Girls Night Out - 21st April 2007

It had been decided it was time for a Girl's night out!! A friend from work Mel, who is also from Melbourne organised for us all to go out for dinner and then off for drinks to a cool bar in London!!

The night began in Soho at a place called 'The Boardwalk', where we all enjoyed a great (cheap too...) dinner and of course a bottle of Champers! There was 5 of us and 4 were from Australia... I swear we are taking over the world! Anyway we finished dinner and we all wanted to check out the latest 'Prince William or was it Harry' (I just can't keep up) club called 'Mahiki' in Mayfair.

We jumped on the Tube as it was going to be easier we thought as the streets were jam packed with people at 11pm (London is definitely a city that doesn't sleep!) We missed our station so ended up jumping in a cab and finally arrived to find out the line was around the corner - oh my god!! Were we that keen.... well we did some fancy manoeuvring and ended up in the members line... which was only a wait of 1 hour... Yes I am not lying, but much better than 2 or 3 that all the others had to wait!

We finally got into this bar and thankfully found a table and enjoyed our first Mahiki cocktail... first of many!! We sat there and continued going through the menu and were impressed with the quality of the cocktails and the service was fantastic - no going to the bar... the waitress was all ours:-) We really enjoyed ourselves and met 2 american girls who recently moved across too... then met a Danish and Swedish girl - so it was a girls night out all round! The bar is a tikki lounge: those Polynesian-inspired rattan beach cabins that were all the rage in 1950s California and the music was 90's wedding songs... which was perfect for the girls!!

The night ended up around 3.30am (yes the lights came on....) and we all headed home to annoy our better halves.... surprisingly sober (I was!!!) It was a great night and we are now busy planning our next one!

Prague - 5th April 2007

What a wonderful place:-) Absolutely stunning, all the buildings were gorgeous and all the streets were cobblestones.. (yes.. best take shoes without 4 inch heels).

We had a gorgeous time in Prague over Easter, we flew out on Thursday night and arrived back on Monday night - so had a relaxing 4 nights in this wonderful city. All we did was walk around and around... everywhere you walked you would end up in a beautiful street full of wonderful shops or buildings or clocks... never seen a place with so many clocks... you definitely do not need a watch and no excuse for ever being late!!

The meals we enjoyed in Prague were of amazing quality and we had some very beautiful dinners and of course wines... Australian nonetheless - it was nice to get hold of a great red!! (these french and italian wines... I might be biased, but definitely not near the Oz quality... okay I can be proven wrong!!)

Everywhere you looked in Prague there was either a view (of a beautiful husband...) or bridges, waters, churches, buildings and so on... We were blessed with the most amazing weather each day, on the last day it even got to 20 degrees, as you can see in the picture they are all full of sunshine and the sunnies even got to come out and play:-)

The things you would see while strolling around.... this picture below of was a tiny alley way down to a restaurant - it had a green man to tell you when to go... The next picture was a sculpture in a square - odd.... and the third was the most bizarra thing I have ever seen, if you receive a parking fine and then did not return to your car within a short timeframe the police would take care of your car for you... within 5 minutes they would arrive and then disappear with your car... (no it wasn't ours!)

It was time to go home after our 4 days in paradise (well at times the tourists didn't help the peace...) they were everywhere!! But then I guess we were one too... so can't complain too much! We had a wonderful time met lots of amazing people, we were out one night clubbing and ran into yet again more Aussies, but amazingly enough one of them was from Rochester - where I went to school and knew my brother - what a small world? We had a blast and if the chance arises we will definitely visit Prague again!

The Gym Begins - 27th March 2007

It has been a slow start, but we are trying to get there and visit the gym. Fortunately we have a gorgeous gym living in our building (although you do need to walk through the bar (below) ... to get there) hence why we try to go at 6am as it is less enticing to stop for a drink!

We have had our induction and have a program so have been able to hit it all on our own. There is lots of equipment and a great pool along with heaps of classes (if you like that thing...) but we are yet to venture in there ... yes especially with my co-ordination!!




We have decided to go in the mornings as we feel much better and more inclined to go, otherwise you get home at night and it's usually late and by the time you cook dinner you end up giving it a miss - so we need to be strong and get up at 6am... luckily the weather is improving. We are having 19 - 25 degree days - just gorgeous:-)

Cambridge - 24th March 2007

The time has come... I must update you all on what we have been up to!!

I will start with our weekend in Cambridge, England. We were looking to go somewhere close by just for Friday and Saturday night so we headed to Cambridge by train... and this was an experience. Have you caught the rail system in London? We got to the train station with plenty of time, started looking around for the screens to tell us what platform the train would be leaving from, but to our great surprise the screen told us we must all line up under the letter E... which was before all the platforms.... then the train arrives and they make an announcement which platform your train departs from and everyone starts running (and I mean running) to the train to line up at the doors for at least 10 minutes before they open, so we are all crammed in like sheep waiting to get on this train... and reason is because they all want a seat!! It was a bizarre experience to watch and to think that is the best system they can come up with for 1000's of people trying to board train everynight.

Anyway off we head to Cambridge, get there shortly after an hour, jumped in a cab and found out the hotel was about 8mile from Cambridge (1st lesson - check hotel location to town...), so that was disappointing as had to travel to town the next day, which we went in by bus and walked around all day, looking at all the gorgeous little streets and stunning buildings, namely the universities - just the architecture was amazing. It was freezing and wet, so we did spend a couple of hours in some great cafes drinking coffee, wine and reading the paper - while of course people watching! Massive tourist town, we were also lucky enough as it was graduation day so we saw all the students marching around town in the caps and gowns! It eventually came to dinner time so we found a nice romantic place for dinner that night (and another bottle of Moet.... it is so cheap - we are in our element here)!!

Then on Sunday we did the same just walked around and of course where there are shops.... you do some shopping - Karen Millen had a sale, so picked up a great top, dress and skirt:-) The shopping is just amazing in London!!! Although must stop soon....before we are broke!!!

Sunday afternoon we headed back to London by train during the day so it was great to see all the scenery as we went through.... one tick down lots more to go:-)

PS. Unfortunately we forgot our camera for the weekend and were unable to take any pics....

The Next Challenge...

A whole new chapter of our lives is beginning!! And as exciting as it is, it is also very scary... we are leaving all our friends and family to embark on this new journey together, but it also creates many new opportunities amongst career and travel and meeting many more special people and developing new friendships!

We have now been here nearly 2 weeks, and has it flown. We landed on 24th February and moved straight into our new apartment - which came fully furnished and all we needed to do was unpack our suitcases and go grocery shopping! We decided we were not allowed to convert back to AUD$ as this became too distressing, therefore we only go by the £ and this way it all seems to be affordable!!!

We started at work on the Monday and everyone has been wonderful and friendly and very welcoming. We all went partying on Friday night, so saw everyone with their hair down and were able to show everyone we were human too:-)

Weather has been gorgeous (for London terms), around 11 degrees each day with the sun shining - who said it was cold and dark in London...

Overall all our experiences here to date have been pleasant and nothing has been difficult at all... best of all we have already planned our first trip to Paris next weekend - can you believe that you can have a weekend in Paris for less than £500 .... we leave Friday night by the Eurostar (train) and arrive home on Sunday evening... looking forward to seeing the 'City of Romance'... It was really funny I had a friend call up and said we must catch up.. she lives in London, so we both went through our availability and the easiest way was to catch up in Paris:-)

Well that is enough from me at the moment and will definitely let you all know about next weekend:-)

PS - Update.... Next weekend never arrived in Paris... disappointing as it was we got to the Train Station that night and all trains were cancelled due to a fire on the railway... so we had to head home with our heads low... but got home had a great idea that we should go partying, so called up some friends and headed to a new funky bar in Knightsbridge called 'The Townhouse' and then off to 'ChinaWhite' a great Club in London.... luckily the person we were chatting to was the owner of Townhouse and straight on the doorlist:-) and had an awesome night....

http://www.lab-townhouse.com/townhouse/
http://www.chinawhite.com

While I am here I might as well provide an update on another special night we had with an English friend of ours Bill (who we met in Thailand on our honeymoon). We caught up for dinner in London at this really amazing restaurant called 'Sketch' - the food was fab and so were the drinks.. and of course the company. But the most bizarre thing about this place was we went into the little bar prior to dinner to enjoy a cocktail and it was a small room with the bar as the centre circle and then guests would all sit around the outside of the room, whilst we were drinking and chatting away we all noticed the music they were playing was quite odd... it was an American chatting about Apartments he had just bought and so on... then we realised as we looked up there was an American sitting on the other side of the room and it was his conversation we were listening to via the speakers... therefore they were probably listening to our... lucky we were keeping it clean:-) We were then up for dinner and also had to venture to the bathrooms... this was another bizarre experience... you went upstairs and there were these cocoons everywhere and they were actually the cubicles for the toilets, you would have to open the door and enter one and then lock yourself in - very weird feeling... check the website out.... All in all a fab time and we are looking forward to going again!

http://www.sketch.uk.com

Our Special Day!!!

1 October 2006 was a gorgeous day and one very special to both of us... and always will be!! The day was perfect and everything was just as we had planned - we married in front of all our friends who have supported us over the past few years (and longer as individuals) and we confirmed our love for one another!!!

I just wanted to share some of our wedding album photos... and the memories that they hold for us both...:-)

Sal's 29th Birthday at Boutique

We knew it was going to be one of our last celebrations and other than Polly where would we go.... Boutique... where we both first kissed and fell in love:-)

A great night was had by all:-)