The first one I want to point out is another Mercedes, being driven around Paris in 1976. The film is called "C'était un rendez-vous", but often referred to just as "Rendezvous". It was shot at 05:30 on a Sunday in August (the month most people go on holiday); this was on open roads with no official approval – there has been no editing of the video footage.

If you're not a fan of YouTube then you can also see it here. For more background info see Wikipedia, Dark Roasted Blend, Hypertextbook, or buy the remastered DVD.

The other video which should really get a mention is Climb Dance, which shows Ari Vatanen doing the Pike's Peak hill climb in Colorado in 1988. There are massive drops as he snakes his way up the hill in a Peugeot 405 T16. He's absolutely on the ragged edge, but also unbelievably fast. Incredibly so.

Also available at Google Video.

I'm also using this post as an excuse to spread the love for the Lancia Delta Integrale, one of the most beautiful cars ever made:

So there we go, just thought I'd bring those to your attention. Obviously there are plenty of excellent car sequences in films (e.g. this and this), but these are two excellent displays of real-life driving which might easily pass people by.

Our house, in the middle of our street, etc.

A few people have asked to see photos, so I thought I'd post this to fulfil that role. In addition, some people have even dared suggest that "I'm removing tiles" is just a convenient excuse for not climbing / going to gigs, etc. – hopefully this will also persuade people that we really have been doing an awful lot of work! ;)

First dinner in our new home - microwave pasta on a paint-pot table!

The plan from day one involved a lot of refurbishment, meaning we started pulling out old bits of wall / flooring / utilities almost as soon as we got the keys.

The kitchen prior to 'renovation'.

The kitchen was nice enough on the surface, but investigation revealed cupboards held together with sellotape, worktops not stuck down, and the weirdest boiler wiring you've ever seen. All this had been spotted on our viewings prior to purchasing, so we quickly set about ripping everything out in preparation for an entirely new kitchen.

Kitchen - this is called progress.

Further investigative work with James led to a number of awful DIY discoveries, my personal favourite being that the hall walls had effectively been reconstructed with newspaper and toilet roll!

The study - not too bad before we got to it.

All the rooms had dado rails, which were removed at the expense of the aging plaster.

Stripped back study. Note the dado rail shaped holes in the plaster.

The ridiculous boiler in the kitchen has now been replaced with a nice combi in the attic, but this also necessitated the replacement of all the central heating pipes throughout the house. In the process, we lost the hot water cylinder and so decided to knock a wall through on the landing. That therefore needed a bit of work…

Looking across the landing into the main bedroom. I have no idea what those wires are for.

Similarly the bathroom had a wall moved and the suite was being ripped out and replaced. I made start but quickly ran out of time…

The bathroom before the professionals moved in.

… so we brought in someone who wasn't trying to fit the job into two hours after work each night. They quickly dealt with the issue…

We agree the pipe is horrible. It's on its way out at the moment.

Meanwhile things moved on apace in our bedroom, with David plastering around the new wardrobes (deftly re-arranged by James):

Something which got nicer instead of more desolate.

In the kitchen, the tiled floor is now down, and the electrics have been sorted out prior to plastering…

Another piece of construction rather than destruction. Kitchen looking across to the dining room.

The bathroom will hopefully be sorted by the end of this week, along with the rest of the plastering in the bedrooms and the lounge. Although it's a nightmare of planning and organisation, it's quite a fun project and a massive learning curve. When we get towards the bit where it's actually furnished and can be lived in, I'll take some better photos. For now I'll leave you with the foggy view from the back of the house, which isn't too shoddy…

Beats looking at the back of student housing.

• Castles and Town Walls of King Edward in Gwynedd (1986)
• Durham Castle and Cathedral (1986)
• Giant's Causeway and Causeway Coast (1986)
• Ironbridge Gorge (1986)
• St Kilda (1986, 2004, 2005)
• Stonehenge, Avebury and Associated Sites (1986)
• Studley Royal Park including the Ruins of Fountains Abbey (1986)
• Blenheim Palace (1987)
• City of Bath (1987)
• Frontiers of the Roman Empire (1987, 2005,2008)
• Westminster Palace, Westminster Abbey and Saint Margaret's Church (1987)
• Canterbury Cathedral, St Augustine's Abbey, and St Martin's Church (1988)
• Henderson Island (1988)
• Tower of London (1988)
• Gough and Inaccessible Islands (1995, 2004)
• Old and New Towns of Edinburgh (1995)
• Maritime Greenwich (1997)
• Heart of Neolithic Orkney (1999)
• Blaenavon Industrial Landscape (2000)
• Historic Town of St George and Related Fortifications, Bermuda (2000)
• Derwent Valley Mills (2001)
• Dorset and East Devon Coast (2001)
• New Lanark (2001)
• Saltaire (2001)
• Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew (2003)
• Liverpool – Maritime Mercantile City (2004)
• Cornwall and West Devon Mining Landscape (2006)
• Pontcysyllte Aqueduct and Canal (2009)

So, a couple of days in London should knock most of those on the head. Looks like I'll have to suffer a trip to Bermuda at some point, too. I'll be honest, the one that's worrying me most is "Gough and Inaccessible Islands" – to get an idea of why they're called the Inaccessible Islands, check out this Google Map (you'll probably need to zoom out. A lot.):

Strangely, I seem to have racked up more globally than in the UK, the list so far being:

• Canada - Canadian Rocky Mountain Parks
• Czech Republic - Historic Centre of Prague
• Czech Republic - Kutná Hora: Historical Town Centre with the Church of St Barbara and the Cathedral of Our Lady at Sedlec
• Greece - Medieval City of Rhodes
• Ireland- Skellig MIchael
• Italy - Venice and its Lagoon
• Portugal - Historic Centre of Oporto
• Slovakia - Levoča, Spišský Hrad and the Associated Cultural Monuments
• Slovakia - Caves of Aggtelek Karst and Slovak Karst
• Slovenia - Škocjan Caves
• United States of America - Grand Canyon National Park
• United States of America - Yosemite National Park

You can view any blog posts with the UNESCO keyword by clicking here. Both nationally and internationally I've not included ones I've been past but not into (primarily cultural ones such as Mont-Saint-Michel and the Tower of London). Annoyingly, it seems I was within a few miles of one in Andorra several years back, but was blissfully unaware at the time! UNESCO have their own interactive map, which is quite good. Anyway, I'll update this page as we go along…

Houses on the north side of the Douro river, Porto.Copyright Haydn Williams 2009.

I was out well before sunrise, which helped, but I think that photographically speaking it was a pretty successful trip generally. Mind you, the old town is a UNESCO World Heritage site, so how could it fail to be amazing? That's another one added to the list. :)

Inside a port lodge in Vila Nova de Gaia.Copyright Haydn Williams 2009.

The next day we did the touristy thing of a bus tour, boat trip and visit to the Port cellars. That was followed by a nice conference dinner in one of the university buildings (think big chandeliers, endless canapes, and silver service). After that we swapped hotels and ended up within walking distance of the sea, so that killed a day when combined with the big city park and the Sea Life Centre. Despite one of the staff members having a small hiccup with the Portugese > English translation of "Sea Urchin", it was pretty interesting. Her English was better than my Portugese, anyway!

Vila Nova de Gaia from the old town.Coypright Haydn Williams 2009

That was pretty much it really, given that it was always supposed to be a whistle-stop tour. The old town's pretty nice, but as a city it's definitely not geared up for tourism at all. There's loads of derelict buildings right in the city centre, although there is now a lot of building and modernisation work going on. I seem to enjoy getting out early and watching big cities wake up; Porto was great for that, and I think there's probably still just enough left to do for it to warrant a return trip.

The old town, Porto.Copyright Haydn Williams 2009.

First class, Czech style.
Copyright Haydn Williams 2009.

There's an ossuary at Kutna Hora containing the stacked bones of around 40,000 people, and the town is a UNESCO World Heritage site. This was the first of three heritage sites this trip, adding significantly to my running total. The whole town is very nice, offering a glimpse of the history and architecture seen in Prague, but without the crowds. I'd also highly recommend the silver museum with a trip down the mine.

We then took a sleeper train to Slovakia, based near the High Tatra mountains. The following few days saw us with plenty of possibilities, and we managed to get in some walking, a bit rafting (the sedate, "drift slowly down a river" kind), cycling and also got a trip on a Polish disco bus (Euro-trance on the stereo, blacked-out windows and lit entirely in blue).

The group on our way to the first chalet of the day.
Copyright Haydn Williams 2009

Spissky Hrad was the second World Heritage site of the trip, and it's honestly the most awesome castle ever. It's partially ruined, but it's basically what you imagined the perfect castle to be when you were about eight years old. There's a huge central tower and loads of outer bits to wander around. Ace.

Popradske pleso.
Copyright Haydn Williams 2009

Dobsinska ice caves are a series of caves which, by some fluke of geography, remain at or below freezing all year. This means that all the water draining into them freezes and has built up over the last 7,000 years or so into a massive space-filling block up to 25m deep in places. It's a surreal experience to go from the heat outside into a crazy world of icicles (which, incidentally, are just screaming out for axes and crampons).

Descending a tunnel cut through the ice in Dobsinska Ice Cave.
Copyright Haydn Williams 2009

Despite a 3-way UNESCO heritage site bonanza, I think the highlight of the holiday was the last night, which we spent in a five-star hotel in Prague. I knew it was going to be awesome when we arrived at 08:55 and the first thing they did was take us up to the restaurant and feed us cheesecake! We then delighted in the delicious complimentary finger food, massive DVD library, jacuzzi bath, and the utterly ridiculous "pillow menu", offering a selection of head-and-neck support options. Our driver arrived the next morning to take us to the airport in style, after which we came down to earth with a bump in the scrum for the Easyjet check-in desk.

In terms of photography, there wasn't that much potential as we weren't out and about at the right times of day, but there are a few pattern shots I'm reasonably pleased with. I also managed to get two shots of the moon at different locations, which seem to have worked out quite well. All photos are in the gallery now (but seem to be taking a long time load!).

The coast trip was basically an excuse for me to go and check out lighthouses for the project I'm doing on them. Not terribly successful, because the sky was really overcast, dull, grey and boring. I got one OK shot at our first stop, Killantringan lighthouse, but it's certainly not of the standard I need – more of a favourite (in my usual minimalist style) than a truly good shot, I think.

Killantringan Lighthouse.
Copyright Haydn Williams 2009

From there we drove south to the Mull of Galloway, the most southern point of Scotland and home to another lighthouse. Unfortunately this one was less photogenic! While the coastline was reasonably pretty, we were probably spoiled on our last trip by how amazing the beaches at Northumberland are.

The next day we ventured inland, into Galloway Forest Park. We wandered around Loch Trool, which was still frozen despite the warm temperatures and lack of snow anywhere else. Over the course of the walk (6 miles, a couple of hours) we saw four other people – the peace and tranquility were just stunning. The cloud was pretty low all morning, making everything look rather dramatic too.

Loch Trool.
Copyright Haydn Williams 2009

Being the heartless beast I am, I then left my better half to her own devices all afternoon, while I went riding at one of the 7 Stanes mountain bike centres. The sites consist of a variety of graded trails, with traffic only going in one direction, and no pedestrians. It's amazing! I went to Kirroughtree as it was only ten minutes drive from our hotel, and hired a bike from the bike shop at the site, called The Break Pad. They were really friendly, and kitted me out with a Trek EX-7 full-susser. Having not ridden anything other than a hardtail before, and having not ridden properly for around six years, it was all a bit daunting. However, the trails are really well signed and maintained, the bike rode like a dream, and I completed 'The Twister' in a couple of hours, without passing out or crashing.

The faithful steed at Kirroughtree.
Copyright Haydn Williams 2009

Anyway, suffice to say it's re-kindled my desire to ride, and I'll be checking out the possibilities for regular riding a bit closer to home or Snowdonia.

We arrived on Thursday night, and early on Friday I drove to Lindisfarne, the island just off the coast which is famous for being pillaged by vikings. There's a causeway that goes to the island, but it's only open at certain times because it floods at high-tide. I arrived at 06:50, in time for sunrise. The plan to photograph a lighthouse went titsup when I realised I was using a 1:50,000 OS map and it was actually twice as far to walk from the car as I thought. That left me with little choice but to head to the harbour at Holy Island (the village on Lindisfarne), and shoot in the direction of sunrise.

Sunrise over the Farne Isles and Bamburgh Castle

For the rest of the day, we wanderered along the beaches near Bamburgh, where we were staying. The castle's pretty impressive (but was closed when we were there), and certainly dominates the local landscape. The beaches are incredible, and while out near Dunstanburgh we found an old WWII pill-box. We spotted another, ruined one, on the drive back to Bamburgh, so I went back later that night to try and get some moon-lit shots of it. It's location in the middle of some steep sand dunes wasn't too conducive to getting the right shot, but I quite like the result.

Moonlit pill box

The concrete and grass were 'painted' using a small headtorch, leaving the sea and sky to expose normally.

Having seen more photos of Bamburgh castle than I care to remember in brochures, photography society competitions, magazines and books, I had been desperately trying to avoid shooting cliched shots of the castle across the bay, and I think I succeeded. On the last day, there was glorious sunshine, so we took the dog for a wander on the beach before breakfast. The image below is the closest I got to shooting the castle, but hopefully it's a little different to the standard shot.

Bamburgh beach sunrise

Cadini di Misurina mountain range from Misurina. (c) Haydn Williams 2008.

We arrived in Misurina late on Thursday night, where it proceeded to pour down all night. It stopped momentarily when we got up, but over the course of the day we alternated between glorious sunshine and absolute downpours. After taking the chairlift to Col de Varda (opens 09:00, €4 single ticket), we spent the day on the Sentiero Bonacossa, with a detour after lunch onto Via Ferrata Merlone. The route goes up the west face of Cima Ciadin de Nord Est, but we had to abandon on the 'airy traverse' due to a combination of running out of time and a sudden downpour turning the pitch into a waterfall. It seemed like a great route, and when the cloud cleared as we were stood at the bottom of the route, it turned out we weren't actually that far from the summit.

View from Sentiero Bonacassa. (c) Haydn Williams 2008.

We carried on along Sentiero Bonacossa as far as Rifugio Auronzo, where we stayed the night. If anyone's thinking of staying there, we paid €14/night (€11/night with a BMC membership card). The food's good and the beds are fine, but don't forget a sheet sleeping bag.

Climbing Via Ferrata Merlone in the rain. (c) Haydn Williams 2008.

Day Two entailed a walk to Rifugio Locatelli alle Tre Cime de Lavaredo, and then an ascent of Torre de Toblin via the north-west chimney VF route. Descent was by the 'normal' route, with small detours into a variety of old tunnels and machine-gun posts. Rigufio Locatelli does a variety of great lunches for ~ €8, and after indulging appropriately we following Sentiero de Luca/Innerkofler to Forcella del Camoscio. From here it's a small detour to the summit of Monte Paterno, which gives excellent views of the whole region. The sun shone the entire day, including over the remainder of the route which traverses the mountain back to Rifugio Lavaredo.

Lunch at Rifugio Locatelli. Tre Cime de Lavaredo in the background. (c) Haydn Williams 2008.

Lavaredo is a great hut; small and friendly, and the fact that you have to share a table with someone else for dinner means you'll definitely get chatting with other people.

Sunrise over Rifugio Lavaredo. (c) Haydn Williams 2008.

The forecast for Day Three was thunderstorms, so we got a reasonably early start to do the VF route running from the east of Monte Paterno to Forcella del Camoscio. It's a long, uphill walk in, and the actual VF section isn't that long. There's a few bridges and it's quite good fun; it's a shame it ends just as the fun really begins.

Tre Cime de Lavaredo in morning mist. (c) Haydn Williams 2008.

From the forcella, we reversed the previous day's route through the galleria tunnels to Rifugio Locatelli, wolfed down another great lunch, and walked back to Rifugio Auronzo via the north-west side of the Tre Cime de Lavaredo. As it was, the weather held out until we were about 50m from the Rifugio, so everything worked out pretty well in the end.

There's all sorts of extreme-sports stuff to do here, and it seems like a great place to come back to. Our hotel was at the quieter, west end of the lake, situated at the end of the valley and only a couple of hundred metres from the valley sides and headwall. It's just an amazing place to be in, and the mist in the valley early in the morning is incredible. It doesn't clear until about 9am, so you can even be a lazy photographer and still catch the best of it after a lie-in!

The train journey from Bled-Jezero to Nova Gorica was fantastic too – you follow narrow river gorges all the way, through little tunnels and over massive bridges. We stayed one night in Gorizia, and have just got back to the UK – knackered, but a great trip!

We've also walked to the Vintgar Gorge, a 1600m stretch of, erm, gorge. This is proper gorge – steep, narrow, and with a vicious river running through the bottom. A wooden walkway was constructed down the gorge in 1893 and has been continuously repaired ever since. It looks a bit dodgy in places!

The walk back to Bled over Hom and through Zasip is also well worth doing, as is the short but incredibly steep trip up to the Osojonica viewpoint at the south-west end of the lake.