3 Days to go

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3 days to go. After endless flight bookings,plans,vaccinations,medical and dental checks we are down to packing. After many months of thinking about what to do we got down to serious arrangements after we returned fronm Antarctica 10 days before Christmas 2008. We are fortunate to have our son Tom looking after things at home. He will continue his university studies while we are away.Annie and I are both working until the last moment,while trying to sort out our house and life!We will miss all our old friends and work mates but other than that we will be glad to be away.For me it will be fantastic to be back in Africa and to add to the 30+ African countries I have been before. for Annie it will be her first trip to West and Central Africa,having been to only 10 African countries previously and for us great to be back in Africa together again and maybe this time we will make it to Equatorial Guinea! If all goes well we will make it to South Africa within about 6 months.It will be an interesting experience travelling across the Sahara in a truck with a group of backpackers, since Annie and I have mainly travelled together for the last 30 or so overseas trips. We will head off on our own some time after the Sahara but who knows what will happen. We fly to Tunis via 2 days in Qatar and travel around together- we are looking foward to the Roman ruins at Catharge and the North African Desert and of course the Cuisine.We will then move on to Melilla for a couple days -a rarely visited Spanish enclave in Eastern Morocco before joining the group to tackle the desert. Anyway that's it. We will return to our preparations.

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Photos

Street tango Buenos Aires12/08
La florida -a favourite haunt of ours. The tango is good and the Gauchos are great

Departing Ushuaia11/08
The beginning of a another Antarctic trip.

Helicopter flying12/08
Antarctica

Mr possum 1/09
Hiding in our wardrobe at our farm

Peter 1 oya 11/08
almost the most isolated island. 50knot winds prevented zodiac operations

Deception Island 11/07
this active volcano provides hot water for swimming

Elephant Island 11/07
Ernest Shackleton's men were marooned here in 1915

Shackleton's Nimrod hut12/08
he wintered here in 1908