Von Bondies and London

Hallo all in blogger land, I hope you are all well and enjoying whatever you happen to be doing.

Right I'm now this very minuet sat on a train going to London and the reason I have my laptop is to keep from going insane for the 3 hours I have to sit here. Now I'm off to the big city just for a meeting about audits or something of that nature (thinking I could have done with a little more research on this meeting). It’s nothing to big and I'm glad to get out of work for the day even if it is going to turn in to a long day. So you would think as I needed to get up at 6am this morning I would have been tucked up in bed at 10pm the previous night, well Ha you would be wrong. The von bondies were playing at the Night and Day and I had managed to get on the guest list even though the night had sold out and I'm glad I did as not seeing them live before I was very happy with the night, they are a great band and if they come around again and you spot they are playing it would be well worth £10 or so. So instead of being in bed nice and early I was in bed at a stupid hour and drunk but I still managed to get up on time and get to the train station with time to spare and then off we went. I'm going down with Echo11 and it is only for a few hours.

Back soon ......

Ok back o the train to Manchester and got another 3 hours to burn, got to the meeting just in time and it was ok, it is looking at a self audit for the department I work in but not just for us but for everyone throughout the country so you have to look at it from a company perspective and not just from the view of where you work. I had no problem with this but there were some who could not seem to see past this so we spent most of the day just trying to convince the small group in the meeting of this. So however much I think we had some sort of impact in this new aspect of the company it was a bit of a waste of time when we could have got so much more done in the time we had.

For some reason it has taken me 2 days to get this blog finished, I have just got up from a night of drinking playing board games, I was happy with my drinking ability after a long day but I did well and lost the game with style. Any way got to go to work, something about hours and projectors I think.

Buda – birthday - pest

So it has been a busy week and I week with lots happening, to start I think I will take you a week back and that would be last Saturday. I it was my birthday coming up along with my good friend brain splat we decided to go out as it was going to be a few weeks before we were both in the same country so we grabbed a few friends and out we went. We had a good few drinks down in the ouster bar and then went on to the northern quarter for a few more, I would like to point out the difference in price for a drink – Ouster bar £1.47 and Centreno - £3.20, that is a big difference!

So night came to an end and a few of us made our way back to our flat for a few more drinks and just like lads do we went in to piggy back mode and I have to say I was good at giving piggy backs, this cannot be said for Mr Moodie as half way through his legs just stopped and he hit the road with me on his back with a hell of a force, enough force to crack open his head, I came of better with just a good part of the skin missing from my knee and a few bumps. So after cleaning up his head we finished off a few drinks and called it a night. Getting up in the morning the realisation of the pain not just from the beer kicked in, ouch! But we didn't have time to cry about it as we had to pack as I was not going to turn 28 in the UK!

Budapest

Day 1

Monday to Thursday to Budapest, so off we went Monday and none of this early morning flights a nice midday flight, didn't even got off the ground before we had a problem, got asked to come to the frount of the plane before they closed the doors to find out case had opened, so after a bit of kicking and a strap the case was closed and in the plane, we got there for just after 6, we booked some where to stay with a back packers web site as it was cheaper, we did book something with a room to ours selves as we had enough to do so, so getting there we walked past the place a few time as it looked burned out! But a lot of the buildings did, so we get there and the blokes says ok you are not in this building, ok, so off we went to the nicest part of Budapest and we had an apartment, so we didn't even unpack and just went out, got some food and loads to drink and that was our first day.

Day 2

We decided to hit the first full day we had with a bit of force and get some of the sights done, so we walked over to Buda and headed up this huge hill to see the base where the Germans camped during WWII but now there is a peace monument, it looked like it was not far away and it was not in a horizontal sense it was just miles away in a vertical sense, but after stopping a few time and taking in some of the views we made it, then we headed down the other side and on to Margrot island which sits in the River Danube between Buda and Pest. This was a beautiful place and it was odd how quite it was, so after pottering round a little we made it in to Pest and got something to eat. So after I tried to pay about 17000 florint instead of 7000 (the 1000 and 10000 look the same) we had to get a few bits and then we made our way back down Pest to out apartment so we could get changed and then out for some nice food and today was my Birthday! Yes it had to come at some point and this time round I hit the Big 28, ok 28 is not a big one but hey, so we went out to a place called ... nope cant remember... and it was a fantastic meal (and cheap) and then we went on for a few more drinks. What a day, I was completely knackered but we got so much done and it was just a wonderful day and one I will remember.

Day 3

As we had got a lot of things done yesterday it was nice to take it easy and my legs were very grateful, we went to the statue park on the out skirts of Buda. This park as a lot of statues from the communist era of Hungary's past, they got all these statues in one place as there was a fear of them being destroyed as did the statue of Starlin and all that remains is his boots. This was the first day we had a go at the public transport system and you know it was good, you buy a ticket (well we got 10) and each tickets is valid for one trip, no matter where you are going or how far it is just one ticket! So it was a bit of a trip but well worth it, its not a massive park but its interesting to see all these statues. We headed back to Pest as we wanted to go to one of the thermal baths, these baths are heated from thermal vents and the baths are outside, so once you have got changed you get you towel and flip-flops and you head out side, it was about 3°C outside which is not very warm but that was fine as it was about 28-30°C in the baths, there we 2 so after some time we thought we would try the other one which was about 25 meters away, so we got out and buy the time I got to the other pool my shorts had started to freeze it was that cold outside. It was wonderful, being outside in the cold in really hot outside pool with the steam and mist just sitting above the water, that has to be a must for anyone going to Budapest. For the evening we went out to a restraint in Buda just next to chain bridge as recommended but Mr Moodie, after that we had a few drinks in a bar just round the corner but decided to head to a bar near our apartment. So we walked back and went to this wonderful bar, it had big bowls of monkey nuts everywhere and hey on the floor and a really good live band, they also had things stuck on the walls and posts and ceiling, when i say things I mean anything you can think of, train tickets from around the world, receipts, bus passes, cig packets, anything you can imagine. So I had to leave something so my City of Manchester card and my friends FatFreeMedia card now sits on the wall. It was a really nice place and was very happy we found it.

Day 4

And the day we fly out we wanted to get the last few things done we had up to now not had time to get done, so first was the Zoo and what a Zoo, it was like they had everything and more, it was a little scary as you would be walking thought and would walk was one of them display cases you would see at H Samuels and it would have some killer snake in, the elephant house at the Zoo looked like it was something from the 19^th century, it was beautiful. After the Zoo we walked down to the Terror Museum, this was interesting, this is when the German police had their base during the War and then where the Russian secrete police had their base. To give you an idea what this building was used for the walls are about 6 feet think so as people were walking by outside you could not hear the screams of people inside, it was a dark time after the war, if you were to have thought to have any contact with the German occupation during the war you would have been killed, if they thought you know something you were not saying all your family would be torched or killed until you confessed. There were cells where you could not stand up and one where there was just enough room to stand up and that's it. It was a eye opening place to visit and how ever disturbing the place is you should not miss it out.

All day I had not been feeling too well and at first I thought it was down to the beer from the night before but after sometime it would seem not, yes I had somehow come down with the flu!

Now to break up this 'Day 4' we need to talk about Converse. My first ever pair I got from my lovely girl friend last year, she got me some wonderful green boot converse and they lasted a full year but knowing I was going on holiday I needed some more, can you buy green converse now? NOPE, you can get them anywhere, it like they thought green was no longer for them. So I got some blue ones and they are really nice but as we are walking though the main part of Budapest what do I see!!!!!!! Yes !!!!! GREEN CONVERCSE !!!!!! so my wonderful girl friend got then for me, she is so nice.

Back to the day, we had a evening flight out and I thought it would be just as easy as the flight it but I started to feel very very ill and it turned the flight in to a long time and with the bad winds in the UK it was a very scary landing but karma smiled on me as our bags were the first off the plane and we were on our way back and I have been in bed since. Starting to feel a little better now and got a good night sleep last night.

Please have a look at my photos from my Budapest trip,

The day I touch a cloud,

So today I had the wonderful pleasure of touching a cloud. Think how often you have seen clouds in your life time, think how nice they look some days and think of how many interesting things they can resemble. Have you ever touched one? If you would like to touch a cloud all you have to do is get someone to take you up in a micro light and fly in to one which I did today. Now like most people I tend to think that the bigger planes are more safe and more of a smoother ride and I was expecting for my day in the sky to be a scary and bumpy one but this was not to be. Once getting to the air field (no thanks to GPS, I didn’t think a farm would also do flights) I was expecting a 20/30 min lessen in what not to do when up there but after getting out of my car it was 2/3 mins before I was kitted up and sat in the motor bike of the sky. After a few “don’t do this” lessens we say at the end of the air strip and waited for clearance to take off, now these little things are really like motor bikes of the sky. You ever seen a motor bike at the lights? As soon as the light goes green they are off with this is the same for micro lights, as soon as he got the ok we shot down this grassy runway like we were being powered by a rocket and within seconds we were up and up and up. I think most people have been on a plane and for me take off is one of the more interesting times, not good just interesting so I did expect the same type of feelings but nope. It was such a smooth flight as we went out to the cost of Liverpool. as we got there, there were some clouds which he was going to fly under as the last thing both of us wanted to see was a easy jet flight up close and personal but as we start to go under we flew straight through one which I did reach out and touch (with permission) we flew down the beach passing Formby (location of the lovely picnic last year) and then down until you could just make out the Liver building, then we heeded back in and passed over Magul before turning back for the air field. While up there I chatted to the man flying who was telling me how easy these micro lights are to fly at which point he took both hands off the controls, at this point I did close my eyes waiting for the noise of the quickly approaching ground but after a few seconds this was not the case and the micro light just flew its self, even with a bit of turbulence. So after about 20 mins we were back at the air field and starting our decent at a fast rate, with in mins we were quickly approaching the ground and in the blink of an eye we were down and moving back to the safe area.

I know it didn’t last for long but I can tell you that is an amazing thing to do, its not what you expect and is a smooth, worry free, beautiful flight in a wonderful place. I would recommend it to any one