Backpacking Bretagne & Channel Islands

It all started with a report on Arte about the little island of Sark, which made me want to travel there. No cars, just tractors and horse carts sounded lovely. While planning the trip, my girlfriend and I decided to include a bit of the Brittany and the other Channel Islands as well. We ended up backpacking almost three weeks:

We started in Lannion, Brittany with stop-overs in Ploumanach, Abbey Beauport, Brehec, and Dinan. From Saint-Malo we took the ferry to St. Peter Port, Guernsey and stayed in Vaugrat before heading to Sark. After a few days exploring this stormy island with its peculiar people we transferred to Herm, an even smaller island with hardly any permanent inhabitants but beautiful beaches and even plenty of sunshine! As our last stop-over, we visited Jersey where we stayed near Rozel and explored parts of the scenery.

Throughout our journey we experienced rain, storm and beautiful sunshine; usually all within a few hours 😉 With reliable equipment and a good portion of humour, we made the best of it and had a really great time travelling!

Here we go with some impressions of the trip:

Some more panoramas:





Down Under

I made it to Eva’s Backpacker
Wow … this is a really nice backpacker! With BBQ on the rooftop, and really nice ppl. Lots of Germans here, so i won’t loose my mothertongue.
The first day here, i joind some others from the backpacker and went to some pub to watch the rugby match Wales-Newsealand. I dont like soccer too much, but rugby is really great!!! Way more interesting and really male!
The Pub was really nice, if you ordered something before 830 that day, the bartender would throw a coin, and if you won, you got what you ordered for free! … we won two jugs of beer! 😉
After the match some black singer showed up, playing lots of evergreens. A really good party with about 2/3 of backpackers there.
The second day I slept till 1300, read the newspapers from the last few days on my notebook, had a shower and went out to get me something to eat. On the way I found a small wooden backgammon, just the kind I was looking for. Back at Eva’s i made me the noodles and sat on the rooftop where Axel joined me when he returned from his work (a small candle factory). Sitting in the sunshine (sure with sonblocker on my skin!) having a beer and playing backgammon was really like holiday.
As more and more ppl showed up om the rooftop, we decided to have a nice BBQ for dinner, so some of us went out to get some kangaroo meat, and some vegetables for sidedish. Another one got a 4l box of Ozzy wine (not too bad). With all this we had a really nice dinner with a bautiful look on the skyline of sydney! At 2300 we had to change to the kitchen, as the rooftop is closed after then. But that didnt stop the party!
Today I’ll have a walk in the city, looking for a mobile phone, and other stuff I need. Cya m8s!

Back from Kyoto

two days in Kyoto
Monday i went to Kyoto by Shinkansen, the fast Bullet-Train. I Kyoto i had reservation for some cheap hotel called Uno-House, an german couple in the New Koyo had told me about. A really funny place, with japanese-style dorm (4 matrasses on the floor and nothing else 😉 ). The rest of the house was really chaotic but a nice atmosphere, like living with a family.
the first night there i went out with some guys (GB, NL, DE) who stayed there, too. after dinner we found some original japanese reggae-bar 😉 hehe … had to take off our shoes and where laying aside the small table … a nice place with a calm and darkatmosphere.
the next day i took for walking Kyoto, starting at the main-station, wich took me some hours for itself, really amazing architecture!!! later i went to some area with lots of temples and park, a nice walk for the whole afternoon, but sadly there were masses of japanese tourists.
in the evening i called my grandma back in hamburg, who went 84 that day. in the evening we went out with the ppl from the hotel again. we startet with 6 ppl (Sing, Jap, GBx2, NL, DE)on the way we acquired an english couple, and in the restaurant we met some friendly american guy. after a good dinner and lots of japanese beer we went outside and split up in smaller groups. The Sing and GB went to some club with two japanese girls the met in the restaurant, some went back home and the US-guy and me got us some sake and had a nice talk on some bridge with a view on a river floating through Kyoto. in front of an ampm we ran into a really friendly ozzy guy in his 50s, who took us with him to his favorite japanese restaurant where he knew the chief and staff. we’d been living in Japan for 15-20 years or so and did the english translation of the menu there. after some really tasty pork-sticks and some french wine i got home to the hostel at 330.
In the morning everybody at the hotel got up around 900 and nearly everyone had a good hangover 😉 the others who went to the club came back around 200.
after searching some international ATM, i went to the station to get on my bus back to tokyo.
having a nice talk with a friendly and english-speaking girl, the 8 hours to tokyo didnt seem very long. even though i’m getting better in seeing differences in japanese faces, it still hard for me to guess their ages, so i thought she was around 26, but in the end i realised that she was 37!!!
at some 15min stop in the evening we had some hearty japanese noodles for dinner.

back in Tokyo
arriving in tokyo around 1900 i went on to the starbucks where martine and i set up a date. with a big cup of hot chocolate i waitet for her, later we dropped my stuff at the New Koyo and went on to Ueno, where we looked for some english pub.
after some beer we had to get the last train home, each of us in another sirektion. we set up some date for the next day (today).
after a long sleep till 1000 i had some cup-noodles and went to the place where we wanted to meet, as trains had to wait a while (probably some track-works) i got there about 30 mins late, and couldnt find her. after another 30mins waiting i gave up and went to the HotSopt in Shinjuku to update my webstuff. well here i am … up to date again. 😀 two more days in Tokyo and on i go for Sydney.