Travel | Wanderings and ... wonderings.

Dec 08 2019

Photography, Scotland, Tourism, Travel, Uncategorized

St. Andrews ‘bantz’.

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I’d never been here before until this weekend yet have lived in Scotland (on and off) for more than two decades. Apparently they play golf in this bubble and some ‘Royals’ got into the local university despite possessing mediocre academic qualifications; is this what they call ‘privilege’? I once lived in student digs with a stripper from Wigan and we had a spare room; this geeky fucker from St. Andrews turned up for a flat viewing. The pole dancer looked at him and within four seconds concluded he was a cretin. He didn’t get the spare room. That’s most likely the reason I didn’t visit until now.

Anyway, it was a nice wee place. Nothing special. Nothing bad. Just politely bland. It reminded me of Last of the Summer Wine but without Compo and Nora Batty. I was fucking raging at the £15 train fare back to Edinburgh. I once purchased a flight to Stockholm for £2.

Welcome to Britain (it’s fucked).

Tagged Golf, Scotland, St. Andrew's, Tourism, Travel

Dec 03 2019

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Architecture, Christmas, Edinburgh, Manchester United, Photography, Tourism, Travel, Uncategorized, United Kingdom

The Edinburgh Christmas Market is back with a vengeance.

This Xmas market is an addiction. I don’t enjoy a single second meandering about its gruesome stalls, yet I continue to do so every year as it gets worse and worse in its lumbering pointlessness. The only parallel I can think of is watching Manchester United play football these days.

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One day this is going to end. Best to savour it while it’s here.

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Air travel, Photography, Tourism, Transport, Travel, Uncategorized

Six days in Barcelona.

Barcelona was fine. I couldn’t be bothered seeing Las Ramblas or the Camp Nou, preferring the boulevards of Gràcia and its surfeit of supermarkets and bars – the district didn’t strike me as a ‘tourist trap’ even though it might have been. Most of my time was spent either there or ‘exploring’ the metro system. I am a geek for anything ‘Trainy McTrainface’, especially of the underground variety, so this pursuit I found most arresting.

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The holiday apartment building, however, was the noisiest place; someone inhabiting a room on the floor above would turn on the shower and subsequently the building would shudder. I barely got a wink of sleep because of the noise. In addition to this din, renovations were being done all day. I almost expected a wrecking ball to crash through our living room. Absolute fucking racket.

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Trip highlight – a midget sold me a cheap bunnet.

Trip lowlight – Ryanair at Barcelona-El Prat charging me €25 for a too-big bag, even though it could clearly fit in the overhead locker. I’ve been on almost 50 flights with that bag (I call it the ‘Big Bag’), and this is the first time it’s been picked out in the queue.

Fuming.

P.S. Here is Homer and Marge Simpson in Gràcia.

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Tagged Barcelona, Camp Nou, Catalonia, Photography, Spain, Tourism, Transport, Travel

Nov 20 2019

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Edinburgh, Photography, Scotland, Tourism, Transport, Travel, Uncategorized

Edinburgh’s own winter wonderland.

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Meadowbank/Abbeyhill is drab and dreary for much of the year, and during the summer months approximates ‘peak chav’ when they all crawl out of the woodwork and luxuriate in the sweltering heat.

Winter on The Ranch is tolerable, however. The season has a calming effect on the locals as ‘Cloud City’ acts as the temporary backdrop.

Environmental determinism is real.

Tagged Abbeyhill, Cloud City, Edinburgh, Meadowbank, Scotland, winter

Nov 16 2019

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Britain, Edinburgh, Photography, Tourism, Transport, Travel, Uncategorized, United Kingdom

Edinburgh congestion is torture.

Leith Street purgatory.

The traffic in Edinburgh is a sadistic abomination, something that would drive Michael Douglas out his car à la Falling Down (1993). Every fucking day there is a jam of jams, caused and compounded by traffic lights with a five-second gap between green and red, omniscient roadworks, never-ending tram extensions, a 20 mph speed limit, tourist questions to the bus driver as if he were a tourist information office, and Edinburgh’s much-vaunted position as the prime location for filming chav fodder (Fast & Furious, Avengers) in, which brings about all manner of diversions. The city is a conurbation of the slow.

Whose doing is this? I don’t know but I can tell you that Edinburgh Council are, in the words of John McEnroe, “The absolute pits of the world.” So I blame them whether it’s their fault or not.

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Architecture, Berlin, Germany, Tourism, Travel, Uncategorized

The fall of the Berlin Wall – 30 years on.

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The Berlin Wall has been down now for longer than it was up (1961-1989). A lot of stuff seemed to happen during that Cold War era but since the wall’s … demise it’s like very little of significance has actually happened, even though it has. When you live through the decades rather than read about them things are less dramatic.

Francis Fukuyama’s ‘The End of History’ is of course absolute pampers but for me at least, it does often feel like history is indeed over, the Manichean structure of it gone, and we are now living in post-historical times. And nothing means anything anymore. Maybe it’s the 24-hour news cycle, the desensitisation to carnage as a result of its hourly reportage.

Anyway, here’s a mediocre snap of the Berlin Wall from my first trip there in 2009. Later that day I went to Checkpoint Charlie with a pal of mine and said to him: “This is fucking shite.” I don’t know why I was expecting something magical.

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And check out these two stunning movies:

Tagged Berlin, Berlin Wall, Cold War, GDR, Germany

Nov 09 2019

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Air travel, Photography, Tourism, Transport, Travel

Three days in Belfast.

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A wee jaunt here for a wedding and an excuse to watch Titanic (1997) for the 169th time because of the Belfast connections; I couldn’t be arsed with the museum because I refuse to pay for anything that I can see for free on Google Images. I did, however, do quite a fair bit of wandering around the Titanic Quarter for some amateurish snaps on a fucked Android that has somehow managed to pap seven midgets in five cities.

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I like Belfast. The history of the place is not a nice bedtime story but that doesn’t enter into my evaluation of its pubs and of course the Titanic connection, which is all that matters when it’s all said and done, eh.

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Highlights: The airport bus (No. 300) driver calling a daft bloke driving the wrong direction down a one-way road a “gobshite”; the hotel receptionist asking me where and when the Titanic foundered (people really should know this); the Titanic Hotel charging a ridiculous £5.70 for a pint of Diet Cola (staff were awful as well), and, inevitably, watching Titanic (1997) in my sweatpants with a bottle of Peach Schnapps. Billy Zane is what it’s all about.

Not too shabby wall art, either.

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Tagged Belfast, Northern Ireland, Travel, Ulster

Nov 02 2019

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Edinburgh, Photography, Scotland, Travel, United Kingdom

Edinburgh – winter is coming.

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Princes Street is ghastly – chavs galore and feckless tourists – but every Christmas it’s almost bearable. Because it rains and snows and people look fucking miserable. I like misery and I enjoy seeing people miserable. Great.

Tagged Edinburgh, Photography, Princes Street, Scotland, Scott Monument, Still image

Oct 12 2019

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Cinema, Film, Movie, Photography, Thailand, Tourism, Transport, Travel, Uncategorized

Thai road-trippin’.

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Time flies. This was six years ago today, and what a silly wee adventure it was, Bangkok to Rayong to Pattaya to Ayutthaya. The piece-of-shite motorbike I purchased off a Burmese borderline dwarf exploded about two hours into the journey to Rayong so I had to sit on a rotten minibus like a tinned sardine for half the day. But Fleetwood Mac got me through proceedings. I hate to appropriate the word ‘epic’ but this sojourn really was because it had everything; it was The Wolf of Wall Street (2013) but without Velcro dartboards to launch midgets at.

Good times.

Tagged Adventure, Bangkok, Thailand, Transport, Travel

Oct 01 2019

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Air travel, Planes, Tourism, Transport, Travel, Uncategorized

The AAirpass actually exists.

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It was sold for a one-time fee of $250k in an attempt by a cash-strapped American Airlines to raise revenue without having to borrow from the banks. Unfortunately (for them), they didn’t factor in just the levels of dedication the 28 pass holders (flying addicts) would bring to the agreement. Millions have been lost in fares and taxes, and a bloke by the name of Steve Rothstein, an investment banker from Chicago, was their number one ‘abuser’.

He took more than 10,000 flights and essentially circumnavigated the globe a zillion times before AA had enough of the geezer and managed to revoke his privileges. They cited various ‘fraudulent activities’ such as his habit of cancelling reservations or letting strangers use his companion pass (extra cost $150k).

This guy is a hero. Imagine the movie. I think you’d need to insert something more than comedy into proceedings, make it all Terrence Malick with the transcendental freedom of travel (until nasty corporation breaks the contract) the main theme. Or get a meagre Ryanair version made.

Of the 28 AAirpasses purchased, 25 are still valid.

Wanderings and … wonderings.

Category Archives: Travel

St. Andrews ‘bantz’.

The Edinburgh Christmas Market is back with a vengeance.

Six days in Barcelona.

Edinburgh congestion is torture.

The fall of the Berlin Wall – 30 years on.

Three days in Belfast.

Edinburgh – winter is coming.

Thai road-trippin’.

The AAirpass actually exists.