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No one speaks English and everything’s broken – Tom Waits

Trains are great places for reflecting (if you can stop yourself nodding off to the rocking). Am on eurostar.
At the risk of being a know-all aussie abroad, the following observations spring to mind about England and France.

Newcastle’s multiculturalism is very European. You immediately notice the difference when you get to Sydney. Sydney is polyglot. England and France are similar.

When we got on the metro this evening there was a young girl wearing full fitted head scarf. She also had on skin tight jeans, was wearing rings and spent most of her time on her mobile phone. Her friend was a young woman of African descent. There was no doubting this young girl’s religious conviction. Equally there was no doubting her membership of the current youth generation. Their elders (muslim and non) may have difficulty with this hybridisation but for this young person and her friend this was the most natural thing in the world. I have seen young white males arm in arm with black and/or muslim females and vice versa. I have seen gaggles of young people mixing naturally without any seeming acknowledgement of the diversity of colour and culture amongst them.

“what we need is a great big melting pot
Big enough to hold the world and all it’s got
Keep it churning for a hundred years or more
And turn out coffee coloured people by the score.” – Blue Mink

We’ve had about 50 years. And i think 100 years might be close to the mark.

Now before i get accused of being overly sentimental or optimistic, let me lay some reality on these observations.
1. Racism is not dead. But it appears to be waning particularly amongst the young
2. Most menial service jobs (particularly in France) and done by blacks.
3. There is a massive wealth gap between black and white (and between white and white)
4. The belt tightening as a result of the financial meltdown will impact harder on the less fortunate which means blacks and those from the sub continent and the middle east.
But progress is being made. I’m not sure of the origin but someone said that comedy is tragedy plus time. Well maybe tolerance and understanding is strangeness and difference + time

“sometimes the best map will not guide you, you can’t see what’s round the bend
Sometimes the road leads to dark places, sometimes the darkness is your friend” – Bruce Cockburn

The problem with quoting from song lyrics is that you start seeing connections everywhere. On a really banal level i cannot imagine how we could get around without Clare, our GPS. But the certainty of the minutiae of which road to take may blind us to the wider question of whither are we going? The great thing about our trips is that we organise them ourselves. No “if it’s Tuesday it must be Belgium for us”. Sometimes that means we make mistakes. In hindsight we (for we read me) really mismanaged the Caen/Rouen sojourn. What we should have done is two days on Caen, caught a train to Rouen and then another train back to Paris and had an extra day in Paris. But we would have missed driving over the Pegasus bridge and Pont L’Eveque. Pegasus bridge was a canal bridge inland from Gold beach which was captured on the night of june 5 by British paratroopers. They held it until relieved and in doing so prevented German re-inforcements being transferred to the beaches. I was resigned to missing it. But our road trip to Rouen not only took us over the bridge but we had to wait while it was raised to allow a couple of tugs to pass under.

Back on the train, there is a tall, veryl good looking black man sitting in the seat opposite me. The young French lady sitting next to him (sitting there because i sat in the wrong seat i might add) just had the most minute flirt with him. See!!

Annie the Dragon
This was a picture I found on the net of the Dragon Point dragon before it fell apartFriday morning was peaceful when we left Dragon Point, and remained fairly uneventful. We saw NASA buildings at Cape Kennedy Space Center on Cape Canaveral and discussed being in the area for the launch of the next space shuttle mission scheduled for April 29. We hope so, since our faces are going into space on that shuttle (see NASA’s website for their faceinspace program to sign up.)

We stopped for the night at the Titusville Municipal Marina. There were a lot of boats (mostly sailboats) anchored outside the entrance to the marina. Plans are to put a mooring field there in the near future. We pulled into the marina and up to the pump-out dock, where Kerry emptied the pooper before moving into a slip nearby. We saw a manatee in the marina, our first of the trip.

Once settled in, we walked to the grocery a few blocks away and stocked up. It was hot inside the boat until late, but lovely outside. We ordered pizza and ate on the front of the boat, enjoying the cool breeze. There is a festival in town this weekend, with carnival rides and music, some of the rides visible just a

Sunset from Dragon Point
short way down the shore. We listened to the kids screaming on the rides and the music playing until bedtime.

Saturday morning the recreational boaters became more numerous as we neared Haulover Canal at ICW mm 870. Inside the canal it was slow going as it was a no wake/manatee zone as well as being crowded with a couple of dozen kayaks and several fishing boats. Once out of the canal, we turned more to the north into Mosquito Lagoon, where the breeze coming across 2+ miles of open water brought a welcome coolness.

At New Smyrna Beach the ICW winds around small islands and shoals with several cutoffs to confuse the unwary navigator. The boat traffic by this time was plentiful and boisterous. We were rocked and rolled by wakes all the way from New Smyrna Beach to Port Orange, where we checked into the Seven Seas Marina for the night. Saturday afternoon is no time to be boating in highly populated areas. We hope to be settled onto a mooring ball at St. Augustine before it gets wild tomorrow afternoon.

More later.

Sunrise over Dragon Point

NASA buildings
at Cape Canaveral
Kayaks
by Haulover Canal
Ponce de Leon Inlet
lighthouse
Same lighthouse
slightly different angle and nearer

Hi all,
To those of you who are reading my blog, I would like to thank you. As you know I generally post some text and then it is followed shortly by some photos. The reason for this is that not all internet kiosks allow you to upload photos to their computers. Also I don’t always have my camera on me. Well this entry will be no different and I encourage all to log back on for the photo upload in a week or two because these are the best pictures to date.
The Milford track… Suppose to be the finest track in the world and now I know why. It was absolutely stunning, deep valley’s surrounded by spectacular steep cliffs. With the rain, the valleys were swarming with waterfalls. At times on the hike I was surrounded by what felt like hundreds of waterfalls in reality it was probably only about 50 but any attempt to count was futile as they seemed to disappear and reappear in seconds. These waterfalls only show themselves during the rainfall and run dry minuets after the rain stops. The quantity of rainfall and the wind direction, seemed to dictate the flow of water off the mountain peaks. And yes it was raining and I was very glad for that, otherwise I might have missed out on one of the most stunning landscapes imaginable. On the third day the rain ceased and that was also a blessing as this day we were due to hike the Makinnin mountain pass and observe the beautiful view from the top. Had it been raining I might have missed out on the second most beautiful landscape I have ever seen. It felt like I had won the beautiful world lottery as I stood atop the pass and took in the view. The next day while walking through another valley it rained again showing me once again the amazing beauty of this place. That day I also did a side hike that took me behind the highest waterfall in NZ. (Please standby for pictures they are worth it).
Since then I have been doing the usual travel thing. Did some hitch-hiking, the van broke down and I spent the next couple of days communicating with the NZ version of AAA trying to get a free tow as I am a member in the states, and wouldn’t you know I not only got a free tow I got a free 6mo. membership to the NZ version of the company. One more reason why it pays to belong to AAA. After the Fiordlands I made my way east to some rather unattractive cities on the east coast. Ant now I find myself exploring the north part of the north island. Beautiful ocean and islands. I look forward to my next adventure and wonder what the future has in store for me.

Be Happy,

Graham

Zo, de tassen zijn gepakt, handbagage goed onder het gewicht hoewel, de koffer van Alexander weegt 6 kilo, de tas van Wendy 4… de grote koffer weegt 14 kilo, voor 2 personen, geweldig! (er kan in Japan gewassen worden)

De kado’s zijn ingepakt, ben ondertussen ernstig nieuwsgierig geworden, hopelijk kunnen we wat slapen in het vliegtuig.
Anders is daar het onboard entertainment system met veel films en series (Black Swan, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Pt 1, Hereafter, The King’s Speech en Tangled is een kleine selectie.)

We komen woensdag middag aan, als het goed is hebben we dan een voorsprong van +7 uur.
in Nederland zal het woensdag ochtend zijn, geen idee.

Groetjes,
Co