Don’t let anyone tell you climbing St Paul’s Cathedral is easy. Getting to the “whispering gallery” is… Not too bad, but getting any further requires a lot of effort, and some of the stairwells are *tiny*… (as in duck-down and turn partly sideways kinda tiny…. Even for shorter people)

There’s a faily strict “no photography” rule throughout, and outside it was pretty miserable weather (first rainy day since I’ve been here), so no photos to speak of.

Had lunch in an english pub too, which was good — The Wellington, fwiw.

Oh, and went to the movies later that night, Ice Age 2… Quite funny, I really don’t know why Margeret & David (of At the movies, ex-The Movie Show) didn’t like it.

(posted 2 days after)

Spent most of the day wandering around Hyde park today. Great weather, so everyone (or atleast the brits) was getting their kit off all over the place.

The park is pretty damn big, but it obviously needs to be.

Ian took me and two of his friends (Gabby & Amy) to “Symphonic Rock” by the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra… Great show, all sorts of rock/pop sos from Coldplay’s “Fix you ” to The Beach Boys’ “Good Vibrations”, and a few beetles songs I cant remember the names to.
Unfortunately towards the end I was getting a bit tired and had to really concentrate to not fall asleep.

BTW, incase you did’nt know: The hall is *huge*… you definitely don’t get the correct impression when you watch it on tv.

(Posted the day after)

Spent today learning my way around the tube. Its easy enough to get around if you´ve got a tube map (which I do, thanks to Ian) - and know that not all the trains that turn up at a tube station are necessarily London Underground services.

I caught a tube from Tottenham Court to Kew Gardens (more on this in a moment), on the way back I caught what I thought was the right train (it turned up at the station … there was only one line that I could see, it should be right, right?) — which ended up being a ¨Silverlink¨ service which didn´t actually go where I thought it should´ve.

Anyway, after a few panicked moments (looking at the big posters about 100 Pound fines), I found another common station, and got my way back easily enough.

Kew Gardens is big, I didn´t get to spent a lot of time there — about 2-3 hours, but I did manage to see a decent portion of the gardens.

On that note - I have some photos online, both of Kew Gardens and some photos I took in Singapore.

Apologies in advance for the photos not being rotated correctly — the software I´d normally use isn´t available to me here (I´m using Ian´s mac)

The Main gallery — contains links to all the sub-galleries, and some miscelanious photos.

Singapore — contains photos from around Singapore, and from the Orchid Gardens.

The Main gallery — contains photos from around Kew Gardens.

–
Oh, and for anyone who has too much money, and loves gadgetry… Tottenham Court Road is heaven. There´s a huge number of electronics shops… Oh for a few thousand to go blow on some camera gear… mmm Canon L-Series lenses.

The flight in was good, sat next to a nice older couple from WA (Bunbury). The upgrade to aisle was excellent.

Now sitting here in Ian´s place (Update your blog already), watching TV after eating dinner.

Not quite sure what I´m doing tomorrow, wandering around hyde park/tottenham court, etc.

It´s now about 10PM, so probably off to bed…

It’s now 4:45 am, and I’m getting ready to head out to the airport in about 40 mins.

13-16 hr flight ahead, hopefully i’ll get an aisle seat this time.

The music on the hotel tv screen is good to wake up to…

Artist : Motorcycle
Title : As the Rush Comes

Trance/dance-ish music.
Anyhow, ciao from Singapore.

Updated @6:25AM (Singapore/Perth Time - GMT+8):
Got driven to Singapore Airport in a nice Mercedes, but damn I’m here early.

Currently sitting here in an Internet Cafe, at 6:25, but the flight isn’t due out till 9:30, so don’t know what gate I’m supposed to go to. Got a window seat again, unfortunately - damnit.

“Sorry sir, the flight is very full - will a window seat be OK?”

Damnit, there’s gotta be a trick to this.

Atleast I managed to transfer some of my camera gear to my backpack - bringing it up to ~19.8KG, and dropping my carry on weight by half.

updated @ 08:16am (Singapore Time, GMT+8)
Singapore Airlines rocks (yeah, I’m cheap)… got transferred to an aisle seat, which has made me very happy…

BTW: Non, sorry about getting cut off… not sure what went wrong.

Anyway, got the wireless working at the airport (obviously), so will be online for a little longer.

….
in other news, that ‘where the bloody hell are you’ ad is getting played a lot here in the airport. Alongside a malaysian ‘true culture’ (something like that) one…

Wireless is finally working, just about to head out to a half-day tour… It’s overcast but not raining yet– still expected to hit 32C though.

No photos yet–basically collapsed after writing the post last night.

Back later.

Updated :
Well, the tour of singapore was interesting. Saw parts of little india, a buddhist temple, found out that “singapore” comes from “singa” the malay word for lion, and “pore” for fish (mermaid, perhaps?)….,saw parts of the botanicv gardens too (the orchid gardens).

Had lunch at McDonalds… (kidding), but ALL the US chains are here in large numbers. Any lost/culture-shocked americans/westerners should be able to recover somewhat in one of their regular fast food/coffee/convenience/book chains

Spent time after lunch wandering around, and got a little wet–though you’d have trouble getting cold and wet, so no real risk of hypothermia.

Very early start tomorrow (5am), so going to get an early dinner and head to bed.

Oh, got a bunch of photos too… will see if i can get them online.

PS; can someone let me know if they got my email earlier today?

Arrived at Sydney airport at 8:30am, for my 11:30am flight to SIN (love the singapore airport code).

Not that Much to say about the flight except that it was long (8hrs).

The one thing I do have to mention is that noone tells you how much those wings flex… Really, don’t think of them being these semi-rigid things that keep the plain up-think more like someone has picked the plane up by the wingtips. The engine movement is just as disconcerting, they’re constantly bouncing around.

Landing in singapore was interesting, it was absoloutely bucketing down-touchdown was smooth, but then they put the airbrakes on and do something wit the engine thrust I think—that results in water going everywhere.

By the time I had passed immigration&customs it had stopped raining, but tbh I wouldn’t have noticed-the humidity is damn high, and it was about 30C+ so felt like a sauna run amok.

Currently (midnight nsw time) I’m trying to get the wireless working here, so this might be a little late.