I can hear you all singing along as I write!! Even further back than the car towing incident, in 2001, we had plans to visit the battle site where the 1815 battle of Waterloo between the Imperial French army of Napoleon took on the might of the British, Dutch and Prussian allies. You think Napoleon would have learnt his lesson. Only having just escaped from Elba, rather than live his life a free man he decided to stick it out for round two. In case you don’t know your history (or Abba songs), the next line of the ditty is, Napoleon was defeated… Before I carry on, it is probably best that I provide a potted history of this tyrant with the nickname, the Little Corporal. After attending military school, ... read more

On 2nd August 2018, Roisin and I walked out of the doors of HMRC for ever. The day had finally arrived. We are now retired (although not officially retired until 3rd September 2018). The most popular question to ask retirees is: ‘Now what are you going to do with your time?’ However, the few people that asked Roisin or myself this question knew, in their heart of hearts, what they answer would be!! When we both became partially retired twelve months ago no one asked us the question: ‘Now what are you going to do with the extra two days per week?’ I can now, however, reveal how one of us has spent most of HER partial retirement…..making travel arrangements for when we retire!!! As of 2nd August 2018 we had twelve ... read more

Alta, the apex of our trip. After this port we turn around and head back South so it was now or never. I’ll cut straight to the chase…we saw them!! The Aurora Borealis, commonly known as the Northern Lights. For those of you who don’t know or who think they know but aren’t too sure, here is the science bit: The Northern Lights, or to give them their scientific name, aurora borealis form when charged particles emitted from the sun during a solar flare penetrate the earth's magnetic shield and collide with atoms and molecules in our atmosphere. These collisions result in countless little bursts of light, called photons, which make up the aurora. Collisions with oxygen produce red and green auroras, nitrogen produces the pink and purple colours whilst helium produces an orange hew. With ... read more

We arrived in Åndalsnes at 8:00am to clear skies and stunning scenery. This is just another of your typical fjord like communities. The snow-covered mountains swept down to the shore of the Romsdalsfjord. There were peaks in every direction giving the illusion of a town that is cut off from the rest of civilisation, yet with a population of approximately 2,500 life just goes on as normal. The temperature today is a chilly -11°C. A purpose-built quay has been constructed for cruise ships and the loch is deep enough for the modest sized ships to come along side. There is no need for a tender today!! We came ashore at 10:30, well wrapped up. The first thing noticeable was the wind. Whilst it wasn’t exactly gale force, the chill factor made the air temperature plummet which ... read more

The end of the road. Nuremburg. If the boat had been using a sat-nav/ GPS, we would have heard those famous words: ‘You have reached your final destination!!’ It started raining, although quite a mild temperature of 7 degrees Celsius. Our organised tour in to Nuremburg was not until 13:30 so we had the morning free to decide if we wanted to go. Other than the more popular ‘optional’ excursion of the WWII tour, one of the more unusual excursions was to a pencil factory!! Nuremberg, I understand, is the pencil capital of the world (not many places can claim that distinction!) for they don’t just have one pencil factory but Nuremberg is home to the two largest manufacturers and distributors of pencils in the world in Stædtler and Faber-Castell.As Stan Laurel once said ... read more