3/11/09 - The Running In Heels Autumn Playlist

Autumn is upon us and Running in Heels has found the best tunes for curling up on the couch, kicking through leaves and dancing like a zombie to…

http://runninginheels.co.uk/articles/autumn-playlist/

We finally get to buy the scarves and mittens that were too warm to contemplate a month ago, tights and boots become a wardrobe staple, leaves start to change colour, early nights mean curling up on the couch to relax. As summer turns to autumn we reflect over what has gone before and what’s to come: relationships ending, new beginnings, reminiscing over what happened during those long summer nights, making plans, and kicking your way through piles of leaves. Could there be a better season than autumn? To celebrate this season of transition this month we offer you a playlist of two halves – enjoy! The playlist is available to listen to on Spotify or watch the videos on Youtube.

Kicking through the leaves…

California Dreamin’ – The Mamas and the Papas

This is the quintessential autumn song even though it’s actually about winter! Who knew?

Sometime Around Midnight – The Airborne Toxic Event

This is a total post summer romance song if only for the line ‘and that white dress she’s wearing, you haven’t seen her for a while.’ It’s a mini narrative about seeing someone who you loved carry on living their life without you. While it’s clear that the relationship ended badly, the song is incredibly beautiful and intense. Anyone who’s had to say goodbye to someone once autumn hit will empathise with and love this song.

Your Ex-Lover Is Dead – Stars

The most hauntingly beautiful song I’ve heard in a long time. Could any song sum up the end of a relationship more perfectly? ‘There’s one thing I have to say so I’ll be brave, You were what I wanted, I gave what I gave, I’m not sorry I met you, I’m not sorry it’s over, I’m not sorry there’s nothing to save.’

Autumn Leaves (Les Feuilles Mortes) – Edith Piaf

A song that has been covered countless times by everyone from Nat King Cole to Eva Cassidy, each with their own unique take on the song. Listen to Edith Piaf for the original and one of the best versions.

Something’s Missing – John Mayer

The line ‘when autumn comes, it doesn’t ask, It just walks in where it left you last’ is genius because to me it’s a reflection on how for him nothing changes year after year. Something is missing in his life but he doesn’t know what it is. Given that autumn is a season of renewal and starting again this song is a good one to reflect on at this time of year.

Could anything celebrate autumn better than the craziest party of the year? Hallowe’en!

The Party – Justice (feat. Uffie)

Gather your mates, turn up the sound and start getting ready to party! There’s truly no better song to get you in the mood for fun. This song is refreshing in its delivery and the brash confidence of Uffie means that you’ll be ready to face the crowds after this track – whether it is as a sexy cat, a pirate, a Rubix Cube or a tribute to Michael Jackson!

Psycho Killer – Talking Heads

A great one to get a party started with its persistent back beat and catchy lyrics. Scream it out ´Psycho Killer Qu’est-ce que c’est?’.

Thriller – Michael Jackson

Does this song even need an explanation? The late, great, unforgettable Michael Jackson. If you do nothing else watch the video, which lasts a whopping 13 minutes and showcases some inimitable dance moves and impressive costumes.

The Time Warp – Rocky Horror Picture Show soundtrack

Get everybody dancing in sync or better still dancing in sync in full costume to this ridiculously fun song. For those party guests who have lived under a stone since 1975; ‘It’s just a jump to the left, And then a step to the right, With your hands on your hips, You bring your knees in tight, But it’s the pelvic thrust that really drives you insane, Let’s do the Time Warp again!’

The Monster Mash – Bobby Pickett

Another cheesy fun song to get the party moving. Nothing says Hallowe’en like monsters, ghosts, vampires and zombies dancing en masse!

Listen to the whole playlist on Spotify here.

30/09/09: Oktoberfest!

The one and only Oktoberfest in Munich – Germany’s annual beerathon.

http://runninginheels.co.uk/articles/oktoberfest/

Oktoberfest!

When in Munich...

‘What a genius idea!’ declared the Aussies I was travelling with. I was little more apprehensive. Beer? No lovely cocktails? Well when in Munich… Oktoberfest is a 16-day festival that takes place every year in Munich. Last weekend I braved the opening weekend and I can confirm that whether or not you are a beer lover this is one festival you shouldn’t miss. The action has already begun but continues till October 4th so you still have time to join in the fun!

Where to stay

I joined some Aussie friends on Friday evening after a never-ending journey from Madrid to Munich. The campsite we stayed at, Thalkirchen, is a 15 minute walk from the nearest metro stop and really cheap if you‘re travelling on a budget. For those who don’t enjoy roughing it there are plenty of hostels and hotels in the Munich area, although they get pretty booked up this time of year.

A good tip is to book through a tour group. This cut out a lot of effort for us and we arrived to ready-erected tents complete with air mattresses. The showers were hot and there were even electrical sockets in the bathrooms. For someone who is wedded to her hair straighteners this campsite gets definite thumbs up from me! Unfortunately my happiness was slightly marred by the fact that I didn’t get a tent near my mates due to my late arrival on Friday evening. Instead I ended up rooming with an English guy who was part of a stag party surrounded by tents containing his friends. Truly, it could only happen to me!

What to wear

Dirndl and lederhosen may sound funny but they are a must! We went for the more traditional costume of full skirt, puffy sleeves and low neckline whilst the guys opted for anything from braces and a hat to the full lederhosen ensemble. But there were a lot of variations on the traditional German dress from the tourists – anything from hot pants to über short skirted versions that could only have come from a sex shop. A word of warning to those ladies who go for the ‘updated’ German dress though – don’t stand on the tables. Please.

Beer wench!

What to do

The central activity of the festival is, predictably, drinking. The tents are open from 10am on weekdays and 9am on weekends. Be aware that purchasing beer can be a major challenge, especially at busy times. You have to be seated before you can be served although if the waitress (beer wench) has served everyone at her tables she may serve people standing in the area. The waitresses (beer wenches) work voluntarily so you must tip them if you want to get served again. A good rule of thumb is to give them €10 per stein and let them keep the change.

Each tent is dedicated to a specific beer but, as you’ll realise pretty quickly, they’re also dedicated to a specific crowd. We spent most of our time in the Hofbräu tent which is (without a doubt) the tourist tent. A sea of tour company t-shirts greet you when you walk in and the majority of accents are British or Australian. Unsurprisingly, this tent gets pretty rowdy in the evenings. In the centre there’s an area called the ‘pig pen’ which is a standing room only. Be wary if you’re a lone female in this area; aside from being grope central, you’ll notice the overhead angel steadily accumulates clothes and underwear thrown up from the crowd as the day wears on.

Bands play all day long and random outbreaks of singing in the tents add to the rowdy atmosphere. We spent a lot of time jumping up from our seats onto the benches to sing along to quality (?) tunes such as Mambo Number Five. Every ten minutes or so the band plays the Oktoberfest toast song which is your cue to get up on your seats and start clinking glasses left, right and centre. Having no clue to what the German in the song meant I was perfectly content singing my own gibberish version especially as the hours passed by… Just remember to say ‘prost’ at the end of each song!

What to eat

Food is served in the tents and festival grounds all day. Two typical snacks you must try are pretzels and gingerbread cookies. You can buy absolutely gigantic pretzels at the festival which go perfectly with beer. Unfortunately once you start you just can’t stop, resulting in a vicious circle of drink – eat salty pretzel – get thirsty – eat another salty pretzel – drink and so on and so forth. Another typical snack is the giant gingerbread cookie, which will often have a phrase iced onto them. My mate went for the ‘Ich Liiiiiebe dich’ iced message and I, unable as always to avoid the tacky, went for ‘Mein superstar’. These can be hung around your neck so you can take bites when hunger strikes. What a genius idea!

Beats a currywurst we say...

No more beer

There’s no doubt about it that two days of non-stop beer drinking requires stamina. As someone who rarely drinks beer, after a couple of steins I was well on my way to drunkenness: so remember to take breaks! Don’t be that person who vomits all over the table.

Within the festival grounds there are lots of fairground rides to take advantage of although some – including the rollercoaster – may be better on an empty stomach! There’s also a huge statue of Bavaria on a hill at one end of the festival grounds where people go to relax or, in some cases, sleep off the alcohol.

Do try as well at some point to leave the festival and see Munich itself. The beautiful English gardens are a lovely escape from the madness and contain everything from nudist sunbathers to surfers on the river! Munich’s Marienplatz is one of the city’s central squares and a great place to grab a coffee and people watch. At 11.00am, 12.00am and 5.00pm you can see the famous Glockenspiel in action as the carved figures move about accompanied by taped music.

So go and enjoy Oktoberfest while you still can. It’s definitely worth it. I’ll finish with one invaluable lesson I learned this weekend at Oktoberfest: Don’t take a camera on a rollercoaster when you’re drunk. It will fall out of your hands… But at least I’m now the proud owner of a dirndl!

Find out more about Oktoberfest from Munich’s Tourist Board.

28/09/09: Contributor to Running In Heels Feelgood Playlist

The tracks that uplift you when you're down and give you a shot of motivation to take hold of life once again!

http://runninginheels.co.uk/articles/feelgood-playlist/

Drops of Jupiter – Train

This is ‘my coming home from travelling song’ that I always put on my iPod as I walk through the arrivals door in the airport. For me it perfectly encapsulates how you feel when you arrive home after experiencing new things and I absolutely love the opening line ‘Guess who’s back in the atmosphere, Drops of Jupiter in her hair hey hey hey hey.’ The song is written from the perspective of the guy who was left behind and though he’s kind of cynical about what she experienced ‘when she was looking for herself out there’ he’s still there waiting for her nevertheless. A beautiful song.

28/09/09: Travelling Solo?

Holidaying on your own: the pros, the cons and the best ideas for travelling solo

http://runninginheels.co.uk/articles/travelling-solo/

Travelling Solo?

Lonesome?

‘Table for one?’

If that phrase strikes dread in your heart it’s time to think again. Nowadays travelling alone has never been so easy… or fun! So why isn’t everyone doing it you ask?

You might find the answer hidden in the words of the not-so-great Akon: ‘lonely, I’m so lonely’. Oh dear. The fear that you’ll spend your days alone is one of the main reasons people don’t like to travel alone. But, unless you’re planning to spend your time in a remote hermitage far off the mainland, I can almost guarantee this won’t happen.

If you want a break from the world, travelling alone is the perfect way to find time for yourself. Or, if you’re simply travelling alone because you can’t find someone to travel with, don’t worry! There are a million ways to find friends and fun along the way. Here are some hot tips to get you started:

Accommodation

The key to travelling alone (and I may be stating the obvious here) is to be sociable. Hostels are a great way to meet people and make friends. Try sites like hostelworld.com and hostelbookers.com and check the reviews to see what people say about the atmosphere of the place. Hostels that organise nights out are ideal if you want to get to know people quickly. Even just hanging out in the kitchen or lounge area gives you the chance to meet and make friends with fellow travellers from all over the world.

Extreme couchsurfing

If you want to get to know a place and its people a little better you could consider couchsurfing. This is a great (and free!) way to travel. All you have to do is fill out a profile on the website and then search for couches in the area you’re planning to travel to. Then, pick your favourite person in the area and send them an email asking to stay. Most people have a limit set on how many nights a guest can stay so don’t outstay your welcome! Keep in mind as well that you may not be sleeping on a couch. In the world of couchsurfing anything goes: from the floor, a blow up bed, or (as in one of my more memorable experiences) a prison bus! Most hosts are eager to hang out with their guests so don’t treat this as just a place to stay. Think of it as opportunity to make new friends and to get to know the real life of wherever you’re staying.

If the idea of turning up to a complete stranger’s house to spend the night scares you, try looking at the events happening within the couchsurfing community you’re travelling to. Lots of cities have active communities who meet up regularly so invite yourself along.

‘What do travellers do all day?’

This quote comes from one of my favourite books about a young English guy who is doing a gap year. He poses this question after spending all day lounging about his hostel. Don’t be this guy! Get out there and discover what there is to do…

Sightseeing

Sightseeing alone can be a depressing business especially if there’s no one beside you to discuss just how small the Mona Lisa really is or whether Spanish or French guys have sexier accents. For this reason a bike tour is a great alternative to the traditional bus tour (where you’d have no one to sit next to) or walking around alone. People tend to be a lot chattier on bikes, not least because battling against the traffic tends to break the ice! One excellent company is Fat Tire Bike Tours who do tours in Paris, Barcelona, London and Berlin.

Become a wwoofer!

Volunteering

If you fancy getting involved in something and meeting people while travelling, volunteering is another option. There are thousands of different ways to volunteer, depending on what you like doing. Here are a few suggestions:

• Teach English: A couple of companies run immersion camps in Spain that look for volunteers to work as English teachers for them in an informal capacity. You don’t need any qualifications apart from being a native English speaker. You will get your food and accommodation for free in exchange for spending all day chatting to people who want to improve their English. Two companies who run immersion programmes are VaughnTown and Pueblo Inglés.

• Go wwoofing: If switching heels for work boots doesn’t turn you off, wwoofing is another option to consider. WWOOF stands for World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms and is an organisation that assists those interested in working as a volunteer on an organic farm. Almost every European country has a wwoofing organisation. You pay a membership fee and once you are registered you can browse the list of farms available and email the farms to ask for a few days/weeks work. It’s voluntary and generally you receive food and accommodation as payment.

• Work at a festival: Another good idea if you’re travelling alone if to volunteer to work at a festival. For example, the Great British Beer Festival is staffed completely by unpaid volunteers and you get benefits like free accommodation, entrance to parties, etc. But that’s only one festival, many more look for volunteers. Try websites such as Festival Volunteer. Who knows who you might meet? I’m thinking music festivals and Kings of Leon personally, mmm…

Skiing in a group means there'll always be someone to pick up you up...

Go in a group

You could also plan your trip within an organised group so you have a readymade group of people to hang out with. Companies like First Festival Travel and Top Deck Tours organise group trips to festivals, sports events, skiing and snowboarding holidays and lots more. Given that the prerequisite of these trips is that you are able have a good time you can’t go wrong!

Or alternatively, consider signing up to a boot camp or for group lessons in whatever activity you’re interested in – snowboarding, windsurfing, or horse riding to name just a few options. Like bike tours, learning something together means that you break the ice straight away and can lead to having brilliant fun and making great friends!

So there you go, being a lone traveller doesn’t mean being a lonely traveller so get out there and start your adventures!