Yay! We are home again. We have had the most amazing trip away. I've loved catching up with my friends, and it was grand to be at the Olympics. Thank you so much to Hilary, Holly, Katrina and Steph who we stayed with while we were in London. Being able to stay with each of them really made our trip.
We had an uneventful and long trip home. We saw lots of Olympic athletes from a real mixture of countries while we were at Heathrow. We even sat next to a Latvian judo athlete on the plane to Frankfurt! Finn also got to have a look in the cockpit of the airbus that we flew to Frankfurt in. Lucky boy!
We were able to go swimming again at the airport in Singapore. It's so lovely to splash around and be active in between such long flights. Plus it's a bonus to have a shower and change of clothes part way through the journey.
Thank you for following us on our dream holiday. We're really excited to go back to school and work next week and see our classes and our friends.
Love to you all.
Over and out,
Finn & Deb
PS if you'd like to keep in touch by email this is our address: debmalnz@gmail.com
Friday, 17 August 2012
Tuesday, 14 August 2012
Last full day
We spent our last full day in England visiting with Louise and her family. She lives in a gorgeous village about an hour out of London and about 25 minutes from Brighton.
Her house is amazing! It's amazing because it is nearly 500 years old. It's listed and has wooden beams and brick. It even still has the bells for calling the servants!
We had a great day, catching up, going to the pub for lunch, playing, walking in the woods and we even saw pigs, a guinea fowl and squirrels!
Our bags are packed and we managed to fit most stuff back into our bags alongside all our Olympic and Disney souvenirs. We are only leaving a few things behind. I'm really pleased with that.
We are sad to say farewell to our wonderful friends but we know we'll see them another day. We still have so many things left to do in London that we'll have to come back another time:-)
Of course we'd love to see our UK friends in New Zealand too!
At the same time we are really excited to be heading home. We've had an awesome holiday and we're ready to go home. We'll be back in our own beds on Thursday night - Yay
A big thank you to Steph & Simon who have had us to stay for the last week! It's been grand to be back in Balham (where we lived when we were over here).
Her house is amazing! It's amazing because it is nearly 500 years old. It's listed and has wooden beams and brick. It even still has the bells for calling the servants!
We had a great day, catching up, going to the pub for lunch, playing, walking in the woods and we even saw pigs, a guinea fowl and squirrels!
Our bags are packed and we managed to fit most stuff back into our bags alongside all our Olympic and Disney souvenirs. We are only leaving a few things behind. I'm really pleased with that.
We are sad to say farewell to our wonderful friends but we know we'll see them another day. We still have so many things left to do in London that we'll have to come back another time:-)
Of course we'd love to see our UK friends in New Zealand too!
At the same time we are really excited to be heading home. We've had an awesome holiday and we're ready to go home. We'll be back in our own beds on Thursday night - Yay
A big thank you to Steph & Simon who have had us to stay for the last week! It's been grand to be back in Balham (where we lived when we were over here).
Monday, 13 August 2012
Olympic Torch
This week while we were at Olympic Park, Finn & I got to have our photo taken with the real Olympic Torch. It was an absolute highlight for us. Of course we had to buy the photos!
Here is one of them:
Here is one of them:
The Paralympics
These signs are now popping up all over London promoting the Paralympics starting soon after the Olympics end. The athletes who take part are really inspirational!
Godstone Farm
We have had a great weekend visiting with Katrina and her family in Chipstead. It was really good to catch up. We visited Godstone Farm where you can feed the farm animals (goats, llama, rabbits, pigs, horses etc) and they have a small holding area where you could hold a rabbit. They also have a fabulous playground there that is huge and spreads out up a hill. The children spent ages playing there. They even had these little sleds where you could slide down wet artificial grass. That was a highlight for Finn!
Today we went walking through woodland in the Surrey Hills. It was very pleasant just strolling around. We also found time for a play at the park before catching the train back to Balham.
Saturday, 11 August 2012
Duck tour and more!
We started our visit to London with the hop on hop off tour and today we ended with the Ducktour trip. We travelled in an amphibious vehicle (used in the D-Day Landings in 1944) around central London and then entered the River Thames by MI6. We had a very entertaining guide who pretty much talked non stop for the whole 75minutes of the tour! Most of what he was saying matched up with what we heard on the earlier tour but I'm sure that there is plenty of fabrication mixed in too!
As we were right by Waterloo, we took the opportunity to go to the Sealife Aquarium (London Aquarium). It really is fantastic. We saw loads of fish, sharks and rays. Plus exotic species from around the world. The penguins were really popular with the kids. The kids got to feed the rays, which involved touching stinky fish and prawns and stuff.
After today we have just 3 days left in England. We are going to spend the weekend with Katrina and Mike in Chipstead (outer London) and then on Monday we are going to pop down to visit Louise in Haywards Heath (about an hour out of London). It will be Tuesday before we know it and we'll be beginning our journey home. We leave here on Tuesday and head straight home but because of the date line we don't get home till Thursday the 16th. We'll then have Friday, Saturday and Sunday to get over our jet lag and I'm back at work on Monday the 20th. Finn's school has decided to add in a teacher only day on the 20th so he'll have to wait to the 21st to catch up with his class.
Last night I got to chat to my class. It was fantastic to hear their happy voices. You're the best Room 3! Have a great time at our school Olympics. I'll see you in a weeks time and I can't wait to hear all your stories.
Oh - we nearly forgot to tell you about something very special that we got to do yesterday. We got to hold the Olympic torch that went all through Great Britain before lighting the caldron at the Olympic Stadium. We got some photos. I'm just waiting for them to be released online and then I'll post them on our blog.
We have had the most amazing holiday but we are ready to come home too. There is still heaps for us to do in London but we'll save it for our next trip. It's fabulous to go away and great to go home. See you soon :-)
We will endeavor to add another post or two before we head home.
Love to you all,
Deborah and Finn
As we were right by Waterloo, we took the opportunity to go to the Sealife Aquarium (London Aquarium). It really is fantastic. We saw loads of fish, sharks and rays. Plus exotic species from around the world. The penguins were really popular with the kids. The kids got to feed the rays, which involved touching stinky fish and prawns and stuff.
After today we have just 3 days left in England. We are going to spend the weekend with Katrina and Mike in Chipstead (outer London) and then on Monday we are going to pop down to visit Louise in Haywards Heath (about an hour out of London). It will be Tuesday before we know it and we'll be beginning our journey home. We leave here on Tuesday and head straight home but because of the date line we don't get home till Thursday the 16th. We'll then have Friday, Saturday and Sunday to get over our jet lag and I'm back at work on Monday the 20th. Finn's school has decided to add in a teacher only day on the 20th so he'll have to wait to the 21st to catch up with his class.
Last night I got to chat to my class. It was fantastic to hear their happy voices. You're the best Room 3! Have a great time at our school Olympics. I'll see you in a weeks time and I can't wait to hear all your stories.
Oh - we nearly forgot to tell you about something very special that we got to do yesterday. We got to hold the Olympic torch that went all through Great Britain before lighting the caldron at the Olympic Stadium. We got some photos. I'm just waiting for them to be released online and then I'll post them on our blog.
We have had the most amazing holiday but we are ready to come home too. There is still heaps for us to do in London but we'll save it for our next trip. It's fabulous to go away and great to go home. See you soon :-)
We will endeavor to add another post or two before we head home.
Love to you all,
Deborah and Finn
Friday, 10 August 2012
Hockey
We had a great day at the hockey today. It was super super hot and sunny. We even got a little sunburnt! Whoops! We watched the semi final match between the Australian's and German's. It's great to see that even top level hockey players argue with the ref! Using the video ref a German goal was removed from the scoreboard! Olympic Park was once again absolutely packed and it took us 50 mins to walk from the Riverbank Arena to Stratford Train Station just due to the shear number of spectators in Olympic Park. If you happen to be watching we should be easy to spot as we were directly opposite the cameras, right at the top of the stands under the black umbrella.
BTW Germany won 4-2
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)