Cinque Terre - Corniglia 21st-25th May, 2009 So, the story goes... Rupesh and I went to Italy for the long weekend at the end of May with Bern and Elizabeth to meet up with Erin and Mark who got married in Melbourne at the end of April. Erin and Mark were on an 8 week honeymoon around Asia and Europe. We flew from London to Turin and stayed the night before catching a train to La Spezia and meeting Erin and Mark there. We stayed in the village of Corniglia - one of the 5 villages making up the Cinque Terre [View Full Entry]

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Birthday Weekend in Cornwall & Devon 24th - 26th April, 2009 Rupesh and I are loving having our own place and being able to have visitors. On Easter Sunday, the Dornoms arrived - not Bern and Elizabeth but their parents and brother. Bern and Elizabeth were in their last weeks of work at the end of the ski season in France. Susan, Ian and Timothy spent a week with us in London before heading off on a road trip to southern England and then on to France to stay with the girls. We enjoyed having them stay but what I enjoyed [View Full Entry]

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Winter, 2009 It was an incredibly long, cold winter in London. At the end of October, just after Rupesh and I moved in to a place of our own in North London, we had a light dusting of snow. Quite unusual apparently for October. Then in January it got so cold that the ponds in Hampstead Heath including the ones that people swim in, iced over. It was entertaining watching the ducks and other birds as they tried to negotiate walking on the ice. Some of them were sliding all over the place! Check out the video! In February, when Victoria [View Full Entry]

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Granada, Cordoba & Seville 21st-25th January, 2009 Rupesh and I met up with Melinda and Mark in Madrid to spend some time with them on some of their travels around Spain and to explore a few places we had not seen in Spain. Madrid to Granada Our morning in Madrid began with Churros (long skinny donuts) and chocolate dipping sauce for breakfast! We then started our road trip towards Granada. We stopped briefly in Aranjuez where there was a not so spectacular palace. We continued on to Linares, a small village where we stopped for lunch. There was a small bar [View Full Entry]

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London & France Nov - Jan, 2009 Rupesh and I had guests booked in to 'Hotel Lou & Rupesh' before we even finished unpacking! We were fortunate to have a spare room at our new place and were really looking forward to having people stay. Bern and Elizabeth were our first guests before they continued their French studies in Annecy and then on to their third ski season. I then visited them for a very chilled weekend in Annecy. Lots of playing of their new Wii and trying out all the local cake shops. Lake Annecy was also a short walk [View Full Entry]

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Singapore 23-26th October, 2008 On the way back to London after celebrating Mum's 70th in Australia, Rupesh and I stopped off in Singapore. It was a great opportunity to visit Melinda and Mark who moved to Singaore in January. We had a busy few days with only the best recommendations from Mel and Mark. Singapore Zoo was huge and very impressive. Alongside the zoo is the Night Safari where your board a small train in the late evening and view animals in the night. We had our first real Singapore Sling at the Raffles Hotel where you eat peanuts and throw [View Full Entry]

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Somehow I managed to do it again - mum had no idea that I was coming home from London for her 70th. Kathryn picked me up from the airport at 6.30am almost 2 weeks before her birthday and took me back to her place where mum was waiting for a mattress to be delivered. I'm not sure who would be delivering a mattress at 7am! Although mum was annoyed at having to be at Kathryns at 6.30am to wait for a mattress, she did get quite a surprise when the mattress turned out to be me! A week after that Rupesh [View Full Entry]

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London & Around April - September, 2008 Just thought that I would give a snippet of lots of outings and events that I took part in from April until September, 2008. There was certainly a lot happening in and around London. I continued to have quite a bit of time on my hands looking for work and then in July I applied for a resident permit for the UK. It was a quite a stressful time for Rupesh and I putting together a whole array of documents that the Home Office in Croydon requested to see as part of the application. [View Full Entry]

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Camino de Santiago 1st - 25th June, 2008 What is the Fountain of Wine? More about that later! Buen Camino means Good Camino - pilgrims will often say it to other pilgrims, wishing you a good journey/good walk on the Camino de Santiago trail. The Camino de Santiago, also known as the Way of St. James is a 783km pilgrimage route accross northern Spain. The route passes through the regions of Navarra, La Rioja, Castilla and Gailicia and finishes in Santiago de Compostela. Back in the 9th centuary a religious hermit followed a mysterious shining star which led him to t [View Full Entry]

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Slovenia 6th-10th May, 2008 Bled Bled is really a very lovely town set at the base of the Julian Alps on Lake Bled. It was a very chilled out town to be when we weren't off on our adventures. A very long day of travelling to get to Bled via Trieste and Gorizia in Italy. There were spectualar views of the Alps during my flight to Trieste. And the views were equally as stunning on the train journey from Gorizia to Bled along the Soca River which was a very vivid blue. Met up with Harry at the Bledec Youth Hostel [View Full Entry]

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