November Phil

One thing I forgot to put in last months entry was the GV Cat 3D model that I created.  I put in the photos of it but not the model itself, so here it is.  The photo is of the machine part stripped down covered in muck with a few bits missing looking from the rear with the rear cover removed.  The front and rear covers are what hold the whole thing together so you cant get a phot without either of them.  However, its very easy to hide any covers that you like in a 3D model so its easier to visualize how it works.

Its funny, last month ended up a huge post in the end.  I started it early because I knew that we had no holidays or anything arranged for the month and thought it would give me a chance to do a couple of extras to fill in.  As the month progressed, more and more happened which gave me lots of photo’s as well.  November had a mini break to Prague and I have already posted a few times anyway so don't expect so much in this post.  Next month is our three in one holiday which is already starting to go wrong as they keep changing the flight times for the worst which means that we have to stay in a hotel at Gatwick before and after our holiday.

Of course, I have to put loads of pictures from our mini break in Prague.  I have tried to put most pictures that you have not already seen but I couldn't resist a couple of my favourites.

I usually put a picture or two of our room but I need to get in it first as Claire messes it up within seconds.  This time, I was the gentleman and carried Claire over the threshold and consequently she got in first and messed it up.  If you look closely below the right hand window we have a radiator.  It was covered up by the long curtains and nets.  Once I had spotted it and lifted the curtains into the window ledge the room warmed up much better. 

This is how I remember spending most of our time, walking around near water in the freezing cold.  Still, it meant that when we got back to England and it had turned cold here, we didn't feel it cause it was warm to us.  And of course, we had our woolen hats and scarves.

Wonderful building around Prague and you can even see at what time I took most of the pictures.

 

There she goes.  The difference this time is that I carried the backpack.  There wasn't room in our safe deposit box for a computer so I had to carry them around all day and I didn't want Claire's water on them.  Although this time she wasn't carrying water around but hot coco.

The square was very bust and all the market stalls were selling gluvine.  We did have one but its hard to drink more than one.

 

The Charles bridge is always good for a picture, whichever direction you approach it from.  Like Claire’s hat.  Trouble is , she even wore it in bed.  Should have kept them boots on too girl.

One of my favorites with the railing arches reflecting the bridge arches.  Another lucky stroke.

I was expecting this picture to come out better but the light was coming from the wrong direction with such a dark statue it looked too silhouetted.  The pigeon was sitting on Christ’s head and pooping on it.  That's supposed to be lucky.

We always like to have a drink in a Hard Rock if theres one around.  They still sell the hurricane cocktails where you get to keep the glass.  A 14 oz cocktail and the glass for just over a tenner; a real bargain when I had my first one in NY 33 years ago they were $10.

Ohh, I almost forgot, here is a picture of the Lagenda where we spent all our evenings.

This one reminded me of that nursery rhyme, what was it, where the cow jumped over the moon.  I am so pleased that we managed to get away as it seems to have done Claire (the moon) the power of good.

This month, Sue had, not one but two charity dinners.  One near the beginning of the month and one near the end.  Well it is near Christmas; how many will she have next month?

It was a great idea, everyone paid a tenner to come for a three course dinner which got donated to charity.  The money, not the dinner.  The chosen charities were, The Marie Curry Fund and Oxfam (I think, or maybe it was Alzheimer's) .  I think it must have cost Sue more than that for the ingredients so she could have just denoted the money to the charity .  But then we wouldn't have had such a good time.  These charities shouldn't only think of themselves, they should think of all those people out there enjoying themselves on their behalf.

The first charity dinner ended with a few songs from Pat.  It was a great night, thank you guys.  The next one it Pat’s charity dinner but we are still holding it at Sues because she has a bug table and lots of room.  Pats bringing two guitars to his dinner and Im doing the garlic bread so don't kiss me in the morning.

There is no party complete without Punch and Judy dancing the night away, even after everyone has gone home, slept and got up again.  Look, its already light.

I also managed to get to Loghborough to see Steve again.  Steve already had a ticket for the town hall where they had a Motown evening.  This is Steve with “Von”, Mell’s wife.  We had already been for a drink with Mel  before going out.

It was just like the old days; nothing had changed, except maybe 40 years.  Steve even celebrated by putting his central heating on.  He even cooked us bangers and chips when we got back but I had already passed out by the time it was ready.

It was also our Wednesday night, “Ladies Night” this month.  It should have been held on the 27th November but they changed Joan’s hospital appointment so we had to go a week early.  Unfortunately this meant the Jan and Steve,  Harriet and Billy and Vanessa couldn't make it. Here is Shirley telling Sue one of her many secrets.  Well, what used to be secrets.

Here is a nice one of Claire making sure that she gets in my picture rather than Jimmies.  It reminds me of that Dali picture, "Swan's reflecting Elephants".

It was nice to see Dave (Moth) Brown again.  He had a story to tell about a new species of moth that had eluded him for many decades.  He also had a couple of other stories to tell, one about his forthcoming trip to Japan with one of his university students.

Here is Jim saying Grace just before he started his colossal meal.  We still had a good night but we all had an extra drink for absent friends.

This month also saw Harriet and Billy view their very first house with a preference to buy.  It is in Giffard Park, just about three houses away from Bolbeck Park.  They are looking for a 2 bed but this one is a lower end three bed semi.  It has no garage but parking for two cars.  It needs work but nothing too major.  Its in a bit of a mess because it is being rented at the moment and full up with the tenants junk.  The kitchen is a little small and consequently they have white goods all over the rest of the house.  It seems a bit over priced to me but they will be open to offers and if they can get it at the right price should be a good investment at the right time.

The second of Sues charitable parties saw the same people as the first with a couple of exceptions, Dave and Carol didn't come to the first one.  I had heard a few stories about Carol but none of them materialized on this night and Dave seemed quite a character.

†he usual suspects were there.

And Pat made the night again singing more songs, old and older still.  I did take a video of him which I hope to edit and email to him as he doesn't have any.  Trouble is I took it with the camera on its side and its not like a photo where you just rotate it.  I need advice from the Wednesday night crew.  Got to go now, we got a holiday to go on.

Prague tour

Last night we did venture back to the Legenda pub and have a meal.  A little of a disappointment but it did the job and the service and beer were good.

We set out quite late so as to give us a chance to relax and read in bed after breakfast.  We had done enough walking the first day for our entire weekend and our feet were sore and our legs ached.  Our idea was to walk down to the river in time to catch a boat trip that had entertainment and lunch but we think they stopped the lunch trips earlier this month and are only doing the dinner ones.  We walked around the river to the large boat mooring place but nothing was happening other than a few tramps throwing up near the bins.

Claire had read in the guide that there was another popular square called the Wenceslas square where it all seemed to be happening so we decided to walk through the town in that direction and look for a nice place for lunch.

We walked through the Jewish quarter and just before the main square in the old town I spotted a nice restaurant that served Oriental french fusion.  Claire had a look at the menu but decided to walk on.  Big mistake.

We found a nice little square that was rather old fashioned but it had a Hard Rock hidden away.  The last time we visited a Hard Rock was in Las Vegas on our round the world trip.  We popped in for a drink.

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We decided not to eat there as it was more than the nice fusion place that we hadn't stopped at.  We carried onto Wenceslas square.

There were all sorts of markets, stalls, restaurants and shops around but all a little too touristy for us.  Glad we saw it though as we hadn't stumbled across this last time here.

There are loads of Crystal places around Prague and when I looked at my map I found that at the end of the square was the museum.  If we turned right there we would be on the road that our hotel is located.  All that walking to the river, around and back into town could have been avoided.

Rather than walk back into town we headed back looking for a place to eat on the way.  Luckily I eventually found a steak house called, “Original Praveky Restaurant”.  It didn't look much from the outside with all the graffiti and all the places here look quite dingy when you look through the window.  I didn't even look open but I tried the door and it was so we went in.  It was like a cave pained with prehistoric cave art; I really liked it.  Mind you, it looked like women had painted the art judging from their dainty hand prints.  Or maybe they were Neanderthal; queer ones.

20,000 Steps

 Our stairway.

Our view from our window.

Here we are in foggy Prague having walked all day in the cold.  Claire started by buying a new hat in a stall by the Charles bridge.  Unfortunately, nowhere was open that sold SD to USB converters as its Sunday and the tourist places that are open only sell SD cards and tourist stuff like hats, Crystal and porcelain.  Our hotel is called Prague Central Plaza which is located in the city with a long walk to the New Town; even further to the Old Town and Charles Bridge and even further to the Jewish quarter.  We did them all and then crossed the Charles bridge to the other side.  Its about 7 years since we were last here for a long weekend and we could hardly remember anything.  I took some great photo’s but you wont see them until I can get a converter so Later I took a few crap pictures on my phone which are in this blog.  It was so cold that we both ended up buying a scarf each in the same stall by the bridge on our way back and I have yet to take mine off.  I am sure that we will be both still wearing them in bed when we wake up in the morning.

The restaurant we both fancied is on the other side somewhere near the Castle.  Its the one we found last time by chance that Tyco Brahe and Jonas Kepler had rooms in with a courtyard restaurant.  We had a lovely meal there last time but, although we tried hard we didn't find it.  We found loads of places that looked similar but no cigar.  The restaurant we ended up in for lunch was quite nice and the tourist 3 course menu was cheap.  The courtyard that looked most like it was called, “U Labuti” but they do all look quite similar.

Tycho Brahe had lost his nose in a sword dual and had a gold and silver one made that he wore most of the time.  He was an astronomer that kept impeccable records of planetary motion throughout his life.  In later life he took on Kepler as his apprentice and when he died at about 1600 Kepler took over his data and records.  Kepler used this mass of information to formulate planetary motion and came up with his famous three laws.  The first one said that planets take elliptical orbits around the sun which is at one of the ellipses loci.  The second one states that the planets sweep out equal areas in equal time intervals around the sun.  The third one is a formulae that shows how long an orbit takes around the sun using its average distance from it.  These laws are all mathematical formulae but I cant remember them off the top of my head.  As I am writing this in a bar quite near to our hotel you will have to look them up if you are interested.  For me, Kepler was the start of the scientific revolution that we are still in and is a very important part of our history that maybe is not recognized as much as it should be.  To be able to take huge amounts of data and convert this into mathematical formulae that is easily understood is an incredible trick.  The reason that I like science so much is that, once something is found out, we all have it forever and we can build on this to find new things.  The old noseless wonder that kept these incredible records could have lived for a thousand years and never have used it as Kepler did to benefit us all.  He was a stamp collector while Kepler was a true scientist that wanted to understand things.

The bar we are in is called “Legenda” and I guess that we will see rather more of it than we should do.  It is warm, far warmer than our hotel room without any visible form of heating or control and they sell cheap proper Czech beer.  They have “Staropramen 11%” and “Staropramen 12%” and a whole load of others to chose from.  I have chosen the “Staropramen nefiltrovany”, which costs 35Kc for 0.5l.  I had forgotten that the Czech Republic doesn't have the Euro and still has Crowns.  Luckily I got some out at the airport before we were picked up.

Although I couldn't find anywhere that sold converters, I did bring my camera charger that plugs into my USB port so I have managed to use the photo’s that I took with my camera.  We are back in our room now and Claire is in the shower; not sure if she has taken her scarf off yet.  Hopefully, I will get time to publish this before she gets back.  The title of this entry is the number of steps that we have done today.  The most I have done since I started using this pedometer that Claire bought me.

Not quite sure what we will do later tonight as we are both knackered from our journey last night and our long walk.  Maybe we will stay in or maybe we will be back at the Legenda again for an early meal and an early night.  I will let you know in the next entry.