Like a layer of long dead blubber

I read in the IHT on Saturday that Moscow had its hottest July since the city began taking such measurements 130 years ago. Last Thursday was the hottest day ever recorded. The report quotes that ‘more than 2,000 people have died from drowning in June and July, often after they sought relief from the heat while intoxicated’.

More than 2,000? That is a serious number of drowned drunks. Most of the drunks we saw in Moscow were either legless or comatose. How do they get to the water?

I read last week that the first six months of this year globally was the hottest six month period ever recorded. More lies from the ‘Climategate’ scientists. 

Thank goodness there will not be any global warming in Australia under Tony Abbott. He is not going to stand for any of that nonsense. 

America should be OK also as soon as the new Republican President is elected. 

These two countries will be havens, indeed oases, when the rest of the world is burned to a crisp. 

People (Republicans mainly) will sit under palm trees sucking Mint Juleps watching Fox as the reporters explain that sure it is 150 degrees in LA today but that is because those Marxist Democrats have used death rays to make the sun hotter - or we are getting closer to The Rapture  - but until that sublime moment arrives we all need to fry a little - just to imagine what it is like in hell. 

Hey - maybe that is god’s plan. Fry us all slowly. Brilliant idea. 

Well - I gave you a perfectly  good planet and look what you have done to it. I mean- really - Miley Cyrus, MTV, Jersey Shore, Jackass, Big Brother, Dance Your Ass Off, Lindsay Lohan - and stiffen the Lizards - Justin Bieber - spare me! I could go on but you people make me want to vomit. 

I wonder in 20 years time if people will say ‘I wish President Obama had done something about environmental issues instead of burning his buns on health care’. 

I will be able to report first hand from Italy very soon on the state of the weather there. We are expecting hot to very hot. We are hoping for not too bloody hot.

The say on the brochure that the boat is air conditioned. They also say that on three nights the power goes off from 10.30 PM  to 7.30 AM. Hmmm....this must be the time when the Punkah Wallahs arrive in our cabin with palm fronds and gently fan us all night

Although.....Gwenyth has had a close look at the pictures of the boat cabins and says that when two people are in the cabin with their two bags there is not enough room left  for an emaciated Igel. We shall see.

Being divers we are accustomed to tiny cabins so it will not be a burden - particularly when the alternative is to cycle for hours in the scorching sun. 

In fact being divers we are accustomed to all kinds of ghastly and humiliating conditions. Like - for example - pulling on a damp wet suit at the end of a week’s diving. Not only does it smell like a long dead Seal - it clings to your body and has to be dragged on and peeled off like a layer of long dead blubber. 

Cycling will be a doddle compared to this. 

It is my earnest intention to update the Blog while I am traveling. But - it is always my earnest intention to do this and I rarely follow through. But maybe this time it will be different?

I will do my best. Probably from my iPhone. 

Llama the Hottie from Sydney arrives tonight and tomorrow we are on the train to Bolzano. If you wish to come and wave goodbye - give us going away gifts etc - we are leaving from Westbahnhof at 9:44.

Ciao (I have been practicing)