New York, New York

After my two months in Europe and before landing back in Australia, I spent a couple of weeks in the US (specifically, New York and Chicago). I didn't take all that many photos, particularly in New York, but I did take some. Here are a few from the southern end of Manhattan.




This set wouldn't have been complete without a squirrel
The hole in the world

A selection of Northern Denmark

On my way back down through Denmark, I took advantage of the fairly regular trains and spent a little time wandering in Hjørring and Aalborg before spending the night in Århus again. And when I got back to Århus, I wandered some more, this time making it to the Botanic Gardens. Where I saw people playing an odd sort of game with sticks. Really, I should have stopped and asked someone what was going on (and nobody that I've spoken to since has been able to tell me), but c'est la vie, that's one more thing to find out at some stage.

Hjørring is very small town - I really only stopped there because I had to change trains and had to wait half an hour anyway. I essentially wandered up to St Olai's Kirke and cemetery at the top of the hill and back down again.




Aalborg is, like Århus, a university town. There's something about each town that gives it away, even before you know there's a university there. Maybe it was just a subconscious assessment of the age of the population or something like that. Anyway, my Norwegian friend A. had recommended that I stop in Aalborg, perhaps even stay there, but I found that the town had been gentrified more than Århus and I couldn't find a cheap hostel to stay in (at least, not centrally). So I just spent a couple of hours wandering around.




And finally, back to Århus that evening, to the Botanic Gardens - complete with windmill and Den Gamle By (the Old Town) and compulsory shots of the new city, as well.

Confetti, confetti, confetti!

Apologies to Orry

Sulmona is a town whose economy is traditionally based on the manufacture of confetti.

Now its economy appears to be based on confetti and a small amount of tourism centered on confetti.

Ah, but confetti is not what you think it is - it is not tiny round circles of paper. Confetti (at least in the Sulmona context, I'm not sure how it relates to the paper) is sugar-coated almonds.

And of course, they've branched out. It's now sugar-coated almonds, chocolate-coated almonds, sugar-coated chocolate - and various other combinations of sugar-coating, chocolate, nuts and fruit.

It's also quite a pretty town in the middle of the mountains. I stopped there on my way from Napoli to Firenze. I was meant to catch a train from Napoli all the way to Sulmona, but this didn't end up happening - the train (an old, tiny little two-carriage affair) was clearly having trouble about an hour into the journey. The conductor came into our carriage to tell us what was going on. I didn't understand (apart from "Tren Fermata!" - "Train stop!" - but I'd already figured that out...), the conductor spoke no English, I've mentioned my oh-so-(not)-extensive Italian language skills before, and nobody else in the carriage seemed to speak English either. But a young family adopted me and I followed them off the train and onto a bus, asking the driver "Sulmona? Fermata Sulmona?"

I was somewhat amazed, still, to find that I actually got to Sulmona, albeit several hours later than I had originally intended.

That said, it was quite a spectacular drive through the mountains, possibly more so than if we'd stayed on the train.

I arrived quite late, checked into my hotel (!) (there were no hostels and I hadn't been able to find a couch to sleep on). It was only luxurious in comparison to where I'd been sleeping lately - but simply having a room and bathroom to myself was luxury enough.

The next morning I had a couple of hours to have breakfast and wander around. It was quite a pretty town.

And now for something completely different!

Well, maybe not completely...

In January this year, I planned to go on a three day hike with a couple of friends in the Koscziusko Alpine Park. For various reasons, it fell through, and I just took an urban hike with one friend, S. We walked from Manly to The Spit. It was a gorgeous day, not too hot, and we finished up around lunchtime - and then caught a bus down to Dee Why for fish and chips and some spectacular gelato.

I took my camera so I could do the tourist thing.

Since I was doing the tourist thing, I found it necessary to take a photo of the Bridge from a ferry:



Once we started walking, you would hardly believe that we were actually in the city:





We even saw wildlife:




And my favourite, flannel flowers:

Fraternising with the enemy

Just at the end of my first term at Oxford I headed over to Cambridge with some of my friends from Lincoln. One of these was the militant tourist type, and you can see him in this photo far ahead of the rest of the group, all of whom were content to dawdle:


There are obviously some similarities between Oxford and Cambridge - the fact that there are a lot of old sandstone buildings, for example - but there are some definite differences as well. Oxford really does feel like more of a city (albeit a small one), while Cambridge is definitely a town. It's less built up - more space between the colleges, with many of even the central ones running just a short way to The Backs (along the river Cam):


With some, the buildings themselves back onto the Cam, as at St John's:


I guess I should include some of the really iconic colleges, like Kings (we went to a chapel service to hear the choir):


And here's Trinity's Hall:


Peterhouse, the oldest of the Cambridge colleges is also a must-see:


The town also has the soft English beauty that I got a little used to (it was only when I got back to Australia that I realised my eyes had been missing our brighter colours).