May Days

Bit late in updating the blog and we have done quite a lot of travelling in May!

David met me in Cologne from Dusseldorf on 8th May – very quick train trip for him from Dusseldorf. We stayed at the Cologne Hilton, fantasic rooms, which is right in the centre of town.

Cologne is a really pretty town. We spend Saturday sight-seeing around the town. Wandered the lovely medievel streets, shopping, drinking by the river and climbing the tower of the cathedral (exhausting!!)

There were 533 steps up to the top of the cathedral and I am so unfit at the moment!!! But the view was worth it.

Spamalot was playing in Cologne and because we missed it in London thought it would be good to see……. interesting night because the whole show was in German! We had thought that the songs would still be in English but no, the whole thing was in German. Despite having no idea what was being said it was still very, very funny.

On Sunday we visited the Roman-Germanic museum which was good. They had some fanatsic mosaics in perfect condition.

Not too much else to do in Cologne so we spend the rest of the afternoon wandering through parks and enjoying the sunshine. The weather was fantastic and sunny which made a lovely change from London. We caught a cable car over the river and had a giggle when we went over a spa with naturist loving Germans  thoroughly enjoying the sunshine….

There we two long weekends in May and over the second long weekend we hired a car. On the Saturday we ran a few errands, taking advantage of having a car and put together our new BBQ (finally)! On the Sunday, we drove down to Kent and visited the lovely Leeds Castle.

Leeds Castle is your ideal, liveable castle!! Comes complete with moat and not too big, I am trying to convince David that we should upgrade :-)

We had a lovely picnic in the castle grounds, got lost in the maze and enjoyed some fantastic weather!  The afternoon we spent exploring country lanes (I am suprised by how well I can reverse a car when I come up to another car on those lanes).

We stayed overnight in a pub in Ashford before exploring more on the Bank Holiday Monday. We visited the White Cliffs of Dover, had a lovely lunch at a country pub and drove around the Isle of Sheppey. Lovely and relaxing weekend just driving (not too far) and exploring the beautiful Kent countryside.

Last weekend we were back to Kent! David and Ged won tickets at the recent London Golf Show to the European Golf Open. On Saturday, David & Ged played golf back at Leeds Castle and Erin & I went shopping in Royal Tunbridge Wells.

Tunbridge Wells was a lovely town and the shopping was pretty good too!  We spent the night at the Maidstone Hilton and Sunday headed to London Golf Course to watch the Open.

The weather last Sunday was spectacular and it was a great day following the golf. We had a lobster lunch in the Moet & Chandon marquee (nice) and then following the only Australian playing, Marcus Fraser, around for the rest of the day. He was winning for a while but got three bogeys in the last four wholes and ended up finished equal 8th (David said that I should add that was three shots off the pace).

The only issue of the day was at the end of the day, there was no management of the carpark which meant it took us 2.5 hours to actually leave the carpark!!

David spent the whole week in London this week which was great. He is back to Dusseldorf on Tuesday and has had his countracted extended for another 3 months.

The hot weather didn’t last long but we have had a good weekend. Saturday lunch we caught up with Justin, Ged & Erin while Justin was back in London from Finland. Last night we had dinner an “English cusine” restaurant with David’s uni friend Daniel and his fiancee Anne who are heading to Australia next week to get married.

We are off to Egypt in two weeks and I am very excited! We have four nights in Cairo and four nights in Luxor and will be doing lots of sightseeing, relaxing by the pool and seeing lots of old stuff :-)

Lindsay, good luck in Golburn!

Published in: on June 7, 2009 at 4:46 pm Leave a Comment
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Rainbows, Waterfalls and Castles

Settled back in to London pretty quickly when we arrived from Australia and the jetlag wasn’t too bad for once as we went back to work straight away.

It is definately Spring time with the days starting to get longer, the sun is making special appearances and there are bulbs and blossums everywhere.

I have started playing netball on Tuesday nights (last week we won 26-6!) and David is back in Dusseldorf a couple of days a week.

For the Easter long weekend we headed up to Scotland for four days with a girl from work, Ola, her husband, Remy and house mate, Aga.

It was a mammoth trip, we drove all the way from London so covered 2700km in the four days but had a fantastic time!

After a 5am start, on the Friday we drove up the West coast of the UK, passing through Glasgow, Glencoe, Fort William, past beautiful mountains and lochs and over to the Isle of Skye. It was cold and wet but the scenery along the way was incredible. Waterfalls and rainbows everywhere!

We stayed overnight in a tiny village called Kyleakin where we explored the ruins of an old castle.

The following morning we drove up the Isle of Skye to Dunvegan Castle where we stopped and explored the gardens. Also on Skye we visited more waterfalls and ruins of an ancient fort. More dramatic scenery along the way.

At lunch we stopped in the pretty fishing village of Ullapool (back on the mainland) and took a dramatic drive up to the town of Tongue where we spent the second night.

On the way to Tongue, we stopped at Smoo cave which is a cliff cave with, you guessed it, another waterfall!

Our hostel in Tongue was lovely. It was situated on the edge of a lock and was an old 18th centuary hunting lodge.

On Easter Sunday we woke up to a fantastic Polish breakfast (the others we were travelling with were Polish) before heading out again. This time we followed the coast along to Dunney Head, the most northern point in the UK. Along the way we stopped and visited the ruins of a 15th centuary church, St Marys.

We also stopped at John of Grouts, the lovely town of Lybster where we had lunch by the harbour, another ruined fort and the beautiful Dunbeath Castle.

That evening we stayed at the Hilton Aviemore before an epic drive back to London.

We saw so many amazing sights in Scotland. It truely is a beautiful place. We have wonderful sunny weather from Saturday and saw so much wildlife including deer and seals. As you will see in the pics there are a lot of photos of castles and mountains and waterfalls. I haven’t been able to name many of them as they were just everywhere! In four days we managed to see so much.

Back in London we have been spending a bit of time fixing up our little garden and enjoying the sunshine. The garden is coming along nicely and came complete with some nesting birds.

Off for a bike ride while the weather is lovely!

Published in: on April 19, 2009 at 3:17 pm Leave a Comment
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A Beach Wedding (make that two)

After a lovely stay with David’s parents (sorry about the jetlag) we headed up to Port Douglas for a week in the sun and my brother’s wedding.

Arrived into Cairns, to wonderfully hot weather and a shock of humidity, where we met by parents.

The drive up to Port Douglas has to be one of the most beautiful drives you can do. It takes you up along the coast and pretty breathtaking.

Our first day in Port Douglas was spent exploring the town (very pretty), shopping, relaxing and of course enjoying the sun by the pool!

Did have two encounters with snakes on our first day, including one with the pool with us. After trying to convince people in the UK was safe and that you rarely saw snakes, spiders and sharks (more on sharks later) in Australia we had to have a laugh. They were only tree snakes but it is a bit of a shock when you turn around in a pool and realise that oh, there is a snake swimming next to me!

The next day we spent out on the Great Barrier Reef. Mum and I went scuba diving while dad & Dave snorkled. We ended up doing three dives and had an amazing time. It was the first time mum had dived and she did really well. I had not been out to the reef before and it was just amazing. So much to see, the coral was beautiful, so many colours and fish just everywhere. We saw lots of clams, slugs and other creatures as well. On one dive we had a huge Mauri Rass (I think that is spelt right) following us around for the dive and it kept coming up for pats – very cute in a huge fishy kinda way.

On our second dive we were greeted by five or six reef sharks! They were amazing, we swam below them but they were very quick so it was kinda freaky as every now and then one would dart past and you’d think – OMG it’s a shark! Very silly I know but they were cool.

Over the weekend we did Mossman Gorge and the Port Douglas Markets. The rainforest at Mossman is pretty impressive, as long as suspense bridges don’t freak you out. Was really looking forward to a refreshing swim in the Gorge after our humid rainforest walk and once you got past the water being so cold you were numb part, the swim was lovely.

The markets at Port Douglas were good too. Had a very nice massage by the beach and we bought some lovely lemon myrtle pasta that we finally ate last night (very yum). We also caught the old sugar cane train back to our villa that afternoon which was fun.

Then it was time for my little brothers wedding! About 20 people had come up to Port Douglas for the wedding (the larger wedding celebration was being  held in Sydney a couple of days later), it was mainly family and the bridal party and we had had a great couple of days before the wedding catching up at BBQs and the boys had played some golf. The ceremony was held at the chapel at the Sheraton Mirage which is just lovely and overlooks 4 mile beach. Aaryan had an amazing dress (pics below) and the whole wedding was very touching.

So amazing to see Lindsay and Aaryan married and it was very special that they asked me do to a reading and witness on their marriage certificate.

The reception was held at the house where Aaryan’s family were staying. Lindsay and Aaryan had found a brillant chef to do the catering and the food was so yummy.

Our last couple of days in Port Douglas were spend relaxing and soaking up the sun before we headed into Sydney!

It was so nice to arrive back into Sydney (home!). We spent an afternoon in the city, taking the usual tourist photos and just wandering around. It was a bit of a mad couple of days travelling around Sydney and catching up with people.

On Saturday, Lindsay and Aaryan had their second wedding! Everyone was instructed to meet at Akuna Bay in the afternoon where we were picked up by three very stylish cruisers. It was a suprise and people had no idea where we were off to. After about a 20 minute boat ride, we rounded a headland and were greeted by a beautiful set up on St Hallets Beach in Pittwater. Along the beach was an amazing set up of gazebos and one long banquet table – it looked just incredible.

We had a wonderful dinner under the stars in the most stunning location. The whole set up was very impressive and we had great night. The beach can only be accessed by boat so we had the whole place to ourselves (although we had to share it a couple of hungry goannas).

Lindsay and Aaryan had planned an amazing wedding and we wish them a very happy and loving life together.

The day following the wedding we had a great BBQ at my parents and it was so nice to catch up with so many people.

Sadly, before we knew it, Monday had come around and it was time to fly back to London.

Published in: on at 12:30 pm Leave a Comment
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Quick trips and one long trip

Well the snow didn’t last very long but I had a white birthday which was good fun.

In February we planned a couple of day trips outside of London. Train travel is so easy that we are planning to visit quite a few towns and sights up to 2 hours outside of London.

Our first trip was to Windsor and Eton. It was the weekend after the snow and the first time the sun had come out in a long time! Had a lovely day wandering around the lovely town and castle. The castle was beautiful, a really fairytale castle. The rooms that were burnt in the big fire about 10 years ago had been completely restored and you couldn’t tell what was original and what was new. The Queen was spending a weekend at the castle but didn’t invite us in for tea.

Wandered around Eton which was pretty. The school is basically a village and all of the buildings and houses in the village make up the school.

Our second weekend trip was to Canterbury, again another lovely town. We visited more Roman ruined and saw some amazingly preserved mosaics. Then we headed to the ruins of St Augustine’s Abbey which would have been huge before it was demolished a couple of hundred years ago. Then onto the vast Canterbury Cathedral where we attended evening song. The size of the European cathedrals still amazes me.

We have both been working pretty long hours over the last couple of months so were actually looking forward to the long flight back to Australia! We flew out after work on Friday night and had a good flight to Brisbane. Enjoyed the movies on the plane but have to say that we were pretty disappointed with the food that was served!

We have had a fun couple of days in Brisbane with David’s parents. The weather has been pretty windy and damp because of Cyclone Hamish up north but it is still at least 15 degrees warmer that we have been in 3 months!

Tomorrow we head up to Port Douglas for a week and Lindsay and Aaryan’s wedding. I am so excited that my little-big brother is getting married!  We are in Port Douglas for 7 days and then to Sydney for 5 days so a quick trip overall but it is so nice to be home!

Published in: on March 10, 2009 at 5:15 am Leave a Comment
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* * * Snow Day * * *

Well today I finally experienced one of those things we heard about at kids but  never had at home – a snow day!!! More on that later….

After a couple of hectic weeks at work, I was looking forward to heading away on Friday to Dusseldorf to meet up with David. The weekend didn’t start so well with HSBC putting a stop on my account card on Friday afternoon (still no idea why) which meant I had no money to get from Dusseldorf airport to our hotel.  After hearing my dilemma while I has arguing with HSBC over the phone, a very nice man sitting next to be on the Heathrow Express gave me some money to cover the trip. I know he won’t read this but I still wanted to say a huge thank you, it was very much appreciated! Not the first major issue with have had with HSBC so we will be looking to change banks on the weekend me thinks.

Anyways, we stayed at a lovely hotel in Dusseldorf, really pretty hotel room and woke up to a lovely sunny morning on Saturday. We had a great day wandering around Media Harbour and it’s impressive modern buildings, the lovely Old Town and the Japanese town where we had a fanastic lunch.

Dusseldorf is a really pretty city and everyone was so friendly. The river was impressive too, the Rhine is essentially a water highway and we saw almost everything possible being freighted by boat.

One of the German guys that I work with had recommended a dinner show and we decided we would go to celebrate my birthday. The show is called Palazzo and is a cabaret / Vanderbilt / circus type show with an amazing dinner – http://www.palazzo.org/

It is set in a Spiegelpaläste, which is an opulent tent, and David and I had a fantastic booth. The show was great and 70% of it was in English so that was helpful! There was an amazing four course dinner (probably the best meal that I have had since Australia and the Angus beef was actually one of the best meals that I have EVER had). We just had a fantastic night! In fact, the head waiter, who was also one of the main actors brought David and I an extra main course to enjoy as we loved it so much! Great way to celebrate by birthday weekend away.

Yesterday we went to the art gallery and enjoyed the Old Town in the afternoon.

Our flight back to London was delayed due to snow in London! We landed into very heavy snow and we pretty amazed when we got off the Tube! It started snowing around 3pm yesterday afternoon and was pretty thick as we were walking home. Made a tiny snowman in our backyard last night before heading back to bed…………….only to wake up to even more snow!

It was amazing this morning, our street looked beautiful and everyone was out enjoying it. Tried to get to work a couple of times today – train line down, all buses cancelled, no taxis and there was no way I was walking all the way to work – absolutely no was I could get to work – so I have had a Snow Day!!

It is the most amount of snow that London has had for 18 years. They are saying 20cm in London but the snow outside is over a foot deep! I walked David to work and we had a couple of snow fights along the way. All schools were closed and all the parks have been packed with people enjoying the snow.

It is meant to clear up tonight so hopefully I can get into work tomorrow but it has been a very fun day and London looks just beautiful in the snow.

Published in: on February 2, 2009 at 7:56 pm Leave a Comment

Happy New Year

Happy New Year everyone! Hope you all had a fantastic time welcoming in 2009.

Amie & Greg arrive last Monday and we had a great night together for new years. We started off with a lovely dinner at our place and then went to the local park to let off some more fireworks that we had bought (I know we are turning into pyros)!

Despite it being -3C we headed into town for midnight and more fireworks. We watched Big Ben ring in the new year and could just see the top of the fireworks off London Eye – fantastic night and it was so great to spent it with Amie & Greg.

On Saturday one of Amie’s friends took us down to the seaside. We had fish and chips on the beach in Eastbourne which is a lovely town not too far from Brighton. After that we headed to a lovely little village for afternoon tea (lots and lots of eating this week).

On Sunday we took Amie & Greg to the Wolseley for a lovely afternoon tea – more eating! Had an amazing weekend and a lot of fun catching up.

The weather is so, so cold. It is the coldest weather in about a decade and has been getting to -10C in parts of London overnight. We had snow yesterday morning and they are expecting some more tomorrow. Walking to work through the snow has been pretty fun.

Published in: on January 6, 2009 at 8:12 pm Leave a Comment

Snow, Ski, Christmas, Geneva (Yawn) and an Incident….

Sunrise over the mountains

Sunrise over the mountains

Last Saturday we headed off to France for our week of skiing. A fun day of transfers – planes, buses, buses, buses- we arrived in Les Menuires in the 3 Vallees of France. http://www.lesmenuires.com/index_en.php

Very excited to arrive to snow filled mountains. We were staying in a Chalet with 10 other people, we only knew one person so it was a fun week making new friends.

The chalet was really pretty and situated right on the slopes so it was easy to get started every morning. During the week we skied pretty much all of the 3 Vallees, so I saw heaps more that when we were there last time when I was learning to ski. We had amazing sunny and almost warm weather for pretty much the whole week. It didn’t snow all week so by Saturday afternoon on our last day we were skating on thin ice……….

Had a great time in the chalet, each night a different pair made dinner. David and I did Christmas dinner, yummy pork and some BBQ chickens.

David and I did a ski lesson one day and our ski intructor worked us pretty hard but it was also a lot of fun. He took us through some pretty descent jumps, tree runs and a 3 metre vertical drop! Not too many bruises!

On Saturday we headed back to Geneva where we spent the night. Our plan for Sunday was to spend the day sightseeing in Geneva. It is a city we have been through a couple of times but never stopped…. and now we know why. Geneva, especially on a Sunday in Winter when the temp did not get above -1C, is not the worlds most exciting city. We saw most of the main sights within an hour and then nothing else was open – no shops, museums, restaurants – it was like a very pretty ghost town! So we ended up finding a lovely Italian restaurant by the lake and had a great, long lunch.

Too cold (and boring) to do any sightseeing after lunch so we headed back to the airport a couple of hours early to catch our flight back home.

Our plane was ready to go, engines were being warmed up and we started off down the run way. Just as our front wheel left the tarmac, it slammed back down again, the plane breaked really heavily and we skidded to a halt. It all happened pretty quickly but was very scary. Our flight crew were all really shaken and scared too which I think made us realise that something pretty bad had happened. It turned out that just was we were going to take-off one of the planes engines failed. Very glad (and lucky) that it happened on the runway.

So we were escorted off the runway by a whole fleet of fire engines. Once we were off the runway, the firies spent ages checking the breaks – because we stopped so quickly there was a chance that the breaks could catch on fire. By this stage everyone on the plane was having a good laugh about it all and taking photos of the fire engines. So they kept us on the plane for anoth 30mins while they did inspections before escorting us all to a waiting area.

Our flight was cancelled (obviously) and they tried to move people onto different flights out last night or stay in a hotel and fly out the following morning. David and I were at the very end of the queue and didn’t fancy running to try and make a plane that would of gotten us into London around midnight. Instead we took the option to stay in a hotel (paid for by the airline of course) last night and  took an early flight tomorrow. Very nice hotel too and it probably cost more that the plane tickets!

We flew out this morning with no more incidents. So it turns out that Geneva can be interesting after all!

Hope everyone had a great Christmas, ate too much and enjoyed hot weather! Happy New Year.

Published in: on December 29, 2008 at 9:31 pm Leave a Comment
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Merry christmas to all…

David started his new job last week. He flew to Dusseldorf for the day on Wednesday (his birthday) and met the team over there. In the new year he will start working three days a week in Germany but at the moment he has been working in the London office and getting to know the company.

Tomorrow, David is giving a talk on test driven development in dot net. I have absolutely no idea that means but it is keeping him very busy.

I caught up with Nicole from Tour Host and her baby yesterday which was great. She is over here for christmas with her family. Fionn has grown so much!

We went ice skating the other weekend at the Natural History Museum and had a fantastic time. A great way to spend a wintery day. We then spent the afternoon in the Natural History Museum running around like little kids which was great.

Work has been good and very busy, two more functions to go for me for the rest of the year.

Saturday we head to France for christmas! There has been heaps of snow lately so looks like we are well and truely in for a white christmas.

I will be sure to post lots of pics from my new camera when we get back (thanks mum & dad).

Wishing you all a wonderful christmas. Stay safe and have lots of fun.

Merry christmas!

Love, Kaija & David

Published in: on December 16, 2008 at 10:14 pm Leave a Comment
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I’m dreaming of a white christmas

Well it certainly is winter, it so absolutely freezing! Can’t go outside without looking like the Michelene man and am getting very good at “dressing in layers.”

We had a tiny bit of snow on Sunday morning. Most of it was melted by the time we got up but is was still exciting.

David starts a new job in a couple of weeks. He will be contracting again (yipee) and starts the week before we go away for christmas! The new job is working for a large energy company and will he will spend two days a week in London and three days a week in Dusseldorf, Germany. David is very happy to be contracting again and I can’t wait to meet him in Germany for weekends away.

We were real tourists on Sunday and went to Madame Tussau[ds. Had a great afternoon playing paparazzi. As cheesy as it was, we had a lot of fun.

Afterwards we wandering around Oxford Street looking at all the christmas lights. Everything is looking very pretty at the moment - as cold as it is, the skys are clear and there are fairy lights everywhere. I am starting to feel chrismassy too know which is funny because christmas is meant to be hot!!

We are going skiing in France for christmas with 10 other Aussies. We have booked a chalet in a village called Les Menuires which is in the 3 Vallees. It is the same ski area that we skied in for Rick & Sara's honeymoon but the resort is SO huge that we having seen the area we are staying in. Anyway, it should be fantastic fun and we will be having a white christmas!!

After christmas, Amie & Greg will be here. Can't wait to see them and catch up.

This weekend we are off to the Winterwonderland (gosh, it's a winter themed blog today). It is a big fair in Hyde Park with lots of rides, ice skating and a German christmas market. Lots of fun!

Now we are settled into our house we are starting to play tourist again. If anyone has any suggestions for things we should see in London, please drop us a line! 

Published in: on November 25, 2008 at 9:29 pm Leave a Comment
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Finally back online!

We move two weeks ago for what should hopefully be that last time in at least a year! Our new flat is a lovely one bedroom garden flat. We are in Fulham in a neighbourhood called Sands End which is really lovely. Close to the river and lots of good restaurants and shops on Wandsworth Bridge Road.

It was fantastic to finally really unpack everything and settle down. Had a lot of fun at Homebase (which is the UK equivilant of to Bunnings) getting bits and pieces for the new place.

Weather is truely close to winter. It actually snowed one night last week which was a bit of a shock.

Last night was Guy Fawkes Night and everyone was letting off fireworks which was fun. We sat in our lounge room and watched the neighbours display from the comfort of our living room – no need to to get in early for a good spot!

Monday night was our one year wedding anniversary (awww). We went out for dinner and saw the musical Avenue Q. It is a musical done by puppets and was very, very funny. I know of a lot of people that have seen it and I was warned that it was very wrong but funny – so with that in mind, we had a good laugh.

The day we moved I had a work team building day which ended up being a scavenger hunt around London!! It was so much fun and our team won (no one said we couldn’t use a taxi to help us get around).

Hope everyone is well and the weather is getting nice and warm at home – can’t wait for the hot weather when come home in March for Lindsay’s wedding.

Published in: on November 6, 2008 at 8:17 pm Leave a Comment
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