NZ ~ London ~ Porto

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Hi Everyone

I know we have been super slack with staying in touch but we have hardly had a chance to catch our breath so far!!
At the moment we are in Porto (Portugal), we had our frist day here today but I should start from the beginning....

Our flight to London went well and we only arrived about half an hour later than expected. Adam and I both had about 6 hours sleep over the 24 hour flight so of course we were feeling extremely refreshed when Tommo (Adam´s friend who lives in London) picked us up from the airport.

This was lucky as we only had 2 hours to get back from the airport, get showered and get to the pub in time for the All Black game against the Springboks. GO THE ALL BLACKS! It was definitely much more exiciting watching the game in London with a whole lot of other kiwis and safas.
I tried my first snake bite (drink = beer, cider and blackcurrent) and feel in love with them, the rest of the night is a bit of a blur but I do know many good times were had.
Thanks to all our kiwi mates who showed up for a drink or 20, it was a great night and we really do appreciate it :o)

Tommo our wonderful tour guide showed us around London:
OXFORD ST, TRAFALGAR SQUARE ~ Adam had heaps of fun in a 8 story toy store, especially when he found the transformer stuff.
HARRODS ~ The only thing we could afford were Krispy Kreme dougnuts but they are the best dougnuts in the world so happy with that!
BUCKINGHAM PALACE ~ Stuppidly massive but beautifully kept, huge!!
CAMDEN MARKETS ~ Awesome, love this place. Full of punks and markets, really somewhere different, we could have spent hours there! Heather you will love it there!
ST PAULS CATHEDRAL ~ Where Lady Di got married, beautiful as well and huge. We went right to the top, 435 steps, so we were sore afterwards!! We lit a votive candle for everyone back home, really special place with a beautiful vibe to it. The murals on the ceiling are amazing.
VISITED ADAMS GODSON AND AUNTY ETC ~ It was great catching up with them, they live in Surrey which is quite far out but have a huge place with a pool and everything. Pretty impressive around these parts!
ABBEY RD ~ Checked out the Beatles studio.

Today was our frist day in Portugal, we are in the town called Porto. It´s pretty busy and known especially for it´s large river and is where Port originated from.
The morning went really well and we managed to find our way without too many problems, the buildings over here are really crazy. Pretty but really run down ~ a lot of the buildings even have painted ceramic tiles for the cladding.
They have huge statues and churches on just about every corner some of them are hundreds of years old.

The weather is beautiful, totally clear blue skies and very warm, not too hot though.

Adam and I keep forgetting that hardly anyone speaks English over here and tend to bowl into shops without checking our Portugese phrase book frist ~ the blank stares and people laughing at our gay attempts at Portugese has been funny but would be hard work if we were planning on staying here a while.
Portugese is definitely really hard to pronounce, we can´t decide which one of us if worse but I know we definitely both suck!! ha ha.

This afternoon didn´t go quite so well as I think we got a bit cocky and ended up hopelessly lost down by the river ~ it took about 1.5 hours of me moaning and us both stomping up huge hills to get home and we had already been walking for 2.5 hours. So tired!
I have massive blisters and we are both shattered so we´re just going to go and find some dinner and then go to sleep. Boring I know but we have another day here tomorrow and are thinking about cruising up the river to go Port tasting... YUM!!

I will try and upload some photos tomorrow and keep the updates coming a bit more regularly.

Much love to everyone, Adam is whinging about being hungry so I had better go.

Luffs

Ellen and Adam!!

P.S. Sorry about the spelling ~ the spell check is in Portugese and Adam will fade away if I make him wait any longer!!

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Comments

[Zaneos]

mint
Sup, was mean to see you guys over here in the weekend, even if it wasn't for all that long. the all blacks game was pretty mean at the walkie aye! Boy did we rinse it after you guys left, still recovering from that one. Glad you guys enjoyed your time in the UK, but the best is yet to come - have fun... Have a good time in Portugal you lucky buggers! get on the sangria..

[Adam]

Still in Porto????
Adam needs to go try Franszinger (not sure how to spell it, but thats how you say it). Its a typical dish from Porto, you wont get it anywhere else in Portugal. I guess its the Porto version of a hamburger. Trust me its good

[Shrek and Donkey]

Nope we'd just left, only just checked this message now anyway. Food in Portugal was AVERAGE, thank god the port made up for it :o)