I should not be doing this. A travelogue should be written contemporaneously. With the passage of time recollection of amusing, poignant or even annoying moments fades into oblivion. It was an early start from Perth at the commencement of this five week odyssey. I don't know how we made it to the airport for 5.30am, but we did. I must see what time the alarm clock was set for when we get back home. I am relieved to hear that the aeroplane will not be full. I am paranoid about overloaded aeroplanes. Our Airbus A330 leaves on schedule. Our next sight of land is of the Sarawak River snaking through the lush vegetation prior to our approach to Kuching Airport. I did not know what to expect of Kuching but I find it is not llike Kuala Lumpur. We had to spend an hour in the lounge while the aeroplane is refuelled. It is a small lounge and there are few seats available but we did manage to get a table. We were joined at the table by other travellers with whom we struck up a conversation. This turned out to be fortuitous as one of the persons at the table was a director of the Holiday Inn at Kuching and we were in need of a hotel booking to complete our itinery on the return trip. My preference for the Holiday Inn was losing out to the Hilton on the assumption that the higher price brings greater comfort. Our new acquaintance rang the Holiday Inn on his mobile and made the booking for us. We continued on to Kuala Lumpur where we were met by family. There is a family reunion the following evening. The next day we set off for Penang by road. We are booked in at the Lone Pine at Batu Ferringhi. By the time we arrive I have developed a head cold and I am feeling lousey. The pool is right in front of our room but I did not feel like joining the people splashing about in it. There was another family gathering at a restaurant in Georgetown. After two nights in Penang we return to Kuala Lumpur to spend another two nights with the KL family. For our last two nights in KL we are booked in to the Concorde Hotel by a director who is related to a friend in Perth and who we met at a Hari Raya party in Perth. Checking in on arrival we received an invitation to the re-opening of the Saloma Restaurant. I really did not expect any more than a standing drinks and nibbles for an hour or so. However, the event turned out to be more like a wedding reception with speeches by our host and the Minister for Tourism followed by an exellent cultural song and dance variety show by all the beautiful people dressed in their finery. Apparently the Saloma Restaurant is named after Saloma who was a singer in the 1960's and 1970's who was married to the famous P. Ramlee. I had not brought my digital camera on holiday as I could not be bothered carrying the battery charger and the plug adaptors. However, I did bring the memory card so I got the photos taken previously download and printed at a kiosk outside the front of Lot 10. We also went to the Megamall. I had a haircut (rambut ikut) at the hairdressers outside the Carrefour supermarket. That completed our errands in KL. After two nights at the Concorde and a lunch at the Hard Rock Cafe, we continue our journey to London. On arrival in London ther is a minor hitch as we had failed to pick up one of our bags from the baggage reclaim. That is the hazard of travelling with too many bags. Once that is sorted out we got the bus to the Ibis Hotel which we have used on a number of times before. They have a special cheap rate because it is a week night even though it is Friday. The next day I find there is time for an early morning walk before going back to the airport. I walked a couple of kilometres to where there is a take-away indian restaurant where we got a memorable meal on an earlier occasion. Of course, it is closed at this time of day but I am re-assured that it is still there. After settling up with the Ibis we take the bus back to London Airport. Here there is another hitch. Our daughter had booked our flight to France on the internet. Until they had swiped her credit card they would not check us in. I managed to call her on her mobile. She was still on the bus but would be arriving at the London Airport shortly. When she turned up we were able to proceed, still in good time. Here we are in the South of France again. It is our favourite holiday destination. On arrival at Nice there is a delay before our baggage was available. I had anticipated catching the airport bus to the train station but opted to get off at the bus station, a little closer to our appartment in Rue Massena. It was a fortunate choice as Avenue Jean Medecin which we would have taken from the train station was subject to roadworks probably for laying a new tram track. As it was it was still an ordeal dragging our baggage across the streets in th hot afternoon sun. As the bus took us down the Promenade des Anglais, if we had been really smart and known where to get off, that is just past tthe new casino that wasn't there last time, we would have had only 100 metres to walk to Rue Massena. Although we were in good time we had to wait until 4pm for Madame to open the front door. Once we are in the door we are in a better bargaining position even though Madame Concierge is a bit dubious about our documents. At a time share apartment it is not just a metter of arriving and paying money. We have paid maintenance fees for our time share apartment in Australia; we have paid a fee to exchange that entitlement for a week at the apartment in Nice. Madame must satisfy herself that everthing is in order and that we are the people who have made the booking; and have paid for it. I was expected to be asked for, and was prepared to pay a security bond of 500 euros. However, Madame thinks I look the honest type and settles for 100 euros plus 40 euros for electric which is not returnable. This time our apartment does not face onto Rue Massena but faces onto the back yard which is rather disappointing. We settle in and then go in search of food to cook as we do not intend to eat in restaurants. There is a small supermarket around the corner from Rue Massena wher we get bread and milk for the night. For breakfast in the morning we go out and get a baguette, one of those long sticks of French bread. It costs 0.75 euros which is very cheap. The next day is Sunday and there was an Italian food festival on the Promenade des Anglais. We bought a chunk of Gorgonzola cheese. Later in the day, we walked down the Promenade and round into the old port of Nice. From there we crossed the road, the Cour Saleya, and into the old town of Nice where the streets are barely wide enough for two bicycles to pass. The next day we took a bus to Villefranche-sur-Mere, the next seaside townalong the coast from Nice in the direction of Monaco. Here the old town of Villefranche comes right down to the seafront. There are two cruise liners in the harbour. When we felt we had had enough of Villefranche we went to the train station to get the train to the next town along the coast which is Eze. At the train station we met a couple from Brazil. They had arrived on the cruise liner which they had joined at Barcelona. The cruise liner will visit five ports around the Western Mediterranean and return to Barcelona. The other cruise liner had come from Venice. The Brazillian couple were restauranteurs and this was their off-season being winter in Brazil. At Eze we could not find the shops. We asked directions from a building worker - in French. He replied in perfect Irish and pointed to the top of the cliffs. This is the town of Eze. Eze is an art and craft village. It is only accessible by cable car or taxi. We thought it was just too difficult and went for a snack before catching the bus back to Nice. On the bus there were more cruise passengers. I sat next to an old American. He was impressed with the bus driver's cornering. Next day we went to Antibes by train. The attraction here is the Picasso Museum. The building had belonged to the Grimaldi Family of Monaco but Picasso had actually worked in the building in 1946. Most of the works were from that period. I am not an admirer or Picasso. Next was a visit to St Paul de Vence. Last time we got to Vence but missed St Paul. This time we went to St Paul but not to Vence. St Paul is the original tourist trap. It is very tiuristy. It exists for tourists. That said, it is a typical French hill village. I guess that tourism and the money that tourists spend helps to maitain the village in pristine condition. It was here that we found a couple that we had met on our visit four years ago. They brought a painting to show to the friend we were staying with at Port Grimaud. Here, they were in St Paul with their own gallery. The weather changed. It became overcast. It rained and then it turned quite cool. We visited Cour Saleya, the flower market of Nice. It was here that we bought a French table cloth. It was 12 euros or about 20 AUD. On our last day the sun is out again. We take a trip to Monte Carlo and take our photographs outside the casino. If one is not a gambler, Monte Carlo does not have much to offer. We managed to get out of the apartment by checkout time and reclaim our deposit. We Hauled that luggage the 100 metres to the Promenade des Anglais and caught the 99 bus to the airport. We came on a large Boeing 767 but we are going back on a much smaller Airbus A319. At London Airport we separate from our daughter who is going to Brighton for the medical exam she has been studying for while we have been in Nice. This part of the holiday which consisted of two weeks in England and Scotland and a few days in Prague, I will come back to later to avoid making this passage overly long. The last bit of the holiday was the stopover for three nights in Kuching in Sarawak. We had stopped briefly in Sarawak on the way to Kuala Lumpur five weeks earlier. From the air one sees the chocolate brown Sarawak River snaking through the lush, emerald green jungle. We arrived about midday after a meal of nasi dagang, my favourite Malay dish, on the aeroplane. We checked into the Holiday Inn. A room with a view over the Sarawak River. Although I arrived jet lagged I have had five or six hours of chemically induced sleep on the flight from London to Kuala Lumpur so I am ready to hit the shops in Kuching until bedtime local time. I successfully manage to get some local currency out of the Maybank teller machine. I then go to a photo shop and buy half a dozen rolls of remarkably cheap Fuji film. The next day, after breakfast at the hotel, we go for a ride around the city on the tourist bus. It is just an introduction to get the lie of the land. After that we walk the esplanade. On the way back the mood takes us to cross the river to go to Fort Margherita named after the wife of Charles Brooke, the second white rajah. The Fort gives a good view of the city from across the river. Being the second full day, I have booked a trip to the Cultural Village. Here there are several different types of dayak longhouses, Malay and Chinese farm houses. Even though the village is not the real thing because it has been built for tourism, it is nevertheless very interesting. Following this tour of the houses we enter into a very cold air-conditioned theatre for a cultural show by people in their native costumes. The cultural village is close to one of several jungle-clad limestone mountains rising very steeply out of the surrounding plain. The top of the mountain is above the clouds. It is so steep that I wonder how anyone could climb up there. It is the last full day and I want to see the museum that we had passed on the bus the first day. The museum is a very distinctive European-style building perched on the top of a hill. The architect responsible for the building was French and he modelled the building on a town hall in Normandy. Inside the building they have constructed the interior of a Dayak longhouse. The displays include displays of the local flora and fauna and it was very interesting. After this I headed for the river and made another crossing heading for the Astana which was the residence of the Brooke’s who ruled Sarawak until the Japanese invasion. Unfortunately the Astana is not open to the public.