Ireland and England

I am back!
After 256 days of travelling the trip has come to ..let’s say a break. The last week I spent in Ireland and England. Most of the week, I stayed in the capital city Dublin. I guess I can’t really say I’ve been to Ireland since I only spent one day on the countryside, but that’s good for now. Dublin was like everyone expects: rainy but not really wet, cloudy but not really dark and chilly but not really cold. Nevertheless, I was back to Europe and it felt a bit depressing. Something that was quite easy to solve by visiting one of the many pubs – or more..

There will be photos as soon as I’ve solved my temporary living and Internet situation. For now, I have to say it feels awesome to eat dark bread – and, of course, to see my family and friends again.

Lots of plans await my realisation – or at least my tries to. Enthusiastic times – even though the weather gave me a hit on the head (including snowy things). Well, if all else fails, next stop: Mexico!

USA – New York, New York

New Yorker are ‘children of excitement’ as I will call them from now on. They like morning TV, stars, talking about stars, police with machine guns (at least they don’t mind them), fast food and flags – especially stars and stripes (what better way to describe the flag?). Despite the feeling that half of the cars were taxis and the other half emergency vehicles the city felt quite clean and save. New York is quite a big apple with over eight million people. In some parts it seems like most of them are tourists and the rest policemen – but honestly, NY was a great experience without any troubles.

There are thousand things to see: Central park, Times square, Staten Island, the Statue of Liberty, Brooklyn bridge, Rockefeller centre, Empire State building, Flatiron building, Guggenheim museum (among hundred others), Chrysler building, Battery park, Grand Central station, the whole financial district and many more..
I tried the NY hot dog, but in my opinion it tastes kind of artificial and can’t possibly compete with one from Vienna. The soft ice cream and pretzels were surprisingly good though.

But risk a look at: Times square, Manhatten as seen from the Staten Island ferry, Chrysler and Empire State building from the top of the Rockefeller centre at night time, and Brooklyn bridge – over to Brooklyn – just before sunset..

After a week I crossed the Atlantic ocean over to Ireland, Dublin where I stayed till yesterday.

Canada – Ontario

Canada was awesome or – to revive the British English – brilliant!
Unfortunately, my backpack is a little too small to take one of those black bears or some moose with me. After Ottawa, Toronto and a trip to the Niagara Falls, I took a 12 hour bus drive to my new location.

I present: Ottawa church, mounties in front of the parliament, Ottawa locks, Niagara Jump and the best shrimp and chicken burrito ever.

Location update: New York, New York.

Canada – Ontario and Quebéc

Toronto is the biggest city in Canada with something like 5.5 million people all around the area. I stayed right in downtown, with lots of people, skyscrapers and a nice little lake nearby. Although, it is the smallest of the five big lakes, lake Ontario would cover about half of Switzerland. Except of one really bad thunderstorm during an hot evening there weren’t any annoyances. I went around markets, Chinatown, the university, docks, parks and museums. On my last day in Toronto, I went to practice a little climbing and jumping in a Parkour training court, called the Monkey Vault, I found somewhere north-west in the city.
On the next day, I was off to Montréal. Quebéc seemed to me mostly French, so it was quite different for me. Somebody told me that it’s far less French than it used to be. Mainly, because English is just the language when you want to make it in any job here, but I’m not so sure. It seems like the people were proud of their strange (as told by several French guys) quebecian French.

So that was around Toronto with the CN tower and Yonge-Dundas square. And around Montreal, Biosphere on Île Sainte Hélèn and the skyline from mount Royal.

After my stop in Montréal I took the bus back to Ontario, where I’m currently stopping in the country’s capital named (who knows?) Ottawa.

Canada – Alberta and British Columbia

I am back. Back from the Rockies, back from wild animals and the raw Canadian bush. It wasn’t bad at all. Although, there was a lot of rain in the beginning and massive fires in the middle. Afterwards, there was a lot of water too, but I think that’s quite common when you go to an island. In the end, everything worked out without casualties, so I’ll call it success.

Now, I don’t want to bother you with a lot of text. Let the pictures talk..

The Canadian nature with amazing mountains, waterfalls, dunes (with jump)..

..perfectly and glacier-water coloured lakes (Lake Louise just one of many)..

the awesome wildlife from bears to chipmunks, moose and whales..

and other interesting stuff from bear traps to garbage cans..

I left the west coast of Canada and exchanged it for Ontario, where I’m currently in the big lake area, in Toronto.

Canada – Vancouver

Before I hit the road – or better the canadian mountains – I want to give you a small summary of the last six months of travelling:
- half a year, 26 weeks (from 2009-01-16 to 2009-07-17 – 183 days)
- Japan, New Zealand, Australia, Fiji, USA (Hawaii, Washington), Canada
- diving, snorkeling, kayaking, swimming, surfing, hiking, running, climbing
- by plane, bus, car, boat, hitchhiking, train, walking
- best breakfast: Seattle (fruits), Fiji (just everything on Beachcomber island)
- best shower: New Zealand (after days in the wild), Vancouver (just good)
- best sleep: New Zealand (in my tent in the bush and at the French Ridge Hut)
- best rocks: New Zealand (at Castle Hill), Australian blue mountains
- best food: sushi in Tokyo, fish and chips on Steward Island
I haven’t been stolen anything and lost only one t-shirt and that to the sharks while on a diving trip in Fiji. Unfortunately it was my Come-To-Pay shirt (sorry, Arvid) – you might know it from a lot of famous jump pictures.

About Canada.. I wasn’t fully healthy when I crossed over to Vancouver. Still, after a few questions at the Canadian border, everything was done. The green US passport paper (everybody makes such a big fuzz about it, cause it makes it hard to enter the States when you forget to return it after leaving) the bus driver just ripped out, after I asked about it. She told me she’ll throw it in the box at the US border on her way back – she does that all the time – aaalright.
I came across a lot of homeless people and street dealers when I walked from the bus to the hostel in Vancouver. Then on one corner an older woman in a car stopped and offered me a chicken dinner, because she bought two for one. Oh, strange Vancouver. Due to feeling not a hundred percent fit, I didn’t do much the first few days. I explored the city and went on a day tour but that’s basically all. (I saw fish again – yes, I like stating and keywording ‘fish’)

Around Capilano park, Burrard and Lions Gate bridge and Granville island..

Today, I made my way over to Calgary. I learned about distances in Canada. It was a 15-hour bus drive through awesome Canadian landscapes. I lost an hour by crossing a time zone. Tomorrow, I’ll start a 20-day camping trip through the Rockies, Banff, Lake Luise and back to the West over Vancouver Island.

Uh, before I forget.. I did an update on my domain and account. Take a look at almost.plain.at. There you’ll find a selection of my best photos in various categories (you’ll need to click them, to get to the actual gallery). Thanks a lot for keeping my plain.at account Viktor!

USA – Washington, Seattle/Mt. Rainier

The United States are different in many ways. It seems like people enjoy being told what they are allowed and not allowed to do. At least they accept loads of signs all around telling them about fines they’ll receive and jails they’ll have to visit for doing various things. I heard bus drivers shouting about random things, was told not to lean on walls or take pictures, had to face the most complex tax calculations when buying chocolate bars, but also went up rather random office buildings to visually document the views without being bothered by anybody.

Anyway, I stopped arguing with random people some time ago in Australia – so I was able to simply enjoy Seattle. Last Friday, I went with four fellow travellers and a rental car to mount Rainier to do some hiking. To see a volcano with glaciers, almost perfect blue skies and to wander over big white snow fields was definitely one of the highlights of the last week. Unfortunately, the weather was rather changeable and I got a bit sick soon after. If it were the air-condition systems everywhere or the rather cloudy and rainy weather doesn’t matter.
Nevertheless, I got up to Vancouver, Canada by the Greyhound bus without any difficulties and took the chance of being not a hundred percent healthy to sit back and relax my first days in the province of British Columbia.

Around Seattle – Pike place market, the place where grunge was born, the locks around Ballard (with fish) and at mount Rainier (with lakes and jumps!)..