A new decade, a new era

We're starting the celebration of the new year with a bottle of Spain's finest. We're utterly convinced that this upcoming decade will be the best in our lives and we're sure that goes for all of you. Happy new year to all of our dear readers and have fun tonight wherever you are in the world!! Love from Canaries / Taru and Alex

Burning skies

The sky is on fire. We're just about to have dinner with a light wind, some luminescent plankton and a purple-pinkish shimmer around our boat as the only peaceful company tonight. See you tomorrow in Gran Canaria. /T

Jamie's Phuket - Highlights 2010

Where to begin? Quick lowdown on Jamie's Phuket Blog... I started the blog in 2006 with the aim of showing what I might call the "real" Phuket. I have been here since 1999 and tend to keep away from the most touristy areas of Phuket, which is hard to do since I work at Karon Beach (manager for Sunrise Divers) 6 days a week... finding time to blog can be a struggle sometimes too. After over 4 years I keep finding new things to blog about - festivals, restaurants, places to visit. Some events like the vegetarian festival I blog every year, trying to get better photos than the previous year. I look at some of the old posts from 2006 - 2007 and probably should get some new pictures here and there since back then I had a cr*ppy little camera.. but until I win the lottery and can devote more time to blogging, this blog will normally get updated about once per week, hopefully with something new, hopefully something that will interest visitors.

So here are some of the highlights of the Phuket Blog in 2010 ...

In January, I took the kids to the Phuket Tin Mining Museum, which was not quite finished and indeed closed again later in the year.. not quite sure if its 100% open now. Anyway, we loved it. I enjoyed the fact that my kids enjoyed it, if you know what I mean. I will take a look at the museum again soon and see if it's fully operational yet. Also in January, my Mother finally sent me a very nice story which I had been asking for... she and my Dad did an elephant ride some years back and I wanted a first hand story about the experience - have a read: Elephant Ride in Phuket (by Jamie's Mum).



February... The Big Buddha in Phuket is now a major attraction, and you can drive up to the top of the 400+m high hill... or you can hike up, which is what I did one morning : Hike to the Big Buddha. I was also happy to finally blog the Thai Italy restaurant in Patong which we have been to many times. Great Pizza.



March - lots of good stuff. My wife and I enjoyed an evening at Glastnost Cafe in old Phuket Town, I had a birthday on the water chasing speedboats with a helicopter, and we discovered the Phuket Heroines Festival, something which is in the diary again for 2011.



April - as if that hike in February had not been enough, I did a day trip cycling at Koh Yao Noi. Saddle sore and very enjoyable. Also blogged about a trip to James Bond Island and Ko Panyi.



May - some holidays! We spent a night at the Cliff and River Jungle Resort near Khao Sok National Park. Beautiful.. we went again in September. I also re-blogged Laem Hin Seafood, which was the first restaurant on this blog and is still a favourite.



June & July ... into low season now, we drove up Radar Hill one misty morning - this is the highest road in Phuket, over 500m above sea level, with some great views.



Kathu village where I live staged it's second cultural festival. In 2009 I was the only foreigner present for the main parade. In 2010, the promotion was a little better, I must have seen at least 4 other foreigners!



And another very local event.. I checked out the Phuket Butterfly Release in July and there was still time for the second Phuket Photo Walk, part of the Worldwide Photo Walk.



August - I finally went to see Phuket FC - I love football, and I am happy to say the Phuket FC have now been promoted to Thai Division 1. Well done, boys.



Also in August I felt quite out of place for a while attending an afternoon party at the Hongyok family house in Phuket Town celebrating the 2010 Baba Wedding ceremony. Like being immersed in history.



September - my wife and I used to drink coffee at Tunk Ka Cafe about 10 years ago. One day after lunch in Phuket Town we realised that we'd not been there for a loooong time. Coffee still good, and we went back again later in the month with my family visiting from England. Dinner with a view.



October - I had found out about Phuket Heritage Trails via a friend on Facebook - Pu and Gan will give people a real Phuket cultural tour, as you'd expect from 2 Phuket natives. I went with Mum, Dad and an errant traveling cousin on a morning tour around old Phuket. Great.



And then .. the Vegetarian Festival, my favourite time of year. And not because of the food, although I do take the opportunity to eat a cleansing diet. No, I like the festival for this:



I posted multiple entries about the festival : Part 1, Episode 2 and the much awaited Chapter 3. Plus there are lots of photos on Flickr: Phuket Vegetarian Festival 2010. I might change camera next year, but the old Canon EOS 20D was aided by the purchase of a 50mm f1.8 lens which was used for the photo above. Very good for sharp portraits.

I had some holiday end of September and early October when Mum and Dad visited, and we did plenty of exploring, much of which was blogged later in November and early December such as the Wat Tha Reua temple and the Phuket Butterfly Garden. On our return visit to Khao Sok we stopped to look around the old town of Sri Takua Pa, like a town that time forgot...



December, nearly home. We had already done a trip in Phang Nga Bay this year, but I reckoned if we planned things right we could hit James Bond Island when all the tourists had gone home. It's taken a few trips to plan this. But now we've got it sorted - Phang Nga Bay - Doing it Our Way :) - and you can book a tour doing it Jamie-Style by contacting Easy Day Thailand, a tour company set up by some friends of mine this year.





The Big Buddha has been blogged many times as the building continued for many years, and is still not complete. We were up there again in December to get the latest photos. I also blogged about local markets - want to see real local life? Markets are the place to be.

December was time for something new in Phuket. The first 'Phuket Street Show' festival. A couple of streets in old Phuket Town were closed off for several evenings and made into walking streets with stalls and stages set up with performers doing juggling, drumming, acrobatics, comedy and more. Great event, happy faces everywhere. In fact my favourite photo of the festival is a photo of the crowd. Everyone is smiling.



Back to the vegetarian festival for a moment - my favourite thing... and I was very chuffed that some of my photos and writing was published on the France 24 News website - see Phuket's Bloody Vegetarian Festival, or in French here. And then later I did a webcam interview which appeared on TV and on the website here - certainly a highlight of 2010 for me :)

I have been in Phuket for 11 years now, still looking for new places, new food, new experiences. Maybe in 2011 I will finally try the bungy jump. We have been to Phuket Fantasea recently, not blogged yet. I want to take the family out on boat trips to the Similan Islands and Phi Phi sometime soon. And people have contacted asking for some more general information on the blog... Maybe. I want to keep this blog a bit more personal showing this places we go as a family. If anyone has any suggestions for what could be on the blog, do let me know. Oh, and please do Follow me on Twitter and join the Jamie's Phuket Facebook Group.

Happy New Year! Sawatdee Pee Mai!

• Best of the blog 2009 Part 1 - Best of 2009 Part 2
• Best of the blog 2008
• Best of the blog 2007

Updates

When hearing and reading about other peoples Atlantic crossing this year, we are glad that we'll have a late approach for it. The tradewinds were late to establish this year and many of the people we've been in touch with or read about in their blogs, have suffered from seasickness due to poor winds and the rolling of large seas and many seem to have experienced their crossing as a very uncomfortable one. Our original plan was to cross the ocean in early December but as of many unfinished boat projects, we're about one month late to the original schedule. Good like that, and the new plan for the ocean crossing is set to begin after New Year. There are still a couple of things we need to complete on the boat and also a couple of packages to receive and we're scheduling ourselves for a departure towards Martinique on the 10th of January. Let's then all hope for the best and pray for the tradewinds to be working it like they should - and a landfall is wished to be made about 3 weeks thereafter - where we'll be good in time for meeting up a couple of friends on the Caribbean side. Cannot wait for getting started with the crossing, but also we're glad to have made the decision to await for a perfect time to get it all started instead of stressing us through this first part of the tour. By the way, Marina Rubicon where we're staying at the moment has been an excellent stop for us. Peaceful, clean, fresh, great service and good facilities. The price a bit high (23 Euros/night) but over all an excellent marina. We're just about to leave for Gran Canaria and Las Palmas this afternoon where we'll make a quick stop before heading to the Southern parts of that very same island. 

New Year is now due to be celebrated in Gran Canaria, we have no plans whatsoever on how to spend NYE, but I'm sure we'll figure something fun out tomorrow when we arrive. Christmas and New Years celebrations have not been high up on our priority list for this year. But at least we have the fridge full of Champagne for a new years toast. /Taru

Photo from the Atlantic beach of Rabat, Morocco.

Cabins and Swedish candy

Some of you were interested in having a look into our cabin .. so this it is. Not very extraordinary but oh so cozy. This is where I'll spend the rest of the night with a movie and candy* as my PMS doesn't allow me to do much else without getting in a bad mood. Good night. /T

* Stina my dear, would you please be so kind to bring some Swedish sweets when you come to visit next time! Everything is finished by now and I would die for some djungelvrål, sura nappar, dumle and ahlgrens bilar mmmmm...

"Splendore nella regola. Codici miniati" in mostra dal 31 marzo al 1° maggio 2011 presso l'Oratorio di San Rocco di Padova

Dal 31 marzo al 1° maggio 2011 lo "SPLENDORE NELLA REGOLA. CODICI MINIATI" presso l'Oratorio di San Rocco.

La mostra presenterà una ventina di codici - quasi tutti mai esposti in precedenza - dei secoli tra il XII e il XV, scritti e miniati in Italia ma anche in altre parti d'Europa e provenienti da importanti istituzioni monastiche padovane come gli Eremitani e Santa Giustina. Grazie anche ai frequenti spostamenti dei frati, maestri delle Scuole teologiche, che portavano nelle loro peregrinazioni i libri, strumenti primari di predicazione, di insegnamento e di preghiera, si realizzò una vera circolazione di saperi che fu anche circolazione di immagini dipinte. Proprio nell'età dei Carraresi e per loro iniziativa queste scuole raggiungono lo status di Facoltà teologica dell'Università.

   

Ultimo aggiornamento: 31/12/2010

   

Fonte: www.turismopadova.it

L'esposizione del "Magnifico Cratere" dal 13 febbraio al 13 marzo 2011 presso il Palazzo del Monte a Padova

Dal 13 febbraio al 13 marzo 2011 la spettacolare esposizione del "MAGNIFICO CRATERE" presso il Palazzo del Monte.

Con la mostra Il Magnifico Cratere e i tesori delle Tombe principesche di Trebenište e di Novi Pazar, la fondazione della Cassa di Risparmio inaugura i nuovi spazi espositivi di Palazzo del Monte, dopo alcuni anni di restauro. Il prezioso cratere bronzeo, opera che da sola vale la mostra, è alto ben 72 cm, elegante, realizzato in ambiente greco verso la fine del VI sec. A.C, è in esposizione insieme al corredo militare della Tomba 8 di Trebenište.

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"Il Simbolismo in Italia" in mostra dal 1° ottobre 2011 al 26 febbraio 2012 presso Palazzo Zabarella a Padova

Dal 1° ottobre 2011 al 26 febbraio 2012, troveremo, presso le sale di Palazzo Zabarella a Padova, la mostra "Il Simbolismo in Italia". Proseguendo nel suo percorso di ricerche e approfondimenti dell'Ottocento italiano fino alle avanguardie, Fondazione Bano promuove l'importante mostra dedicata al Simbolismo in Italia. La forza di questo movimento è stata quella di interpretare e riuscire a rappresentare in pittura, penetrando anche nel territorio dell’inconscio, i grandi valori universali dell'umanità: questa straordinaria avventura artistica verrà ricostruita attraverso i quadri - capolavori ormai entrati nell'immaginario collettivo - dei suoi protagonisti (tra cui Segantini, Previati, Morbelli, Pellizza da Volpedo, De Carolis e molti altri).
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"Guariento e la Padova Carrarese" in mostra dal 16 aprile al 31 luglio 2011 in varie sedi a Padova

Il Comune di Padova e la Fondazione Cassa di Risparmio di Padova e Rovigo organizzano un grande evento espositivo che svilupperà in diversi sedi espositive in diversi aspetti del Guariento e la Padova Carrarese.

Nella rinnovata sede della Fondazione, in piazza del Duomo, verrà ricostruita la figura di Guariento, il primo artista che può essere definito pittore di corte dei Carraresi, i principi che governarono Padova nel Trecento. Verranno riunite tavole e affreschi staccati, provenienti dai principali Musei italiani e stranieri, fra le quali spicca la serie di tavole dei Musei Civici di Padova, già decorazione della cappella privata della Reggia. L’importanza del suo percorso artistico, che da un giottismo rivisitato attraverso la versione riminese lo condurrà a un'adesione al gotico che anticipa aspetti "cortesi", emergerà anche attraverso il confronto con dipinti di altre personalità operose a Padova nel Trecento (Giotto, Pietro e Giuliano da Rimini, Semitecolo, Giusto Menabuoi, Altichiero) e da una panoramica sull'evoluzione della pittura a Venezia (Paolo e Lorenzo Veneziano, Jacobello, Giambono e altri), da lui influenzata grazie al Paradiso realizzato per Palazzo Ducale.

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Surf in Lanzarote

I have always known how important surfing was to Alex for about 15 years ago or so. When he was a surf teacher on the French Atlantic coast and when he was traveling the world from Mexico to South Africa to Angola and Bali, Portugal and the coasts of Morocco in search for the best waves, but I have not really seen it in action - and as it was such a distant image for me, I haven't really seen him, nor could I really picture him, as the surfer he obviously once was - even though I've seen some old photos of it. He's been mumbling about getting that board in the water once we get to warmer waters like the Pacific or such, while at the same time I have felt that he's been worried for being a bit too old and rusty - so with time I have also somehow thought that yeah, he probably is a bit too old and rusty to get it going on the big rolls. But so today I finally got to see him working that board for real for the first time in my life and while sitting some hundred meters away, prepared with my tele-objective, I could slowly start to realize the deep importance the surfing have had on him - and obviously still does in a nostalgic, deep way and I felt such strength of seeing him excellently maneuvering the board after such long time. Obviously a lot more stiff than I can imagine him working it in his 20's, but still he had the flow. 

For some odd reason I even almost started to cry for fucks sake, when I saw him taking off on a two meters left. Two meters (6,5 foot) is really nothing when it comes to serious surfing but it did made me proud to see my handsome man making some action after such long time. Is that the second you know that you never loved anyone higher - when you're almost 30 and you begin to cry when watching the love of your life doing something he really loves from the bottom of his heart or is that just a sign of that human beings (me) gets more pathetic with age? Seriously. Either way I had an amazing time watching the show and Alex was obviously really happy to have found himself some good waves again. Can't wait to learn this sport myself and I'm glad I have the perfect teacher for it.

Also I definitely need to get a good waterproof camera/video cam so that I can shoot better pics and videos of Alex (and maybe even me!) surfing on our tour around the world. This is something we cannot miss out on I'm telling you.
/Taru

"Angeli di Omar Galliani" dal 16 aprile al 31 luglio 2011 presso il Museo Diocesano padovano

Dal 16 aprile al 31 luglio 2011, in contemporanea con quella sul Guariento,"ANGELI DI OMAR GALLIANI" presso il Museo Diocesano padovano.

Mostra-istallazione allestita nel medesimo periodo e con lo stesso orario della grande rassegna su Guariento, il pittore degli Angeli al Palazzo del Monte. Un grande artista del Trecento, Guariento, e un grande artista contemporaneo si trovano a declinare uno dei temi più affascinanti dell'iconografia sacra, quello degli Angeli.

   

Ultimo aggiornamento: 31/12/2010

   

Fonte: www.turismopadova.it

Isle of Wight: The Seaside Town of Cowes

There is something almost other worldly about visiting seaside towns outside of the summer months but that is just what we did on a rainy afternoon during our trip to the Isle of Wight in March.  We’d been blessed with some gorgeous weather on our arrival in the Isle of Wight and on the day we took a ride on the Isle of Wight steam railway and we certainly hadn’t let the weather dampen our visit to Carisbrooke Castle but that was about to be put to the test!

Stephen could not have parked further away if he’d tried and we had quite a walk into the little seaside town of Cowes.  I immediately liked the old-town look of the place that was maintained even thought some of the buildings were quite new.

We took a walk along the promenade.  The sea and sky were similar shades of steel grey and it was a really windy and chilly day. 

 

We found a pebble beach which I found quite intriguing.  It looks like quite a struggle between nature and humanity as people have obviously been trying to control the drift!  Stephen thought he’d be romantic and picked up a shell for me.  It was pretty bashed up and scratched but I guess that is what you get with a pebble beach.  I think I might just prefer the sandy beaches in South Africa with their shiny shells!

  

 

There was a lot of lovely Art Deco architecture and Victorian features and I imagine that Cowes was quite the place to be back in Victorian times or in the interbellum period.

I found this forlorn looking chap sitting on a bench after a visit to a public convenience and we decided it was definitely time for something warm to drink.  We went to Chocs Away for a cup of hot chocolate.  It was literally a cup of melted chocolate and it was absolutely divine.  Yum. 

After that, we walked back through Cowes.  It really is a picturesque little town and must be really pretty and vibrant in the summer months.

Safety equipment part 1

What was that fashionable bracelet I had on the last picture, you might ask. So I'll tell you: It is actually not a thing with a fashionable purpose, more with a surviving one. This wrist transmitter from Navicom is connected to our radio which is connected to our GPS/Chart plotter and in case any of us would fall overboard, this will transmit a distress signal to the radio and GPS. This armband is for us a necessity during night watches, as it will awake the person sleeping if the one of us two on night watch would fall out of the boat. Obviously we will in every way possible avoid falling overboard in the first place (life vest attached to lifelines) - but would it somehow happen - this armband will immediately send out a high sounding distress alarm awakening every living person onboard and at the same time indicate on our chartplotter exactly where the person fell out and we will have a higher chance of finding the person in the water. One of those security things we find invaluable for our trip on the seven seas. /T

"Humanae Vanitates et Pompae" dall'11 febbraio al 20 marzo 2011 presso l'Oratorio di San Rocco a Padova

Il cinquecentesco Oratorio di San Rocco fa da cornice ad un'altra bella mostra di arte orafa. Tessuti che richiamano le antiche cromie degli affreschi, morbidamente drappeggiati e sostenuti da spille e collane: filati e gioielli creati da Alberta Vita, una delle rappresentanti della ricerca orafa contemporanea a Padova.
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