From one big city to another: New York to London. I was preparing myself for another huge week but surprisingly I found London much more laidback than New York but maybe this was beacause we took a took a much more relaxed approach to the city.

It has many historical buildings and landmarks and most of the time we just walked around and admired. The two churches were incredible: Westminster Abbey was so detailed and intricate, just gorgeous, and Saint Pauls Cathedral was huge. We climbed all the way to the top and saw a not so amazing view of London (the city is almost entirely flat), and whispered to each other across opposite ends of the whispering gallery in the dome itself. Other gorgeous London sights were Buckingham Palace, Big Ben, The Tower Bridge and the Tower of London. It was also great to stroll through the huge parks, including Hyde Park.

A highlight of London was definately in the East: Brick Lane and Spitalfield markets. The markets weren´t just your junky market, it had some really cool stuff not to mention the amazing food of which we bought fresh bread, smoked sausage and cheese. Brick Lane was very alternative and had lots of Indian restaurants along the way, one of which we ate a mini banquet and of course over indulged!

Shopping was also great! The centre of London wasn´t too bad at all but I really loved Kensington. It had a great vibe and awesome shops. I probably spent too much money on a dress, but hey, it´s London right? We made our way down to Harrods from Kensington and gaped at more designer clothes than you could imagine with ridiculous price tags. Then we over-indulged again: we went to the French cafe in Harrods and had the most amazing cakes with some very aromatic Chinese tea (we had to do the English afternoon tea tradition!). These cakes were AMAZING. I can´t describe how good they were but you can see for yourself:

I must also mention that on the night we arrived I got to see my favourite band at the moment: Arcade Fire. For those of you who aren´t aware this band is a sensation and are selling out gigs at incredibly fast times. We were very lucky to get tickets. It was worth the sleep deprivation and much much more (we had the 6 hour overnight flight from New York). The band had me in awe a few times and I had to pinch myself to make sure it was real. Wake Up was so so inspiring and awesome. The only unfortunate thing was that they didn´t play my favourite and possibly their biggest song: Power Out. Anyway, this makes up for missing the Pixies (please don´t tease me).

Next update is for Paris: more shopping and much more food!

I'm not sure why they call New York the Big Apple but I can assure you that it is big. In fact, the city is huge and the size overwhelmed and facinated me all at once. I knew it was going to be big but nothing prepared me for how big. We had a week to conquer New York but you couldn't see everything in a month so we tried our best amidst exhaustion and sickness.

We arrived in the evening after trying to get to our lovely little guest house in the East Village via the confusing and very dirty subway. Looking for a bite to eat we arrived at the famous Katz's Deli where I ate an awesome hot dog with saurekraut and mustard and a hearty helping of chicken noodle soup. We hung out at a groovy bar and then saw blues/rock artist Holly Golightly at the Mercury Lounge before collapsing in bed.

I was tired and probably not prepared for the amount of walking ahead for the next few days. A free ferry to Staten Island was adequate enough for a look at the Statue of Liberty. We had a walk around Wall Street, which had guards with huge guns!, and the financial district, before reaching Ground Zero. There wasn't a lot to see, just a timeline and pictures of the event but it did give me chills none the less. We made our way up to Canal Street where there was many a bargain to be found (if you could sort the real stuff from the fakes) then ate at an excellent dumpling house where they had 10 dumplings for $2!!! What a feast.

The Museum of Modern Art was free after 5pm so we made our way down there and it really was the most I have ever enjoyed art. The building was amazing and they had pretty much everything from the Impressionist period onwards. After this we saw some different art: music at Brooklyn's Southpaw, which has played host to some great bands. Tonight we saw some Chinese rock bands and some weird electro dudes from Canada.

That day exhuasted me but the next few were worse: we did plenty of window shopping in Soho, where everything was too expensive for real shopping and everyone looked beautiful and in which case I felt completely ordinary! This area is very upmarket with so many designer shops and expensive cafe's. The Prada store impressed me the most with what looked like a giant skate ramp in middle. I didn't belong there! Broadway was much more affordable for shopping and a lot of fun to walk around. The next day after walking around midtown for hours and window shopping and strolling through Central Park I walked 80 blocks back to the guest house and nearly collapsed! My feet were in so much pain. This area is exactly what you see in the movies. And although it cost 18 US dollars I had to go to the top of the Empire State Building and gasp at the view. It was beyond anything I had ever seen in my life. This city is enormous!

An entire day was also spent exploring Brooklyn, in particular Williamsburg and Park Slope, the former being a really cool alternative area with vintage shops and dive-y bars and the latter being very picturesque and more residential. Brooklyn was a great 'escape' from the busy, noisey life of Manhattan but even so you really cannot escape the city in New York, which is ultimatley why I could never live here. We ate at a great burger place called Schnack where they give you an option to have as many mini burger patti's in a bun as you like and beer milkshakes (they taste better than they sound!!).

I didn't think I would but we spent a bit of time around Times Square, where all the bright lights and crazy ads suck you in. We even bought Hershey's chocolates at the huge store which was packed with tourists. The square is so bright it looks like daytime. And you can't help but be sucked into the ads some of them are really awesome. We also saw The Roots at Nokia Theatre here, which was a lot of fun, and The Producers, which was so funny and entertaining! My broadway show was truly worth the $60 ticket (half price at tkts).

I did so many more things like gape at crazy clothing price tags in the East Village, eat Magnolia Bakery cupcakes and fall really sick with a cold and cough, surely due to exhaustion. But there is so much to do in New York that I couldn't waste time recovering in bed. It's a crazy city and very overwheliming. Surely unlike anywhere I will ever visit in my life.

Click here for photos

When I emerged from the subway station Chicago greeted me with a cold cold wind. I have never been colder in my life, walking the streets in the middle of the day in negative 5 degrees and battling the freezing wind. Last night after the ice hockey, where I saw the Chicago Blackhawks beat the LA Kings 3-0, it was snowing and hasn't stopped yet. We went down to Lincoln Park where the free zoo is and everything was blanketed in a thick layer of snow. You probably don't need to be told that most of the animals weren't frollicking in the snow.

Besides the freezing weather Chicago is an awesome city. It's fairly big but not overwhelming. We've probably covered most of it. The streets are very long and one street in particular, Michigan ave, is referred to as 'Magnificent Mile' where all the designer shops and expensive restaurants are. It's lovely to walk down and window shop but not great to look at the prices. The 'cool' area though, is down at Wicker Park, which could sort of be compared to Fitzroy and Brunswick street. Here we found some trendy cafes and bars and vintage stores, where I bought a few bits and peices for more affordable prices. We spoilt ourselves with a lovely Spanish tapas style dinner and ran out after leaving only a $4 tip. (The tipping is very hard to get used to). Apart from that we have been eating lots of hotdogs and Chicago style deep-dish pizza, not the healthiest but very tasty (and an improvement from all the fried chicken).

The first night we arrived we decided to go to a small bar, which was difficult to find as it was in a quiet part of town just outside the city and was around what appeared to be some old abandoned warehouses. Once we found it though, it was very cool and we watched a Melbourne band called Love of Diagrams play. Coming half way around the world to see a Melbourne band play is quite amusing in retrospect. But apart from the barman staring me down without me realising cos I had forgotten to tip him, the night was a lot of fun.

When I was little I was a huge Wizard of Oz fan so when I saw that a musical called "Wicked', about the untold story of the two witches of Oz, was playing at the Oriental theatre I really wanted to go. We put our names in for a lucky draw where we could purchase tickets for $25 if we won. And my name was drawn! We had terrible seats but the theatre was not full so we moved to an awesome view. It was very entertaining and a fun night, hopefully you will all see it in Melbourne soon.

As for me, my next show will be at Broadway in New York City!

When I arrived in Arkansas after 23 hours in transit I planned to sit in a classic southern USA style diner at least once for the 8 days I would be here. Well, that's exactly where I ended up on the way to Michael's Mum's house from the airport. We sat surrounded by cheesy American patriotic objects, like mosaic American flags plastered on walls and 'God Bless America' banners. We ate fried shrimp, fried catfish, fried chips, fried chicken and yep, fried frogs legs. It felt so bad but I just had to taste the South USA fried specialities.

Unfortunately, that's pretty much all that's available to eat down here. So I got sick of it pretty fast. It's actually really hard to find some healthy food here. There are about 20 different take away food outlets and even the supermarkets (or WalMart) are chock full of bad food. We couldn't even find aborio rice to make a risotto!

I'm staying in the middle of nowhere in a little town called Calion. Everyone knows each other and everyone says 'ya'll'. I love listening to this accent. The house I'm in is on a huge lake and cos winter has just finished the trees are really bare and there is a really eerie vibe. We took the boat out on the lake and it's so peaceful and calm. We saw a few abandoned duck houses, where people park their boats and shoot ducks from perches. There is a lot of hunting down here.

We also went down to New Orleans in Louisiana for a couple of days. Most of the city is restored but you can still see some of the damage that hurricane Katrina left behind, especially in some of the poorer suburbs. The city itself is a little sleazy, particularly at night. You can walk around with alcohol on the streets and every second shop is a sleazy, cheesy cover band joint with middle age boozers dancing around. We tried to find some jazz but had no luck. By day the city is nicer, especially The French Quarter, which is a bit more picturesque. We did, however, eat a lot of very nice food, included cajun food, which is a style of cooking special to New Orleans. My favourite was probably some snails I had which were marinated with mushrooms and came with French bread. It sounds gross but it tasted amazing. We also went on an airboat tour in the swamps and marshes, as a lot of south Louisiana is covered under water. We saw some alligators and I held a tiny one.

Just trying to get some relax time in before the busy backpacking kicks in. Next stop is Chicago.

Ya'll have a good time, ya'll.

Photos