We're home!

It's great to be back in Sydney although I think I am having withdrawals from the morning ritual of croissants.

We enjoyed our brief stopover in Singapore but before we knew it it was time to get back on the plane. It was good to spend some time with Flip and Hodgey who were in Singapore for work and we managed to have a delicious buffet dinner with them and Scott.

Lily with Flip and Hodgey in the first class lounge waiting for our plane to board

The flight got off to a good start since Lily slept for the first two hours but she picked up a bug and spent a good part of the flight crying or whinging. When we got back home she only managed to sleep two and a half hours - it was not a good night to say the least. But Lily is all better now and now I am sick.

Lily made a new friend on the plane - she had fun with Margot in the bassinette. I think she enjoyed being in economy more than business!

Although she does look pretty comfy

View from the plane of the French Alps poking through the clouds
Lily was happy to see Oliver at the airport


It's hard to believe that our European sojourn is over and now it's time for Michael to get a job.

It's time to head back to reality...with an unscheduled stopover

Well here we are stranded at Singapore, our flight has been delayed so we won't be home until Thursday now - there is a problem with one of the doors and the trusty Qantas engineers are working away but best to give them time so we don't get sucked out mid-flight.

After we checked in our 90+kgs at Heathrow and bought Lily another toy we loaded ourselves onto the plane. We were expecting a very different journey to the one on the way over to London where Lily slept about 18 hours since she is much more vocal and wriggly now. On the first leg from London she managed to sleep about 7hours and luckily (for us) only had a few screams which didn't seem to bother her fellow business class passengers. Hopefully we will find out soon if we are transferred to a flight leaving tonight or whether we get an overnight stay at Qantas' expense in Singapore.

London was fabulous as ever. We managed to catch up with quite a few people while we were there although the on our last day we were bitterly disappointed to miss seeing Mike, Deb and Rob (who traveled up from Dover just to see us, or probably Lily). For once I must take some of the blame since I sent them the wrong mobile number and while we were wandering through Tate hoping nothing bad had happened to the them they were standing outside Charing Cross tube waiting for us and we only received their email later that evening. So so sorry we were daft idiots...what more can I say.

The Lily factor was in full force when we checked in with over 80kg at Nice airport - we didn't get charged a cent and they gave us an extra seat! It's her cheesy grin - people just cannot resist (although cute it is not overly attractive).

We stayed with Josh, Jen and Amelia and the two girls had a ball playing together and I think Amelia coped very well having to share all of her toys with Lily for the five days.

Amelia reading to Lily
We met up with Michael's friends from Qantas who are now working in London- Ray, Tom, Andrea and Nick. Can you believe Lily was not allowed into the local pub since she was under 18 so we had lunch at the Marriot. She didn't overly enjoy her lasagne for lunch so she left them a little present.

It was great to catch up with Warren again and he even fed Lily.
Although after a while the spoon needed more professional guidance to make it to her mouth since she was too distracted by the pint of beer.

Frank Chalmers, who is writing a book all about swimming and we met in Dover (and a fellow Channel swimmer) hosted a dinner on Friday night with Kevin Murphy. Between the four men they had swum the Channel 37 times although the King of the Channel is responsible for 34 of them and the other three have one each! It was great for Michael to be able to spend some time with Kevin and we all watched the great doco King of the Channel which features Des and Kevin challenging eachother to three swims in Sydney Harbour, English Channel and Loch Ness.

Kevin, Frank, Michael and Simon
That night he agreed to swim in the Serpentine at Hyde Park the next morning - of course Lily and I stayed in bed. Every Saturday morning year round there are a group of swimmers that swim laps of the pool at the Serpentine. Water temperature was 6degrees but Michael managed to win his 50m race with a 33second handicap. He enjoyed the experience so much he went back on Sunday to do it all again!

Michael testing the water temp

Even though we only had a few days in London we managed to catch up with quite a few people. Maarinke has been in London for about four months now and Lily absolutely adores her. We got Indian take-in since we couldn't leave without having the national cuisine.

Lily also got to meet Andrew and Martina who I worked with at BT all those years ago. I hadn't seen them in about five years so it was great to enjoy some wine and food with them at Earls Court.

On Monday we went to the Tate Modern and I got to see Mark Rothko's work again which I love and we also got to see some 'art' such as a green flourescent light nailed to a wall titled Diagonal or a square canvas covered in only black paint which had a huge paragraph explaining the artist's thought process.

Later that evening we took a stroll along Oxford and Regent streets with Warren to see the christmas lights and to do some last minute shopping. Lily was very excited when Warren turned up with a Hamleys bear - every child has to have a Hamleys bear!

We had a great time in London apart from missing lunch with Deb, Rob and Mike. A big thank you to Josh, Jen and Amelia for having us.

Lily is on the move!

Lily loves her baguettes! She had already eaten both ends and we ate the other half for lunch!

Has anyone seen Little Red Riding Hood?

What? The wolf is coming here?!

Thank you to my French uncles!

A big thank you to Martin and Eric for making our time in Provence one that we will never forget.

Lily with Martin

Lily with Eric

Flirting in Paris

The weather back in Provence was lovely after the cold in Italy - we were enjoying 16degree days and sunshine. One day Michael was even up on a ladder helping Martin and Eric pick their olives which they press to produce their own olive oil – it is divine and tastes so much better than the commercial product. Martin hosted a farewell dinner for us in Nice and prepared the yummiest lamb roast. His apartment is stunning, on one side it over looks the coast of Nice and on the other side it overlooks the mountains.

After only three days at the villa we were on the TGV to Paris. Lily behaved herself for the four hour journey mainly because there were loads of people to smile at and they were literally sitting ducks for all of her flirting.

We stayed in the Opera district which was great even though we originally wanted to stay in the Latin Quarter, but considering we were booking our hotel only 15hours before we arrived we weren’t in a position to be fussy. It was soo cold the first night but we were lucky enough to have ‘warmish’ sunny days for the rest of our stay which was great since we spent the four days strolling around showing Lily the sights although every time we got to somewhere of significance she was asleep. It was a little like the ‘sleeping tour of Paris’.

Lily at the Louvre
Lily at the Arc de Triomphe

Lily at the Eiffel Tower
The christmas lights along the Champs Elysees were absolutely amazing – we went into Zara and did more shopping (for me this time) and when we came out the whole boulevard was lit up and I was blown away at how magical it looked. I almost got killed trying to take this photo in the middle of the road!

We went to the Eiffel Tower in the afternoon but little Lily was asleep and we wanted to go back to see the lights anyway but when we arrived back there at 7pm Lily was asleep again but luckily she woke up just in time to see the flashing lights (I promise I didn’t accidentally poke her). She absolutely loved the flashing lights and was so mesmerised by them she cried when we rolled her away!

We are not sure where she learnt this cheesy grin from but she is constantly flashing those pearly whites!

You have to love facebook – a friend from Spain who I lost contact with found me on facebook only a week ago and she just happened to be in Paris working for a few weeks so we were able to meet up for lunch and a stroll around Paris. We had not seen Isabel for about five years so it was wonderful to see her.
We were able to spend a few hours at Musee D’Orsay, one of my favourite museums – I wasn’t quite sure on the Lily factor but thank goodness she enjoyed looking at all the pretty colours as much as we did.

View of Montmartre from Musee D’Orsay
I am not looking forward to joining the masses doing the christmas shopping when we get home but nothing could be as chaotic as our experience at Galleries Lafayette – complete madness! It was like being in the mosh pit at a concert but you were actually in a department store with people buying Prada, Tiffanys, Louis Vuitton (btw we were flicking through The Times newspaper and who would you expect to be the next face of Louis Vuitton? Scarlett Johannson perhaps, no, the latest advertisement features Mikhail Gorbachev!). The shoe department is like a dream come true but the hundreds of people (and the lack of enough money) meant you couldn’t really enjoy it for all it’s worth. I left with only a new hat but I was glad to get out of there, you could feel your stress levels drop when you walked out the doors.

It was so lovely to be in Paris again and it was wonderful that the winter weather allowed us time to walk the streets and since we had been there before we were able to take in more of the real Paris rather than just the famous sites. It’s getting a little sad now since we only have a few days left here in Provence then five days in London and then we are back home in time for family dinner on the 12th. In saying that we are happy to be coming home after over four months away and plus Lily is looking forward to being naked more often.

We will miss the French pop music (even though I have little idea of what they are singing, but Michael likes Vanessa Paradis’ latest song), the endless aisles of Carrefour, all of those croissants and delicious pastries, good value French wine and champagne, and of course the shopping – although we are paying for it now as we are packing. Monty is proving to be a bit of a challenge to fit into the suitcase but he has to come home!

Rain rain go away...

We've been in Venice for a few days and it is cold and wet today. This is when travelling with a babe is not easy. For those of you that haven't been to Venice there are loads of little bridges taking you over all of the canals (and there are loads of them which is why Venice is Venice) and we have to carry the stroller up and down the stairs - not fun in the rain I can assure you! Plus Lily was screaming since she couldn't see properly through the rain cover - definitely not fun! I must say it is a wonderful city to stroll around the streets and along the canals but it is not a child friendly city....and nor should it be since it would not have the charm that it does.

It has now been raining for two days and I guess it was finally time for the rain to catch up with us. Before now we have only had two days of rain since we left home over four months ago.

On our way to Venice we went to Lake Garda and stayed in Sirmione which is a cute little town on the southern end of the lake situated on a pennisula. It has the obligatory old town but since it is getting close to winter there was not much open and strolling around the town felt like walking through a ghost town - there was noone around but we were able to find a gelato place so it was all good. We much preferred the scenery of Lake Como but Lake Garda was still impressive - it reminded me of a little version of Chicago as the lake looked more like an ocean since you could not see the other side because of all of the winter mist.

'Romeo Romeo where for art thou Romeo'...no we did not shout it from Juliet's balcony on our stopover in Verona but we did have a great lunch at a little cafe in a side street and Michael finally drank a decent coffee since being away.

Lily is not rolling around so much anymore as she is trying to crawl and is attempting the commando move and manages to move forward little by little but gets more frustrated than anything. We feel a little bad since she has not really had loads of floor time over the last month since we have been on the move so much but we make up for it by sharing our bed (not so much by choice).

I think Lily is looking forward to home cooking again (or at least the French jar food) since the Italian jars leave much to be desired - it is the first time she hasn't enjoyed her food and that says a lot!

We are now on our way back to the villa and are hoping to go to Paris next week now that the French transport workers have ended their strike. Shame on President Sarkozy wanting to cut back on the endless benefits given to all government workers which is unsustainable for the future economy.

No George sightings in Bellagio

After a few days in the villa Lily was getting bored so we drove four and a half hours north to Lake Como in Italy. No, we didn't go there in search of George, although I was on the lookout (apparently his villa is in the Bellagio area). Warren and Merci recommended Bellagio as they went there last christmas and loved it. Bellagio is much smaller than Como and we think much more beautiful. The town is on a headland that divides the lake in two. Everywhere you look there is the lake and the majestic mountains. It has been pretty cold lately with temps during the day reaching about 8degrees. No blue skies but also no rain and I think the misty weather makes the scenery look much more beautiful (or is that what I am telling myself since it is soo cold!)

View from our room

It is base season now so most of the hotels, restaurants and shops were closed and you can only imagine what the town is like in the summer months. It was nice to stroll through the narrow streets in peace and quiet apart from Lily 'chatting' to us.

We took the 40minute hovercraft to Como and Lily loved the trip since she had loads of people to look at and they couldn't go anywhere! After an afternoon in Como we were glad we stayed at Bellagio instead - Como was just like another town whereas Bellagio had a small village feel to it.

These are a few of my favourite things….

Monty, cow and touchy feely animal book.
Lily now has two front teeth which certainly makes eating the end of the baguettes much easier for her! It’s great, who would have thought a piece of bread could amuse her for so long – we should have thought about it much earlier. Our strategy is to give her bread when our meals arrive and it works a treat most of the time!