, its Windmills and any of the other sites you can see from a cruise taken down one of Brugge’s many Canals.

Markt - Brugge

I would definitely recommend Brugge, out of everything I saw in Belgium.  For a city of just over  a 100,000 people, there’s more to see, more going on and its at least tenfold nicer than its capital city of Brussels.  A must see!

continued on from Paris (The Holiday - II)……

I had meant to finish my mindless ramblings about Paris all in one go, but I was looking back on what I wrote the other night (whilst slightly innebriated, mind you) and realised that I’d hardly written anything at all. Worst of all, I’m not living up to expectation (mine mostly, as the ultimate companion to any Lonely Planet, Shannon’s Guide to the world… Or at least to the places he’s actually been). Whats the first rule of the SG series? They’re supposed to offer something different than others. But, it probably won’t, and guess what?

I’m going to write it anyway…..

Moulin Rouge (23/08/2007)

What did I know about Moulin Rouge before going? Not much! I’ve seen the building before, that neon Red Windmill (which I’ll assume was where the idea for the “Gentleman’s” ahem.. strip club came from in Perth) and I remember the boring movie, it did nothing for me, and was probably the main reason I wasn’t terribly fussed whether we went or not. I get it, they family-ified it, but meh anyway. I’ve also heard a few stories about it, like the one of the H-Dog praying to the porcelain god (without the porcelain) out the front of it on a contiki tour, if I have this wrong then I’ll most certainly correct it, but I’m pretty sure those were the details.

(more…)

There’s no doubt about it, Paris is a great city, and definitely one that grew on me a lot, especially after visiting it for the second time. I’ll admit, we werent’ quite in the same area as we stayed last time, but the first thing I wondered was where all the grafitti, vandalism, rubbish and slashed tyres were. It wasn’t as if were were on the other side of the city, we were probably about 4 or 5 miles away, staying near Franklin Roosevelt Station (Champs-Élysées), compared to last time near Anvers/Gare du Nord stations. The suburb/area/district (not sure what the French call them) we stayed in this time was the nicer part of Subiaco, or Claremont compared to Northbridge or Perth City at Night. And we were lucky enough to get a reasonably priced hotel, which was really quite nice as well. For 100 euro’s a night, with a delicious coffee/baguettes/crossaint and tasty cheeses, was a darn good deal:

It seems everyone has a story about a European city, how sleazy Rome is, or how dangerous London is, watch for pickpockets in Paris and Brussels or even stay alert and don’t get in a position thats likely to get you mugged in Madrid, but I’d say a lot of it comes down to common sense, and a big chunk of luck. Of course, I feel sorry for this guy, and have heard many stories similar in the past, but I didn’t see anything that made me at all uncomfortable, at least not in Paris.

Versailles Palace (21/08/2007)

Not knowing a terrible amount about French history (nor much history at all for that matter), I wasn’t really sure what to expect of Versailles, but we’d heard that many people talk about it, that we just had to go and see it. The whole setup is a lot like the English Palaces, probably more like Hampton Court Palace than the others, but far, far more grand, and beautiful. Of course, Paris, being the most popular tourist destination in the world, meant Versailles had a most obvious downside, and that’s people, and queues. Walking up to the front gate there was a sea of people, with queues lining both sides of the massive entrance with no barriers/sign posts to direct you as to which of the two of three lines was which. After smirking at the idea of standing in a queue for two hours we went off and looked for a quicker way in and found an alternative ticket desk selling entry tickets for slightly more (€19 instead of €14) and allowing you to skip the first, longer queue. Why anyone queue for two hours just to get tickets, only to join another queue is beyond me.

Sea of People

The palace is definitely worth the ticket fee though, and some of the rooms in the palace, halls, and king and queens quarters are nothing short of spectacular:

Rating Guide

Travel: About 45-60 minutes from Paris by RER Train 2
Price: €19/ea
Time: Approx 2-3 Hours
Value: Good Value

More to come..

I thought long and hard about what I could possibly write about our recent fortnight in Europe without rehashing every Lonely Planet, Thomas Cook, or other Travel Advisor type publication. After all every book, website and travel liftout in the newspaper will tell you about how great the Lourve is (don’t know, missed out for the second time, maybe next time), how fantastic Notre Dame is (went, saw the lobby and left), or climbing the Arc de Triomph (which I imagine would be heaps of fun).

Then it came to me, this guide should be something that you won’t necessarily find elsewhere, not that you would anyway, as I can’t write to save my life. It’s Shannon’s Guide to the World (or at least to the places he’s actually been) . And it shall come in various parts…. Maybe.

I see value in different things, both in time and money, on one hand I’m an impulse buyer/gamble anything/throw away money on a 18 Euro beer (just because), but on the other I’ll penny pinch, and bitch about spending money on a taxi when train/bus would have done similar for a third of the price. So this will give me a chance to push some goood (and bad) value things, at least in my point of view. But I’m writing it, so you’d expect that.