C’est magnifique !

Last Friday night mum and I jumped on the Eurostar to Paris! It was such a fantastic and easy way to travel overseas (or should I say underseas)! No long transfers to the airport, long customs queues or waiting ages for your bags. One minute I was leaving work and 30mins late on the train to Paris!

We stayed at the Hilton LaDefense (love staff rates) which was just outside the centre of Paris. On Saturday we took the hop-on-hop-off bus around the city and had a fantastic time being tourists. Mum hadn’t been to Paris before and just loved the city. The sales were on at the department stores and we had a great time wandering around window shopping and generally enjoying the sites.

Sunday was more siteseeing, visiting the Champs Elysees, Arche de Triomphe and Effiel Tower. Had fantastic weather – it felt like spring and Paris in the sun (as opposed to winter when I was there before) is just so pretty.

Mum and I just had a fun, relaxing weekend seeing Paris and eating really yummy crepes!

Mum headed home on Monday morning which was sad. Looking forward to seeing them again when we head back to Oz for Lindsay’s wedding.

We are moving house finally next weekend, yipee, so this weekend we will be packing. Quite suprised how much stuff we have accumulated after only 4 months!

The roof inside CNIT where our hotel was – looks a bit like the inside of the Opera House roof

The arch at LaDefense

Mum playing tourist

Moulin Rouge

Shopping in style

So beautiful

Does it come with matching cushions

Mum at the Eiffel Tower

Me!

It’s brown!!

Been to London to visit the Queen

Well last weekend was probably the last time that we will see the sun for a very, very long time! We made the most of the fantastic weather by sunning ourselves in the parks London style.

On Saturday we went and visited the state rooms of Buckingham Palace with Nat from my work. We were really surprised how beautiful and ornate the palace was inside as it looks fairly plain on the outside. The state rooms were just amazing and the dining room / banquet hall was set for a state dinner. The precision on the settings was incredible – everything was just perfect! It takes two days to set the table for 200 people!! That’s some turnaround time…….

We also went househunting on Saturday morning which was the usually pain of rushing around and seeing some really, really bad places. Thankfully the first place we saw was just perfect and we signed the contract yesterday! We move on the 25th Oct and (fingers crossed) that will be our last move for at least a year.

David went to Octoberfest last week two days after we came back from Rome and had a great time….
I arrived at the airport Tuesday night after work.  Bought a random book called “City Boy” which is basically an autobiography of a sex crazed, cocaine addicted London trader who made millions up until the credit crunch stopped the party. 

The beer festival was awesome.  Lots of Germans dressed up to party.  From babies in strollers to grand parents who were all wearing lederhosen (no idea about the spelling). Each day we had 2 beers and half a chicken. 

On the Friday the Expert crowd headed off to Berlin while I spent the day walking around the city and checking out as much as I could before I flew back to London.  Arriving in London was so fast for once - at Heathrow 90% of the passengers being either Europeans or British had to go through the slow lane.  Meanwhile there was an empty line for foreigners with work permits.  Ten minutes from getting off the flight getting my baggage and out of customs…  Is there anything better.

Mum arrived back on Wednesday afternoon while dad has headed home to watch his team win the grand final. They had a great time in Italy and survived their drive through Sicily unscathed!

Yesterday we hired a car and went for a lovely drive in the country. We visited Audley End (http://www.english-heritage.org.uk/server/show/nav.12088/chosenImageId/2) which was a beautiful old palace but it was so freezing being out!! Winter has arrived and it has been so, so cold over the last couple of days.

Today mum and I went window shopping around Knightsbridge. Had a great time in Harrods and bought a very yummy dinner from the food hall. We then met Erin for High Tea at The Wolsley and had a fantastic time – it is such a grand restaurant and quite nice for a spot of tea, http://www.thewolseley.com/

Tomorrow mum sets off for a trip up north for a couple of days to visit lots of historic houses and Hadrians Wall and then next weekend we are off to Paris!

Hope everyone is well – we have had 1000 hits to the blog since we started so it’s fantastic that people are keeping in touch! Would love to hear how everyone is so don’t forget to leave your comments.

Buckingham Palace

Good bye sunshine

Let by…..us!

Audley End

Mum & David all rugged up at Audley End

The beautiful cloud hedge