A European city for 5 days in April

Why don't you think Turkey for your holiday.. I can suggest you such as
little, quite, famous and beautiful town all over the world Dalyan -
Caunos. Still tourists are coming here back to back.. NO FIGHT, NO
VOICES... EVERYTHING IS NORMAL.. if you decide maybe, please contact
me..

On Sun, 08 Oct 2006 08:13:07 +0200, B wrote:

On Sat, 07 Oct 2006 19:22:18 GMT, "Calif Bill"
wrote:

The Northern Italian food was less tomato based than the Southern food.
Still a lot of olive oil.

I've read otherwise with regard to the olive oil. What is your source?
Risotto, for example, which is a classic northern dish, uses butter,
not olive oil. Polenta is traditionally served with butter and grated
cheese (also mushrooms). Various classic veal dishes use butter.

The butter is frequently substituted with olive oil nowadays. You can
see it in the supermakets where they have 2-3 types of butter and 30
types of olive oil!
--
---
DFM - http://www.deepfriedmars.com
---
--

On Sun, 08 Oct 2006 08:13:08 +0200, B
wrote:


I've also just about given up working out how to publish on
a web-page so I may use blogger or similar. Can anyone
recommend a good, simple to use free blogger for publishing
travelogues etc?

I also encourage you to post the text part right here on r.t.e, in
chuncks of course. It sure beats a lot of the other stuff on the
group. You say you're no Bill Bryson, but I've always found your posts
enjoyable.

Thanks Barbara, that was unexpected.

I'm still learning how to use blogger, but here's my first
attempt: http://loraltravel.blogspot.com/

Let me know if it works. I'll probably do a few entries each
day. The first thing I discovered was that you have to read
from last to first.

Here's the text of the first three entries, but it makes
more sense with the occasional photo:
***
Brisbane to Singapore

The third of May, 2006. Well, the planning was finally over.
We're about to head off on World Trip #2.

We had decided to spend the night before departure in
Brisbane, rather than have to wake early and drive two hours
to the airport. We took the opportunity to wander through
downtown that afternoon and had dinner at the pub around the
corner from Quay North. Nice view of the river from the
hotel room.

The Qantas 7 1/2 hour flight to Singapore was uneventful;
after our fears my wife (who doesn't enjoy long flights) was
fine, even though it got dark just as we arrived. The
Holiday Inn Atrium was as good as we remembered it back when
it was the Concorde, after some minor problems getting a
non-smoky room.

I found a worker's cafeteria in the base of an apartment for
a low-carb breakfast. Hygiene was a little lacking but the
food was good; I took similar chances thoroughout the trip,
my only restriction was to NEVER drink the water - anywhere.

***
Singapore and en-route
We weren't really interested in the usual tourist traps, so
we did our standard thing - wandered into town on the bus,
bought tickets on the local rail transit system and rode the
rails for a while. We would emerge from an unknown rail
station and wander around the district and then move on to
another train and another station. We tend to like seeing
ordinary people doing ordinary things - in a way different
to those at home.

Singapore is so small that we eventually covered Orchard
Road shops, and a couple of markets, and of course Raffles
Hotel anyway.

They do have some interesting specialty shops - the photo's
a little dark:-)
We ate lunch at a cheap cafe, and of course I had to try
Singapore Crab again for dinner. Some of the restaurants had
some fairly interesting menus, and others had interesting
warnings, but we survived.

We checked out at 2am for the 5:30 am departure. Security
was so much simpler and less frustrating than US or
Australian airports.

GulfAir to Bahrein to transit to GulfAir to Istanbul was a
bit of a let-down after the superb Qantas service (and
never-ending Jacobs Creek Reserve Shiraz) but was adequate.
My wife got bored with the in-flight entertainment and made
good use of her new DVD player. The flight to Istanbul was
only half full, so plenty of room, but it was very difficult
to get the attention of a Flight Steward. They spent the
entire four hour trip concentrating on selling duty-free
cigarettes to the other passengers.

As we flew over Dubai, I noticed an odd shape on the
coastline. I had heard about this seaside development, but
it was fascinating to see it from the air. I found a report
on it he
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palm_Islands

***
Itinerary
It just occurred to me that it may help to know where we're
headed - after all, it took a while to plan it. Briefly, we
flew from Brisbane to Barcelona, via a couple of days in
Singapore and three in Istanbul.

After a couple of nights in Barcelona we picked up our
fantastic little diesel turbo Clio from the airport and
drove off on the wrong side of the road. Over the next 7
weeks we wandered 8500km through the south of France, north
Italy, Slovenia, Hungary, Slovakia, Poland, Eastern Germany,
Czech Republic, Bavaria, Rhineland and finally (for that
section) Paris.

Then we flew to London for a few days and took the bus to
Oxford for a few more. Next, to Dublin and picked up a car
to wander for a week via Wexford and Waterford to the Ring
of Kerry and the Cliffs of Moher.

Then from Shannon to New York City for three days in the Big
Apple followed by the train (AMTRAK) to Buffalo. There we
picked up another car and wandered in a loop for two weeks
from Niagara falls to Massachusetts to Montreal and Toronto
and back to Niagara.

Finally, home via a night in Chicago, a night in LA, three
nights in Waikiki and one night in Sydney.

So, there's a little more to come yet:-)
Cheers, Alan, Australia

On Mon, 09 Oct 2006 00:34:06 +1000, Alan S
wrote:


I'm still learning how to use blogger, but here's my first
attempt: http://loraltravel.blogspot.com/

The first thing I've discovered is that on Firefox you need
to click on "October 2006" to get past my "practice" page
which I thought I had deleted. For some reason, which I
think is related to my transfer to beta-blogger, it didn't
disappear.

Well - at least you'll see a nice piccy of my
grand-daughter:-)

For some reason, it doesn't always happen on Explorer.

Cheers, Alan, Australia

Alan S wrote:

I returned in early August. I've only just finished culling
and filing the photos in some sort of order. The problem is
where to start as each time I do I get bogged down into
detail and dry prose. I'm definitely not Bill Bryson.

You seem to have at least one thing in common with him: you write in a
good-humoured way.

And,
of course, notes were sparse (I went for fun, not as a
journalist) and memories fade.

Until r.t.e. agrees to pay travel expenses, that's the way to do it.

....

And I may blend some bits to be a hybrid, because we
re-visited some places that we saw on our first long trip in
'03 but also saw southern Italy, Greece, Scotland, Wales,
California and the South on that trip. And Fiji and NZ in
between.

Why not? Personally, I consider a simple travel log to be less
enjoyable than a piece of interpretation, which might not fully accord
with what happened on a particular trip, but which reveals a truth
about a place. Truth in writing is not the same as accuracy in
recording.

*sigh* so much to see, so little time. I have a lot of
travelling-Oz-but-not-much-else years to make up for.

But I'll make a start. Maybe Brisbane to Avignon. Thanks for
the prod:-)

I want to read what you have to say. Consider that another prod.

--
PB
The return address has been MUNGED
My travel writing: http://www.iol.ie/~draoi/

On Sun, 08 Oct 2006 11:47:11 +0200, Dave Frightens Me
wrote:

On Sun, 08 Oct 2006 08:13:07 +0200, B wrote:

On Sat, 07 Oct 2006 19:22:18 GMT, "Calif Bill"
wrote:

The Northern Italian food was less tomato based than the Southern food.
Still a lot of olive oil.

I've read otherwise with regard to the olive oil. What is your source?
Risotto, for example, which is a classic northern dish, uses butter,
not olive oil. Polenta is traditionally served with butter and grated
cheese (also mushrooms). Various classic veal dishes use butter.

The butter is frequently substituted with olive oil nowadays. You can
see it in the supermakets where they have 2-3 types of butter and 30
types of olive oil!

I'm sure that's true, just as you also said that pasta is now is very
popular in the north. However, I was talking about the traditional
northern dishes, and I thought Calif Bill was also. Tomatoes, which he
mentions as being "southern" are also very widely used now in the
north.
--
Barbara Vaughan
My email address is my first initial followed by my surname at libero dot it
I answer travel questions only in the newsgroup

On Mon, 09 Oct 2006 00:34:06 +1000, Alan S wrote:

On Sun, 08 Oct 2006 08:13:08 +0200, B
wrote:

I also encourage you to post the text part right here on r.t.e, in
chuncks of course. It sure beats a lot of the other stuff on the
group. You say you're no Bill Bryson, but I've always found your posts
enjoyable.

Thanks Barbara, that was unexpected.

Why, you think I have no taste?
--
Barbara Vaughan
My email address is my first initial followed by my surname at libero dot it
I answer travel questions only in the newsgroup

On Mon, 09 Oct 2006 00:34:06 +1000, Alan S wrote:

I'm still learning how to use blogger, but here's my first
attempt: http://loraltravel.blogspot.com/

I've just read your blog, and enjoyed it immensely. Keep it coming!
--
Barbara Vaughan
My email address is my first initial followed by my surname at libero dot it
I answer travel questions only in the newsgroup

: : Plus, when did the word "Jihadi" take on a negative meaning?

: I know a few Americans including myself who know the technical or
: dictionary meaning of the word jihad but unfortunately we never have
: seen or heard any Muslims doing something positive and referring to it
: being a jihad...

From "Quranic Concept of War" by [Pakistani] Brigadier SK Malik ,
chapter on strategy:

"Only a strategy that aims at striking terror into the hearts of enemy
from the preparation stage can produce direct results and turn Liddell
Hart's dream into a reality. During peace time our 'will' must find its
expression through 'preparation'. Terror struck into the hearts of the
enemies is not only a means, it is the end in itself. Once a condition
of terror into the opponent's heart is obtained, hardly anything is
left to be achieved. The Quranic military strategy thus enjoins us to
prepare ourselves for war to the utmost in order to strike terror into
the hearts of the enemies, known or hidden, while guarding ourselves
from being terror stricken by the enemy.

"Jihad is a continuous and never-ending struggle waged on all fronts
including political, economic, social, psychological, domestic, moral
and spiritual to attain the object of policy. It aims at attaining the
overall mission assigned to the Islamic state, and military strategy is
one of the means available to do so. It is waged at individual as well
as collective level; and at internal as well as external front."

=

So far I've gone from Brisbane to Barcelona via Istanbul.

I mainly did rest and recuperation in Barcelona, but I'd be
fascinated to know if anyone can tell me what the real
purpose of Star-Fleet headquarters is.

Cheers, Alan, Australia
http://loraltravel.blogspot.com/