Andrew

Family Mudpie

Andrew

Fiona and I started this blog in September 2004 when we decided to take a break from our jobs to go tour some of the world with a bag on our back and some money in our pockets.

We had an incredible time, seeing some beautiful places and meetings some nice people along the way, we started in San Francisco and our last destination was Bangkok, in between we visited Hawaii, New Zealand, Fiji, Australia, Korea, Japan, China, Vietnam and Laos.

We were armed with a 1.2 megapixel camera at the time, no mobiles, no WiFi, just good old fashioned books and the occasional internet cafe. The trip was excellent, it all went according to plan - well whatever plan there was to start with, we had some hilarious adventures and some real quality time together, you'll find all of the stories enclosed.

We came back to Scotland for Christmas 2005 where I proposed to Fiona and we've been married near 10 years now and have moved gradually North from Edinburgh to Dundee to Montrose where we now live, and there's no longer just the two of us... Our daughter Lois joined the traveling team in 2009 and she wasn't on her own for too long as her wee sister Ella joined the party in 2011 with our next addition, Flynn, coming to his Dad's rescue in early 2014 and our latest arrival, Martha completing the family portrait in 2017.

We still do a fair bit of "traveling" or should that be holidays? A lot in Scotland and some foreign trips thrown in too, Ella took her first trip abroad in June 2012 when we visited Italy and then went to France in July 2013, which was her sisters fourth holiday abroad after visiting France, Italy and Spain already in her first four years on this earth. Flynn's first trip outside the UK was to Catalunya in 2015 and we all loved our trip to Tuscany in summer 2016 with Martha's first trip abroad coming before her first birthday with a holiday in Florida in 2018.

We're just back (October 2019) from an incredible off-grid holiday in the Scottish Outer Hebrides where we had some much needed downtime.

I'll try to update this more as I do enjoy telling the stories and reading about others, take it easy.

Andrew, Fiona, Lois, Ella, Flynn & Martha x

Craignish Peninsula and Isle of Barra

Europe » United Kingdom » Scotland » Outer Hebrides » South Uist October 23rd 2019

IMG_20191018_175418-EFFECTS

Family Mudpie

First and foremost this vacation ended on Na h-Eileanan Siar, the Western Isles in the Outer Hebrides, on the Isle of Barra not South Uist, I couldn't work out how to add that to the list of options under Outer Hebrides so there we are. I also can't speak Gaelic so forgive me if I make mistakes in any names I type of this stunning place. This holiday, a year after our amazing vacation in Florida, couldn't have been more different, rugged off grid with no cell service or WiFi, battered by the elements we had an equally, albeit totally different trip this year. Things have been hectic, I gave most of the update in the last blog I just published but I've taken on a new role in my company that involves a lot more ... read more

Fairytale vacation - Florida 2018

North America » United States » Florida » Orlando » Disney World October 11th 2018

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Family Mudpie

So, it's been a while and I don't think anyone reads these anymore but my kids want to start looking into what their parents got up to in the olden days so I'm going to make another effort on these pages! Quick update, surprisingly we've not had any more kids since our last blog, the big three are now all at school (p6, p4 and p1) and Martha will be two in a few weeks time. We're actually just back from another holiday (October 2019) which is the opposite of what I'm writing about here, this trip to Florida (October 2018) was a full on exhausting adventure and next month we're going to the Isle of Barra in the Scottish Outer Hebrides for some much needed unplugging off-grid time. I've been doing a lot of traveling ... read more

It happened again.....

Europe » United Kingdom » Scotland » Angus » Montrose January 30th 2018

family

Family Mudpie

Well, it's been over a year since our trip to Italy and, as predicted, I've not been back to that post to updated it.... BUT I've had good reason, which will probably not be a surprise to anyone who has followed this for the last 8 years, but we've had another baby! Baby Martha was born on 11th November and is settling into our fit-to-burst home. I appreciate this has become less about travelling over the last few years but it's still relevant to our journey so here we are, our first year (2017) without a family trip abroad was completed with the arrival of Martha in mid November. So, what's been going on? Well Flynn has just turned four (it's the 30th of January 2018), Lois is away to turn NINE and Ella is six, ... read more

Summer holiday in Tuscany

Europe » Italy » Tuscany » Cecina July 21st 2016

The never ending horse ride...

Family Mudpie

Greetings, summer is here (and gone in Scotland, we got one great day...) and we're just back from our summer vacation in Tuscany. We stayed in a camping village in Montescudaio which was close to a little town called Cecina on the Tuscan coast, about an hour south of Pisa. We had an excellent time in a beautiful setting with wonderful weather for the full two weeks, in fact the only day that wasn't great was our last day when we got a light storm followed by overcast cloud for the rest of the day. Nothing exciting happened although we had a great day every day at the pool, beach or on day trips. We did have an exciting day at Cavallino Matto amusement park where Ella rode her first high rollercoaster and Flynn got in ... read more

Jeeze, has it really been that long?

Europe » United Kingdom » Scotland » Angus » Montrose April 20th 2016

The Glen

Family Mudpie

I have always meant to keep this blog more up to date but life just seems to get in the way, I wanted to keep this more of a diary of our travels and trips but I’ve not succeeded in that aim, as always I will plan to do so going forward! So, where are we – April 2016, we’re still in the same house and I’m still working the same job. The kids are well, seven, four and two year olds now, work is going well - very busy with some travel to the Middle East (Doha, Abu Dhabi, Muscat) America (Denver, Houston, Austin) and Europe (Rome, Amsterdam, Barcelona, Vilnius) since I last wrote here. Fiona gave up her job with the NHS and is now starting a private practice for Speech and Language Therapy ... read more

Catch up on various trips

Europe » Italy » Lazio » Rome October 1st 2015

Kids at Kenmore

Family Mudpie

We had a great time with the larger family in October first staying at a beautiful lodge in Kenmore and then just the five of us heading down to Loch Lomond for another few days in a lovely cottage. We went to Kenmore with 12 of my family and had a wonderful time all together, my cousin Jennifer came over from Abu Dhabi with her young son Henry who was only a few months old, it was great to all be together again and it was a very relaxing time. After this we went down to a cottage, complete with hot tub, on Loch Lomond for an extra three days to spoil ourselves with trips to the Safari Park, Science Centre and the surrounding countryside thrown in. Around that I’ve been working in Houston and Austin ... read more

Family vacation in Catalunya

Europe » Spain » Catalonia » Torroella de Montgri June 20th 2015

Barca boy playing in the park

Family Mudpie

We flew from Edinburgh to Barcelona then hired a car to drive the 150KM’s to Torroella de Montgri near Girona where our campsite was situated. It was such a great holiday we barely left the campsite which is unlike us, I’d had a busy few weeks of travel with work before we left so I was delighted to only use the car to get us there and back with a couple of trips out into the real work for supplies to sustain us. The campsite (El Delfin Verde) had everything we needed, we stayed in a lovely three bed bungalow in a quiet part of the site with access to a playpark and a paddling pool for the kids, there was a large swimming pool and a number of other playparks around the site and it ... read more

The local playpark where the kids were free from the parents!

Two became five, what the funk just happened?

Europe » United Kingdom » Scotland » Angus » Montrose January 20th 2014

flynn

Family Mudpie

Hello my lovelies, I just ask the question as I really don't have a scooby what's happened in the last decade, in 2004 I started planning a round the world trip for me and my tidy girlfriend, later that year it all went ahead as planned and in 2006 we came home enlightened and encouraged. We weren't long back before I started to think about the next trip, Africa and South America were the (not quite so) planned destinations but first we had to pay of the debt accrued from the first trip and save for the next... Then life got in the way. The next year I married the tidy girlfriend. The next year Fiona got pregnant. The next year we had our first born, Lois (now four). The next year Fiona got pregnant. The ... read more

New York, New York, business and a lot of pleasure...

North America » United States » New York » New York » Manhattan November 1st 2013

my medal for winning the Marathon

Family Mudpie

So I got the chance to go to New York on Business in November which was nice! I had work commitments on the Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday but when I looked at the flights it was costing £1500 to fly out Monday and back Thursday night, so when I looked at flying out on the Friday, giving me Friday night, Saturday, Sunday and Monday to myself the same flights were £412. My work agreed to pay for the extra nights hotel as it was still much cheaper than the original work related flights and off I went. I've been to Las Vegas, Houston and Chicago on business before and had travelled through California with Fiona when we went travelling in 2004 and all over Florida with my family when I was younger but this was my ... read more

Summer holiday and Lois the flower girl

Europe » France » Aquitaine » Tremolat July 1st 2013

Lemur sanctuary

Family Mudpie

What a wonderful holiday we had this summer in France with the highlight being my wee cousin Jenni's wedding in a French castle where Lois was the flower girl. We started our break in Saint Avit De Loisirs is the South West of France, about 100 miles east of Bordeaux. It was a pretty small campsite with a great pool and lovely grounds. The girls went pony trekking for the first time and we all got bikes and toured the local area in our 10 days there. We then went for a two night stay in our favourite wee town, Arcachon, which was quite close. A couple of lovely nights out and days at the beach meant we were well rested for the wedding of the decade. Jenni and Andy's wedding was in a beautiful castle ... read more

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