Travelogue: Road Trip to France - Part 2 Loire Valley

After reaching Calais, we had a 6 hours drive to our holiday rental south of Loches. Loire Valley is a huge area and we have decided to concentrate on the area east of Tours. We found a holiday rental which was doggie friendly just south of Loches.

After a night's rest, we headed to the beautiful town of Amboise for the day. Unfortunately, the weather was bad. The rain was coming down non-stop. Despite that, you can see how beautiful Amboise is. The town sits on left bank of Loire with the Chateau towers above the town and the river.

Amboise

You can't come to Amboise without visiting the Chateau. The tickets are 10.50 Euros each. There is plenty to cover inside, so take your time. I am not going to go into the history, just enjoy the pictures :)

Going up to Chateau 'd Amboise

The Chapel of Saint Hubert where Leonardo da Vinci is buried

Top Left: View of Amboise town below, Top Right: Chateau d'Amboise, Bottom left: View of Amboise, Bottom Right: View across Loire

View of Chateau d'Amboise Grounds

Travelogue: Road Trip to France - Part 1 Crossing the Channel

At the end of August, the whole family (parents, husband and dogs included) went on a 2 week road trip to France. We planned a week in the Loire Valley, and a week in Brittany. It went fantastic!!! This was our second time bringing the dogs on a road trip to France. Armed with their pet passport and our 4x4 packed, we drove from home all the way down to Folkestone to catch the Eurotunnel over to Calais. Last time, we took the Ferry due to a strike on the Eurotunnel. So we were quite apprenhensive as we didn't know what to expect. All fears were blown out of the window, once we started our journey. It was raining cats and dogs on the day itself which was horrible as we got there early and had to make sure the doggies had their wee before we packed them back in the car to go on our merry way.

Rainy day at the Eurotunnel

The experience of driving into a train carriage was amazing. We had a tall 4x4, so ended up booking to go in the single deck carriage. If you have a normal car, you would go into a double deck carriage which I think is much more interesting.

The carriages open out to allow the cars to drive into the train

Once you are in the train carriage, the Eurotunnel staff would guide you and all loaded, they would closed down the gates between the carriages. The journey itself took 35 minutes, and the loading of all vehicles were really quick. We reached France really quickly, and the carriages reopened and you drove off into France. It was super easy and the waiting time was very reasonable. Best of all, the dogs get to stay with you in the car. Unlike taking the Ferry from Dover across to Calais, where the trip takes 1.5 hours, you have to leave your dogs in the car during the entire journey. A bit unnerving I would say, so if you are travelling with your dogs, I would definitely recommend taking the Eurotunnel. It is more costly, but the shorter journey time and for the dogs, it is the far superior choice. You pay £15 for each animal each way and it is very easy. At check in, you just have to let the attendant know that you have animals in the car, and they will give you a sticker to place on your car so that any Eurotunnel staff will know there are animals in your vehicle, and that's it. No red tape, special queues etc, very easy to take your dogs with you.

We are in France

On arrival, we just drive out of the train and voila! we are in France. Just bear in mind to drive on the right and you will be alright.


Join me next on the Loire Valley Leg of our trip. It was a 6 hours drive from Calais to where our gite rental was in the Loire Valley, south of Loches. Stay tune.

Back in London

Sorry all for being MIA. Was in UK for over 3 weeks. It has been 2 years since my last visit and it was great to be back. Another friend of mine was in UK at the same time, and we had a great time checking out old hangouts and discovering new places too. We were also lucky with the weather. It was in the teens and lovely sunshine, the perfect weather for walking around. I also got to drive a lot, from London out to Essex, Suffolk, Hertfordshire, Kent & Surrey and it was great. After driving over 1000 miles in a manual car, I didn't grumble at all. It was therapeutic to drive in the UK as almost everyone is a polite driver. Now that I'm back in Singapore, I am missing that very much.

Lots of stuff have been happening since I'm back. The hubby and I are rushing off on our New Zealand South Island trip for 10 days. The shortest planning time I ever had for a holiday - 2 weeks! Followed by arranging to go to Kuala Lumpur for a short weekend to meet up with some friends in november. The hubby also will be popping back into London for another business trip and it is very tempting to follow along.

Anyway, here are some highlights from my trip:

This was taken from the cab from Heathrow to our service apartment

Sun was shining when we arrived in Heathrow. I had to snap this picture as we drove past Buckingham Palace in our cab. The sun was shining and London could not look more beautiful!!!

View of Canary Wharf from our service apartment

London Day out

The next day after I arrived, I met with my friend and off we went for a day of fun!!! We went to check out the British Museum. It was good to be back. We spent a few hours there and went for lunch. Found a quaint little french restaurant that offered a great lunch deal. My friend ordered this yummy pork belly dish. The pork was done amazingly, it was crunchy outside and soft on the inside. After the heavy lunch (plus desserts), we had to walk it off. We went from Holborn all the way to Covent Garden to Leicester Square where we checked out the the humongous M&M shop! It has 4 stories of everything M&M!!

Kent 

The weekend, the hubby and I picked up our rental car and went off to explore Kent. We drove over the familiar Dartford Bridge and entered Kent. We checked out the lovely quaint English villages along the River Medway. Ended up in Maidstone where we stayed for the night and went to have another lovely french meal at Cafe Rouge. The confit duck was heavenly, totally worth every ounce of fat I've ingested :p

Highlights of Hertfordshire & Bury St Edmunds

My friend and I spent a lovely day exploring parts of Hertfordshire. The lower left picture was taken at the village green at Hatfield Heath where we enjoyed a lovely day sitting outside. The temperature was perfect at around 18C. Another day, I drove up to Bury St Edmunds on my own. Went up to see some friends as I used to live there before moving to Asia 4 years ago. We went for a lovely lunch followed by a walk with my friend's beautiful black lab. It was great to be back in the outdoors. I missed this lifestyle whereby the dogs get all this space to roam and fellow dog owners are gracious. Anyway I ended the day with a steal from the wednesday market in Bury with a big bag of cherries costing just a quid!! :)

Another weekend in Kent

The 2nd weekend, the hubby and I popped back into Kent. This time we explored further. We went to a village which had the most beautiful postcard view ever. A lovely bridge over the river Medway, with willows swaying in the background. We had a lovely pub lounge overlooking the river and went off on the public footpaths for a lovely saturday afternoon walk. Life's just dandy!!!

Exploring London

The last weekend in London, we decided to spend some time exploring her. We went off back to Covent Garden and discovered an area that was new to me. I had always gone straight into Covent Garden but this time we turned left into an area known as Neal's Yard. It looked really bohemian. There were cutesy boutiques, and one of a kind shops. Even the cafes and restaurants in the yard looks really funky. A note to check it out the shops proper with a girlfriend. Hubby is not a shopper at all so I didn't want to bore him that afternoon.

London Part 2

For Lunch, we had it planned to go for the Four Seasons Roast Duck as mentioned in my other London posts. It is the most amazing, yummylicious duck ever. Even my fussy tongue hubby loves the duck, so we went there just before the lunch crowd to grab seats to enjoy our lunch. It is still as good as I remembered. After that, we went off to Piccadilly and walked to Fortnum & Masons to pick up some goodies to bring back as gifts. I spent a good while wandering around all the selections to pick up what I wanted. Finally we were back in Canary Wharf. It has a different feel to the rest of London. It reminds me of Singapore with all the tall gleaming offices, and clean streets.

Final Day

Three weeks came and went so quickly. Before we knew it, it was the day to fly back to Singapore. As we had some time to kill before getting the cab to the airport, we went to check out the big new Westfield mall at Stratford. It was huge and had all the known high street names in there. They even have a nice selection of restaurants and an ultra cool food court. I settled for a meatball pho as it's been a while since I had any nice soup noodles. What a great way to end my trip back to London. Will be back soon!!!!

Travelogue: Trip to Greece - Exploring Athens Part 2 (Acropolis)

The Acropolis of Athens overlooks the city of Athens. As you wander around the city, all you have to do is to look up and you will see the Acropolis up on the hill. It is a beautiful structure even from afar. We got to visit the site and luckily on the day where it was the World Museum Day where entry was free :)

Warning: Photo Heavy Post

Acropolis

Travelogue: Trip to Scandinavia - Stockholm: Gamla Stan

The first country that we started our Scandinavia trip in was in Sweden, famous for being the home country of Ikea. Would I be seeing Ikea shops everywhere in the country? We flew into Stockholm, the capital city of Sweden.  Just joking. One of the main reason we visited Stockholm was to visit my friend from back in my University days.What impressed us about Stockholm is how beautiful, clean but yet funky and stylish. It provides a lot of attractions and places for tourists to check out.

Stockholm

Travelogue: Trip to Prague, Czech Republic - Part 3

After spending 1/2 a day with Alena at the Prague Castle, we continued with Alena as she took us to explore more of Prague. She and the hubby were happily discussing about Czech Republic history as I wandered alongside enjoying the sights and taking lots of pictures of this beautiful city.

Colourful buildings as we were walking down from the castle

Top ten offbeat things to do in London

With Olympics happening right now in London, there must be a lot of tourists spending time in London. I love London!!! You will never get tired of visiting her. I am sure there are no lack of things to do and places to visit while you are in London. The numerous historical sites, buildings, amazing architecture, world class galleries and museums, the west end for the musicals, the markets, the shopping, the list is endless. But there are also many other things to do while you are there that you won't find in conventional guide books. If you are looking to do something different while you are there, why not check out my list of offbeat things to do in London. Without further ado, here is my list of top ten offbeat things to do while you are there.

Tower Bridge, London

Travelogue: Trip to Italy Part 2b - Pompeii & Herculaneum - Pompeii

After spending the morning at Herculaneum, we headed towards Pompeii via the Circumvesuvian railway and alight at Pompei Scavi Station. The entrance to Pompeii is about 50m away from the station. Many people gets confused regarding the name, the ancient site is known as Pompeii while the modern town that stands there now is called Pompei.

Pompeii

Travelogue: Trip to Scandinavia: An Overview

One of the main item on my bucket list was to see the Northern lights. I've written about it on a previous post . The husband and I went to Tromso in Norway to see it but we weren't going to fly all the way to Norway just to do that. For the trip, we took a 2 week trip and went to visit the other Scandinavian cities along the way. I have friends in Stockholm and Helsinki. Since we have never been to that part of the world, it was the great excuse to visit.

Snow everywhere!

Travelogue: Trip to Greece - Exploring Athens Part 1

Greece is an amazing place to visit, whether if you are a history buff, you will be spoilt for choice here with the vast length of history that Greece was part of. It is the birthplace of Western civilisation. Perhaps no nation in Europe can boast of a more ancient history than Greece. Greece's antiquity dates back to 3000 BC when the powerful Cycladic, Minoan and Mycenaean civilisations flourished here. The evolution of powerful city-states, especially Athens and Sparta, between 800 and 500BC produced the classical age of Athens which was the high point of the Grecian civilization.

The Acropolis 

Travelogue: Trip to Italy Part 2a - Pompeii & Herculaneum - Herculaneum the other Pompeii

Sorrento is a town that features beautiful architecture and beautiful landscape. Another great thing about Sorrento is one can use it as a base to visit the other surrounding attractions. As it is on the Circumvesuviana rail system it is easily reached from Naples and an ideal base for visiting Pompeii and Herculaneum. Ferries regularly commute between Sorrento for Capri, making Sorrento an ideal base for exploring that island as well.

So the next day, we took the rail to see the famous Pompeii, not to be mistaken for the modern Italian of Pompei. Pompeii,  UNESCO World Heritage Site, was destroyed and buried under ash and pumice in the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in AD 79. Pompeii remained preserved and undiscovered till 1749 after being lost for nearly 1700 years. Since then, Pompeii, one of the most popular tourist attractions in Italy, has fascinated 2.5 million visitors every year. This time capsule provides amazing details and insight into life in the city back in AD 79, is a must visit if you are in the area.

Warning: Photo heavy post

Herculaneum

Travelogue: Trip to Greece - Overview

Our trip to Greece was a last minute decision as I spotted an irrefusable bargain on Qatar Airways. This trip was squeezed in between on the other trips we planned last year for our 10th Wedding Anniversay Year. We went to Siem Reap in early May, a week later I went to Tokyo when the husband went on his business trip, followed by the trip to Greece in late May. Not forgetting we went to Italy for a 2 week trip in late feb/early march. I was a happy bunny with all those travelling :)

Travelogue: Trip to Prague, Czech Republic - Part 2

We started our second day in Prague visiting the Prague Castle. Be warned that this will be a photo heavy blog post.

Prague Castle

Travelogue: Trip to Italy Part 1 - Sorrento

Our 2 week Italy holiday started with us flying into Rome. We had bought Italy rail passes for the both of us. We went with the Italy Flexi pass for 2 First class saver adults for 7 days which cost us 460 Euros. For their intercity trains, you always have to make a seat reservation prior to your trip which is free of charge. You can find machines in any major train stations and do it from there.

Warning: Photo heavy post

Coastline in Sorrento

Travelogue: Dogsledding in Tromso, Norway

We had five days in Tromso, one of which we went to the Polar Zoo. Check out the blog entry. And another day, we went to do dog sledding. It is a great winter activity that you cannot miss when you are in a winter wonderland. Despite the high costs, it would be a wasted trip if we didn't go on it. 

Dog Sledding

Travelogue: Trip to Italy - An Overview

Last year, the husband and I decided to take a 2 week long trip to Italy. The last time we were in Italy, was in Venice back in 2007. It was also the first country we took a trip to as a couple, so it was definitely time to return to country famous for their food, wine, great art, Gelato, culture and history, the list is endless.

We have been to Italy a few times before. First was when we rented a lovely villa in Tuscany for a week and drove around to explore the area. The next was a short weekend trip to Venice. We thought this trip, we would explore more in depth. We selected all the places that Italy is famous for and then checked if we could fit them all in 2 weeks.

Images of Italy

Travelogue: Trip to Prague, Czech Republic - Part I

Prague is one of my cities on my 'must-visit' visit. Weirdly, after living in UK for more than a decade, I never got my "derrière" (Pardon my french) to visit Prague even though it is only a 2 hour flight away. I finally only got to visit this magical city of bridges, cathedrals and gold-tipped towers after I have moved to Singapore. Fret no more as at least I got to visit this amazing capital city of the Czech Republic.

We stayed at a newly opened hotel called Jurys Inn which is located in a convenient spot for the Prague Old Town. It has the Florenc Metro across the road and a tram stop right in front of it. We spent two lovely nights there and paid only SGD$100 per night for the room and somehow the rate was for a triple room.

Jurys Inn Prague

Travelogue: Trip to Polar Zoo in Bardu, Norway

During our winter 2012 trip to Scandinavia, the highlight of the trip was to see the Northern Lights. Since we flew from faraway Asia, we wanted to pack a lot more into the trip. One of the other highlights while we were in Tromso, was to visit the Polar Zoo.

Here's what is written on their website:

Polar Zoo is one of northern Norways most popular tourist attractions and well known as the worlds most northern zoo. The park uses an area of 114 acres with wild and beautiful nature in Salangsdalen in Bardu, in the county of Troms. These amazing nature surroundings will make your visit in Polar Zoo complete.

Our main attraction is Wolf Camp, where you have the possibility to join us inside the wolf enclosure to meet the mythical and legendary wolves close up.

The Wolf camp was exactly what we came for. From Tromso, the Polar Zoo is around a 6 hours round trip on the bus from Tromso. Here is the bus timetable. Of course, it is easier if you were to rent a car and drive there.

We caught the bus at 615am and reach the main road leading to the zoo at around 935am and the Zoo sent a van to pick us up. Even though the bus journey was long, the views along the way were amazing. It's just something magical when everywhere you looked is snowy and white :)

View from the bus

Travelogue: Northern lights in Tromso, Norway

It has always been my dream to see the Northern Lights, or Aurora Borealis. I'm not talking about following in Joanna Lumley's footstep. Since 20 years ago, when I first heard of it, I have been wanting to go. Finally this year, I got the chance of a lifetime.

It was going to be a 2 weeks vacation to Scandinavia with the highlight of the trip - Northern Lights viewing. It has been predicted by astronomers that 2012/2013 will have solar maximum which will result in a high incidence of the Northern lights. This is the reason why we choose 2012 as the year we will go to watch the lights. 

The Northern Lights are usually observed above the Arctic Circle. We chose Tromso in Norway, which is 350km inside the arctic circle. It is also made famous when Joanna Lumley went there in the BBC documentary to catch the Northern Lights. Remember if you decide to go, to book your tours and accommodation early, as most of them get booked up very early.


We joined a bus tour, unlike the others, our guides Anja and Francesco were great. There were photographers, and not only they gave us loads of pointers, they were super enthusiastic and took care of us. I would highly recommend their service to anyone thinking of going to Tromso to see the lights.


Here are their details:

Arctic Guide Services - their facebook page.
Northernshots site where they sell the great photos they took each night.

Without further ado, here are the pictures I took on the 4th March 2012.