Paris

I have one day in Paris to see the beautiful Parisian women, er I mean, the beautiful Parisian landmarks. Anyway it looks like half the women here are tourists. No, make that about 90% from the number of cameras being whipped out.

I remembered to put on my jacket, but I forgot the scarf. It was my one taste of a gloomy northern European autumn day to make me grateful I was going back to spring in Sydney. There was also a cold breeze so I had to duck into arcades or the metro whenever it got too cold in the open. 

If Madrid is an open-air history book, then Paris is an architectural museum. It is the top tourist destination in the world; show a picture of the Tour de Eiffel or the Arc de Triomphe to people and chances are they will recognise them as French landmarks. So I don't really need to caption the pictures; you know these places already. Sorry, no Eiffel or Grand Arch at La Défense—it was foggy and if you cannot see the landmark, then you can't see the ground from them either. Besides, that weekend, as it happened, due to works, metro line 1 terminated at Étoile.

I walked down Boulevard de Champs-Elysées towards Concorde. All the haute couture brands have a shop there. But my favourite shop was the FNAC.  For things you can get from Amazon, stick with Amazon, especially during this time when the greenback is getting a bashing, but FNAC stocks many small EU labels that put out some good compilations. Most of the compilations are lackluster sessions or lesser known works by famous artists, but some bargains can be found. They also have a good selection of world music.

By the way you may have noticed by now that 2 of the pictures aren't of standard Paris landmarks. In fact they are faux landmarks installed as part of the celebration of 50 years of Asterix and his plucky band of resistance fighters.

The last is a reworking of Olympia by Manet. So the French do have a sense of humour.

From Concorde I walked towards the Latin Quarter, which I found more interesting than than the architectural gems on the way.

The Latin Quarter has also a good variety of restaurants. Many of them are tourist traps, but off the busy streets you can find some gems. That evening I went back to the LQ, on my day ticket, to dine at an unpretentious Vietnamese restaurant that made very good phỏ. Afterwards a quick stop at Pigalle (actually Blanche is the closer Metro station) to take a picture of the famous Moulin. (I was too tired and too poor to do anything else, honest.)

AVE

The AVE leaves at 1330 so I have time to explore a couple of the plazas. South of Huertas where I am staying is Lavapies. (Lavapies translates to footwashers; one charming piece of trivia about Madrid is that there are many decorated tile street signs. I don't know what footwashers did historically; tell me if you do. But they are also not consistent; I saw a Calle del Leon (Street of the Lion) sign, alas behind scaffolding so no picture, and at the other end of the street Calle de Leon (the city, I assume)) There are a lot of Chinese-run import firms. It's not just the factories of China that are contributing to its success, but also a untrumpeted army of Chinese who set up import firms and variety stores in other countries. Someone once commented that you could judge the viability of an economy by the number of Chinese conducting business there. If so, then Madrid seems to be in good shape. At the Mercado de San Miguel I stop again to have a jamon bocadillo and a slice of truffle cake.

Security for the AVE for Atocha includes X-raying of luggage. I don't know whether this was already in place during the bombings. (It wouldn't have helped, the targets were suburban trains, but I suppose the AVE is a high-profile target.)

The acronym (expanding to Alta Velocidad Española) and logo are suggestive of speed. It takes 3.5 hours to Barcelona Sants but it made stops in Guadalajara, Zaragoza, Lleida and Tarragona. I think the non-stop service takes 2.5 hours and of course, costs more. It reached a top speed of just under 300 km/h by the display but this wasn't sustained. I wouldn't not have guessed we were travelling that fast. There are no means of comparison except the occassional car on a parallel road.

I'm too tired to see a bit of Barcelona so this time I'll just shoot through. There are frequent trains to França, where the overnight departs, so I have dinner at a Sants cafeteria and go to França around 2000.


The Elipsos coach designers could have been taking lessons from Japanese capsule hotel designers. Everything feels cramped, for example, the doorways of compartments are barely the width of one person. On the other hand, the coach is fairly new, all the appliances work and the airconditioning is perfect, so I am being picky. The curvy surfaces even look a bit art deco-ish.


I have a fascination with night trains going back to childhood journeys between Kuala Lumpur and Penang or Singapore. In those days, it took a whole night to travel 400 km. From the tiny ventilation window of my berth, snug under the sheet, I would watch as the train rumbled past rubber plantations and small villages with only one lamp burning. At night everything is full of mystery and wonder—a chthonic world dissipated and turned ordinary by daybreak. That feeling of mystery in night travel, fictituous as it may be, has never left me.


This trip, I watched for a while as Catalonian highways, shopping centres, and factories slipped past our window until the concierge came to lower the bunks. Except for a few minutes of interruption when a fellow passenger got out at Limoges, I slept deeply until the train deposited us at the Gare de Austerlitz.

Madrid

The Hotel Miau is very nice. Probably the best accommodation I will have this trip. Paris will cost more and probably be less comfy. I deserve some luxury at the end of this trip. Besides, how could I resist a name like Miau? They even have a pixellated cat for a logo.

In the morning I discover from the Elipsos website that there are no sleepers left for the Madrid/Paris night train. Not even reclining seats. Uh oh, panic time. I should have purchased a ticket over the Internet weeks ago, but I didn't want to tangle with the mess that is the Elipsos website and printing a ticket or giving an address to receive it, which I obviously can't.

Flights between Madrid and Paris cost too much, and I would still need a bed for the night. Wait, there are sleepers on the Barcelona/Paris run. I can get a cheap Ryanair flight from Madrid to Girona, where there is a transfer bus to Barcelona. But I'm sick of going in and out of airports. So I decided to go to Barcelona in the afternoon by AVE, the Spanish high-speed train. Costs more but I've never tried it. A trip down to Atocha station and it's all purchased. Whew. Incidentally Atocha is the nearest station to where the Madrid bombings took place.

Then a Spanish breakfast and I can do the two walking tours in my guide, Old Madrid and Artistic Madrid. Those take the rest of the daylight hours. I get back to Hotel Miau at sundown all exhausted. The Madrid metro is very efficient. I never had to wait more than 4 minutes for a service to come along. I had a day ticket so I tried many lines.

Puerta del Sol is where all distances in Spain are measured from and there is a Km 0 marker on the ground. There seem to be a lot of anti-GFC public works going on.

The Mercado de San Miguel seems to have a collection of boutique food stands, even a book shop. Obviously meant as a tourist attraction. I had a nice smoked mussel tapas.

There is an expo of pictures of the CERN LHC by Peter Ginter near Plaza de España, where there is a statue of Cervantes and his most famous creation, Don Quixote.

Madrid is one lively city. I like how the residents fully use their city every hour of the day. I'd come back in a trice if it were simple.

How to lose your things while travelling

Millions of unfortunate travellers come home with all their belongings intact. Here are a handful of tips that will help you avoid such a fate. 

1. Carry lots of bags. Why limit yourself to a backpack and daypack? Take along shopping bags, supermarket bags, any sort of carrier. This will increase your chances of losing one. Airline check-in counters will love you too.

2. Store things at random places in your luggage. For example, your passport can go into your toiletry bag, and your credit cards in the mobile phone pouch. While you may not lose things this way, they will be as good as lost when you need them.

3. Use all the storage locations provided by your accommodation. Why do hotel rooms provide so many cupboards and drawers? To store your things in, silly. Don't disappoint them. This will increase your chances of forgetting to collect some things when it's time to leave. Also see tip 5.

4. Stick things in outside pockets on your backpack or luggage. This will make it easier for them to fall out and for some lucky local to benefit.

5. When you leave your accommodation don't bother to do a final check of your room to see that you have everything. Of course you have. They are somewhere in your bags. You hope.

Timezone arithmetic 6

A small jog this time. Flying from Lisboa to Madrid and went from UTC to UTC+1. So it's an hour later here. (Western Europe except UK and Portugal is on UTC+1.) I arrived at the Hotel Miau (more on it later) past midnight because of the late Easyjet flight. Even so, lots of Madrileños are out on the streets, living up to their reputation.


I went through the fall back from DST last Sunday morning on Madeira.

Tram 28

Even though I took an ordinary bus to Madeira airport very early at 0715 (the airport shuttle doesn't start until 0800), the incoming Easyjet flight was delayed due to fog in Lisboa.  This would reduce the time for a quick tour of Lisboa using tram 28 so I had second thoughts about spending money both ways on the shuttle for a few hours. In the end I decided I couldn't stand doing nothing at the airport so I put my backpack in left luggage and went into town on the shuttle.

Tram 28 was very jerky as expected with steep rises and sudden swings.  This is the one they usually use/used in movies with Lisboa trams. Lots of other tourists were also on the tram. Unfortunately I didn't have a good seat to get the best shots. Never mind, this tram is much photographed.  When the tram reached Bairro Alta I decided it was sufficient and hopped off.  Fortunately the hostel had told me about the metro elevators that are very useful for moving between Baixa and Alta.

Then it was to a pastry shop for coffee and nata but I changed my mind, or rather the nata, when I saw the maça asada folhada (baked apple foldover).

My original plan had been to take the overnight train from Lisboa to Madrid, but since Portuguese Railways made it difficult for me to buy a ticket when I last passed through, if you remember, I decided that they didn't need my patronage and I instead bought a cheap Easyjet ticket to Madrid and booked a hotel room. Comes up to more that a sleeping berth, but I will have a very nice night's sleep. I deserve some urban pampering at the end of this trip anyway.

Madeira 6

Last full day on Madeira and last levada walk. Today's walk is near Saturday's walk but takes in a different two levadas. First we walked uphill following one levada, then up a hill, over a bridge which spans the river feeding the levada, and then down a different levada.

As this walk didn't take very long, I had a chance in the afternoon to go on a guided tour of Old Blandy's Wine Lodge. There the history and process of making madeira was explained, and of course we finished off with a tasting of two 5-year old varieties, one dry and one sweet. I won't try to repeat what I learnt—I'm sure it's all explained somewhere on the web, but if you invite me over to dinner, I promise to bring a bottle of madeira we can educate ourselves with. 

An interesting pair of gender signs

At the Jardim Botanico, Funchal. Took me a moment to work it out too. A bit retro though.

PS: In case you didn't know, you can see a larger version of the photo by clicking on it.

Madeira 5

No guided walk today, the last one is tomorrow, so I'm going to visit the Jardim Botanico.

I still had to get out early because the buses are less frequent on Sundays. As it turned out, I was one of the first through the gate at 0900. As expected from the relative sizes of the archipelagoes, the Jardim Botanico is less extensive than its counterpart on Gran Canaria. It will be 50 next year. It is on land that once belonged to the Reid family, who still have strong connections with Madeira. The garden has a collection of native Madeiran plants. Naturally, succulents are well represented, but so are palms.

The best part of the garden though was the parrot collection, with a collection of birds from all over the world, including cockatiels and budgies from Australia. I don't know why they bothered to have a cage of pigeons though, the specimens inside looked exactly like the numerous wild ones outside.

I hope Madeira continues to maintain and improve this garden as it's a valuable resource. Better labels would help though.

On getting back to Funchal I hopped onto a bus saying Santana, as this is the village with the triangular shaped roofs. Turns out that the bus went to a different Santana, simply a suburb of Funchal. Luckily I was on a day pass. Back in Funchal I discover that buses to the real Santana are sparse on Sundays, so I have to give that up. I however visit the Madeira Museum, which is an excellent introduction to the history of Madeira. Very well executed with modern interactive exhibits.

Madeira 4

A few collected observations about Madeira.

Madeirans seem to enjoy a higher standard of living than the mainlanders, from what I can see. Houses seem to be better maintained and the variety of goods in the stores is impressive. Or perhaps I am only seeing the holiday homes. Tourism is the main industry now. In the beginning it was sugar, until Brazil proved more productive, then it was wine. Madeira still supplies Europe with bananas.

Recycling is big here and bins for various recyclables are all over. I think they have no choice as landfill would consume valuable land on the island. Also, Madeirans are conscious of energy and water use.

Road tunnels are everywhere and are essential on what is a volcanic island some 15 million years old with steep slopes, though somewhat reduced in height by erosion. I can see by comparing the roadside volcanic rocks with much more recent ones that I have seen on Lanzarote, an island in the Canary group, that they have had their jagged edges worn down. Recent volcanic rocks must be the most ugly forms in the world. I can't find words to describe them, they are not even fractal, they are every whichever shape the solidification of the lava gave them.

Not surprisingly, roads are steep and narrow. Vehicles often have to pass each other with a hairbreadth of space to spare. This is not helped when some are parked on the side of the road. Sometimes one vehicle has to reverse to let another through. Somehow the Madeirans muddle through.

Eating out in Madeira is quite affordable. (I'm not looking forward to the price shock when I get back to mainland Europe.) I had a nice lunch of grilled cuttlefish, boiled potatoes and salad for 10 € at a well-recommended place, Café Londres.

But other days I had dinner (lunch was picnic food due to the outings) at the Pingo Doce cafeteria, which is a por quilo place. There you pay by the weight of the food on your plate. It's a concept quite familiar in Brazil but less so in Europe. You fill your plate to your heart's desire with salads, cooked vegetables, rice, potatoes, and mains, which at Pingo Doce, was a selection of several meat and fish dishes. (Starters, deserts and drinks are separately charged though.) Your dish is weighed on an electronic scale that has been tared with an empty dish. Pingo Doce charged 10 € per kilo. Depending on how hungry I was, I paid between 4 and 6 € for dinner.

Madeira chestnuts

This family run stand selling roasted chestnuts on Funchal esplanade seems to be a popular fixture with the locals. The chestnuts are roasted in earthenware urns with a wire mesh bottom seated over a charcoal stove. Every minute or so the man would raise the urn and give it a shake to even the roasting. It wasn't just strollers who were buying; every now and then a car would stop and a passenger hop out to buy a bag or two, and then the car would resume its journey.

I had a dozen and very nice they were to eat doing nothing else at all except watch the world go by.

Madeira 3

Strictly speaking a levada is a water channel constructed up in the Madeiran highlands to capture and carry water from the rainier north to the dryer south. However as so many of the beautiful walks in Madeira involve levadas, walks in general have become known as levada walks.

Today's walk is called the Rabaçal walk and takes in the Risco waterfall, and another called 25 Fontes (25 Springs). Most of the walk runs along levadas. These are channels that gather the runoff water from the spongy laurisilva. They were created on a large scale in the 19th century, carved out of rock using nothing more than blasting powder and hand tools by Madeirans, at the cost of some lives due to the hard work in steep terrain. There are some 2000 km of channels. Today cement channels and steel pipes augment the traditional hewn channels, They still supply Madeira's water, whether for domestic, industrial or tourism use. The guide said that their potential is not fully tapped, it is estimated that only 60% of the available water is used. The state maintains the channels now.

An interesting note is that eucalyptus was brought in to provide a fast-growing source of wood for the sugar mills, thus sparing the slow-growing Erica. However the introduced species has become an intruder and threatens the water gathering capability of the laurisilva due to their thirst.

After yesterday's mountain walk this was a relatively easy walk for me. The guide was rather jocular, talking about "papparazzi stops" and other similar jokes. Another time while showing us a giant dandelion, he mentions the saying that in Madeira only the bananas and people are normal size. He related that when he had shown the giant plants to Americans, they had exclaimed omigawd, so he had told them that if ever they were chased by what looked like a grizzly, they were not to worry because it would only be a rabbit. I don't know if they bit that one.

Madeira Mandolin Orchestra

I saw posters around Funchal advertising a concert by the Madeira Mandolin Orchestra. Intrigued I went to the concert at the English Church. I enjoyed it a lot.

Ensemble mandolins take the place of the strings in this orchestra but because the instruments are plucked rather of bowed, this gives an extra zing to the interpretation. The orchestra played a programme of light classics such as Skaters' Waltz, and finishing with the rollicking Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2 by Liszt.

If they are in concert in your area, go hear them, and enjoy a treat.

Vapourised rice?

Actually, steamed or parboiled I believe.

Madeira 2

I've signed up for a trio of levadas (hikes). The unique Madeiran landscape is one reason people come to do hikes here.

 As it so happened, I started with the hardest one, a walk from the third highest peak on Madeira, Pico Arieiro to the highest peak, Pico Ruivo. In places the trail runs along a ledge with drops on both sides. But it's not as scary as it sounds because for most of its length, there are cable railings. Still, not recommended for those who suffer from vertigo. It used to be a tougher walk until some tunnels shortened the length. It's about 6 km from the car park at Arieiro to Ruivo, going up and down hillsides and through tunnels, then a 2 km walk to the car park at Achada do Teixeira. Arieiro is accessible to vehicles and is a stop on the tour bus itinerary, but Ruivo can only be reached on foot.

When the excursion van took us to Arieiro, we ascended through the low-lying clouds that were covering the island into clear sunshine. From above all you see is a sea of white clouds, punctured by peaks that rise above the cloudline. It said that on clear days you can see all the way to Porto Santo, the other island.

There were interesting plants on the way, but I'll have pictures from the botanical gardens later.

Madeira 1

I was worried about making the connection, but the TAP flight from Recife to Lisboa was trouble free. A fairly new plane even. I transfered to terminal 2 with 4 hours to spare for lunch and catching my breath. It's kind of strange to fly northeast for 5000 km and then back the other way for 1000 km on the same day, but modern travel is like that.

Like the Canary Islands, which belong to Spain, Madeira is volcanic in origin. Unlike the Canary Islands, there aren't any sandy beaches on Madeira though there are some on Porto Santo, another island of the group, which I won't be visiting. I've had enough of beaches for a while anyway. So Madeira gets a different kind of tourist, perhaps older, and looking for something other than a tan. On my visit to the CI 5 years ago I had meagre pickings with backpacker accommodation because most accommodation is in the form of holiday apartments rented to package tourists. No such problem on Madeira. The locals are more likely to speak some English than mainland Portugal because of tourism. And Madeira has a long history of association with Britain from the madeira trade. Names of British merchants are scattered throughout its history.

Madeira is a lush, verdant island. But flat land is rare and terracing makes the most of the land. The landing approach is said to be as exciting as the old Hong Kong airport with a special last minute bank required. The hillsides run down to the Atlantic ocean. There is a highway linking Funchal with the airport to its east and points beyond but the local bus used the older road linking the towns. This road is entwined with the highway through many convoluted access ramps that must be the pride of Madeira's highway engineers.

 Madeira is like a balm after the hustle and bustle of Brazil. I chose it for that reason and also to compare with the Canary Islands. It's pleasantly cool, daytime temperatures hover around mid-20 all year. Evenings are fantastic. I'm sitting in my shorts on the terrace as I type, with a glass of Portuguese mainland red and a slice of Madeira honey cake to hand. Speaking of wine, I don't know how this Portuguese supermarket chain, Pingo Doce, their Aldi if you like, has such low prices for table wines. Sure, it's table wine, but the equivalent of just over $2 a bottle, wow! I bought a slightly better vintage and it was perfectly drinkable.

I didn't do much the first day except look at the historic buildings in Funchal. That statue is of Zarco, the Portuguese who brought "the first fleet". Incidentally when an immigration official asked me where I was staying in Funchal, I realised that I had been pronouncing it wrong in my mind. I was calling it "foon-kal", but of course I should have remembered that Portuguese requires that it be pronounced "foon-shal". I had intended to visit the Botanical Gardens but I watched the bus depart its stand as I was waiting to cross the road. The next one wasn't for an hour. Bus services here are mostly for the locals. Dang. So I decided to go up to Monte, where there is a lookout over Funchal.

Here you see a couple of tourists going downhill from Monte in a wicker toboggan. This was a speedy way to get down to Funchal in the past. I didn't find out how the toboggan drivers get their sleds up the hill again, either in the past or now.

Goodbye Brazil

Brazil doesn't let go of you that easily. While I was having dinner at the airport, a handful of urchins came over to beg for food. I didn't want to give them money but I thought perhaps I should buy them some food but by the time I had this idea they had moved on. I guess they slipped in through the car park from the neighbourhood; Recife's airport is in an urban area. Poverty is never far away in Brazil.

Then the check-in clerk wasn't sure what the rules were for Aussies entering Schengen and asked colleagues, then checked the rule book. I assured him that I was within the 90 day allowance. I take this to mean they don't get many Aussies in that part of the world.

So for my time in Brazil I have insect bites and hiking scratches on my legs. Brazilian pavements also made me stub my toe a couple of times. Of course I have more, I have great pictures and memories of a warm people. I hope the future will be kinder to them. Life for so many Brazilians seemed to be subsistential and improvised. Nature is bountiful but many people seemed to lack either the means, knowledge or incentive to go beyond gathering.

For me it was a harder destination than usual. Backpacker tourism in the northeast of Brazil is underdeveloped; information about services is lacking, and you really need to learn some Portuguese to survive. As if to stress the potential for improvement, Ministry of Tourism market researchers interviewed departees while we were waiting in the departure lounge. One question intrigued me: Why Brazilian beaches and not Carribean beaches? Well, they are unique, I said, and of course the locals are friendly.

Timezone arithmetic 5

I am now neither on the South American nor the European continent. I'm on the island of Madeira, about 1000 km southwest from Lisboa and about 600 km from Morocco.

In flying from Brazil to Portugal I have moved from UTC-3 to UTC+1 since Portugal will be on DST until this coming Sunday. (A previous version of this post got the zones wrong, but the difference correct.) Madeira is in the same timezone as mainland Portugal which makes it simple. But this makes it much west of its timezone meridian so the sun sets later, like around 1930.

The direction of change is such that the locals are feeling sleepy before I am. So I have to learn to go to bed earlier. It's harder going from west to east because the body clock tends to want to run with a period > 24 hours. But for 4 hours difference I think I will cope.

Olinda

Ada and a couple of her friends are going by taxi to Maceió to do some business and do the shopping. So I pay my share of the fuel cost, and get a quick ride to Maceió rodoviaria. There I catch a bus to Recife, arriving around 1530. I was not sure which stops the bus would make before the rodoviaria in the end; buses here usually drop passengers at stops more convenient for them. Fortunately I knew what the airport stop looked like and jump off there. I caught a metro to the centre and then a bus to Olinda. The locals were very helpful, showing me the right bus and where to get off.

Olinda was the old capital of Pernambuco before Recife took over. I think Olinda got the better deal. It's tranquil and pleasant compared to Recife, which is a gritty working city.

The HI hostel in Olinda is one of the better outfitted hostels that I have seen in Brazil with recent facilities. There is a nice pool I can cool off in after doing my tourist bit.

In the evening I found a restaurant by the water edge and treat myself to a goodbye Brazil fish dinner in the cool sea breeze. It was fairly good, but the mash tasted sour. I reckon the cook used sour cream or yoghurt instead of butter or cream. I'm sure the top restaurants in Brazil are a match for any in the world, but unless you have money, class and a car, you have to make do with ordinary cooks who make haphazard food.

That night I discovered that the hostel has one big drawback: it has very hungry mosquitoes and a dorm that is still warm from the hot day. I cannot open the window or more mossies will enter. The best I can do is sleep with the fan and light on and put on an eye shade. Inspite of the repellent, the mossies manage to find some uncovered spots. Grr. I'm sure that Brazilian rubbish breeds mossies in open containers, causing dengue fever, etc. When I was a child in Malaysia, I was a litterbug. So was my dad. And all the other citizens. Then the government introduced HBMI (Human Behaviour Modification Incentives), otherwise known as FINES, and nowadays, at least in the cities, littering is just not done. This is a public health issue, and so last century.

In the morning right after breakfast, I don't bother to shower; I just put on my thongs, sling my camera bag over my shoulder and go look at old Olinda. As I've said before, architecture is not my thing and I'm quite happy to see these buildings in glossy books. But the old churches and gaudily painted houses do look good in the viewfinder. I'm sure the locals paint them on purpose that way now for the tourists. Speaking of which, I'd like to know how those professional photographers manage to keep electricity poles and lines out of their shots. Maybe they have assistants lop them off before the shot and replace them afterwards.

Afterwards I treated myself to royal coconut juice as you can see from the picture. Then I had a dip in the pool before showering, repacking and checking out. The flight isn't until nearly midnight so I'll hang around the hostel where the WiFi is free, go to the airport when it's cooler, around 3 or 4 pm, rest and have dinner there before the flight.