The Orange Country - Holland

Cafe in Arnhem

Autumn leaves on the water, Amsterdam

Bicycles...yep Amsterdam

Getting back into the swing of things...

So we are officially back on land that "is girt by sea", as goes the national anthem, that's right Australia, and to be more precise Adelaide, Australia.

It's day 6 and I am ready to curse the person who invented cardboard boxes. I have paper cuts galore, my hands are a ruddy black colour, my nails ruined and I am permanently dusty. Ok am a bit overboard there, but I just want you to understand that I am up to my armpits in boxes and I get excited when its NOT a cardboard box that I am unpacking or i get to tidy something or better yet do washing.

Then to make matters worse, we haven't even received the shipping stuff yet, so although I am now about 90% done with existing boxes (we had an entire furnished house) and there are about 33 on their way via customs. Customs just charged us $88 for alcohol - damn that WET tax, why do they tax wine so heavily in this country - so any day now.

Fortunately of the 33 boxes, about 80% of that will be bubble wrap. That of which we may have to donate to a multinational glass exporting company for re-use after, which could potentially save them $1,000's on shipping costs. Mark made wrapping the shipping into a high security military operation for which I did not have the correct authorisation codes or biometrics, thus was relegated to a desk job, aka spreadsheet data entry clerk. What fun.

So anyways...enough about me, ok no...you want more. Glad to hear it. More there is. Well I have been to an agency already on Monday and they had 3 suitable roles, varying in my preference for them of course. They told me to give them 72 hours and let them work their magic, well success, I am lined up for 2 interviews already. Wish me luck. Mark fortunately is already working, though I say fortunately because it means he doesn't have to un-pack stuff with me.

Now this is nearly the end of Tourists on the Weekend, as we are definitely no longer such, more like Sunshine Devourers of the South, hmm, nice ring. Oh and my photo of the day project has clearly gone tits up. However, because I don't like things to remain unfinished I am going to probably change it to a Photo of the Week....maybe month....or a photo of the year....project just to complete it. Don't worry though, there will be more blogs to come, we did get up to quite a lot in our last couple of weeks in the UK, including a trip to Oxford and various parties. Photos of Egypt will follow too, just a few as most will go up on Flickr of course.

Ok well the boxes are calling me, they have a high pitched whine, its rather unsettling, so I shall get back to them and bid you adieu for now, whilst you contemplate if I should do a new blog and what it should be called... your thoughts please.

Oh MY GOD!

I am so behind on here, totally sorry, but I have just been enjoying myself in Egypt with Mark for the last 10 days. No laptop was taken, no mobiles were on. Bliss. Back to usual on here soon I hope but I have a whirlwind of a week or so ahead with the dwindling of days that are leading me back to Australia. Sigh.

Ps saw Kylie Minogue tonight at Miss Polly Rae's Hurley Burley burlesque show, and I had better seats than Miss Minogue. Oh and Boy George was there too. Show was brilliant, couldn't have been better if Dita herself was there, though would have loved to see the act with the champage glass.

Photo of the Day No.32 - Fifteen

Dinner at Jamie Oliver's Fifteen Restaurant, near Shoreditch and Old Street in London. Very Italian very unusal, but extremly tasty. No we didn't see Jamie.

PS I know my Photo of the Day are not exactly always awe inspiring, but I think I have come to the conclusion that my Photo of the Day will be a mix of my photography development and events/dos/happenings of our life in London (what remains of it)

Photo of the Day No.31 - So Long Farewell....Tufnell Park

The last photo of us at our flat in Tufnell Park, just minutes from leaving, our mini cab is in the drive behind us. We now live in Bush Hill Park, quite North but still in London!

Gone for a Walk - Hyde Park

A couple taking a lazy sunday stroll on the Serpentine

Building reflection in the ICE...on the Serpentine

Me in the Italianate Gardens

Mark, the ever reluctant photo subject in the Italianate Gardens

Swans, and lots of them

A cute... if that is possible Canada Goose

They're prepared this year!

This was simply the most massive Swan I have seen, its a bit hard to tell here though

Kensington Road, with the classic British phone boxes

Gloucester Road Tube station with the old Metropolitan Railway signage.

Photo of the Day No.17 - Hyde Park Italianate Gardens

The sun was shining, what better excuse to get outside for a wander around London. With both exhibitions I wanted to see unavailable we made do with a walk through a family fest that was walking through Hyde Park.

Ducks, geese, pigeons, swans, skaters, boarders, bikes, buggies, joggers, walkers, footballs, couples, families - it was all there. This photo here is of the Italianate Gardens towards the Notting Hill end of the park.

Followed up with a lovely Sunday Roast at The Prince Albert on Gloucester Road before some shopping in Harvey Nichols whilst Mark went home to watch the football.

Toast to Australia

On a lovely sunny, sort of, Sunday in June we had tickets to Toast Festival, the Australia day (there is a Saffa and NZ day too). It's as close as we get to the real Australia day, and as for the trimmings it did stack up.


We were there with a friend from work Jon and his wife Neoma, who is also an Adelaide gal and now also works with us too.

Us toasting to Australia.

Mark and I got there early to make sure we didn't miss out on the Polo match, a bit of England vs Australia going on there. So we started with champagne and strawberries, why not. Neoma and Jon, as I now have discovered, are notoriously late - yes even more so than me, I am either spot on time (most of the time...) or several hours late, so I can sympathise. By the time they had arrived the polo match was done and dusted, with each side scoring 3 goals (not sure if they call them goals) and we'd moved on to the food.

Yippee we scored..

We wandered round and eventually decided to eat from the Smiths of Smithfield stand, you may know the owner - Jon Torode - if you watch Masterchef, where we got yummy salt and pepper squid, roast lamb and chips. Jon Torode was there and cooking out front on the BBQ, as you can see in the picture. He commented on my fine choice of chips, not seeing that I had the salt and pepper squid in my other hand.

Jon Torode and the rather impressive BBQ

There was some wine tasting, but nothing particularily exciting so after Jon and Neoma joined us, we ate more, wandered a bit more, had some rather delicious and monstourous slabs of Pavlova, before positioning ourselves ready for a bit of Sneaky Sound Systems.

Super sized Pavlova, and it was two for the price of one!

By the time they were on, we were right up front. Miss Connie and Angus were brilliant, and I really enjoyed them, even better the second time around, as we saw them at the good ol' Sheperds Bush Empire a few months back.



Whew after a rather relaxing, but exhausting day, we had a couple of pints with Neoma and Jon before heading back home to Tufnell Park, it could have been a late one, but as Sunday is officially a school night it was not to be.

Tapas Fantasticas...

Tapas Fantasticas

Brick lane, whilst usually known for its abundance of its damn fine curry houses, was this week hosting the Rioja Tapas Fantasiticas. Basically a Spanish food and wine festival.
One of the Spanish bands

A courtyard was set up with various stalls of wines from the Rioja region, along with food from some Spanish restaurants from both Spain and London. A whooping 2 pounds got us a wine glass a 6 tasting tokens. The weather was glorious so rose and white wine was the order of the day.
Slow cooked beeft with chickpea mash...
Mark just loves having his photo taken....

We ate;

iberico ham on bread with a mash tomato sauce
croquetas with ham and cheese
croquetas with salt cod and corn
paella with seafood and peppers
peppers stuffed with beef
slow cooked beef with chickpea mash
chocolate crumble with strawberries

We arrived home about 5pm, which was just in the nick of time, as it bucketed it down and we had hail the size of cherries, oh and Wimbledon was on, no rain over that way though.

Cherry hail stones
Hail on the balcony...

Easter in Pictures

The wonky Church spire of Chesterfield....it will straighten when a virgin gets married there apparently!
Us at Chatsworth House on Easter Sunday in the lovely gardens
The Lion in Chatsworth House, one was awake and one asleep...(this is the asleep one!)
Chatsworth House courtyard

Grandma and Grandad out front of the Oldest pub....no drinks Grandma was on best behaviour
The Easter Monday markets
Mark with his Grandparents at Muriels house where we all stayed

London on the Monday evening when we got back was just beautiful even at 6pm so we had a picnic on Parliament Hill and I took photos of all the kites while the sun set.