Cold Christmas (#2) in Scotland

Well we're back in London today, after a 7 hour (!!) train ride last night - we were delayed for over two hours, 30 minutes out of London, so by the time we'd caught our bus back home it was almost midnight.

Luckily we'd prepared: in Glasgow we bought dinner for on the train, and upgraded our "cattle class" seats to first-class for the princely sum of £15 a pop. So we sat in relative comfort in the (actually too-warm) cabin, snug and safe from the ice and snow outside, and eventually we rolled into Euston Station.





It's been a fun couple of days. We arrived in Irvine (on the Scottish coast, with views of the Isle of Arran) late Thursday night, and Andy and his dad "Rab" (Robert) met us at the station. A short but treacherous walk along icy streets - Dee took a tumble just metres from the door - and we were in the Melrose apartment.

Robert and Dorothy, Andy's parents, looked after us like we were family - delicious food, silly conversations (the "craic") and plenty of the ol' Christmas cheer. We had scallops, Christmas roast, "square sausage" & IRN BRU and even found time for a traditional British curry at an old Scottish pub somewhere in town. We got presents! "A selection for the wains," said Rabbie, handing us each a Cadbury's selection box. "The wains always get a selection box." (I have no idea if that's how you spell it!)





We had a couple of walks while we were there - down to the frozen beach front, past a pub that is older than white settlers in Australia, and into a shopping plaza nearby - but mostly stayed inside (too cold!). We watched a lot of football! (Soccer to us antipodeans.) They really are the nicest people, and of course we invited them to come visit us in Australia...

This weekend is Christmas #3 - now the pressies for Dayna and Bruce have arrived!

There are a couple more photos on Flickr, and I finally got 'round to uploading some of Dee's birthday celebrations, too! Finally, here's a funny IRN BRU ad (it's a Scottish softdrink).

Kerkyra with pictures

More photos, as promised -- press play, then rollover the slide-show for the "full-screen" icon, kick back and enjoy. :-D

Actually, that's exactly what we did in Greece -- a whole lot of relaxing by the pool, a little bit of exploring in an air-conditioned car, and a fair amount of searching for decent Greek food (strangely hard to find).

The trips themselves were somewhere between average and downright horrible: late/early flights, lots of waiting, the stupidest aeroplane seat-configuration I've ever seen (so close together that you couldn't really bring your knees together!), and general chaos on the part of the officials from both Kerkyra and the holiday company, Olympic.

(Our 3am bus, 6am flight happened as predicted. What was not predicted was the hundreds of fellow passengers suffering the same situation -- hundreds of Brits with hangovers, or sunburn, or missing luggage; girls with "flip-flops" and sarongs flirting with boys in cargo-shorts and ridiculous sunglasses; families and individuals with ridiculously large, heavy luggage (what could they possibly be bringing back?!); officials with less idea about what was happening than the human cattle they were responsible for. I remember saying to Dee, "The only way to make this airport more miserable is for some of the fluorescent lights to start flickering." Then a thought struck me: "Or to fill the place up knee-high with stagnant water. That might do it.")

But once we were there -- brilliant! Brilliant despite the crummy accomodation, despite the dodgy bar-tender with his penchant for late nights, loud music and funny cigarettes, despite the narrow, dangerous roads and crazy scooter-riders. Eventually, under the brilliant sunlight, all these things took on a certain romance, a gleam -- they became as much a part of the whole experience as the smell of the ocean, the gentle buzzing of bees and wasps, the sound of our fellow holiday-makers splashing in the pool. Okay, the airport didn't, but the rest ... walking into supermarkets and buying groceries without a word of english is just, just, awesome!

So yes, we explored the entire island by car while we were there -- hiring it from a boy who couldn't have been more than 10 (his uncle came to do the paperwork, but it was the boy's sale, have no doubt). He tried to convince us to get an ATV (all-terrain vehicle) instead: a roll-cage, four chunky tyres and a 250cc engine, no windshield or floor, bucket seats ... Of course we stuck with the little (air-conditioned) Hyundai, thank you very much.

Corfu Town is the main metropolis, and we spent a day walking through markets along tiny streets, dodging scooters and keeping out of the midday sun. It's really crazy how weathered the buildings are -- I kept expecting to hear a crash and turn to find our way back blocked by rubble! We also found beaches, both pebble and sand (hot, hot sand!!), everything from "British" beaches (a whole lot of pale bodies and east-end accents) to secluded ones used by locals and those in the know.

I think the pictures say it all really.

We're going to the zoo zoo zoo...

It was a vaguely sunny Sunday, the middle of a long weekend - no better time to take a trip to the Zoo. Vicki, Steven, Bruce and I all jumped into Bruce's (mostly) shiny new car and off we went. About an hour later, we arrived and parked on the grass (?!) as directed.


It was fairly cold and windy for the first part of the day - but that didn't stop us enjoying watching the elephants! They were so funny! Initially they were messing about in a little pool. It had a small waterpipe and they were stepping on it to make the water spray everywhere (clever things). Next thing, two of the elephants ran into the pool by the waterfall. One moment they were there, the next they disappeared - they didn't teleport somewhere, it was just the pool was a LOT deeper than it looked! It was fantastic to watch them playing.


We didn't follow any particular plan - we just wandered around the zoo, watched random animals and took lots of photos. Well, I took photos until my batteries went flat. :-( My photoset is here. And since Vicki's batteries didn't go flat, her photoset is here. Sometimes it's sad to see animals in cages but it's obvious that Chester Zoo looks after the welfare of the animals - they have inside and outside spaces, there are toys to play with (even HUGE toys for the elephants) and at least some of the habitats are designed for the animals. It's been ages since I'd been to the zoo - think I might not wait so long until the next visit (probably to another zoo). :-)

We're going to the zoo zoo zoo
You can come too too too...

Me too!

I'm also coming back to the land of sunshine for a spell.

Hope it's a good spell, one that brings some rain to Australia (but preferrably not when I'm there) and some sunshine to England (preferrably when I'm there).

I'll be arriving in Melbourne on the 1st December and flying out again on the 7th January. I don't get any fancy 5-star hotels or anything but my flight was relatively cheap, so I'm not complaining.

Is there anything that anyone would like me to bring specially from the UK? I plan on bringing my clothes in a carry-on bag and my backpack full of fun things (to be replaced with Aussie fun things for the trip back).

I'm not sure when I'll be where just yet - I have a lot of people I need to catch up with and a limited time to do it. But I plan on being in Bendigo for about 2 of the 4 weeks! Including Christmas. So I can catch up with everyone and do some sewing and find some well-fitting clothes. *grin* Yes, it IS that difficult to find good clothes here that I will fly all the way to Australia to get some. hehehe.

I have a lot more to talk about, but long posts are silly, so that's all from me for now.

*big hugz*

p.s. the photo is from Glenn and Chris' Manchester Adventure at Easter (oops.. it's taken me a while to upload the photos)

We're coming home after all

Today we bought our aeroplane tickets back to Australia for December-January, after a weekend of research and planning (for both the cheapest tickets, and how we were actually best going to pay for 'em).

In the end, we had a good deal from Austravel which Dee printed took into Flightcenter to see if they could beat. It was with Cathay Pacific, each leg was 11hrs and we had 6 hours in Hong Kong to see a few quick sites (e.g. giant Buddha statues).

When she got there, they couldn't match it -- the Austravel booking system was down. So Dee spoke to them on the phone and found out that the price we were quoted was for August only ... and we're one day into September! Bollocks!

Luckily, the Flightcenter people were nice and agreed to beat the "new" best Austravel price. They also looked around for some other options ... and so we're not going to Hong Kong anymore!

Instead, we're flying Korean Air via Seoul. Again, 11 hour legs (not too bad providing we can sleep). Better yet, because the flights don't connect on the way home, we're getting put up in a 5-star hotel in Seoul! We get in at night, stay at the hotel, and have until probably lunchtime to check out some of Korea.

Fun!

(Cross-posted on glennji.org too)