Saturday, December 24, 2011

Merry Christmas!

Wishing all our friends and family back home (and the friends we've made on this trip) a magical, food-filled, happy, safe and festive Christmas. We are so lucky to have such wonderful people in our lives.

This year we will be spending Christmas in Edinburgh, hoping for a Christmas miracle to make it snow tonight so we can wake to a White Christmas in the morning. We were wandering around the Christmas markets yesterday when Jon suddenly spotted some reindeer loose in the street! No not really, but there really were reindeer! They were so beautiful! Here they are....

photo.JPG

photo.JPG

photo.JPG

photo.JPG

Love us xx

Friday, December 23, 2011

Aussie Goodness

I love love love trying new food around the world, but there are some days when you just crave something familiar (for example I would seriously kill for a Wyton's coffee... hell I'd settle for a decent coffee from anywhere right now) and this is where the Aussie Shop in Covent Garden comes in. When you look at the pictures below please imagine you haven't seen these items for months....

photo.JPG

photo.JPG
Miss my 'choccy biccy at nans house'

photo.JPG

photo.JPG

photo.JPG

The loot = £6/$10!!

I thought we were quite modest with our purchases and I managed to wait a WHOLE MONTH before I ate that cherry ripe (don't ask how long the twisties lasted)

Dublin

Jon asked me yesterday if I had written a post about Dublin yet. I checked and found I hadn't, I'd only written about our visit to the Guinness brewery. So I flicked through our photos, to find a few to accompany the post (or let's be honest, to make up the post as there are usually more pics than words!) and realised that it would be hard to convince anyone that we did anything other than drink and eat in Dublin. Rest assured, we did manage alot of walking and sightseeing during our 8 days here, but the following photos will not support this claim. There is no doubt though, the best thing to do in Dublin is frequent the plentiful pubs and enjoy the live music (along with a wee pint or two of course!)

photo.JPG

photo.JPG

photo.JPG

photo.JPG
The best place for afternoon tea!

photo.JPG

Wednesday, December 21, 2011

Workaway -Borris House

For our first workaways we spent eleven days at Borris House in the little town of Borris (I think the population was about 500) It was a stunning property, stretching 650 acres and it was lovely to escape the bustle of the city for a while. We helped prepare for and run two Christmas events (I had the privilege of dressing as an elf for FOUR days! ) helped to round up sheep and lots of other little jobs around the farm.

For more info on Workaway, click here

photo.JPG
The main house

photo.JPG
Church on Borris House grounds, services are still held here on Sundays

photo.JPG

photo.JPG
Santa's train, or as they would say here 'Santi's train'

photo.JPG
Wandering through the beautiful grounds

photo.JPG
Roast Pork Rolls at the Christmas fair

photo.JPG
The front entrance

photo.JPG
Our little cottage (jono mocking my 'pin leg' pose I tend to do in many photos. I don't know why)

photo.JPG
I think I found my calling!

Saturday, December 3, 2011

The Giants Causeway...

After a few days in Belfast we headed up North to the Giants Causeway, which is a popular natural phenomenon created millions of years ago by volcanic activity. The day we visited wasn't the clearest (or the warmest!) so it was a bit hard to capture the beauty of the place on camera, but it was awesome all the same.

An alternative to the volcano "theory" ...

"Finn McCool (Fionn mac Cumhail) an Irish Giant lived on an Antrim headland and one day when going about his daily business a Scottish Giant named Fingal began to shout insults and hurl abuse from across the channel. In anger Finn lifted a clod of earth and threw it at the giant as a challenge, the earth landed in the sea.

Fingal retaliated with a rock thrown back at Finn and shouted that Finn was lucky that he wasn't a strong swimmer or he would have made sure he could never fight again.

Finn was enraged and began lifting huge clumps of earth from the shore, throwing them so as to make a pathway for the Scottish giant to come and face him. However by the time he finished making the crossing he had not slept for a week and so instead devised a cunning plan to fool the Scot.

Finn diguised himself as a baby in a cot and when his adversary came to face him Finn's wife told the Giant that Finn was away but showed him his son sleeping in the cradle. The Scottish giant became apprehensive, for if the son was so huge, what size would the father be?

In his haste to escape Fingal sped back along the causeway Finn had built, tearing it up as he went. He is said to have fled to a cave on Staffa which is to this day named 'Fingal's Cave'."

(story sourced from http://thenorthernirelandguide.co.uk/giants-causeway-and-legend-finn-mccool)

photo.JPG

photo.JPG

photo.JPG

photo.JPG

photo.JPG

Wednesday, November 30, 2011

Workaway

So we will be completing our first 'Workaway' experience from December 1st - 11th at Borris House in Ireland. Workaway is a volunteer exchange program where host families provide food and accomodation in exchange for volunteers completing 5-6hrs of work per day. The experiences are varied from helping on a farm or working at a bed and breakfast. We are really looking forward to this and many more Workaway experiences.

For more info, click here

Not sure if we will have internet access while we are there so be prepared for lots of photos after Dec 12th!

Sunday, November 27, 2011

It's a nice day for a Guinness...

Jon had been looking forward to visiting the Guinness Storehouse, also known as the "Disneyland for beer lovers", in Dublin, and whilst I was more interested in looking for a cosy cafe for afternoon tea, I must admit it was much, much better than I had been expecting. We spent a good few hours there (and ate a deeeelish Beef & Guinness stew - feed me and I'm happy), poured our own pint of Guinness (which I completely destroyed due to trying to draw a shamrock in the foam whilst pouring! Oh this stubborn Dickinson streak will never cease to make me look like a fool) and learnt plenty about the process of making and history of Guinness.

Ok so enough chatter, here are the pics...

photo.JPG

photo.JPG
Having a wee taster

photo.JPG

photo.JPG

photo.JPG

photo.JPG
In his element

photo.JPG
Ok so mine wasn't perfect, but I still got a certificate!

Wednesday, November 23, 2011

Inspiring Travels Part 2

I stumbled across Alistair Humphreys' website last week and have since read his first ebook and have started the second. Both are free to download from his website. His first two books are about his 4 year journey cycling around the world (Dad you would enjoy his first particularly, this is about his ride through Africa). I found the first fascinating as he describes the experience exactly how I would expect it would be - at times so excrutiating and impossible and within a few sentences the realisation that he is having this incredible, once-in-a-lifetime experience.

He seems to be addicted to adventure, unusual travels and testing his limits.

Direct from his website ---

"Alastair’s quest for adventure began young. Aged 8, he completed the 26 mile Yorkshire 3 Peaks challenge and the National 3 Peaks in 24 hours aged 13. At 14 he cycled off-road across England. After leaving school Alastair taught for a year in South Africa.

Whilst at university (Edinburgh and Oxford) Alastair cycled from Pakistan to China, Land’s End to John O’Groats, Turkey to Italy, Mexico to Panama and across South America. He ran a charity project in the Philippines and the London marathon dressed as a rhino.

Since graduating Alastair has cycled round the world for 4 years, raced a yacht across the Atlantic Ocean, canoed 500 miles down the Yukon River and walked the length of the holy Kaveri river in India."

Very inspiring. You can find him here - http://www.alastairhumphreys.com/

Monday, November 21, 2011

To market, to market...

On a Saturday morning in London we ventured to Borough Market. Food, glorious food! How I wish we had such a fabulous market back home, as I could get used to shopping this way! I love taking photos at markets, but I was a bit hesitant at first as when I photographed some fresh pasta at a market in Berlin, the stall holder was not impressed. But it seemed most people were capturing the buzz of the market on their cameras, so I snapped away...

photo.JPG

photo.JPG

photo.JPG

photo.JPG

photo.JPG
Garlic prawn wrap - yum!

photo.JPG

photo.JPG


...Oh and just for fun, here's that pasta shot (despite the grumpy lady, the pasta was deeelish!)

photo.JPG

The atmosphere was fantastic, and even though itwas crazy busy, it was a great way to spend a few hours.

Saturday, November 5, 2011

Kutna Hora Bone Church

The Kunta Hora Bone Church was a short train ride from Prague, so we decided one morning to go and have a look. We had seen the Church on The Amazing Race Australia and had spoken to a few people who said it was a worthwhile trip.

The Bone Church was constructed in 1870 by FrantiĊĦek Rint. It was a bit eerie, but mostly quite amazing that the church contained the bones of approximately 40,000 people.

photo.JPG

photo.JPG

photo.JPG

photo.JPG

photo.JPG
Me 'pretending' to be scared...

Creeeepy but fun...

Wednesday, November 2, 2011

Lantern procession..

The night we arrived in Olomouc, there was a lantern procession on the eve of their Independance Day. We decided to tag along and there was a fantastic fireworks display at the end...

photo.JPG
Waiting for the procession to begin

photo.JPG

photo.JPG

photo.JPG

photo.JPG

photo.JPG

photo.JPG

It was fantastic because the whole ceremony was in Czech, so we had no idea what anyone was saying but all of a sudden everyone starting walking backwards and suddenly fireworks were set of about 30 meters in front of us. It was beautiful!