So my two Brothers, my Dad and I headed upto Edinburgh on Tuesday on a fairly pleasant and quick enough drive up. We were staying in the Smart City Hostel just off Cowgate in the centre of Edinburgh. Having spent plenty of time in hostels recently I saw no reason to stay in a hotel, especially as we had an entire room to ourselves. The hostel itself was nice enough, perhaps the cleanest hostel I’ve stayed in and had a very nice bar and common area. However the windows didn’t keep the noise from late night drinkers out too well and earplugs would have been useful! Also the place seemed to be hosting an entire school of 15 year old Italian kids and the place lacked the hostel atmosphere really, there was very few other travellers around to talk too and no tours run by the hostel, which are always a good way to meet others staying in the hostel. It was a nice enough hostel, but if someone were travelling alone I wouldn’t recommend it.

After arriving late Tuesday afternoon we spent the evening walking around the most of Edinburgh, we ended up eating dinner at some pub on Grassmarket which was nice enough, followed by a walk around the the foot of the hill Edinburgh Castle is situated on and then heading up Carlton Hill for some rather nice views of the two as the sun was slowly setting.

Early on Wednesday morning we headed out for St Andrews and the Golf. I must admit I’m very much a fair weather golf fan and the weather forecast for Wednesday and Thursday was not good at all. After getting out of the hostel by 8am we stopped in Kirkcaldy for some breakfast. The weather was really rough at this time with heavy rain and winds, despite reminding myself on facebook to pack a warm hat I had managed to forget so I ended up having to find one for a rather inflated price in Kirkcaldy! We drove into St Andrews from here but found it difficult to find anywhere to park. We ended up going past the course and parking just out of town, the traffic queues looked really bad and this was just for the practice day. The reason we were specifically going on the practice day was that there was a special tournament on at the end of the day with many past champions taking part so we could go see this as well as some people practising earlier. However the weather meant no one was really out playing, so we headed to the Golf Museum which free admission into was included with the ticket. Then we headed out to get a warm drink before heading back to the course expecting this tournament to start fairly soon as the weather had cleared up somewhat. In the end they announced they’d cancelled the tournament, basically meaning we saw about 5 minutes of golf practice for over £20 – on a student entrance, and £40 for my Dad! Bit of a waste of cash, and we will be writing in for a refund!

On Thursday Dad and Thomas went for the first championship day at The Open and with a really early start. Kyle and I weren’t too bothered about it with the weather forecast similarly poor and the draconian no camera rules they have for some bizarre reason, so we spent a day in Edinburgh. Turns out the weather was quite alright in St Andrews, however that’s not to say we didn’t have a good day in Edinburgh. We spent the majority of the day in The National Museum of Scotland, which was rather huge and spans everything about Scotland since 600 million years ago, when it was near the south pole right upto modern social issues etc! It took us a good 3 hours to go through and we were skipping quite a lot of the less interesting features too. After heading back to the hostel for some food after the museum we bumped into a few people who mentioned a pub crawl that was going on, so we said we’d go. Except by the time we got there it had already left! So we just spent the time in a few bars playing pool and table football. I won both if I remember right Although Kyle did beat me at Blackjack when I was the dealer!

So that’s all for now – not the most interesting trip I’ve had recently, but it’s always good to get away from home especially when you work from home too! Hopefully my next entry will be about somewhere a little further ashore. I do have some rather ambitious travelling plans for this coming winter, hopefully I can make them materialize.

Itinerary

1. Manchester Airport 27th June 2009:
Take off early on Saturday morning heading for the US of A!

2. Frankfurt Airport 27th June 2009:
A short stop was required in Frankfurt before a flight on to San Fran!

3. San Francisco Airport 27th June 2009:
I arrived late afternoon in San Francisco

4. San Francisco 28th June 2009:
My 2 week Suntrek Trip California Dreamin’ started early on Sunday morning.

5. Monterrey 28th June 2009:
After some sight seeing in San Fran our first stop was Monterrey.

6. Big Sur 28th June 2009:
Our first night was spent in Big Sur where far too much alcohol was consumed!

7. Santa Barbara 29th June 2009:
Next day we visited the picturesque ocean front town of Santa Barbara.

8. Malibu Creek 29th June 2009:
The night was spent at a campsite in Malibue Creek

9. Santa Monica 30th June 2009:
A few of went around Santa Monica and a beach front bike ride whilst others went to Universal Studios

10. Holywood, LA 30th June 2009:
A few days after Michael Jackson’s death there was an eery silence at his HoF star.

11. San Diego Beach 1st July 2009:
Another day on the beach ensued in San Diego, I managed to get myself hideously sunburnt!

12. San Diego 1st July 2009:
A baseball game was the name of the evening in San Diego.

13. Joshua Tree NP 2nd July 2009:
A change of scenery next in Joshua Tree NP.

14. Lake Havasu 2nd July 2009:
The night was spent at Lake Havasu which was unplesantly hot!

15. Grand Canyon 3rd July 2009:
A visit to Grand Canyon was next up, the size is difficult to comprehend!

16. Las Vegas 4th July 2009:
Vegas for a few days starting on Independence Day! Much alcohol was consumed!

17. Death Valley 7th July 2009:
The extreme heats and wilderness of Death Valley was quite a shock after several days in Vegas!

18. Yosemite NP 8th July 2009:
The stunning beauty of Yosemite NP was up next!

19. Petaluma 10th July 2009:
The last night together as a group was spent in the company of too much alcohol (again).

20. San Francisco 11th July 2009:
Several days were spent exploring San Fran as one by one members of the suntrek group left.

21. Reno 14th July 2009:
I travelled to Reno to meet Danny, an old friend from a summer camp I worked at a few years back.

22. Lake Tahoe 15th July 2009:
We drove back to Davis where his parents live the next day and stopped at Lake Tahoe

23. Davis 15th July 2009:
A brief stop was had in Davis where we met up with a few of Danny’s friends.

24. Sacramento 16th July 2009:
The day was spent around Sacramento and I got to see the door to Mr Schwarzenegger’s office.

25. Portland 16th July 2009:
A short flight was taken to the Oregon city of Portland

26. Portland Gigs 17th July 2009:
Two days were spent just out of town seeing Death Cab for Cutie and The Decemberists.

27. Portland International Raceway 19th July 2009:
A trip was taken to PIR to see some Nascar action.

28. Portland 20th July 2009:
Several days were spent in the Northwest Hostel meeting various people from all over.

29. Victoria 24th July 2009:
Next I headed up to Victoria, Canada to meet my Uncle Glenn, where a weekend was spent including taking part in a tennis tournament!

30. Seattle 28th July 2009:
I headed back down to USA and to Seattle for a week.

31. Snoquailme Falls 29th July 2009:
The hostel put on a really nice trip to Snoquailme Falls which made a change to get out of the city.

32. Seattle 30th July 2009:
Several days were spent exploring the city and on hostel run nights out!

33. Mt Rainier 5th August 2009:
I went on a day trip to Mt Rainier which was once again a cool break from the city.

34. Vancouver Jericho Park 6th August 2009:
A few days were spent in the hostel just out of town from Vancouver, events included running in the Ocean at midnight and beach fires!

35. Vancouver Downtown 9th August 2009:
A fun filled week was spent in the downtown hostel in Vancouver, with the hostel putting on many events it had a party atmosphere!

36. Lynn Canyon 11th August 2009:
Erik’s trip to Lynn Canyon was the name of the game on Tuesday. The guy is a legend!

37. Capilano Suspension Bridge 14th August 2009:
Erik’s other trip to Capilano Suspension Bridge mixing in visiting random parts of the city with some random countryside!

38. Kings of Leon Gig 15th August 2009:
Impromptu gig I ended up going to! I wasn’t going until new tickets were added that morning. And that was only part of a very eventful day!

39. Clearwater Town 16th August 2009:
My second suntrek trip – a 3 week tour around the Rockies and Vancouver Island started with a stop in Clearwater

40. Clearwater Lake Canoe Trip 17th August 2009:
The first two days were spent on a spectacular canoe trip up Clearwater Lake

41. Mt Robson 19th August 2009:
On our way to Jasper there was a mass dive into an icey cold lake at the foothills of Mt Robson.

42. Jasper 20th August 2009:
A few days were spent in Jasper.

43. Columbia Icefields 22nd August 2009:
A visit to the Columbia Icefields meant a hike up the fast receeding glacier.

44. Banff:
22nd August 2009:
Banff meant heading out on Saturday night as well as seeing the other local sites.

45. Lake Louise 25th August 2009:
On a day of many lakes we went to Lake Louise…

46. Moraine Lake 25th August 2009:
And Moraine Lake…

47. Ermerald Lake 25th August 2009:
And Emerarld Lake!

48. Golden 26th August 2009:
A day was spent in Golden whilst others when White Water Rafting, it’s a place of too many mosquitos!

49. Kamloops 27th August 2009:
A stop was taken in Kamloops on our way to Vancouver Island.

50. Whistler 28th August 2009:
A brief stop/drive thru was had at whistler, we were meant to have lunch there but failed to find anywhere!

51. Port Alberini 28th August 2009:
After crossing over the river we spent the evening in Port Alberini.

52. Tofino 29th August 2009:
We spent several days on the Pacific seafront at the beautiful Tofino

53. Victoria 1st September 2009:
We spent a few days in Victoria the capital of BC.

54. Vancouver Campsite 3rd September 2009:
Arrival back in Vancouver, I ended up meeting up with some old friends from before the suntrek trip.

55. Vancouver 5th September 2009:
My last few days were spent meeting up with my second cousin pulling an all nighter before starting the trip home.

56. Vancouver Airport 6th September 2009:
Early on Monday morning having not slept for about 20 hours I started the trip home.

57. Los Angeles Airport 6th September 2009:
I had to stop off at LA Airport on the way.

58. Heathrow Airport 7th September 2009:
A long flight later I was back on UK soil, they made me check in my duty free alcohol as extra baggage though!

59. Manchester Airport 7th September 2009:
I arrive home some 2 and half months after I left. It all went so quick!

1. Secret Machines – Lightning Blue Eyes

So the first song is from the Secret Machines who I saw live way back in February at the Ruby Lounge in Manchester. They played a quite amazing set produce the most sound out of the amps in the Ruby Lounge I’ve heard before. However I still maintain that the lead guitar was nowhere near loud enough! My song choice is quite predictable really, in the hit from their 2006 album Ten Silver Drops, Lightning Blue Eyes. Unfortunately I didn’t take my camera to this gig so no actual pictures or videos from me, and the Music Video for this song now appears to be blocked in the UK, so this live version from LA in 2008 that I found on youtube shall have to do!

2. AC Newman – Submarines of Stockholm

Gigs wise the start of 2009 was quite slow and it was May before I went to another gig. A.C. Newman is a member of Canadian band The New Pornographers, and in January he released his second solo album entitled ‘Get Guilty’. He came on a short UK tour and Alex, James and myself attended. Somehow he managed to pick the worst venue in the whole of Manchester playing at Retro Bar on the 20th May. The place stank like it had been flooded and was really very vile. However with cheap whisky and coke on offer the venue was just about bareable, and in the end he played a great gig anyway. Now by this time I had already booked tickets to spend the summer travelling in North America, and had also paid for gig tickets to go see Death Cab for Cutie with The New Pornographers supporting them. So after the gig in my slightly drunken state I complemented him on the great gig and asked if there was any chance of any after party etc in the Portland gig later that year. He didn’t even figure I was talking about Oregon USA to begin with! Needless to say he didn’t offer anything – but well if you don’t ask you don’t get! My song choice here is Submarines of Stockholm. Why? Because it’s a nice catchy song and I went to Stockholm in December so it ties in nicely! Once again no camera so video from another gig off youtube shall do!

3. Fox Force Five – Maryland

Okay so when I said I’d only been to one gig in the first few months of 2009 that was a little bit of a lie, my mate, Dom Farrell is a member of a band called Fox Force Five and I must goto something like 10 or 12 of their gigs a year. They played a few really good gigs this year including The Roudhouse in February, two gigs at Dry Bar in May and one in October as well as headlining Academy 3 once again in September. My choice comes from their first gig at Dry Bar at the start of the Hungry Pigeon Festival back at the start of Whit Weekend in May. My choice is a song called Maryland which they debuted this year. Its quite easily the best song they’ve produced yet, there isn’t a video of it anywhere, however you can listen to it and download it for free on their myspace page here

4. Manic Street Preachers – Marlon JD

The Manic Street Preachers returned with one of their best albums in a long time. Entitled, ‘The Daily Mail’… err I mean ‘Journal for Plague Lovers’, it is made up of a collection of lyrics written by Richey Edwards who went missing nearly 15 years ago now. I turned up at a gig Dom was playing in Chorlton back in March and played him a radio rip of the first song of the album ‘Peeled Apples’ which contains quite possibly the badest bass line I’ve ever heard at the start, not sure if it was the radio quality or not but in the album version it’s not quite the same! Anyway on the back of that playing I managed to convince Dom to come with us to Wales to go see them play at the end of May! So Alex, Dom and myself ended up heading down to Wales on the Monday after a heavy weekend with the above mentioned Hungry Pigeon Festival! (Incidently we were meant to go to London for the day on the Saturday of that weekend but that ended up getting cancelled due to unforeseen circumstances…). So we spent a few days in Llandudno doing nothing much more than playing Crazy Golf on the top of the Great Orm and drinking in Llandudno bars, and being slightly amazed at how dead the place was in the evening! The gig itself was brilliant with the crowd well up for it, they played the entire Journal for Plague Lovers in it’s entirety followed by a mini best of set. They were there usual dedicated selves playing for over two hours, and as it turned out Nicky Wire played through some really bad back pains. On the right hand listen to Marlon JD, my favourite song from the new album.

5. The Beatles – Here Comes the Sun

During the start of 2009 I became a bit disillusioned with work and decided to just change everything. By the end of May I’d handed in my notice in a work and was booked to goto the West Coast of North America for two and a half months travelling! I spent my time on a mixture of organized camping trips and staying in hostels whilst making my own way about. My first trip was the California Dreaming camping trip starting in San Francisco visting LA, San Diego, Grand Canyon, Las Vegas and Yosemite National Park before heading back to San Fran. The trip covered a lot of ground and as such there was a lot of music played in the van with some very long days on the road. I managed to introduce people to the wonderful Frank Turner who went down really well, and Laura managed to have people laughing for a while with Richard Cheese and his covers of famous songs changing a few choice words! However the song that I remember being whistled a lot was Here Comes the Sun by The Beatles. Why? I’m not really sure.

6. The New Pornographers – Go Places

After finishing my California trip I took a week to head upto Portland Oregon. Here I had tickets to go see two gigs on consecutive days. First up was The New Pornographers supporting Death Cab for Cutie. The New Pornographers are one of my favourite bands and I’ve seen them previously in Manchester back in 2008. The gig itself was somewhat out of the way and I was booked into a pretty run down Travel lodge which stank of smoke. However the gigs themselves were pretty great really. Apart from the fact they finished so early! I found myself missing the start of the New Pornographers set who were on by 7pm, and I completely missed Blind Pilot who I quite like! My song choice here is pretty self explanatory, and is off their last album ‘Challengers’. I did take my camera to this gig however didn’t take any videos of the New Ps, however there are a few pictures below!

7. Death Cab for Cutie – I Will Follow You into the Dark

I actually booked tickets for this gig soley on the fact the New Pornographers were playing, and I knew very little about Death Cab, however after listening to them for a while I quite got into there last few albums, and was very pleased to be going to see them. Although I didn’t appreciate the Coldplay comparison that some random person next to me made to me, especially as Coldplay are one of the most bland boring band in the world, a title closely fought out with Snow Patrol! Anyhow they played a pretty good set, although the sound wasn’t really loud enough in my opinion and they were finished by like 9.30pm! Pretty bad restrictions for a Friday night concert really. My song choice is the rather brilliantly acoustically played I Will Follow You into the Dark, from their 2005 album Plans. This time I actually took the video and here are some photos of the gig too. The venue was really very nice place to have a gig, and quite an intimate small outdoor venue, this type of place seems to be quite popular in the USA actually.

8. The Decemberists – The Wanting Comes in Waves

The real reason I was quite happy to goto the gig the previous night was that on the Saturday night The Decemberists were playing at their same venue, in their home town, and their album they released this year, ‘The Hazards of Love’ is my favourite of the year. During the gig they played the entire of ‘The Hazards of Love’ which is kind of a Rock Opera, which sounds bad but is pulled of perfectly from start to finish, before finishing with a set of classics, including songs from their first ever EP. I’m pretty certain the music was louder than the night before and they played later than 9.30pm too! All in all it was an awesome gig, probably my favourite of the year. My song choice is ‘The Wanting Comes in Waves’ with the stunning vocals of Shara Worden really helping to make this song as great as it is!

9. Kings of Leon – Sex on Fire

I found out that the Kings of Leon were playing on my last night in Vancouver back when I was in Portland a few weeks earlier. However when I checked there were only a few seating tickets left, and I didn’t really fancy going sat down on my own, would quite happily jump around at the front on my own mind. When I checked ebay etc there was nothing really there. I thought little of it until I got to Vancouver and met Amanda who was talking about going to the gig on the Sunday as there was still tickets left at Ticketmaster. Saturday had already sold out by this point. Anyway, I said i’d try get tickets for the Saturday and then we could both go if possible – this was on the Wednesday before the gig. I kept a regular eye on craigslist trying to get tickets however by Friday evening I hadn’t had any luck. I had managed to loose my phone on that Thursday – the only method I had of telling the time, and after a great night out on Friday, where they did play Kings of Leon I found myself on Saturday morning waking up in my hostel room, with no one else in the room and it bright sunshine outside. I just presumed that it must be quite late. I got up etc, to find out it was only 9am – I only went to bed at like 3am! Anyway I was to be rewarded when I found out Ticketmaster put ‘limited viewing’ tickets for sale that morning! I slightly debated before grabbing them. They were limited in the sense you could only see side on, but overall we had a great view and it was an awesome gig to top of probably the best week of my travelling that summer I reckon. Where loads of things went wrong, but somehow they just got fixed, I met loads of relatives as well as loads of great people in the hostel and well Vancouver is easily one of the best cities in the world! Anyway here’s my video quite predictably Sex On Fire, which had been played to death in the run up to the gig in various bars etc!

10. Johnny Cash – Ring of Fire

After the Kings of Leon gig, I ended up at a nightclub to meet my Mum’s Cousin. As a result I didn’t gett to bed till like 3am, and the next morning I had an 8am my second camping trip, that would bring to a close my travelling that summer. It was a 3 week trip around the Rockies and out onto Vancouver Island. Which meant even more time in the car listening to songs! There were a few bands getting particular attention, including Kings of Leon, The Beatles, Oasis the day after they broke up. My attempts to get others to listen to Frank Turner didn’t seem to go down quite as well as in the other the other group, although looking at the differences in the groups that really wasn’t a great surprise. However the most popular choice of music for me and a few others was undoubtedly Johnny Cash. The Ring of Fire being the particular song most played – or well sung or hummed by those in the van the most and you can find a video on the right hand side. And whoever it was that said Hurt is horrible was just plain wrong.

11. Slow Club – Christmas TV

One of the first gigs I went to after arriving back in Manchester was Slow Club’s gig at Moho Live in early October. They played a brilliant set and they are one of my favourite new bands from 2009. After finishing the set they decided to continue the gig, in the car park playing an acoustic version of Christmas TV. Thanks go to James for recording this one, as I had just grabbed all my bags from the cloakroom on the way out and was struggling to get them all sorted!

12. Frank Turner – The Road

This year Frank Turner released his third album, ‘Poetry of the Deed’. After two stunning albums expectations were high for a brilliant album, and whilst it wasn’t quite that great, it was still very very very good. During my travels I’m quite pleased I managed to get a few people into Frank. There’s a few songs in contention to be shown here, ‘Journey of the Magi’ is probably my favourite song of his new album and when we went to see him play a packed crowd at Academy 2 in October that was one of his best performances of the night, where as usual the entire crowd was bouncing along. However my song choice simply has to be The Road, a song which whenever I hear it I only wish I was still travelling.

13. Brendan Benson – Garbage Day

Brendan Benson who has worked with Jack White in the Raconteurs, and often referred to as ‘the guy from the raconteurs’, which I’m sure he really loves, is someone I’ve wanted to see live for a long time. This year he came out with his fourth solo album, those four albums have taken some 13 years to be released! The album is quite good in places but at the same time has some lacklustre songs unfortunately though. However when the opportunity to see him live came up I snapped up the chance and Alex, Dom, Ryan and myself ended up seeing him play a quite stunning set at Academy 3 in October. Song choice? Well there’s quite a few choices to use, Folk Singer from his second album ‘Lapalco’ was played brilliantly, as was his set ending ‘I Feel Like Taking You Home’, however after seeing this acoustic version of Garbage Day on youtube there could only be one winner really. Side note, you can see Robert Kubica playing the drums in his band in the pictures!

14. Alberta Cross – ATX

So now we’re up to my penultimate song choice. And it goes to Swedish come American rockers Alberta Cross, who released the debut album, ‘The Broken Side of Time’ this year. I quite liked them before I went to see them play the Ruby Lounge in November, however after seeing them live I like them so much more. They played a storming set, with only two minor flaws, it wasn’t as loud as the Secret Machines back in May and they finished for an encore with ATX… ATX is probably their best song and well there was just simply no way they could follow that up after that! I would definitely go see them next time they tour, however it would be nice if he stopped dressing like Kurt Cobain!

15. The Pains of Being Pure at Heart – Young Adult Friction

The final gig of the year came at the start of December when I went to see ‘The Pains of Being Pure at Heart’ at Manchester Academy 2. I’m not too keen on the name of the band but they make bloody good pop rock music. We headed upto the gig, and managed to catch the end of a support act, and then were a little unsure if the next band was The Pains of Being Pure or not, it’s a good job they weren’t cause they were terrible. Although it later emerged that they share a common guitarist amongst the group. When they did start their set the whole place went mad. I wasn’t expecting to be moshing about but I bloody well ended up doing so! An absolutely brilliant gig! My song choice in ‘Young Adult Friction’, but in truth it could be anyone of about 10 songs there’s not much to choose between them.

Well that pretty much wraps up my playlist. I have to give honourable shouts out to both Becca Williams and Gideon Conn who played great gigs through out the year in Manchester. You can listen to the playlist on spotify if you are from one of the countries that it is supported by clicking on this link. I had to swap out a few songs which weren’t available though. I swapped out AC Newman and Fox Force Five for alternate songs and The Beatles don’t allow their songs anywhere online, so you’ll have to make do with a live cover from Belle and Sebastian, which is in no way a bad thing anyhow.

You can view all of my pictures from this trip either on facebook here.

Or alternatively you can download them all from here

Wednesday morning I got up early expecting to have to check out by 10am, appears no one really checks and I could have easily stayed in bed for an extra hour or so. I found out Jamie had actually managed to make it back to the hostel tonight and had actually had quite a fun night! Anyway by the time we were all sorted and we’d grabbed some food it was time for me to head on home. Jamie had to catch a later flight which involved an overnight wait in Düsseldorf airport. My flight was going back to Amsterdam before catching another flight on to Manchester. However before I went back to the airport I gave one final check to our snow/rock man in the nearby park. Someone had cruelly decapitated it!

The flight to Amsterdam went with out any problems, and I got myself to the Manchester flight gate easily. Then they proceeded to run security checks at the gate for everyone on the flight, this meant it took us a good 45 minutes to get everyone through the gate. Apparently the plane wasnt ready until about 10 minutes before everyone got through either. Then the plane had to be de-iced, we were running a good half hour late by this time. But we took off anyhow. About 30 minutes into the flight my ears start popping as though we’re changing altitude. A few moments later the pilot says Manchester Airport is closed due to a snow storm, as is Birmingham, East Midlands etc and that we’re heading back to Amsterdam.

We get back to Amsterdam and the airport is pretty much closed, as in there are no staff around generally. We’re given vouchers to stay at a hotel overnight and told to come back at 7am to get yourself booked on a flight. I considered staying in the airport bar and just waiting for the morning there, but I ended up going back to the hotel. I got checked into my room, threw my bag down and hit the bar straight away. 6 beers later and chatting to various other people in the bar from Manchester, as well as a random Aussie who turned up, I’m rushing around to go back to the airport. The first shuttle bus was at 4.30am and I had decided to just grab that and get there as early as possible to get myself booked onto a flight. I had heard that others had phoned up already and got themselves onto flights. After a short wait the KLM desk opened at 5.30am, I was booked onto a 1pm flight to Bradford-Leeds apparently. A load of other people were on an earlier flight. I was shattered, I grabbed some breakfast with a voucher they had given me and then went through security and closed my eyes inside the airport for a few hours. I’d met a couple of other people there and they were on the 9am flight to Bradford.

It turns out that their flight had actually been diverted to Liverpool as Bradford was closed, and our flight was cancelled but they didnt tell us until 15 minutes before it was due to be boarding. Cue some confusion and panic whilst they figure out what to do and the possibility of spending Christmas in Amsterdam was looming rather large. They flight company come back 10 minutes later and tell us all that we’re going to get put on a flight to Heathrow and there will then be ground transport upto Bradford. I explain that there are some of us who should be going to Manchester, as that’s where we were originally going, but the flight attendant doesn’t really understand what I’m asking.

Anyway we all queue up to get tickets, and it’s taking a bit of time. Then this one, slightly drunk and very rude man just jumps the entire queue, and then when he gets to the desk starts mouthing off to the attendants who are just trying to sort everything out as best as they can. I politely ask him to calm down and get his ticket so we can all go through. He squares upto me and asks me if I want to take it outside. A little shocked at just how much of a complete wanker this guy is, I just tell him to go get his ticket so we can all get home as quick as possible, this doesnt seem to sink into the idiot though. Anyway, he eventually goes back just as two security guards appear. I go grab my ticket from a desk away from where he’s getting his, and make my way upstairs to clarify how to get home after I get off in London. I’m assured there will be some way for some of us to get to Manchester.

Boarding for the Heathrow flight takes it’s time but we eventually get on. I’m right on the back row and as I get there the idiot from above is sat next to my seat, I’m thinking this just can’t be. Turns out he was sat on the wrong side, couldn’t even read his ticket. So he’s still on the same row as me, just opposite side of the plane. The plane takes off and there’s a very friendly South African woman sat next to me who makes the whole flight a lot easier and we have a good laugh. At the same time the guy on the opposite side continues to be rude to the flight staff. When they refuse to give him a second beer he squares upto the attendant and has a very rude conversation with him, swearing at him repeatedly. Eventually he sits down.

We arrive in Heathrow and of course the police board the plane and take him away. I approached one of the attendants and explain what happened back in the Amsterdam, they ask me to tell this to the Police. It was explained that due to it being on foreign soil nothing would in reality happen, however they take my details and I say I’d be happy to give a statement should they ever need me too.

Putting all this behind me I head on down to baggage collection, where of course my bag isn’t there. I file a missing report, and then it takes the KLM representative almost half an hour to sort out our transport home. The majority of people just went to Leeds/Bradford on two buses, and there was only 4 of us going to Manchester. They basically put on a taxi who drove rather fast and got us back to Manchester Airport in 3 hours. I eventually got home at 10pm on Christmas Eve. A cool 23 hours after I was meant too. But I was just very pleased to have got home safe and for Christmas. I still haven’t got my luggage back and several attempts to get through on the phone have failed. Some people reckoned that the luggage was going to be sent to Manchester Airport on a Christmas Morning flight. Hopefully I’ll get it back, it doesn’t have anything particularly valuable in there, just some very nice T-Shirts that I bought whilst travelling in the past and mean quite a lot to me, as well as everyone’s Christmas presents.

So before we had even left Manchester I had got us booked onto this Viking Sauna Tour. The basic premise is the hostel runs a tour which takes a bunch of us out to this private sauna out in the countryside. Here we get into a 80c+ Sauna and then when it gets too hot run outside and get into a freezing cold lake, then out again and back into the Sauna…. Crazy eh?

The day started early and despite a relatively early night – 2am, I felt rather rough. We met up at 10am in the reception and headed out. We were greeted by a quite beautiful dawn in Stockholm with the lighting quite stunning. However it was really rather cold – and I was shivering already! It was the standing around waiting for buses that was killing me, if we had been moving all the time I think I’d have been okay. We eventually get to where we were going, and were greeted by a 15 to 20 minute walk through the countryside. It was amazingly beautiful here. The way the snow glistened in the low sunlight, it was almost worth the trip for that alone in truth.

Once we arrived at the Sauna, we ate lunch outside whilst the Sauna started to warmup. Jamie had found his shoes woefully inadequate for the weather and his feet were freezing so he just headed on inside, and then managed to fall onto the hot pipe in the Sauna, luckily he only slightly burned his hand, having very nearly going face first into it! Soon enough we all headed in to the Sauna anyhow, I could manage the heat quite okay at first, but as the temperature crept up I found it quite difficult to breath – as I have difficulties breathing through my mouth, i.e. I have to basically think about it all the time to do it! Other people got up the guts to go into the water. The lake had originally been frozen over and we have to hack a hole in the water to get in! As some may know I can’t actually swim. Well I can about 5m, but I wasn’t very confident if I slipped in ice cold water I’d be able to get out again! So I was understandably nervous about getting in the water! However I did eventually pluck up the courage to get in. We had to climb down this tiny little ladder and it was really slippy, and I didn’t dare put my head under. To be honest it wasn’t too bad the first time. I did quickly run back into the Sauna though – and grabbed my beer, which I had been told I couldn’t have until I’d been in the water! Wrong way round if you ask me, I might have gone in quicker if I’d had that first! I went in one more time, but I had been struggling with the heat of the sauna and hadn’t spent quite so long in there this time and it was really really cold this time, I didn’t get very far in before I went back inside. I struggled to stay in the Sauna after that, having to put a towel over my head in the end so that it’d keep the temperature down a little close to my face. Doing that I could stay in quite a bit longer.

At the end the temperature in the Sauna hit a lofty 95c, outside it was apparently as low as -10c at times, and the water was 1 or 2c at best! I don’t think we could have asked for a bigger range in temperatures! We headed back to the hostel after this, even by 2.30pm it was getting really dark outside.

Once we got back to the hostel, I was a little boring and just spent the rest of the evening chatting to a few people in the hostel with a few drinks. The place didn’t quite have the same atmosphere as the nights before, and there was visibly less people about. I should have probably gone out with the others when they headed out at about 11pm, however I was absolutely shattered so just enjoyed my last few beers in the hostel instead.

The next two days were spent partying in the hostel for the most part rather than going out after spending a small fortune on alcohol in bars. Sunday I went and did some grocery shopping with the intention of making Curry in the hostel that evening, but that didn’t materialise. After I got back I met an Aussie girl called Angela, a Mexican chap called Pablo and the Brazilian guys who I’d only met drunk before! We headed on down towards Djurgarden with the intention of seeing some Winter Solstice festival thing that was on that weekend. Jamie came along too despite feeling rather rough after last nights antics!

It took us quite a while to get there, but we had a good chat on the way. I managed to get us there in the end, despite everyone thinking we were lost, to be fair it was quite a walk! We eventually found the required ferry. However Pablo pressed the wrong button and ordered the wrong ferry. Yeah they have ‘order a ferry’ service here. The guy looked a bit miffed when no one got on! We eventually got on the right ferry and headed over to Djurgarden and to this festival thing only to find the place was closing! Rather annoying. So we just caught the ferry back to old town and got dinner at the first place we saw in the end! The brazilians decided they didn’t fancy dinner and left us to it, leaving Me, Jamie, Angela and Pablo. It was a bit pricey, but I did get the biggest burger I’ve seen, must have been nearly 1 pound of meat! Was quite a struggle to eat actually, but I got there in the end!

We headed back to the hostel next, but had to drink rather crap beer as the liquor store was closed, and other places only sell 3.5% beer, which is well, pretty much water! We played a bunch of card games and our group expanded quickly. Starting off with cheat, then heading onto Uno and then Kings. Half way through we went out to get more beer after running out. On the way back we decided to build a snowman. However the snow in Stockholm is really light and fluffy and just doesn’t stick together. So we had to basically make a rather small rock snowman!

It was all a good laugh, then around midnight on a Sunday night a bunch of people decided they wanted to go out! A little late I thought, and unsure if anywhere would actually be open, I headed out anyway. There was pretty much the same group as earlier going out plus a few others including Patrick (German), oh and Jamie stayed in feeling bad from last night. As you may have noticed, we kind of just knew people from their nationality! First we walked past some random bar which was open, so I asked if we could go in. The guy was a bit wierd with me, said it was a private Turkish function and we’d need to pay 150 kronas (just under £15). We nearly went in, but I decided that we shouldn’t. It looked a bit crap tbh, and people there would only be like what are you doing here? And the guy had been quite rude tbh.

We walked on further and eventually found a place that someone at the hostel had pointed out too us. We ended up splitting 3 bottles of wine between us and it was all good fun. We sat outside with big huge heaters about. Made a fun difference! Angela called over a couple of Swedish girls who ended leading us over town in the hope of takeaway food, only for the place to be closed, annoying! It was bitterly cold that night, and we had quite a walk back. After eventually finding a kebab shop still open we made it back.

Monday was spent buying Christmas presents for the family. However my baggage was lost, so I can’t go into much detail about that, as people still haven’t received them! What we did do though today was cook the curry we were going to have yesterday and then goto the Liquor store and buy sufficient beer!

More card playing was had then, however we basically had no-one we knew from the night before! Angela and Pablo had both left to get to go elsewhere, and there wasn’t really anyone else about who we recognized. That was quite a familiar thing in the hostel really. We eventually managed to get a decent sized group joined by a few German chaps (one called Phillip) and American girl Melissa, and a German and Austrian couple (Mara and Christof) – who I’d actually met in the TV Room a couple of nights earlier. The names I remember are squarely dependent on adding them on Facebook! Unfortunately we had no Uno cards tonight so it was just Cheat we really played. Although we did try and play chase the mystery card, but it was decided it was too quiet a game and stifled conversation!

Eventually we found our game completely taken over by a bunch of rowdy French travellers! It’s amazing how much noise we make, we had actually moved into another room cause they were so loud!

During this time Jamie found some other american girls (Amy & Sarah) who were going on the Sauna trip with us tomorrow. He felt they rather picked on him after moving the chair from underneath him as he was sitting down. I’d say that’s rather amusing! Eventually we called it a night, with an early start for the Sauna trip the next day. Early meaning 2am of course.

Old Town was pretty cool and the streets were really rather narrow. Then we took the ferry over to Djurgarden which was a bit wierd. There was a Theme Park there which was closed during the winter, and at times the place was pretty much silent. Next we hit the VasaMuset. This is a Museum which contains an old wartime ship which sank in the waterway around Stockholm in the 1600s and was raised in the 1960s. It was pretty impressive really, helped by the fact we managed to get in for under £5 thanks to Student Discount!

Next we headed over too the Biology Museum which Jamie wanted to see (with out really knowing anything about it). It was terrible, basically just a bunch of stuffed birds in a few rooms. How they make money I don’t know. Gullible tourists like us I guess.

We walked back towards the main city centre area next. Jamie kinda gave us a bad name, by throwing a snow ball at a signpost, thinking it’d just part and not make much noise. However he had picked up quite an icy snowball, which made a huge noise and gave us some dodgy looks from the locals!

We found our way to a pub and had a pint there before heading onto get some food at a restaurant. It was a reasonably priced Italian which was maybe perhaps not such great quality. Especially as I got my Lasagne with in 10 minutes :/ Microwave Job then I guess! We then got a little confused with the bill – It said 25% on it, we thought that meant tip. The waiter gave us a funny look when taking the cash, so we gave him a little extra cash later after checking the Swedish dictionary for every word on the bill and finding out it meant tax!

We headed on back to the hostel where we had a few drinks and talked to a bunch of people, there was a couple of Aussie Guys, the Brazilian chaps from last night were about and some German Girls, who were making Bangers and Mash for dinner! The hostel was pretty good for socialising. Probably better than any of the ones I stayed in North America this summer.

I ended up heading on out with the German Girls and another German Guy to a bar. Jamie was meant to come along too, but he disappeared. I thought nothing much of it, just presuming that he’d fend for himself… Anyway we get to a bar, then I get about 3 phone calls from Jamie trying to find his way to this bar, even passing the phone to the taxi driver. He never makes it here. Whilst at the bar, I managed to chat to some random Swedish chap whilst waiting in the queue for the loos. About what I really can’t remember, but I ended up adding him on facebook. We headed back to the hostel fairly soon in truth, the others were really tired!

Once I got back, I ended up chatting to a load of people back in the hostel. I really can’t remember exactly who they were, mostly the Brazilian chaps again. We got shifted into the TV room in the end due to making too much noise. It was about 2am or so I think. A load of people joined us, and I even drunkenly attempted to play ping pong in there, but really failed rather badly. Plus the table was really tiny!

Eventually I called it a night, only to recieve a phone call from Jamie at 5am. I ignore the first two, but on the third attempt I thought I better answer. He’s lost and in a taxi and wants to know how to get back to the hostel! Myself being half asleep can’t remember the name of the hostel or the address! So I just tell them to take him to the trainstation, where it’s a straight walk back to the hostel, hangup and think nothing more of it. I get worken up the next morning by Jamie, he’d only just got back. The taxi driver had taken him the wrong place, and he’d spent a shit load of money on them. He had ended up spending the night on some random Swedish blokes couch! Crazy.