Got up went in for a swim and then headed to Punto Sabbioni for the boat to Venice - took about 20 minutes to drive to. Arrived at about 12:30 and it was absolutely baked - well into the 30s... Wandered around the historic route in Venice, did the Rialto, St.Marks - stopped in a little Coffee shop for a welcome breather and then continued out into the heat! Rested a while in St. Marks and watched the tours going past - then went back towards the boat. Found a restaurant just of the beaten track that was still expensive but [View Full Entry]

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Up up and over today - went through 2 passes - one at 7400 ft and the St. Gothard at about 7000 before we arrived in Lugano. Loads of great pictures - the kids playing in the snow, mountain ranges higher than Pilatus which we went up yesterday. The Range Rover absolutely purred up and down the mountains - it was like it was a place it wanted to be! Seeing as we drove it up and dwon 2 passes both higher than Mt. Pilatus it did really well. Stayed in Lugano overnight - briefly crossed into Italy and then back [View Full Entry]

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Today we went up Mount Pilatus - it was an excellent day to go because the sky was blue and there was very little cloud. After another lovely breakfast we walked to the station - a total of about 3 minutes. There was a surprisingly large queue when compared to the other days but it was a Sunday and the weather was superb. The trip is about 40 minutes upward to @7000 feet. I last did it in 1966 with my father when he was the same age I am now. Excellent pictures on the way up - at times the [View Full Entry]

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Saturday 25th July Now that was a good sleep! Went to sleep reasonably early particularly for me! Slept right through apart from when Catherine had shut the window and I woke up feeling like I'd been boiled in a bag! Eventually woke the kids up and went down for breakfast which was very good, breads, jams, cold meats, cereals, yogurts, fruit and proper coffee. Our outing today is going to be into Luzern and we have to decide whether to take the boat in and train back or the boat both ways- excellent thats the highligh of my decisions for the [View Full Entry]

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So the adventure begins! Left work a little early @ 16:30 but as we had a ferry to catch from Dover at 21:00 I needed to get home, change get in the car and go. Kids and Catherine had done a marvellous job completing all the tasks set them so all I needed to do was turn up, change and exit stage left. Said goodbye to the cat - Stef is coming in to feed it and do the litter tray and we've got one of those great automatic feeders to give it dry food in small portions 3 times a [View Full Entry]

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Nearly time for the 2009 expedition - after last year in Cornwall with the rather varied weather and dislocated shoulder! we have decided to head into Europe - the tank (Range Rover is ready) and we have booked the ferry but that's about it! We cross on the 24th of July - then 3 weeks away. Intend on being in Switzerland by the end of the first day. Nothing booked yet apart from the ferry - should be a real adventure. [View Full Entry]

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Well 2 days to go and we are off to Cornwall for our summer vacation. Weather here in the UK has been a bit disappointing so far this year so I'm hoping for a couple of weeks of lovely sun - right! Our destination is St. Agnes on the North Coast near to the rather excellent Driftwood Spars [View Full Entry]

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We are booked to fly at 18:55 on BA2152 - so today we got up packed a little more and then went to Folestone where the Marine Reserve is as we wanted to use the other underwater camera. Folkestone is quite nice and used by quite a few locals - it is also roped off so the nutters on the jetskis cant get to you, though they still circle the edges trying to entice tourists on board. We swam out with some bread and were soon surrounded by fish of many colours! The kids took the pictures and we will process [View Full Entry]

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We had booked Horse Riding today - so we were all up early to be there for 8.30. Nice place, like riding stables worldwide seems to have a certain element of rundown mode built in. We arrived early about 8.15 and were there before the owner turned up - just a couple of stable hands getting the horses ready. We weren't the only ones on the ride - there were 3 other people as well. They would go down through the forest and past the windmill and then ride along Morgan Lewis beach (the one we'd been to earlier in [View Full Entry]

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We got up today and it was overcast - still hot but raining. We needed some other things from the shops so we went back to Cave Shepherd in Holetown and bought some bits and pieces. We then headed upto Oyster Bay and it was absolutely lashing it down. Some people wouldn't even get out of the car! We went back to the Villa and decided to go and see the Sunbury plantation house (http://www.barbadosgreathouse.com/) this was very interesting particularly as you could go around by yourself and we were the only people there! Interestingly they left stuff out - if [View Full Entry]

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