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I've found a new blog site that I like a lot better so I will be continuing my travel tales there (eventually...)

you'll need to sign up to vox see it

http://jessiemaxwell.vox.com

Sorry to upset the chronological order of things, but as its obviously going to take me a little while to get through my Europe trip I think I’ll just post an update of my last few weeks in Leeds while its still all fresh in my mind.

I got back into Leeds around the 4th of January, and although it was sad to be saying goodbye to all my new friends from Contiki, I was exhausted and ready to be going home. The thought of my own bed and no bus to catch ridiculously early in the morning was heaven.

I didn’t manage to get a lot of rest though. This is mostly thanks to James (there you go, 3rd mention) and the other boys in flat 1.1 who I went out with the night I got back to Leeds. They should feel privileged that I’d barely been home a few hours and I was already around visiting them.

And then caught up with more people who had also just arrived back in Leeds after going home for Christmas over the rest of the weekend.

Then over the next three weeks I spent most of my time with the boys in the flat downstairs, and James and Don fast became my favourite people in Leeds.


It was really a short but sweet time as Don (who is from the US) and I were both leaving within a few days of each other.

Don’s flatmates got a goodbye t-shirt made for him, and although I didn’t contribute to this I did go with James on a trek around an Industrial Park to find the shop to pick them up from, so was granted the honour of standing in for an absent flatmate to present the t-shirts to a teary eyed Don.

On the Saturday night before I left I had a goodbye party, which consisted of an overpacked kitchen, pizza then Halo – a nightclub inside an old church in Leeds where I had a booked a private VIP area for the night. It was a great night, and I bawled my eyes out saying goodbye to everyone at the end of the night

Then I was packing Sunday and Monday. Had dinner with Bjorn sunday night, and then with James at the Hard Rock Cafe on Monday night, my last night.

Goodbyes:


Packing on Sunday and Monday... I wanted to take EVERYTHING....

At the bus station just before I left – just before I cried...

Then it was hours and hours of travelling. I didn't even bother trying to count it this time or work out when I should be sleeping and eating and waking on Adelaide time like I did on the way over. I just slept whenever I could, which wasn't often. The transfer in Amsterdam airport to my Amsterdam - Kuala Lumpur flight was fine. I pretty much just walked off one plane, to the next gate, sat for a bit then got on the next plane. But then I got to Kuala Lumpur and realised I had a 5 hour wait, and no malaysian currency to buy food. They wouldn't take a card so I had to pay with a British 20 pound note - this meant about 120 ringgit in change. Then I found a bench, set my alarm on my phone and slept for 2 hours. It was the best sleep I had gotten in about 20 hours. Then back on the plane to Adelaide, through customs and back to Charles St.

It was weird coming home - the weirdest part, stragely enough, was walking into the flat and finding it looking exactly like I'd left it. For some reason coming back to everything being the same as when I left made it harder to come back, not easier.

I've been feeling a bit homesick since I got back, readjusting to life here, and dealing with leaving behind what had become my home over in England. While I'm glad to be back and seeing everyone here, I made some really good friends there and I miss them a lot. And though everything is familiar here, I do feel a little foreign in my own country, whereas I had come to feel really at home in England. I'm sure I'll feel better when I've readjusted.

I think I'm getting over jet lag now - after days falling asleep between 3 -6pm and waking up between 1-3am I finally slept in til 5am this morning! yay me! I don't mind waking up early though so I hope I don't go back to sleeping in late.

Anyway, coming up for me is a few weeks of holidays - not quite sure what I'm going to do! I've already done too much shopping, and my bank account won't hold up to much more. Big Day Out this Friday.

Not long til uni starts again though, and I'm really looking forward to it because its all teaching this year.

And I'm hoping to be able to afford to go back and visit people in England for about 5 weeks in their summer, June/July, finances permitting.

Thats all for now.

• We now return you to normal programming.... (more Europe to come soon...) xx

aaah, I’m only just past Amsterdam.... I really should have got onto this sooner. Oh well, I’ll go through the photos and see how much I can still remember! First a reminder that if you want to see more than the limited photos put up here go to http://picasaweb.google.com/a1120631/Contiki

Leaving Amsterdam we drove to Germany, and through Cologne on our way to St. Goar and a little family run hotel in Urbar. We stopped for a couple of hours in Cologne to go and drink Gluhwein and eat gingerbread in the Christmas markets. Jen and I got used as demonstration models for this hair stick thing, a bit like a chopstick with decoration on one end. Good marketing strategy as we both ended up buying two...

The Rhine Valley in Germany is pretty to drive through, and there are castles everywhere. We stopped in St. Goar for wine tasting, a look at the world record holding cuckoo clock (forgive me, but surely this wouldn’t be hard record to beat?!), and a supermarket stop to stock up on supplies for our two night stay in the alps in Switzerland. (That makes it sound like we were going to be roughing it, but its just because to reach the hotel we had to take cable cars which ended at about 3.30pm so restricted access to shops.)

The hotel in Urbar was cute and family run, with just a little bar, but probably one of the best nights since we were all there together (since we had no choice). I spent part of the night watching a group of local guys playing some dice game, which they patiently tried to explain to me in English, but I think eventually gave up and just wanted to play and me to leave them alone!

Apart from that it was too much german beer and wine, and a few random sing-a-longs in the bar – led by the Australians of course....

Sign on the back of the room doors:

I think the other guests 'honourated' our noise levels and we 'leafed' our rooms as they 'were was'. :P

The next day we were up bright and early as usual and driving into Switzerland. Switzerland, although the most perpetually neutral country in the world it seems, is also the most paranoid and armed for defence! They have missiles aimed everywhere, even at themselves if it should ever be best to blow themselves up rather than be attacked, and fake bits of mountains built to house this stuff. I wouldn’t have believed it but I saw the fake bits of mountains myself. And every male in Switzerland does military training and owns a machine gun! The Swiss also seem elitist when it comes to who can become a Swiss citizen – you must speak French, German, English and Italian and a whole lot of other criteria – even if you marry a Swiss person.

Anyway, when we got to Lucerne we got out overnight bags and boarded the cable cars to get to the top of Mt Pilatus to the hotel which is the highest in the Alps. My excitement at going up a mountain and getting to see snow outweighed any fear I might have had about being dangled in a little red box high above the ground.

First glimpse of snow

At this point we were all thinking this was going to be it, just a sprinkling of snow about the place. And I thought, Oh well at least I got to see some even if I can’t really make snow angels in it. In a way the slight disappointment was good as it lowered my expectations for the sights that were actually waiting for us up the mountain.

first time touching snow!

The coldest I’ve ever been in my life, right on top of the mountain. (At this point I was very glad I’d decided to spend perhaps a bit more than I could afford on a ski jacket – I thought at the time, will I really need this?... but yes, yes I did!)

That night we had our own private disco, or Swissco – which still now, even as I remember it, causes me to sing in my head our own take on Who Da Funk’s ‘Shiny Disco Balls’....’late night booty calls, Shiny Swissco balls’... which somehow ended up ‘Chinese Swissco Balls’ – I would say you had to be there, but I was and I still don’t get it!

The next day was sightseeing and fondue lunch in Lucerne. At first we were soaking our bits of bread in the cheese mix and deciding that we didn’t very much like cheese fondue – it had a really strong wine after taste – who knew cheese fondue had wine it? Or were we just ingnorant. But then we decided to just dip it in a little bit it actually tasted good then. Some people bought Swiss Watches and stuff while we were in Lucerne, but that was a little out of my price range. I did buy a white Swiss Army Knife though, white being traditionally the colour that you could only get in Switzerland, Black for Europe and Red for the rest of the world. (Now of course you can get them in any colour, or pattern, anywhere.) And of course I also bought plenty of Swiss Chocolate!

Then on our way back up the mountain we stopped about 2/3rd of the way up to play in the snow! I of course had to try making a snow angel even though I’d been told, quite truthfully, that it just makes you cold.

And then we had lots of fun running, tripping, sliding and falling down the hill through the snow (the only way to stop once you started running was to fall over). Jen at one point was running down the hill and her shoe came off. Of course the snow had immediately caved back in over it and it was a fairly inconspicuous beige colour to begin with. Fortunately after only about 10 minutes of everyone being careful to make no new footprints, someone happened across it and it all ended happily. Lucky, otherwise she would have had to spend the rest of her time in the alps shoeless, least of all having to walk back up the hill with only a sock on.

On my way back up the hill I came across and icy spot that was too slippery for me to get up so I asked for a push from behind, but my friend decided she would be funny, get her camera ready, push me over and take a photo... it was pretty funny, if a little evil :p

Switzerland and the snow was probably my favourite part of the whole trip. It was beautiful and amazing!! The pictures don't do the views justice - it would take your breath away every time.

The next day it was out of Switzerland, through Lichtenstein (“ke-bab, ke-bab, ke-bab”... another inside joke, sorry - you can ask me for an explanation if you like because it has to be heard to be understood), and into Austria. This was Christmas eve, and even through we went to Christmas Markets (which were luckily open an hour longer than they were supposed to be so we got to see them) it didn’t feel like Christmas at all to me. Not really in a sad way – I was still having the time of my life, it just wasn’t anything like Christmas.)

That night we tried the apparently famous Farmer’s Schnapps or something – I think its just famous for being totally horrible and making you feel like you should stay away from naked flames for a while or you might be combustible. The favourite of the night was the Sperm shots of some milky schnapps stuff in giant sperm.

Jade, me and Barbara and some of our sperm collection.

And that’s up to day 6 – just 10 more to go!

Sorry to disappoint, but this is just a quick update to let you all know I haven't forgotten, but its just going to take me a while to get my Europe Trip up here! I have 1050 photos to sort through, and they'll be up on the google album soon, and when I find a significant enough block of time I will sit down and write up my travels. Don't hold your breath - I'm in the middle of exams (plus everything else I have to get organised before I leave - I have so much extra baggage now I'm pretty sure I'm going to have to ship some of it...) so it could be a while. I'll just say it was amazing and unforgettable. I saw all the things I've always seen in pictures, but now I was actually there. It was surreal! It was so fast it was a blur, and we kept asking each other - what day is it? where are we today? what did we do yesterday? I met some great people too, and it was a good taste tester of Europe that has just confirmed my conviction to come back as soon as I can and spend more significant time here. And I saw snow and stayed at the top of the Swiss Alps!! That has to be one of the biggest highlights of my trip!

I'll be back to tell you all about it in 2 weeks anyway!! (Back on the 25th - I plan to go straight to the beach!)

And last but not least, I promised an honourable mention to the two best downstairs flatmates ever - James and Don! Two great guys I went out with the night before I left for my Contiki trip. (I have them to thank for the early start to my sleep deprivation! :P) Love you guys!

And love all you people reading this too! I promise I'll update you properly soon.

hey everyone - please excuse my typing errors im on a weid computer. just wanted to lmet u all know im hacving and amzing time!! in switzerland in a hotel at the top of the alps - snow everywhere!!!!!!! its awesome.
will write more when i find a better computer, otherwise when i get home.
Merry Christmas!!! and haoppy new year!! hope evertyone is well!!!
all mt love
Jessie

http://www.oldaussierecipes.com/aussieslangandhumour.htm

I was worried a little bit about the Christmas holidays here, as everyone else is going home over the 4 week break and I was not looking forward to the prospect of being alone all that time.

So guess what I've decided to do for 2 out of those 4 weeks?? Well what else should I be doing while I'm here but travelling? I had thought about a Christmas tour of Scotland, but then I remembered there is this whole other continent not so far away and shouldn't I be going to see it!!

So I'm booking a contiki tour. (I've just sent off the first email and not sure how long the process takes so I hope it all goes to plan & I actually can go.)

And have a look at this itinerary!

Day 1: London to Amsterdam
Day 2: Amsterdam To Rhine Valley
Day 3: Rhine Valley to Munich
Day 4: Munich to Innsbruck:
Day 5: Innsbruck to Venice:
Day 6: Venice to Rome:
Day 7: Rome Sightseeing:
Day 8: Rome to Florence:
Day 9: Florence to Lucerne:
Day 10: Lucerne to Paris:
Day 11: Paris Sightseeing:
Day 12: Paris to London:

Aagh, somebody fan me I think i'm going to pass out with excitement!

And now I'm stressing, thinking about actually going on this trip. So much to organise... but it will be worth it!!!

And the money, oh the money. But again, worth it!

And now back down to earth... I'm off to the library to start writing an essay.

In answer to the question about where I found my quotes:

the quotes by particular people are from a great website - thinkexist.com - hundreds of quotes on everything.

The movie quotes are mostly from movies I've seen recently and you can find movie quotes on imdb.com

Oh my God, I'm getting pulled over. Everyone, just... pretend to be normal. ~ It is often said that before you die your life passes before your eyes. It is in fact true. It's called living. ~ The future's uncertain and the end is always near. ~ Sometimes the questions are complicated and the answers are simple. ~ If my answers frighten you then you should cease asking scary questions. ~ Have you ever been in love? Horrible isn't it? It makes you so vulnerable. It opens your chest and it opens up your heart and it means that someone can get inside you and mess you up. You build up all these defenses, you build up a whole suit of armor, so that nothing can hurt you, then one stupid person, no different from any other stupid person, wanders into your stupid life...You give them a piece of you. They didn't ask for it. They did something dumb one day, like kiss you or smile at you, and then your life isn't your own anymore. Love takes hostages. It gets inside you. It eats you out and leaves you crying in the darkness, so simple a phrase like 'maybe we should be just friends' turns into a glass splinter working its way into your heart. It hurts. Not just in the imagination. Not just in the mind. It's a soul-hurt, a real gets-inside-you-and-rips-you-apart pain. I hate love. ~ I wanna be with her more, I wanna be with her all the time, and I wanna tell her things I don't even tell you or mum. And I don't want her to have another boyfriend. I suppose if I could have all those things, I wouldn't really mind if I touched her or not. ~ I love you not only for what you are, but for what I am when I am with you. I love you not only for what you have made of yourself, but for what you are making of me. I love you for the part of me that you bring out. ~ For it was not into my ear you whispered, but into my heart. It was not my lips you kissed, but my soul. ~ You know that when I hate you, it is because I love you to a point of passion that unhinges my soul. ~ Oh, please, just shut up. You're wounding my soul. ~ The reason people find it so hard to be happy is that they always see the past better than it was, the present worse than it is, and the future less resolved than it will be. ~ One of the hardest things in life is having words in your heart that you can't utter. ~ Maybe, maybe not. Maybe f**k yourself.

Quotes in order of appearance:

(Little Miss Sunshine)(Terry Pratchett) (Jim Morrison) ( Dr. Seuss) (Pulp Fiction) (Neil Gaiman) (About a Boy) (Roy Croft) (Judy Garland) (Julie de Lespinasse) (About a Boy) (Marcel Pagnol) (James Earl Jones) (The Departed)

I finally found out a few weeks ago that I've been accepted into the study abroad program!!!

So I'll be leaving for England on the 10th of September and returning by the 25th of January (just in time for Australia Day!)

I'll be a bit sad to leave and miss things like Emy's 21st and Christmas and New Years, but I'm sure this will be an unforgettable experience and when I get back I'll party with everyone to make up for it, I promise!

I've already bought my plane ticket, and my travel insurance, and bought a warm coat, and written multiple checklists so I don't forget anything. Now I've been looking into other travel I can do while I'm there - so far I'm hoping to visit:

• London (of course)
  
• Edinburgh, Loch Ness and other places in Scotland
  
• Stonehenge
  
• Bath
  
• Stratford-Upon-Avon (Shakespeares home)
  
• York - not far from Leeds and the "Viking Centre"
  
• as many castles and old building as I can find
  

Any suggestions on places to vist and hints and tips welcome

That's it for now, I'll keep you updated!

I know, I know, it's a little premature...

I just put in my Study Abroad application today so I don't know if I'm going yet or not, but I'm already so excited! (Trying to keep a level head in case it falls through, but its not working

If all goes well (fingers crossed) I'll be leaving mid-September to study for semester at the University of Leeds in England, returning late January.

Here's a map of North West England showing the location of Leeds.