Our Adventure - 4 nights in Ireland

We flew into Cork and our wonderful hosts, the Brady family were their to meet us. It was great to have the locals showing us around and to share it with other visiting friends The Gabor Family. Highlights included: visiting Cobh, Joe Brady's breakfast Fry-ups, visiting St Michael's Skelligs, puffins, touring the Ring of Kerry, navigating through narrow countryside roads in cloud, trying Guinness in Irish Pubs and kissing the Blarney Stone. We know we didn't have enough time here - just saw a small corner of this extremely beautiful country. 

Our Adventure - 3 nights in the Cotswolds

Our three day in Cotswold's included a fantastic day trip to Warwick Castles and also a much-anticipated visit to see our friends the Knox Family just outside Bath. The girls' got to ride Daisy's new pony and we had a dinner at the most picturesque pub in the world. The Cotswold's villages are just so photogenic. We dined outside two of the three nights in the village of Bourton-on-the water.

Our Adventure - 3 nights in London

We took a double decker tour around London on the first day and a Thames cruise so we could see all the sights. The second we took it much more causally and strolled through parks and revisited a few places that we had whizzed past on the tour. London was decked out in Union Jacks and was just oh-so- English. We caught up with Paul and Loce for dinner one night and saw the West End Show of Dreamboats and Petticoats another night. We had a day at Legoland on our way to the Cotswolds.

Our Adventure begins with 1 night in Dubai

We only spent one night in Dubai but we packed in a lot. Highlight was spending time with the Pinkstone Family. Alice and Chloe and have been friends since Year 2 and it was great catching up and hearing about Dubai from those who live there. We went to the Aquaventure Waterpark which has an awesome vertical drop slide through a tank of sharks. We also went on a 4WD tour through the desert which included a BBQ at a desert camp complete with henna tatoos and a camel ride. We visite the tallest tower in the world Burj Khalifa (828 m) and went to the biggest mall in the mall in the world and then headed to the spice and gold markets. Thanks to Claudi and Henry for being wonderful hosts.

 

Super Buckley and the Martian on the Moon

The Staycation

For Matt's birthday back in September he was given a voucher to stay at a hotel (specifically Marina Bay Sands) by generous family members. As HP had paid for Matt to stay for a week at Marina Bay Sands in December, we chose to have a staycation on Sentosa Island instead. It was lovely to pack a small suitcase and 10 minutes later be at our holiday. Just as well because Alice forgot her bathers so her and I took a taxi back home to collect them rather than buy new ones for $70.00 in the gift shop. We settled into our lovely suite at the Sentosa and enjoyed an afternoon by the pool then ventured out for dinner at the Hard Rock Cafe, a trip to Candylicious and to watch the mechanical cranes sounds and light show which was very impressive. 

Next morning after a leisurely breakfast we went to Wavehouse to try surfing. I chose to take photographs of the surfers. It was amazing how quickly Felicity picked up surfing and Alice and Matt weren't far behind however both took hard tumbles near the end. Matt cut his toe quite badly after colliding with  his surfboard. He bravely had it bandaged and we decided to call it quits and head home. After some hesitation, Matt decided he might get a doctor to look at his foot and ouch  - he'd split the webbing and had another bad gash that required several stitches. His foot is now all swollen and purple but the doctor says the wounds are healing and he just needs to keep off it for a while. Next time Matt thinks he may opt to sit with his middle-aged wife and watch the surfing from the comfort of the lounge chairs.