Thursday 9 August 2007

I Admit, I Have Already Been Cruising Travel Sites!



Top: Keith at the Prime Meridian
Bottom: My watch set exactly to Greenwich Mean Time.
Its amazing how wonderful it is to be home again but also a little, well, boring. Boring can be good though. I finished two books since our return home, the last of which was Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. I echo the Brits and say "Brilliant!" Lots of twists and turn up to the last couple pages. Crazy. I finished it at 4.45 this morning. Could not put it down. John, do not block my stuff. I promise I will not tell you how it ends!


Anyways, there are a few souvenirs Jenn left off the list that are worth pointing out:


  • Two ridiculously priced beach towels from Rome. #$%! Romans!

  • Hand stitched table runner from Hungary.

  • One Communist coffee mug reading "Wake up! Drink coffee! Work for the state!" To be used at my new public school teaching job only.

  • One hand carved wooden box from Poland.

  • 1 beautiful set of hand-painted liquor glasses. Now we drink in style.

  • 5 sets of necklaces and earings from Italy and Poland. (Okay, only 2 belong to Jenn! Others are gifts or orders.)

  • 1 toe ring to replace the one Jenn had ripped off in a current pool in Budapest.

  • 3 soccer jerseys because they're crazy cheap in Eastern Europe.

  • 750 ml. of Hungarian Palinka (to be nursed over time).

  • 2 x 350 ml. of Teacher's Scotch Whiskey (seriously, how could we resist that!)

  • Several books (Us? Buy books? Noooo!)

  • Various pencils and bookmarks that Jenn can use at school to make the kids dream (we hope).

  • Cool shopping bags from all over Europe.

  • Amazing memories to last a lifetime.

I have had a few complaints about too much reading and not enough pictures. Well, to that I echo Jenn's statement that if you think you can upload pictures in Polish better than us, go right bloody ahead. Its amazing the difference in computers everywhere. Also, computer keyboards are different in every country. And, by the way, some of you should have left picture books behind long ago!


So we can't decide what we want to do next year? Hot, sunny, beach, and surf somewhere tropical for once where we simply relax all day or go walk 10 to 15 km per day somewhere new. Either way, it should be exciting whatever it is. And yes, I promise to try blog a bit about our regular boring lives throughout the year too!


Monday 6 August 2007

By the Numbers...


Here is the "by the numbers" breakdown of our trip:

33 days
5 countries
7 cities
numerous small towns
12 stamps in each of our passports
1882 pictures (crazy, I know... you're probably wondering why more weren't on the
blog. Well, you try uploading pictures in Polish and see how it works out for you.)
5 books read by Jenn
1.5 books read by Keith
70 pages of journal writing (Jenn)
30kg of luggage on the way home (up about 4kg from when we left)
0.5kg Hungarian paprika
? other souvenirs
?? money spent
-------------------------
0 regrets


Picture: Standing on the Prime Meridian, Greenwich

Thursday 2 August 2007

From London to Home

After Hungary, we spent a little more than 36 hours in London before flying/driving home the Lethbridge. Our cat is quite happy to see us and we are quite glad to be in our own space and to stop living out of a suitcase. Not that we didn't enjoy ourselves immensely, but there is something about being home.

While in London we managed to take in the London Eye, Millenium Bridge, Shakespeare's Globe Theatre, & Liecester Square the first late afternoon & evening. Yesterday we spent quite a bit of time at Buckingham Palace seeing the Queen's Gallery, Royal Mews, gardens and summer opening of the State Rooms (only open to the public in August and September). Just before that we popped into Westminster Cathedral for a look, and afterwards we headed for The Orangerie at Kensington Palace for afternoon tea. To round out the day we took the subway & daily light rail to Greenwich to walk the Prime Meridian before ending our London adventures back at the Duke of Wellington Pub near Victoria Station.

I am not sure who all is out there in cyber space reading the blog, but if you want to know about something we've neglected to blog about then by all means leave a comment or email. I am not sure what to do with this blog next, I suppose that will be decided some time in the next week when I get over my jet lag. :)

My attempt to post pictures has somehow failed this post. I am way too tired to figure it out tonight- look for the last pics tomorrow or so.