This morning we got up early and headed out to the Cotswolds to have a tour of some of the pretty little villages that i have been hearing so much about. We took some little country roads to get away from traffic a bit and to have the time to appreciate the scenery, and ended up stumbling across the prettiest town that we saw, Bibury. We then went on to the more well-known Bourton-on-the-water, Stow-on-the-wold, and the Slaughters (my personal favourite, purely because of the name). We did a bit of window shopping in Bourton, but once again were a bit stuck about how to transport any delicate and breakable christmas decorations home. The Slaughters didnt have much in the way of shopping, except for the Mill shop, and we didnt stop for long in Stow ... read more

Well, what an eventful couple of days. We took the train to Guildford and picked up the rental car from the train station. The guy at Hertz was incredibly unhelpful and we set off without any decent maps or directions or anything. After a quick wander through the town centre we headed off to find Hindhead. After a much shorter drive than expected we reached Hindhead, however it looked nothing like how Mum remembered it. We wandered up and down a bit and then asked at a pub, who told us that although Hindhead is on the highway, the actual town itself was a little down the road further! We took off down there, and located the Woodcock, where Mum worked in 1974. We also found out that they had changed the name of the town ... read more

Well, here we are, passing time at the Auckland Airport, bored to death while waiting for our plane. Plane ride from Palmy was good, Mum just kept pretending it was just a bumpy bus. :) We even made it tothe airport on time, how impressive is that!!! Christmas decorations are pretty,but nothing compared to what they will be when we get to Europe. Everything is overpriced, but i guess we will have to get used to that.:) Havnt remembered anything that we have forgotten yet, so thats a good sign. Looking forward to catching up with Tesni in a few days. ... read more