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 Charlie Knox26, m, resident of spa, northern ireland, a thinker, who tries to be real, enjoys the company of nala(left), indebted to jesus for his grace and instruction in life and whose, amongst other things, studying sports science at UUJ. enjoy rugby a whole lot! |
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Thursday, July 28, 2005 Our 5 Star Accomodation! 
posted by charlie |
10:12 PM |
Beautiful Rovinj 
posted by charlie |
10:10 PM |
Andy showering after a late night dip in Croatia 
posted by charlie |
10:09 PM |
The new Renault Clio (this was them preparing to shoot a TV advert in Budapest!) 
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10:08 PM |
Slovakian Toilet (ie.the wall!) A pee here cost 2Sk(about 4 p, a dump cost 8p) 
posted by charlie |
10:07 PM |
More Slovensky Raj Hiking... 
posted by charlie |
10:04 PM |
Some of the Solvensky Raj Hiking 
posted by charlie |
10:03 PM |
A certain young Krakowian Waitress 
posted by charlie |
10:02 PM |
The 5 in Prague 
posted by charlie |
9:59 PM |
World Toilet Summit to be held in Belfast The conference will be devoted to the issue of lavatory standards outside the home, in countries around the world. Richard Chisnell of the British Toilet Association, said: "For too long our toileting needs have been let down by poor provision and poor maintenance and cleaning. "People don't like using public toilets anymore. Sometimes they go in the street and it's not very healthy." Mr Chisnell said there were "far too many" poor public toilet facilities, including those in pubs and restaurants. The four-day summit in Belfast, which runs from 26 to 29 September, has already attracted delegates from 15 countries including, China, Taiwan, Africa, India, Nepal, Chile. An exhibition will also take place alongside the conference in St George's Market and there will be a dinner to mark the annual Loo of the Year award....more Funny this. While we were travelling we reguarly found ourselves having to delve into our pockets just so we could have a pee (in some places you had to pay more for a dump!) The standard procedure usually involved some wee woman sitting at the entrance who demanded some money and who then handed you a piece of toilet paper in return for your small change. It was a bit of a hassle but the cleanliness of the toilets was always first class - to the point where i began to think it was an excellent idea. So maybe i'll head to the summit and throw in my some of my thoughts! I'll definitely be going to the exhibition in St. Georges!! posted by charlie | 9:25 PM | Wednesday, July 27, 2005 Arrived home safe and sound. Weird feeling getting into a comfy bed last night and to have a whole room to one's self afte 9 nights straight in pretty small tent! Pictures will follow. posted by charlie | 1:55 PM | Thursday, July 21, 2005 Allo, allo Currently hanging out on a Campsite on the Croatian Coastline near a town called Porec. Beautiful weather - during the day at least- at night the tent can get a little stuffy. It's well into the 30's during the day and mid to upper 20's at night. During the day we're swimming, snorkelling and just chilling out at the sea. At night we enjoy some cuisine and have been known to finish the evening with another dip before bedtime. Last night we enjoyed some tennis on a clay court which is a first on my part! A very pretty part of the world (if you stay on the right side of the beach - it has a fairly eye opening naturist section at one end! Can't keep the girls away from it! I'm trying my best Ivan!). We're in a part of Croatia called Istria. It has major Italian conections and you can see that both in the Architecture and cuisine. We'll probably do one more sightseeing day to Pula and Rovinj before we come home on Tuesday! Should also say Happy Birthday to my little sister. SJ is 17 today, so you might meet her on the roads from now on! Have a good one SJ! posted by charlie | 8:58 AM | Saturday, July 16, 2005 G:day from Budapest! Well been a few days since we left Krakow and wee packed lots in. The train from Krakow to Poprad in Slovakia was superb. We cut through loads of valleys and got major amounts of amazing scenery thrown into the price of the train ticket! When we arrived in Slovakia i was disappointed. The guides and pictures had all the described the Tatry national park as a beautiful tree covered area, popular with summer tourists. However as we came into it on the train it appeared that nearly all the trees had been butchered down, like a bomb had hit the place. I was angry that such a beautiful place had been allowed to be destroyed for what seemed like a fast way to make money through logging. I also felt like we would not be staying for too long for this reason. There also seemed to be very few tourists. Anyway we arrived at the local Eurocamp. An interesting place, reminding me of some of the facilities we encountered in Ukraine but far lacking the amount of tourists that had been mentioned on the website! To cut a long story short we got talking to a lady working in the supermarket and she told us about how a storm with 300mph winds had ripped through the place last November and had wiped out the trees causing major damage to the tourist trade. At this point I felt pretty sorry for them. The place really was dead with only about 10% of the available pitches taken up on our campsite and they we obviously glad we had chosen to stay there! Anyway we made the most of our time. The highlight of our stay in Tatry was the cable car ride to Skalnate Pleso and then a further chair lift ride to a place called Lomnicky Stit at a height 2196m! The highest ive been on the earth! Was a little cloudy at the top but cleared for a few moments offering superb panoramas. It was also bizarre to be so cold on a summers day - enough to say there was plenty of ice about! After strenously scaling the mountain we packed up camp and headed to a small town called Cingov on the edge of Slovensky Raj national park. We camped out that night with prairie dogs all around us and cooked some pasta and sauce on the fire we had lit! Always good to get back to the proper way of doing things. The food tastes so much better when you do it that way. A decent nights kip in the tent and we began our 6 hour hike around the park. I can honestly say it was the most enjoyable hiking ive ever done. The park name means Slovakian Paradise and is exactly that. It had fantstic walkways, beautiful views, lovely rivers, fish coming to the surface for food, waterfalls, you name it. Words really dont do justice. When i get home i?l fire a few photos up. Weeksy you would love it! We did get soaked for the final hour of our dander but made up for it with a fantastic and cheap feed at a local restaurant Right i;m tired writing. You;re probably fed up reading. I will continue later. Right now we are in Budapest but we?e heading out in the morning to the Croatian Coast via Zagreb. We'll stay around there for about a week before shooting home next Tuesday! Time flies in! posted by charlie | 5:24 PM | Sunday, July 10, 2005 Great Craic in Krakow Well that's an original title isn't it! Well this will be quick. It's 12.24 and we're heading on from Krakow early in the morning. I've loved this place. It's not immeditely amazing but it grows on you. So many memories and experiences squeezed into 3 days; The cheap, cheap, tasty food (The coit shaped fresh bread from the street vendors is particuarly good!), the massive, ambient town square with loads of street performances at night, the Wawel Castle with dragons lair, the horriffc and vast Auschwitz, the massive fairytale network of Saltmines at Weiliszka taking me as far under the surface of the earth that i've ever been (130m!), the most beautiful waitress i've ever been served by in my 24 year..............the list could go on!!!!!! Not even the pouring rain yesterday and today could dampen our spirits! Been great but good times await in Slovakia. Looking forward to some moutainous activities amongst other things. Better go. 12.32 now. Train at 7.18! posted by charlie | 10:24 PM | Friday, July 08, 2005 We didn't get gassed or robbed on the train! We have arrived in Krakow safe and sound. It's 7.14am amd we've just checked into our hostel. The 8hr train ride was fun, if a little intimate! We took a couchette which is basically a 6 bunk compartment with fairly limited space! We shared with one guy from Melbourne called Al who was a most decent spud. He taught us a new card game which killed a little time before we attempted to sleep. Sleep was fine considering. Took a while to nod off with the various noises (track noise, aussie fellas chatting up yank girls in next compartment etc) and the soaring heat (was 25C up on the top flight!) We were also interupted (twice) at the border where some uniformed blokes checked our passports! The plan today is just to take in afew of the sights around here. Tomorrow we head for Auschwitz. posted by charlie | 5:12 AM | Spent yesterday afternoon in Prague relaxing in Vysehrad. It's an old part of the city with some great views and some seriously large brick walls! In the evening we sampled some Czech goulash (soup) which tasted remarkably like 'Stevies' (chinese in Ballynahinch!) green pepper and black bean sauce! We then shot to the train station where we heard about the awful events in London. We left Prague without a single czech korun! No loose change! Whilst it is a cheap city (pint costs 90p or so) you get charged a few koruns for using toilets(not a bad idea - they were always clean!) and the train ticket machines only take coins! posted by charlie | 5:00 AM | Thursday, July 07, 2005 Czeching out! Hello there folks. Posting from a internet cafe in downtown Prague. The girls are away looking around shops (as is becoming a habit!) so i thought i'd grab a few moments to bring you up to date with goings on. This is our 3rd and final day in Prague. Our first day was November like weather, absolutely peed it down but to tell you the truth that was fine because it freed the cobbled streets up a bit and took away all but the die hard tourists! It took us a while to locate our hostel in the rain but eventually we got there. Nice spot. Clean and with all the facilities we would need. After getting ourselves sorted there we just dandered around some of the sights including Prague Castle (with it's stand-very-still guards!) and Charles Bridge. Yesterday we checked out some gardens which had some peacocks in bloom. We climbed Petrin hill which was a quer walk. At the top we climbed Petrin tower which is a scaled down version of the Eiffel Tower. Having said that when you're 60m up on and on top of a hill, the views are superb! It also has this wonderful ability to free up the digestive system when the tower begins to wobble back and forth in the wind! At the bottom of tower we enjoyed some simple fun in a mirror maze!! For lunch we enjoyed some tasty and cheap pizza in an underground restaurant! In the afternoon we check out more sights including the St Nicholas Church and the gruesome 'Museum of Medieval Torture Instruments' which pretty much did what it said on the tin making Johnny feel sick in the process - very much understandable! In the evening we Tescoed before heading out to our campsite. A long ride on the metro and a 4km later we arrived at our base in the Czech countryside. Campsite had good facilities so we cooked up our pasta dinner and ate and drank til we were content. After a frantic packing rush we just about caught the bus back into Prague this morning. So far we've just dandered around and enjoyed some lunch in a wee bakery. So things are going brilliantly. All getting on still - not bad after 2 days! Worth a special mention in Prague is the superb metro. We've spent a considerable amount of time shooting about the city on it and without it we'd have walked many more km's! Prices are also dirt cheap here so I'm loving it and the word on the street is that things get cheaper as we head east. We do that tonight. We booked on the 2120 overnight train to Krakow Poland! Should be fun. Over and out! posted by charlie | 11:50 AM | Monday, July 04, 2005 Our big adventure around central europe begins later today. We fly out of Belfast at 10:45am for Prague! I'll try and keep fairly regular updates here! posted by charlie | 11:54 PM | Summer Madness I've just spent a fair whack of time over the past couple of days at Summer Madness. I hadn't intended on going down but a friend was taking part in a panel yesterday affo and so i decided to fire down with him. We ended up staying a while and bumped into lots of old friends. I really enjoyed this. Funny to hear how different people lives have unfolded. I have a feeling that next year i might book a place in the campsite and enjoy the whole affair (just like old times!). Tonight i went to see the OC Supertones, a band i used to spend many hours listening and bopping to. They were superb live and will warrant another few listenings on CD! Also enjoyed the tunes of the 'Craig Hunter Band' - hadn't much of them before but i reckon we will have in a few years! posted by charlie | 11:41 PM | |
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