Our last day in Norfolk! We started our trip on the southern end of the journey so the weather would have a chance to warm up some before we go too far north. Well, tomorrow we head off north - we’ve mostly had temperatures of 6 degrees as we’ve wandered through damp churchyards, but today it was only 4, rising to a balmy 5 by 12 noon!! That’s okay. We’ve just worked out the heating in our cottage, let’s hope the other cottages have similar heating systems. I’d still rather that than the 40 degrees they’re getting in Penrith! We’ve been finding that a lot of the pubs are having trouble getting staff, so have cut back on offering meals - they all have positions vacant boards out the front. Many of the pubs are closed ... read more

We headed off early today - I think we’re finally over our jet lag! First stop this morning was Reepham, and St Mary, the church my 3G grandfather was buried at. The church precinct had 3 churches all built on to each other, and all with different saints names! The churchyard however, was not arranged in any order. We searched unsuccessfully for Matthew Fuller’s grave but I was able to enter the church he must have attended. whilst in Reepham we thought we’d try to obtain some demineralised or distilled water for my cpap machine. We asked at both the pharmacy (yes, today we found one!) and at the hardware store, but neither stocked it. At home we buy it from Woollies, but their Tesco don’t have it either. So I guess we’ll have to continue ... read more

Today was blissful - no one’s timetable to stick to but our own, so Tom thought we should have brekkie in bed, which was delightful. When we were at Tescos yesterday we found several Kellogg’s cereals, but not sultana bran, so we had to purchase Tescos own brand - which was okay, not wonderful, just okay - but definitely better if you have it in bed! The peanut butter over here is not quite up to the standard of Bega peanut butter either. When we eventually got out of bed we headed off to Great Yarmouth where my Allman family used to live generations ago. We went to the Great Yarmouth Minster church of St Nicholas where my 5G grandfather, William Allman, and my 6G grandmother, Elizabeth Greenwood, were baptised, my 6G grandparents, Francis Allman and ... read more

The day was one of those days where time moves very slowly. Our flight out of Sydney wasn’t until 7:10pm but we thought we’d just make our way slowly down to the plains. I rang the local taxi service to book a taxi for 12noon to catch the 12:30pm train, only to find there is only one taxi and he was booked out from 11-12:30! You’ve got to be kidding! I wasn’t sure if there was another taxi based in Lawson, so I put a post on the Hazelbrook Happenings Facebook page, and the next I knew I had a text from an unknown number - it was lovely Kath from across the road offering us a lift to the station! Thank heavens! The alternative would’ve been Tom driving the luggage and me up to the ... read more

When we awoke this morning and looked out our window, it was as if we were looking at another ship. It was the Auckland Hilton, built on the pier in Auckland Harbour and built to look like a ship. It is actually above the international passenger terminal. We went up to the cafe for brekky and discovered that overnight the ship had been decorated for Halloween 👻 🎃 After breakfast we went ashore and walked up the hill to the Auckland Sky Tower. I took some lovely pics, but once again my phone has stopped talking to my iPad - I’ll see if I can transfer them today. We went up to the main observation deck, then up to an even higher one, which had cleaner, clearer glass, and then back down to the deck with ... read more