June 1, 2008 - June 7, 2008 Archives

Less than a week to go!

Can't begin to imagine what my life will be without moving 24/7. Before I left I found it hard to sit still anyway.Physically, I'm holding up ok. Just have that constant disgusting sick feeling that you get when you are way too tired and run down beyond repair!
I Feel like a rag doll.

This week is going to be a toughy, not staying on one mode of transport more than a few hours.. having to take all of my bags with me wherever I go... literally not resting unless I am sleeping in a dodgy smelly door style bunk. Ewwww. Ah well, 7 days of Europe, but first, a little escapade in Cambridge on a canal boat... a couple of guys from work are up there already and apparently there's already been a mishap involving a bike in the river. A Magners is definitely in store.

Meet Denzel and Darrel, twins from India. I LOVE these guys. Talking to them is bizarre, they even mirror their mannerisms while they talk. They seriously are the same person!!! So cool. Wish I had a twinny.

Me in a Velo Takso going through Tallinn old town while being interviewed for the Saturday paper lift out magazine. It gives a good idea of the multi-tasking that I need to do, to keep moving. This is a pretty good example of what my day is constantly... don't get much time where I am just looking out the window... which is probably just as well because I think if I actually stopped I don't think I would be able to keep moving!!!! Generally for each interview I am in a mode of transport, filming, taking photos and eating at the same time... Thank God I'm a woman, or a girl at least. He he he. For the bulk of the trip I've been on my own, when I do meet a journalist I generally use and abuse their presence and get them to film a jump clip for me!!! I haven't mastered being able to shoot and jump at the same time... yet.

Metro competition: Found the answer? Visit Metro for your chance to win a 3 Skypephone (UK only we're afraid).

Big thanks to Belles Will Ring for this cool tune. Love it. Check them out at myspace.com/belleswillring

Thanks so much to all the generous souls who donated enough to Motivation to ensure that I had to eat a vanilla and marmite ice cream. No really, thank you - it's a great cause, and please do keep giving anything you can.

If I was doing this trip just 20 years ago, this is what I would have to carry.

A massive thank you to the Musée de l'informatique for their generous donation to the charity Motivation!
If you haven't already, please donate here.

So strange, in France I am somewhat of a celebrity (albeit b grade, I am sure).
Had an interview in the metro, at the Eiffel Tower and in a lift overlooking the whole of France.

Went to the Musée de l'informatique and was shocked to find my face planted everywhere, even on the giant screen as you enter! Was greeted with gifts including a Dimitri painting, some fine wine, duck pate and a very generous cheque for the charity, Motivation!

I only had half an hour here so was given a speed run of the place... so cool, they even let me touch, when the signs said not to!!! It was really cool to see the evolution, particularly in size, of things that we take for granted, like mobile phones and laptops and how far we really have come technology wise.

Before I left I signed the museum's guest book, next to the French Prime Minister! I never know what to write in things like that... especially when everyone is waiting round you watching what you come up with... it always ends up being something lame!

1. Clinique All about eyes - Calms down my puffa-fish eyes

2. Anti-bacterial Hand Wash - Still not got ill. Can't believe it.

3. Wet Wipes - For washing on the go... so I don't smell like a dirty carnie.

4. my trusty 3 Skypephone + Nokia N95 - Stops me being a loner on the trip. Also, lets me talk and chat for freeeeeeeeeeeeeeee.

5. Long dress - My bag is 3/4 filled with cords, cables, adapters and technology. Long dresses are best for travel as they are super comfy, you can dress them up and down, easy to hand wash and take up no bag space at all.

Metro competition: Found the answer? Visit Metro for your chance to win a 3 Skypephone (UK only we're afraid).

Top 5 cosmetics that stop me looking as hideous as I feel

1. Clarins Beauty Flash Balm I puff up like a blow up doll at the first sign of tiredness. Apply this balm to your face before putting on make up and it gives you an instant facelift by somehow tightening up your skin. I have no idea how it does it, but it also transforms dull tired looking skin into bright and healthy looking skin. Tight and bright all the way.

2. Yves Saint Laurent Touche Eclat Radiant Touch This magical eye concealer hides dark circles by illuminating the whole eye area. Makes you look naturally fresh and awake.

3. Eye Drops With all the flying and lack of sleep my eyes are constantly blood shot, scratchy and sore. I keep these in my back pack and give each eye a few sneaky drops every few hours.

4. Cetaphil Face Wash and UV Moisturiser The best cleanser and moisturer out there. Really gentle, simple and cheap too. You can't buy these in the UK but can get them online from ebay.

5. Clinique All about Eyes eye gel Reduces pufflines, bags and dark circles without drying your skin.

None of these products paid me to say this... but if they do then send the freebies my way!!!

Better than a slap in the face, but the effects are just the same. The coffee in Italy never disappoints. I'm already onto my sixth cup and am starting to shake. Bar tender, bring me another.

Founder and President of Permasteelisa.com group (1974-2002); President and Managing Director of Sviluppo Italia Veneto (2003-2006); President of VEGAPARK.it - Venice from 2006. Professor at Politecnico Leonardo in Milan and on Board of Harvard, GDS, MA (USA); passionate about 360° innovation applied in companies.

Since he was 23 he has founded, restored and managed companies, without any dismissals, always making profits and bringing them back in. If this is not enough...

HE HAS A CASTLE!!!!! Woo hoo. I have always wanted to meet someone who owned a castle. He bought it a few years ago, restored it and it is now pretty laa-de-dah! Oh yeah.

I know what I will be doing when I finish this trip. Take the castle tour here. Mwah ha ha ha ha

Each year 22 million people from all over the world visit this wonder of a city. While tourism is the cities bread and butter, it has begun to take over. Venice used to be inhabited by 300,000 Venetians, now only 60,000 remain. Tourism has forced them out of their city by pushing prices up and overcrowding the city all year round.

At the moment, hotels can establish themselves and then purchase the surrounding residential homes to convert into hotel rooms, forcing the Venetians out. The general wear and tear of the city is likely to see it deteriorating at a rapid rate. If you want to see Venice retain some of its authenticity, and help the locals live in their birth city, sign the 40XVenice petition now.

Six tired backpackers stuffed into a shoe box of a room. Ah, European sleeper trains... Not the best for claustrophobia... Thought they'd at least have wash room facilities in the train stations, but so far not so good. Haven't showered in three days. Boats are the way forward I think. I smell like a hippy.

I think there were more Japanese tourists than pigeons in St Mark's Square... Who said stereotypes are unfair exaggerations of the truth...

4am. Waaaaay to early to be arriving in a city. Especially when you went to bed at midnight and are not getting on another train until midnight the next night...
Today is going to be a loooooong one. Had booked a hot air balloon at sunrise over the alps for this morning... but got a call last night saying it was cancelled due to stormy weather :( Ah well, there's still the Sound of Music tour... need to start warming my voice up.

Right, I am in Salzburg for a few hours today. My hot air balloon trip has been cancelled due to bad weather (I really am not meant to fly), so I can either do a Sound of Music Bicycle Tour with die hard Julie Andrews fans or go on a tour around the Lake District?

Instant message me NOW (theskypenomad) for free on my 3 Skypephone.

Big thanks to bloggers Gigi Cogo and Elena Franco for giving me the grand tour of Venezia. They met me at the train platform and accompanied me back there 18 hours later... Doing everything from providing maps, sourcing wifi, introducing me to important people, making sure I ate food, met up with the people I needed to, not get ripped off by gondola drivers etc etc etc. What a difference it makes when you have locals looking out for you. Having been to Venice before, I was already in love with this magical city, but, thanks to Gigi and Elena I was lucky enough to see a little bit of the real Venice. And it was so much more beautiful than I thought possible.

Check out their blogs
Web Conoscenza Gigi Cogo
DElyMyth Elena Franco

So cool. They let me drive the boat!!! They asked if I had a licence.... I thought they meant driving licence... my over-steering gave it away.

I could get used to this... Gondolla ride in the morning past houses that date back to 1800BC, sampling the world's best coffee and salami's while wandering the narrow streets of my favourite city for lunch and an afternoon on a traditional Venezian speedboat in the afternoon. Today was by far the best day of my trip. If there were too many more days to go, I may just have bought myself a Venetian mask and stayed here forever.

I am 48 hours away from the finishing line. From Salzburg I'm getting a train to Munich, then Berlin, flying to Stockholm and then getting a ferry to Skype HQ in Tallinn, Estonia. I'm still feeling strong (?!) and I've got the wrap party in mind! I need some help from you to come up with things to spice up the finish line party. Music, party tricks or lethal drinks. Send them through by commenting below or instant messaging me at theskypenomad.
Over and out.

Thanks for everyone who messaged me yesterday, I ended up doing not just any Sound of Music Tour.... but, 'The most unique Sound of Music Tour'... It's just as well you guys chose that over the lake tour because.... Ever since I was a little girl I have wanted to split leap from bench to bench in the gazebo like Leisel. Apparently I even put on the whole sound of music production for the parents in pre-school. All I remember is the sleepless nights trying to decide whether I wanted to be Leisel, the older beautiful one with the pretty dress or the Gretel, the cute little one who has the best scene on the steps of the grand stair case... I opted for Gretel and have regretted it ever since. But today was the day that I could make up for past mistakes. I was going to capture the Gazebo leap and use it in my jump video. So you can imagine my disappointment when I discovered that the Gazebo is in fact permanently locked due to too many uncoordinated tourists (like me) making insurance claims.

So tired, losing things left right and centre...

Lost my Nokia N95 on the Sound of Music bus after falling asleep and being woken up by the Leiderhousen wearing tour guide :-( But at least I have my trusty 3 Skypephone.

Left my HD Camera battery in England on the weekend. :-(

My favourite little Cannon ix7 camera died after I dropped it in Venice... If that wasn't enough I then put a water bottle in my bag at 3am this morning while getting ready to get off the train in Austria and didn't put the lid on properly... it leaked and soaked my camera and moleskin. :-(

Got into Salzburg today at 4am and have been going ever since.
It's 23.03 now and about to board a train and finally call it a day. 19 hours later... My legs are aching... and I am absolutely knackered.

The Germans do a lot of things right. One of them is trains. I've been on a lot of them over the past 33 days. Have crossed China, Australia, England, Paris, Italy, Austria and Germany... 13 sleepers in fact. And the German is by far the best. A perfect way to spend my second last night. The Paris to Italy train was the worst. 6 backpackers crammed into a shoebox of a room. Actually, China was so much worse that it doesn't even bear thinking about... but I have etched that out of my mind now. Ich leibe the InterCityNight. If you are planning a train trip, check out seat61.com. It helped me big time when I was organising the itinerary. Europe trains are hard to organise as the websites are all over the shop. I really want to do the Blue Train in South Africa next! And the Siberian Railway would be super cool if you had the chance to stop off on the way... not possible on this trip for me!

A quick shout out to a few of the people I've spoken to other the past two days. Teller in Estonia - with some mean Sound of Music tour advice. Zoealanacaldwell in England who gave me some Alpine singing tips. Aegeanx in Santiago from Mexico, those beaches sound awesome. Joshbates, go Aussie, go. Can't say how cool it is to get so many messages each day. They definitely have helped me keep going through the hard days! Only one more to go now...

But only passing through from the train station to the airport. Been here before, but it's such a beautiful day, I wish I had more time to explore this city!!!!!!

Graffiti on the wall.

A lovely German journalist gave me this cool rock that used to be the Berlin wall!
Man, I wish I was the guy who came up with that idea. That's one smart dude.

Can you translate my horoscope for today pretty please?

One more day to go... cannot believe it... it's getting close. Along the road I have gone through different levels of exhaustion. The worst was definitely when I arrived in Copenhagen, after flying round the world, using over 200 different modes of transport, crossing 28 different time zones, 11 flights, 23 airports... I was an emotional and physical wreck. Saturday the 21st of May was pretty close too. I did that day twice. The second time round was much better. These days I just have a constant sick feeling in my gut and it feels like I have gun shot wounds at the back of my eyes. My shoulders are hard as cement and the bags under all this concealer are frightening to catch. Don't worry, I'm not confident enough to let you catch a glimpse of them. Prior to this trip I was not a good napper. But now I find myself falling asleep on even the shortest modes of transport. Missed half of the sound of music tour this way... Struggling to keep my eyes open just now too... Truth be told, I am actually a little scared to stop. I feel a week long bed ridden sickness coming on, or at least a mighty long pass out... maybe I will go recluse like the blonde Abba chick? What's her name? My mind is starting to fail me a little. Normally I'm pretty on the ball and in control of my thoughts... but now my reactions are slow and my head is all over the place. Feels like someone took it off my head while I was sleeping and shook it as hard as they could causing all the pieces to jumble up. Now that I think about it, I think I do hear rattling...

23 hours to go. The other day I read that my trip is actually the equivalent of 250 marathons... This is kinda how I am feeling just now...

Meet Ozcan Gultekin the Turkish singing taxi driver. Love it.

http://www.ozcangultekin.net

I made it! I was in Stockholm just last week but missed out on making it to the Absolute ice bar. This time it was top of the list, a definite final scene for my jump film. Check out the coat. That comes for free, so does your choice of any Absolute cocktail... I opted for my all time favorite day time drink... Bloody Mary. Better than a kick in the teeth.... Matt was there to film it and didn't like his... more for me. In true Nomad style, running out of time for our big beasty Tallink ship, we had all of 5 minutes in there to shoot 3 films. Was pretty cool considering it was 25 degrees outside! The two drinks really hit me in the cab on the way back to the boat. I was a giggling school girl. Went through all of the stages of drunkeness in about 15 minutes... ending up passed out in my cabin. I'm not normally such a lightweight... I promise.

It's official. I hate buffets. A few years ago I would have died before I said that... but since being on this trip I have realised the extent to which they are filled with mediocre, bad quality, luke warm food. None of which I really like. I still get excited when I see the glass covered stands. It's something about getting things for free that is built into all of our egos I think.

It's 2am and bright as day outside. Messes you around a bit. Sitting on my bed collating photos, movies and editing... These things always take longer than you plan. And sleep is the first to suffer. Just realised that we lose an hour going into Estonia. Damn you Grenwich meridian and time zones and day lights savings and loud tourists and annoying voices on the P.A. and anything else that takes my non-existent slithers of sleep away. We boarded the boat yesterday and after my bloody mary in the ice bar I was an absolute mess. Besides my shot in Estonia, I really have avoided alcohol like the plague. Something about letting yourself go and all the tiredness and sickness catching up... Fell onto my bed to start writing but passed out for a good 2 hours. Didn't move from the uncoordinated position I landed in, head crooked up against the wall, one leg under me, the other dangling off the bed. That was the end for me. Woke up feeling like death. Like a sumo wrestler was sitting on me and was never going to get off. Ever. Pullllll yourrrrrsssself togetherrrr Campbelllll... my inner dialogue was even slow. Not long to go now. 8 hours I think.

Coming into port now. I'm a bit nervous... Can't believe it's all going to be over this time tomorrow. Somehow I never thought it would end. It's definitely been the most challenging thing I have ever done... As cool and as fun as it's been I am craving a couch, any food that comes out of a can, a big bottle of rose and a couple of trashy movies.

Literally just got off the boat in Tallinn. Was met by lovely Skype people!!! Almost there now... I can taste the Millimallikas already!