From New Castle we jumped on a DFDS boat to Gothenburg, via Kristiansand (Norway). Matt and I almost killed ourselves carting all the alcohol that Pete and Kate asked for, the taxes in Sweden almost work as well as prohibition…we felt like we were smuggling grog in across the sea border. The “cruise” was great fun…we dined in a swish restraunt…where we couldn’t understand anything on the menu although it was written in English, we saw dancing girls (and a boy), listened to the easy listening, underinspired rock group and did the whole titanic thing (Matt: “I am king of the world”). It was a beautiful experience sailing into Gothenburg, which is a much bigger city than I expected, with big bridges and a built up shoreline on both sides of the river. It was a bit unnerving that it was pitch black at 3.30pm when we arrived…and frezing cold. Not really sure how much daylight to expect…we are travelling south now, so hopefully there will be some improvement.

Tomorrow we start the Christmas celebrations, Swedish style. May everyone have a wonderful Christmas and take joy in the fact that “Man shall live forever more, because of Christmas day”. God Bless you all. Matt: “Bah Humbug”!

We left Bedford last night…very sad saying good bye to good friends! after racing down to the charity shop with our towels and bedding we raced to get a train that missed the airport station that we had to get off at. We jumped on another train and finally got to Luton airport, where we landed 8 months ago. still not British we chose the worst check in line, taking over an hour to check in. The flight was short and sweet and Edinburgh is beautiful. they currently have a winter wonderland theme park set up at the base of the cliff with the castle. It has an ice skating rink and a German market and a Ferris Wheel…which we will check out tonihgt. Today has manly been retail therapy, recovering from a hectic week of packing up and shopping for christmas pressies. We discovered that the scotts cannot cook any better than the English at lunch time, tonight we are going out in search of a deep fried mars bar…to celebrate matt’s 27th birthday.

love you all and hope everyone has a wonderful Christmas….

So finally we have broken the silence…

England seems to be exploding with colour from dusk until about midnight for the last week. I have never seen anything like it and Matt rightly asked why would a country celebrate the failed plot to blow up parliament?? The thick cloud at night reflects the fireworks in the distance and it seriously could be mistaken as a war zone at times! It really is ever so fun and Matt and I enjoyed our first Saturday night out together walking the streets, drinking beer and watching the fireworks. Part of the evening was soaking in the atmosphere, but the other part was celebrating our decision to come home and booking our tickets to arrive home in mid-January. So needless to say the night started in the Aussie pub drinking VB and Boags, and watching Australia take on the French in rugby (league or union it is hard to say…).

Our plans are to leave Bedford on the 21st of December travel north to New Castle then catch the boat to Gothenburg in Sweden. Catch the train down to Pete and Kate’s house and spend Christmas and New Year with them. On the 3rd of January we will catch a plane from Heathrow to Bangkok for some R&R, acclimatisation and to readjust our body clocks…then we will head home on the 12th of Jan, in time to enjoy some of the summer.

There is so much to catch up on that I have decided to write a retrospective series that will cover Liz and my trip to Germany, and the parents’ visits, it should appear over the next few weeks or so. If there is anyone who is still checking this site thanks for still loving us.

Please excuse any typos, I am currently doing battle with a German keyboard.

A quick recap of the last month…there was a fantastic weekend (4 days) in Sweden with our friends Pete, Kate and Olivia. We shopped in Malmo, went to a Swedish surprise party and visited an Alk park. Enjoyed a BBQ and learnt a new board game…it was a fantastic relaxing time and great to be hanging out with old friends.

We have also had some visiters staying with us in Bedford which has also broken up the manotonoy of life a bit. Matt´s brother Simon stayed with us for a week, we managed to cram a road trip into that also – to South Hampton (the Launching place of the Titanic), visiting Oxford briefly to have dinner at the Eagle and Child (Tolkien and CS Lewis´ old watering hole), saw an Abby and a couple of castles and visited Stone Henge all in one weekend!

We then had some other visitors from Oz, Richard Carron (Tommy´s little brother) and his friend Julie. They made good use of the Thames Link and travelled to London everyday to take in the sites. Which reminds us we should venture to London some day :)

Last weekend Matt and I packed the car and made our way down to dover to catch the Ferry to France. We travelled for about 11 hours reaching Antwerp and our beautiful four star hotel. My husband is such a bargin shopper! It took us a while to wind our way to the “tourist” sites in Antwerp but when we got there we were glad we stayed the distance…it is a pretty little city. We then headed off to Eindhoven, where we caught up with the Piening clan and spent a few day visiting the sites of significance to the Piening family. Phillips pretty much own that town. It was hard to find a building without Phillips written on it. We also crammed a road trip to Western Belgium into to our four days. Belgium waffles are great!!!

As we set off again our car was a little fuller, with Liz and Simon crammed in the back with all our gear – Metro Rover what a car. The German auto barns are fast and furious. We had a brief stop in Colone – visiting the Dom (and walking the 500 steps to the spire), and Liz initiated me into the H&M stores.

Our next stop Frankfurt swept us off our feet as we landed there in the middle of a huge festival. All the museums were discounted for the festival and the river bank was a sea of people, market stalls, live music, out door bars and plenty of German food (which is apparently more than sausages). The boys caught a plane the next day to London and Liz and I continue on with our German roadtrip.

That is a whirlwind catch-up and here is my obligatory promise to update the site more often…which I actually think might happen as I am back on the road again. Send Matty emails because he is probably lonley home alone…hey why not even give him a call!

My uni friend Ali and I planned a trip to Brighton that is directly south from London on the coast. Initially we decided to catch the Thames Link train from Bedford that travels directly to Brighton without transfers (through London). We decided however that it would be cheaper to drive in our little rover. When we hit the M25 (London’s outer ring road) we began to think differently. We travelled one exit in 25 minutes and decided we would be best to get off the motorways and travel on the back roads or the A roads. Ali skilfully navigated until we hit an eight-way intersection that made us panic, we ended up heading to Windsor (the opposite direction to which we hoped to travel). We went on a nice sight seeing trip of Surrey (one off England’s posher shires) and eventually pulling over for a picnic next to a local air field…ah the serenity. We arrived in the vicinity of Brighton 6 hours later (when the train would have taken 3 and a half. Our camp ground was actually in a small town east of Brighton called Seaford, we camped right on the beach – if it could be called that, with a pebble coast line and no surf to speak of. After pitching the tent we headed to the toilet block to freshen up for our big night in Brighton.

We caught the surf express that travelled along the coastline affording us great views. As we approached Brighton my preconceptions of this coastal town were blown out of the water – it was a huge sprawling city. We spent an hour or so walking the coastline taking the glitz and glamour and tackiness. It appeared to be a big destination for buck’s parties and hen’s nights which kept us entertained. We ate at a local pub, drinking a bottle of Australian wine and catching up on the details of Ali’s recent trip to Turkey, Croatia and Greece. We then walked over to Brighton’s famous pier that embodies British seaside tackiness, with roller coaster, merry go rounds and stands testing you skills with the odds hopelessly stacked against you. We enjoyed some Belgium waffles and then walked backed to the train station for a good nights sleep.

The next day we packed up and jumped on the seaside express. We spent some time walking though the boutique shops and trash and treasure shop. Brighton has great shopping and bargain hunting, as it has a diverse community (all sorts of “alternate” lifestyles) there are a good variety of shops.

We dragged ourselves away from the shops to do some sight seeing. We visited the Royal Pavilion, which looks like it should be in India next to the Taj Mahal. This palace of similar vintage as Chateau de Versali, an era of decadence for royalty, was built by King Richard IV the son of “mad” King Richard III. The facility was built primarily to have huge parties in. King Richard IV isn’t remembered as a great king and the palace fits in with the Brighton tackiness as the Asian architecture and interior design was reproduced by those who had never been to Asia so is a mishmash of the east meeting the west.

Ali and I headed back to the car via the shops not looking forward to the potentially long trip home. The traffic was fantastic and I arrived home to my husband by dinner time. After being together every day for six months it was nice to have a period of missing each other (even though it was only one night), as they say, absence makes the heart grow stronger.