Victoria Argyle and I visited Suzanna and Cory Black in Leiden in the Netherlands.
Year: 2009
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Leiden
Victoria Argyle and Suzanna Black -
Amsterdam
Vicki and I used Amsterdam as our base for moving around Europe. They have lots of canals … lots of canals.
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How do people deal with me?
Apparently this is what people resort to when stuck in Europe with me for a whole month!
Smoking from a huka.
I tried it too but I don’t recommend it. It’s kinda icky. Caffeine is still my drug of choice.
Insanity kicks in after a while and they start believing anything they’re told. Frederick convinced Vicki that kissing the arse of the solider brought good luck. 
Two bad photos in a row, so I thought I’d better include a nice one 🙂 -
More from London
Here are some photos I forgot to add from my trip around sooty, icky London.
Big Ben in London. 
The Globe Theatre. Apparently this is where William Shakespeares' original plays were performed, albeit this is obviously not the original building. 
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Cologne
After traversing the Rhine, Vicky, Vikas and I headed north to Cologne. We didn’t spend much time there, but the huge Cathedral in the middle of the city sure is an impressive site. Construction started in 1248 and didn’t finish until 1880! It was the tallest man-made structure in the world until 1884.
The Cologne Cathedral 
3D image of the inside of the Cologne Cathedral 
Another 3D image of the inside of the Cologne Cathedral Cologne was decimated after 262 air raids by the Western Allies during World War II. By the end of the war essentially all of Cologne’s pre-war Jewish population of 20,000 had been deported or killed. The photo below shows the devastation of the city.
Cologne in 1945. To see the full devastation in detail, view the high resolution version. Thanks to Wikipedia for the photo (which I obviously did not take!). -
Rhine river
Vikas took Vicki and I up the scenic Rhine river. There are Castles everywhere along the banks of the river.
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Hockenheimring
Vickas took Vicki and I to the Hockenheimring in Germany, the home of the German grandprix. There were no cars racing that day, just testing. But it was nice to see (in person) the track I’ve driven around in so many video games.
Random car circling around the Hockeheim grandprix track. Any ideas what kinda car this is? -
German cows
Ya know how in the movies the cows in Germany have bells on them? Well apparently those crazy Germans actually do attach bells to the poor cows! I have no idea why they do this. Imagine how insane you would go if some dork attached a bell around your neck! Every time you moved you would hear an irritating bell sound.
I took the photos in the Black Forest in south western Germany.
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Technik Museum Speyer
Vikas Aggarwal took Victoria Argyle and I to the Technik Museum Speyer in Germany. They had all sorts of different types of locomotion including trains, planes, automobiles and underwater submarines.
We got strapped to the side of a Boeing 747 and taken for a flight. It was quite blustery but I managed to snap the following pic just after takeoff.
Flying on the side of a Boeing 747 at full pelt can be quite windy, I recommend taking some goggles along. 
My plans of becoming a sub-mariner were squashed as soon as I entered this thing. It is the most seriously cramped place I 
And to really put paid to my sub-mariner plans, these torpedo bays are only meters from the bedroom area. 
A Cosmonaut suit. 
Vikas decided to go first-class instead of wing-class on the Boeing 747. 
Boeing 747 
This was actually taken at the Schiphol airport in Amsterdam, but it seemed like an appropriate place to put it.
