The Fool On The Hill

Ok, time for Tour Eleven. It starts on July 15 and runs through until Sept 4th, the longest one yet at 51 days, so lots of washing! Twenty-one countries in total although I'll only see the airports in Latvia and Greece as I've already seen Riga and Athens before and I don't really set foot in France as I'm using the train along the french Mediterranean coast to get to Monte Carlo. And it's all a bit of a mixture combining the cold of Iceland, where I was forced to buy a woolly hat, to the quite impossible heat of Dubai where nobody walks, except the odd English tourist and the Asian workers!

And as for the title, it's "One for the Road" because I continue to keep wondering how much longer I can continue this manic behaviour of leaving home and dog for months at a time.

Of course, the blame for this bizarre behaviour falls entirely on my hapless students - throughout the year they essentially keep me alive but during the summer they vanish on their vacaciones and by July 15th most have already said their goodbyes. So here we go, and it just leaves me to add that this summer it's going to be a local Tour of Europe "ish".

So where are you going then? Well, as usual it's a long itinerary because I don't let the grass grow beneath my feet with loads of different places because it's a big world out there in case you haven't noticed. So, first to Gibraltar, on the Iceland via London, and then on to Riga, St. Petersburg, Moscow, Zurich. Liechtenstein, Milan, Genoa, Monte Carlo, Vienna, Kosovo, Venice, Cyprus, Bologna, San Marino, Ravenna, Trieste, Ljubjlana, Zagreb, Belgrade, Kuwait, Dubai, Jordan, and lastly Athens.

One of the best moments was trekking around a valley in the middle of Jordan with the locals. Luckily on day 2 of my stay in Dana Nature Reserve in the middle of nowhere, I decided to have lunch in the slightly exaggerated named Tower Hotel ( not because of the impressive name, but because there's not that much choice really ) but after my tasty meatballs was offered a guided tour of the Dana valley. Bearing in mind the Jordanian heat, early morning seemed the best bet, so the following day at 9 I was picked up by a 4x4 driven by a local Bedouin, resplendent in red and white headdress and we slowly descended the dusty, twisting, steep road down into the valley. I had naively assumed that we would go all the way down because the bottom was supposed to be, according to Rough Guide, an idyllic oasis. But no, today we were looking for Ibex.
So after driving only 300 metres, to my dismay, we stopped and my local non-English speaking guide, no not the Bedouin, and I set off down the valley into the wilderness. The Bedouin spoke perfect English and was sorry but it was a holiday, idjj or something, and he had to visit his enormous family of 10 children and 14 grandchildren and only one wife. 
So after a couple of pleasant hours sliding down and clambering over rock formations, including several cups of delicious black tea brewed over a fire, in which we tried to communicate (hibibi, seemed to be a useful word, on later investigation it appears to mean dearie (!)), we settled down on top of an enormous rock to survey the mountain side in front of us. And after a couple of phone calls (amazing they had coverage in this secluded spot) the Bedouin appeared from no-where in the 4x4. More watching through binoculars for quite some time but finally we saw one. Well, it took me a while longer to trace it but they were so determined that I get my money's worth that they kept pointing it out. Oh, there it is in that cave......   

And what a picturesque place this is. A wonderful valley with mountains all around and with the Baron's castle on one of the hills overlooking the town. There's only a couple of streets, one for pedestrians and one for cars so not a lot going on but there's loads of restaurants and if you have the energy you can climb the hill to have  a gander at the castle, but sorry, you're not allowed in.

Petra is rather nice and surprisingly empty of tourists, no not a single Chinese herd in sight.  To get to the ruined city you first you have to walk through the Siq which is very impressive, if you like strange rock formations (two shots above). As you can see it's very narrow too in places and you don't see it until you are on top of it. It's a kilometre or so and quite cool after the long walk from the main gate. And then you reach the famous Treasury. Everyone has seen the Treasury in pictures a hundred times so it isn't really much of a surprise.

The main problem, after being so used to the friendliness of Jordanians, is that here they are a bit of a hassle. There's hundreds of people trying to sell you junk basically and offering rides on horses, mules, donkeys and camels and rides in small carriages. Yes, its very hot and very tempting but I walked. And I am very glad I did because on foot you meet lots of people.

And quite by coincidence here they all are in the second foto.......2 lovely french girls from Guadalupe, a Kiwi who works in Palestine, a guy called Daniel from Manila who works in Dubai, four Jordanian Civil Engineering students, 4 beach boys from California, a very sweaty bloke from Barcelona whose life I feared for and Mariam, a Jordanian stall holder looking for a husband. Ok, a few are missing, Mariam was last seen chasing a potential husband offering him a free fridge magnet,  while two of the beach boys were off looking for some surf........

Sorry, wrong picture, this is the Hermitage Hotel, Monte Carlo, rooms starting at 459 euros per night with Free Cancellation, of course, if you find the moneys running a bit low. 

And no, I didn't stay there, I rested for a brief moment in the rather nice, albeit small park outside the hotel while admiring a splendid open top Lambo and its accompanying models.

And this of course, is the fabulous Hermitage Museum. I have never seen so much gold in all my life. Is it the Fort Knox of Russia or is it supposed to be a museum? The curator has said "I don't know if it's the best museum in the world but it's certainly not the second best". Yes, it's huge, exhausting,and mind-blowing but if you've never seen it you really are missing something.

And this is the fantastic Baggage Reclaim Hall at Dubai airport. Not much gold here, white is the colour scheme but it's Big. The whole of Terminal 3 of the airport used to be the biggest building in the world in floor area (18.4 Million sq. ft.) till the Chinese built a shop (!) in Chengdu.

Airport Reclaim halls are normally places full of panic driven passengers pushing and shoving almost fighting to get their luggage but not here. Arrive via Emirates and they will give you the Belt Number while you are on the plane to save you worrying and once you get there, you'll find walkways to ease you to the correct Belt and plenty of nice, comfy seats to rest on as you wait for your bag to arrive. Meanwhile you can gaze at the surrounding splendour of the design and sheer size of the place while shuddering as you remember the chaos of other less fortunate places. So this is where my petrol money ends up...........

If you're still here, these are the minor highlights - Gibraltar, Reykjavik, the Summer Palace in St.Petersburg,  Kosovo, walking the Grand Prix circuit at Monaco, Genoa, San Marino and an old favourite Zagreb. Although I can't leave out Belgrade and its Moska Hotel.

First Port of Call was Gib. I was expecting a poky little place with nothing to do but have a quiet beer but no my father was wrong there's loads to do over a weekend. There's a Moorish castle with the Union Jack flying, there's a Cable Car if you want to get to the top, there's several impressive tunnels in the rock, some built, strangely enough, during the American War of Independence in 1775 when the Frenchies and their allies the Spanish tried to invade the Rock. No chance! And there's also several miles of World War 2 tunnels, no less than 34 miles in total.....

What to see in Iceland?  Well, apart from the very small but lively capital of Reykjavik there's plenty of geysers which erupt almost on schedule every 50 seconds or so.....

The landscape is a bit bleak but there are trees unlike the Falklands, and lots of water, hot and cold. There is also a Plate, no not dinner, Tectonic if you please, at a place called Thingvellir. In fact its the only place in the world where you can see two tectonic plates drifting apart above sea-level. And they are so near in places that you can touch, in theory, both Europe and America.
And the airport although small is crammed with shops and eateries and one of the liveliest airports I've come across.  

Another beautiful St. Petersburg building, this time the out-of-town Summer Palace that needs a short boat trip or train to find.

As you can see the thing here the main attractions are the numerous ( the figure 140 comes to mind) fountains and the golden statues. The large surrounding park/gardens is very nice too with many trick fountains to amuse the kids. Obviously the Russkies are more fun loving than I had assumed.

I hadn't expected very much from Pristina, Kosovo but I must admit I was pleasantly surprised. I thought it would be another poor Balkan city but no, it reminded me of Spain in many ways. A nice little brand new airport and good roads and the taxi drivers are very friendly for once. Ok, there's not a lot of sights to get excited about but the people are very normal and  friendly, there's some good restaurants and its very cheap too. Two cool beers and a decent plate of risotto, 6.60Euros, 

San Marino

If you like mountains you'll warm to San Marino. A castle, in fact towers, built on top of one. On the right is the minuscule main square and if you're lucky the state's military band will be giving a performance, Magic. It also has some confusingly narrow lanes, nice little shops, a cable car and you can exhaust yourself even more by walking across its three towers. 

The Anna Akhmatova Literary and Memorial Museum 

And lastly I cannot finish without saying something about this museum. I spend a morning there and it really was a very moving experience. I had read a lot about her in books on Russia and wanted to see where she lived. 

The literary museum is in St Petersburg and dedicated to the poet Anna Akhmatova (1889–1966). It opened in 1989 on the centennial of Akhmatova's birth. 

It was a bit hard to find, it's supposed to be on the Fontana river front but the Fountain House is big and the museum, in her old flat, is round the back and actually next to the parallel road 300 metres away. And it's a bit like Pushkin's museum where they have tried to reproduce what life was live in those days.
But here with Anna Akhmatova they have achieved it. All around you are photos, furniture, writings, notes and the layout of the flat hasn't changed. You can see how small it is for the dozen or so people who lived there and there's the camera which appears to have sealed her husbands fate as he made a caustic comment about the Stalin regime while using it. He was denounced by someone who overheard the remark and died in the Gulag! In fact her first husband was also killed by the Bolsheviks and if you had lived through her times during the Terror (her son also spend several years in Prison Camps) perhaps you would understand that her motto through life was "God Preserve Us All".

The museum is located in a wing of Fountain House at 34 Fontana River Embankment. Fountain House was built in the 18th century as a palace for the noble Sheremetev family. Russian emperors highly valued diplomatic and military achievements of several male members of family.

From 1935 to 1941, it housed the Museum of Popular Science, which closed immediately upon the  German invasion. Anna Akhmatova lived in the northern garden wing of the Fountain House in 1918–1920, and lived in the southern wing from the mid-1920s until February 1952.