Tuesday 7 September 2010

Nelson

Long time since last blog, so a fast forward is needed to our arrival home a month ago to New Zealand. We decided to settle in Nelson and already feel very pleased with this decision. It was the family connections, the hours of sunlight and proximity to stunning beaches and beautiful hills that helped us make up our minds. I've joined the energetic team at Nelson City Council, in a fund raising advisory job, at an interesting time with local body elections coming up next month.

So the flavour of my life has changed from being a leaver (from London, Kingston University, Europe generally) to being a joiner (family and friends at home,the Chamber of Commerce, Rotary, the Council, the Italian Club...)

I work four days a week so I now have the luxury of spending Wednesdays at home helping set up the new-old house and garden. (The house was built in 1961, so we are about the same age!)But I also spend a lot of time just enjoying the view - every day the sea, clouds and sands offer a different variation, depending on the prevailing weather and light.

It all feels very comfortable. As I have been busy stocking the cupboards, getting the vegetables sorted in our garden and making new friends I've been thinking that our travel adventures were great for focussing our minds and clarifying what we value in life, and in particular, the NZ way of life.

Lizzie

Thursday 24 June 2010

Sintra & Lagos, Portugal


We chose contrasting places for our first visit to Portugal.

Sintra, a green hilly Northern town near Lisbon with a small tourist centre and several amazing historic castles and palaces. The Quinta da Regaleira was a good choice; we had breakfast at a roadside inn and walked up there passed the line of public art sculptures. Decided to spend the day exploring the house and the grounds which were full of masonic references. The best part was going through the underground tunnels to the submerged tower which was supposed to represent the ascent from earth to heaven. Spooky, but we could have played for days.

We caught the train from Sintra to Lagos and, on the way, met David and Kate from Sydney. They provided good company and the five or so hours went quickly. The whiteness of the town was my first impression. The marina was bright with fluttering flags on small boats, and the tourists (mostly English) were traipsing up and down the long line of shops. We couldn't find a map so we got a taxi up through the strip of town to our hilltop motel which was pink on the outside and lined with tiles on the inside. We walked to the beach the next day but it was too breezy to really enjoy, so we went in search of our Aussie friends and had quite a few beers instead. The next night we wandered around the old town centre and felt sorry for the local tourist trade which seemed to be suffering from a reduction in numbers for this time of year. We watched a World Cup game in the square.

The night before we left we went to a restaurant and had grilled sole and fried squid (a whole one!). The owners wife turned out to be a Kiwi, Karen from Hastings. We chatted for hours then ambled home, happy to have discovered Lagos - but determined to return to Sintra one day.

Lizzie

Sunday 13 June 2010

Bergerac

We arrived from Paris via Bordeaux feeling a bit jaded as the past week had caught up with us. In Paris for the first two days we walked a great deal and got caught in several showers, but it was worth it, especially the Musee D'Orsay. But then Mario got a pinched nerve in his back and I got a headache which just wouldn't go away.

Bergerac became a place to chill out and relax. A perfect place, curving gently up from the wide Dordogne River and made up mostly of golden sandy coloured buildings and narrow streets. We felt we could easily find our way around and just start to enjoy the sunshine and wine. We booked four nights at the Europ'Hotel; a pleasant little place on the edge of the old town with about 20 rooms and a lovely clean swimming pool.

Now two days on we are less frazzled and we've stopped looking at our watches. The market on Saturday was really buzzing with more varieties of tomatoes, radishes and asparagus than I have ever seen before. Today there was some sort of town fete and they strung a hammock type netting alongside the Pont Vieux (quite a stretch, five arches). Locals were lining up to struggle across it, each crossing taking about 20 minutes.

Each afternoon and evening we sit down in the foyer and watch the World Cup games and try and figure out the French commentary. Our friendly hosts can't understand why we are supporting or interested in so many countries - NZ, Italy, Spain, Australia and England. Our French (with bits of Italian and English thrown in) is hopeless, so we cannot explain these things very well, it took us two days to get a good cup of tea sorted.

Lizzie

Wednesday 9 June 2010

Goodbye London

Well, that's it! The flat has been cleaned and cleared, and cleaned again. Our neighbour has graciously taken our last minute pantry stuff and is looking forward to trying the NZ clover honey, crab paste and Japanese vinegar...hopefully not together. She even made us cheese and pickle sandwiches to have on the way to Paris.

I feel really confused - sad to be leaving so many good friends in London, terribly excited about the 7 weeks ahead with Mario around Europe, anxious about getting a job back in NZ, and all warm and fuzzy about connecting up again with so many friends and family back home in August.

Not surprisingly I didn't sleep very well last night - it may have been the fact that we'd given the bed and mattress to a charity and slept on a pile of duvets on the floor, or maybe it was the lingering smell of bleach from the spotless floors and walls...

So, here's five things I love about London:

The audiences - for all types of shows and concerts the audiences are generally well informed, enthusiastic and generous in their responses
The football - everyone knows a lot about it, everyone loves it; you can't help but watch it and become enthralled
The comedy - not just the stand-up, everyone's witty. I love the play on words, and the richness of the language, made better by the combination of so many cultures
The Thames - I've walked along beside the Thames most days on my way to work; it's never boring and there is always so much going on. People go mad here at the slightest show of sunshine and race down to sit, sunbathe, eat and fool around.
The diversity - London isn't England, it's the world

Sunday 18 April 2010

Ash

It's strange that something in nature can have such a profound impact on travel plans, and the activities that surround them.

I'm off to the London Book Fair tomorrow, and hoping its not too blighted by this strange turn of events. I have a conference on Thursday, with a keynote speaker from Australia; I wonder if he will make it. My sister-in-law is stuck here with us in London because she cannot return to her home in Sydney. Her job, studies, family all have to just wait for the skies to clear.

We all went for a bike ride today in Bushy Park; sunny day, lots of birds, no plane noise overhead. It was perfect.

I've always disliked airports - too many sad goodbyes and the accumulated anxieties of travellers waiting to leave, or people anxious to meet and greet. Now I expect they are strangely deserted, with pockets of optimists - or those who just don't have anywhere else to go.

I wonder how the struggling airline companies will survive the economic fallout from these losses. More mergers perhaps. Maybe this, when it eventually ends, have turned people in Europe back to ferry,coach and rail travel as a more preferred option in the future.

Maybe our Eurostar booking, to leave London for Paris early in June, will soar in value. But then it can't go on that long, can it?

Lizzie

Monday 22 March 2010

Is it me?

Is it me, or is the planning just as exciting as the actual trip?

We finished our schedule on Sunday, and have an idea of the likely damages, cost wise. Funny thing is, its not much more than if we stayed living in London, what with the exorbitant rent and commuting costs to cover over here.

The great thing about being your own travel agent these days is all the info you can tap into so quickly on the 'net. We have used some travel books, a map of Europe (which I got at a charity shop), and various blogs and sites.

Mostly we have chosen places at random, or for silly reasons - Bardolino: cos we like the wine, Sardinia: because we like sardines? No, not really... Lucca: because a friend comes from there. Sabaudia: because I think the forest and wild bore sounded interesting.

The main thing has been to make sure we are able to keep an eye on the World Cup as we travel around, with New Zealand in it this time, and Italy to stress over as usual. There's a whole separate column in our plan for the WC games schedule! So, its going to be Milan for the quarter finals, and Lucca for the final...

Lizzie



Thursday 18 March 2010

Finally Started

Well, here goes...

This is the planning stage - 56 days around Europe from 9 June onwards for a couple of Kiwis leaving London to head homeward. We're a couple of 'shifty fifties', and we are preparing to start our adventure.We think we may be addicted to change, but then, what the hell!

Thought I'd start now, because after all, the excitement has begun already. We've resigned from the London jobs, and booked our return fares. Every Sunday morning we sit up in bed with our net-books on our laps and have a Flight-of-the-Conchords type meeting:

M - present
E - present

We are plotting a trip that starts in Paris, goes through Spain, then Portugal, then Spain again, then back through Italy. We finish off with a week in Sardinia, then its back to London to take that long flight to Sydney.

Lizzie