Oxford

We have been over to Oxford to see Mark and Shona and their kids over the weekend. They are off to the south of france - near Perpignan for the last week before school goes back. Big M and little M went to a beautiful village to wander about while Tegan went trail riding (some pony club event). Little M had a short ride on Tegans pony. I took J and Callum out on a hire boat on the Thames while that went on. Boys had a great time - up through the lock, stopped to gorge on blackberries overhanging the river (they are all perfectly ripe just now). Joined the girls for lunch which was a bit interesting - my phone ran out of power so we had no idea which of the several pubs we had discussed they were going to be at, plus there are several pubs in some of the quite small villages they could have been in so did a tour of pub car parks until we saw Shona's car.
Saturday morning we found spot which hired pedal boats and all went out for an hour after lunch before heading back to Abingdon.
We took the guitars over and Mark and I had a great time jamming. Mark is a fair bit better than I am, but we tortured our wives with a short performance (which M videoed and posted on youtube so our shame lives on). Kids got in on the act for a while too but we only had 3 guitars - once we tried to include recorder and clarinet it all got too hard and we had to chuck them out to play!
On the way home we visited Woburn Safari Park. This is the Duke of Bedfords estate, mistake to go on bank holiday weekend though. The roads were all really clear of traffic, so we paid to be in a traffic jam...

Manchester

Big M went to Manchester to work with one of her co authors and friends so we all went along for the trip. Nick and Denise have a cute house in Didsbury which as about 20 minutes by bus from the city centre. Took the kids in to the see the Museum of Manchester and the Science Museum (lots of steam engines from t'mills). Highlights for them were the local park and playground and riding at the front upstairs on a double decker bus. The canals running through the city are interesting - we even saw a narrow boat passing through the locks under a highway.

The science museum was in Castlefields which, not surprisingly, turns out to be the site a Roman fort and small town (forget the name - probably mancunetium). There is a reconstruction of one of the gates on the foundations of the orginal.

On the way home we drove over the Derbyshire peaks in driving rain (of course) and visited Bolsover Castle. This is a ruined Tudor mansion. The fountain was reputedly the lewdest in England.

The frescoes on ceilings and walls were supposedly by Reubens (according to M).

Since we were in the area we stopped in Sherwood Forest. This big oak is over a thousand years old.

London

We took the children down to London to stay with Zoe and visit the Tower, Natural History and Science Museums last week. Hadnt made it to the tower before so we had to make sure we got there before we leave. Managed an overnight trip with just 2 small day packs between the 4 of us which is a major step forward!

M volounteered to work the big catapult in the display of medieval weaponry at the tower. Kids very impressed with mums prowess at knocking down castle walls.
On the second day we went to the Natural History and Science Museums. There was a butterfly house on the lawns of the museums which was a big hit.

After a hard day of sightseeing catch the train from platform 9 3/4 back to Hogwarts.

Sporting Endeavours

Its been a sporty kind of few weeks. The kids had sports day on Friday. J excelled himself by throwing second in both the javelin and the shot put. He was great! Little M won the 500m and second in the 100m and we think she won the hurdles also - here she is in hurdling action. R has been playing cricket for Jesus (college that is, but he loves to tell everyone), and for those who havent caught up with him recently, here is the slimline version. We are very busy, selling things (the car is next as soon as its had its MOT), throwing things out at a great rate of knots, I am selling on ebay now too - the kids beds! Trying to get our finances sorted and of course the full horror of having the Canberra house fail to even attract any bidders at auction. We are trying to ignore that one - perhaps should have taken the ANU job after all. We leave in 8 weeks, before then we intend to have at last trip to Rome, all booked and we figure by then it will be all over bar the shouting!! Kids finish school on Tuesday and are now enrolled in school in Tasmania. So progress is happening. Any last minute requests for things to be brought over from Europe should be lodged now - as they will need to be coming on the boat, as we are limited to 20k each on the plane, not that much when you think thats all we will have for at least 3 months (not like some people we know whose companies airfreight their goods, no such luxury for academics!)

Update!

What a month, its been incredibly hectic. So big M has been to Dublin, Waterloo (in Canada) and Atlanta since last post, all conferences and work visits. Waterloo was interesting in that this is a home of a Mennonite community, so we got to go to the local market and see their wares, bought some pure maple syrup which is totally delicious - we had pancakes for lunch today! There were some quilting exhibitions, the quilts were incredible, all totally hand quilted, and a couple of women sitting at a big frame showing how it is done. Amazingly skilful. So anyone who is interested in this should google for Waterloo and quilting. The place we went was St Jacobs market. Other than that a quite uneventful trip - other than plane being cancelled in Toronto due to the mother of all thunderstorms. Unfortunately my suitcase was on the tarmac when it hit - so everything in my case was soaked and had to be sent to the laundry when I got to Atlanta. Luckily M has done this enough to know that the FIRST thing you do with a cancelled flight is get a hotel room in the airport hotel THEN you get on the phone to the airline where you can sit on hold for 2 hours to get rebooked - that way you dont end up in a line for 4 hours and sleeping in the airport as many poor souls did!!! Only got 3 hours sleep but better than nothing.
SO of course once M got back we were all getting ready for J to have his tonsils out. But of course in the week before he decided to dislocate his wrist (off to emergency) and later that night develop raging toothache resulting in a tooth extraction the next morning. His parents didnt even wait for the dentist to open just turned up there with crying child so they couldnt fob us off with an appointment at some time later in day/week. UK has made us hard with dealing with medical personnel!! Then on Saturday off to hospital for the tonsils. Didnt like the anaesthetic, said he thought his head was going to explode. But the hospital experience was faultless - they were unbelievably good with the kids. One nurse does a long shift so the kids have the same person all day, then a night nurse comes in after they are pretty much asleep and the same day nurse back the next day. It was really very good - strict protocol of dealing with the kids in age order, something they all relate to - the bigger kids quite proud of waiting for the littler kids to be done first. They had about 6 overnight patients (clearly this was a little private hospital) and it was very good. Then J came home and has been recovering slowly - he became annoying yesterday afternoon so we know things are improving. Still lots of painkillers in order though.
R has been playing cricket the last couple of days (!!) He decided he quite enjoyed it, was very stiff after saturday effort, so waiting to see how he holds up today - he has been gone about 6 hours today, so he may be joining J in lying around groaning tomorrow I guess.
10 weeks until we leave roughly. Looks like we will head for HK about 16 September, M has a conference there, kids will do Disneyland and experience a little bit of Asia after spending years just rushing through it, and then aim to be in HObart probably 21 September. New school term starts in tas on 22 September, but that might be just too cruel!! No pictures I am afraid until R uploads from his camera. And as you can gather with all that sickness we havent been doing too much of interest!

York and Casualty

We spent the second weekend of the half term in York catching up with some friends from our 2003 trip to Cambridge. They live in Minnesota so we dont get to see them unless they happen to be in the UK! Owen was J's best friend when we were staying at Clare Hall so J was keen to catch up. M couldnt come with us as she was still in Groningen/Paris.

Little M had a great time with Janet (they have 2 boys so I think a little girl to talk to is nice from time to time).










The squirrel stole a banana from someones picnic and dragged it up a tree - at the same time another squirrel fell out of the next tree - perhaps the fruit was fermenting.
Little M has managed to fracture her left arm again! Luckily (?) she did it before M headed off to Toronto so a bit easier to deal with the trip to casualty. J leapt off the swing they were on and she thought that looked fun, but was too scared to jump feet first so dove head first.

Camping at Southwold

We headed down to the coast at Southwold for a few days at the beach over the half term with some of the kids friends from school and their families. The weather was bit rough but went anyway to see how bad it was.

Turned out to be pretty bad! Wind was howling in at 20+ knots and waves thundering onto the beach. The camp ground, which like many english campgrounds is a big open space was rather lacking in shelter and consisted of a series of islands in one vast puddle.

Kids had fun playing on the beach and going to the sweet shop in town. We wandered down to the pier and they ferreted aroung the arcade on the pier - a whole bunch of 'alternative' arcade games made by some local artisan. A lot of fun, then off to play on the cannons and have dinner of cod and chips at the Harbourside pub. Just about the best cod I have had in the UK.
Apart from the beach and beatiful old houses Southwold has an Adnams brewery. Looked at the real estate agents (what else do you do on a wet day) - one of those funny little beach huts along the sea front costs 70k+, 2 bed apartment 400k.
J is pretty wrecked today, M chafing at the bit and annoyed that her brother is so flaky. Big M still in Netherlands, must be heading to Paris soon.

Cluedo

J's class performed a play written by their teaching assistant this week - we have heard about nothing else for weeks. J has been singing the songs non stop. It is a bit quieter now it is over and he isnt practicing. J was one of the policemen and had 2 lines to say. Needless to say we have hundreds of photos and video clips of the event.
Little M is off to Kentwell after the half term break - this is a tudor mansion which hosts and annual reenactment of its heyday. Everyone on the property during the reenactment is dressing eating and talking Tudor, so the school kids have to do their best to dress up. This is another one of those letters you get which tell you to build a scale replica of the space shuttle by tomorrow morning or your child will be scarred for life! Big M and Little M have been busy making a costume.

Big M is off travelling tomorrow - Groningen and Paris then back next weekend. She is back for a week then off to Dublin, Toronto and Atlanta. We are heading to the beach, weather permitting, for the first few days of the half term break then off to York to catch up with some friends from Minnesota who are visiting.
Nice Grandma made a special bear for J to take to hospital which they both think is wonderful.

The Meadows

Despite being absolutely shattered yesterday the kids were up for swim in the Cam today. Big M went off to the Gym in the morning which takes her half and hour each way to ride. One of J's friends came over and they played in the garden and worked on their book before heading to the river with big M. I went for a ride (about 12 miles) and met up with them at the river.


They had a fantastic time leaping into the river and trying to splash the people passing on punts. The water is freezing so eventually they turn blue and have to stand in the sun to warm up for a while. One the boys from little m's class came past with his parents - they werent letting him in the river but had to cave in once he saw one of the girls from his class swimming!

Southwold

The weather remains fine and sunny...for a whole week. We will no doubt shortly be declaring water rationing and drought. Everything is suddenly GREEN. all the trees now have leaves and the grass is growing - seems like several inches a day. Since it was such a beautiful day on Saturday we drove 2 hours to the beach at Southwold on the Norfolk coast, about 10miles south of Yarmouth.


Kids had a blast - 6 hours swimming and playing on the beach then fish and chips on the pier before all melting down and being unable to agree on whether to drive 2hrs home or find somewhere to stay the night at the coast.

This is the bit of beach we lobbed up at to start with - turned out there was more sand the other side of the pier, but when you havent been to the beach for 9 months (and you are 8 or 10 years old) you pretty much just have to make the straightest line from the car to the sand with no mucking about to find the best bit!

The water was absolutely freezing, and as you can see the beach has a few too many rocks for comfort. When little M turned blue we walked along past the pier for a mile or so until they found a place to bury J.

Of course when they saw the Morgan in the photo they had to have a picture 'for Grandpa'.

There is a possibility we will be going to Southwold for a few days at half term with some of the kids school friends. Big M is off travelling again at the end of the week and we have some friends coming to York who we hope to catch up with later in the month.

Reach Fair

Mayday bank holiday weekend was a scorcher...temperatures in the low twenties and sunshine! Had to dig up the sunscreen to protect our delicate white skins from third degree burns. We cycled over to Midsummer common for a look at the fair on Saturday...the highlight was watching a man opening the lock gates on thre river.
On Monday we drove out to the village of Reach for their fair. This is supposedly the oldest fair in England - started in 1201.

They had local kids dancing round a maypole - this is quite a complicated thing and they make complicated patterns with the ribbons - bit like a game of cats cradle. Perhaps the most amazing thing was that the 10-15yr olds didnt make a single mistake in their 20min routine.

The morris dancing was a bit of a mystery to J until they started hitting each other with sticks, then he was interested!

The traction engine was fascinating - especially wathcing them get it off the low loader - which was not much newer than the traction engine. Kids insisted on a picture for Grandpa.

Just in case you were worried, there were of course lots of rides, bouncy castles, ice cream vans etc. J and little M were pretty shattered after a couple of hours, as were we.

See if can spot little M's haircut in the following picture...she had about 6 inches off and is hoping to donate her hair to a charity that makes wigs for kids on chemotherapy.

just hanging out in Cambridge...

We have been hanging around Cambridge since Carcassonne - some trips to local attractions but nothing too strenuous. J has still not been all that well. Weather is warming up and we have had some lovely sunny days - mornings mostly and rain in the afternoon. Big M and I have started playing Tennis on the way to work. There is a free tennis court next to the bike path. J and little m have also had a bit of hit with us after school.
The long awaited panda jumper has arrived special delivery from Tasmania - it is a big hit and little m has hardly been out of it since! The little flashy badge things and chocolates also went down well, although the badges were a bit of an intelligence test for dad to get them working.

J has been growing his hair and still likes to engage in a bit of body art. Hope he doesnt to decide to cover himself in tattoos later.

There is an old cat over the road with 1 eye and 3 legs that likes to stop and chat, which the kids think is fantastic. They miss 'their' cat from the Eltisley Avenue place, although we do still see her around from time to time. This old ginger cat looks just like Old Tom, a character from a cartoon at home and the kids also have some Old Tom books so they are very pleased to finally meet Old Tom.

Last weekend we all went to the guitar shop. J and I bought the electric guitar to share until we get home to Tas when he will buy a new one...unless he wont let me have the guitar back in which case I might have to get a new one. For those with an interest is a Les Paul style ESP LTD EC-50 with a 15W Roland practice amp. The neighbours are all very happy because we can plug in headphones and they cant hear us practicing (well they cant hear me practicing anyway). Little M fell in love with the 3/4 size steel string acoustic and we had to get that too.


Summer holidays are largely unplanned as yet but we might take the tents to Wales again if weather permits. M is home for the next few weeks but then starts another round of travelling in Europe and US.

Carcassonne

We finally got to go to Carcassonne...it has been on our list of things we wanted to do for a while, but always a bit expensive. It is a world heritage listed site, originally roman, then visigothic, then moorish, then Frankish. Seat of the Cathar heresy and captured during the crusade against the Cathars in 1209. French kings maintained it as a fortified town against spain, but it pretty much got ignored when the border moved to the pyrenees. Extensively restored in the 19th century. Fortunately it wasnt really important after the invention of cannon or there probably wouldnt be so much of it left.

Just the sort of thing we enjoy. Kids dont mind the odd medieval walled town either! J was only just able to get on the plane after a friday visit to the doctor to get antibiotics, but that may have been a mistake as he was sick the whole time we were there. M developed a high temperature just in time to get on the plane back to Cambridge and little M is down with it today! So far I have escaped.

They were desperate to go on the merry go round, we finally relented at the end. There seems to be one of these in every french tourist town.


Little M was very excited when we saw this little fellow on our last adventure...some sort of water rat, about the size of a chihuahua.

If all get over there diseases we might go to legoland sunday/monday.

Snow...at last!

Finally had the winter snow! Didnt look like we were going to get any, but a good solid couple of days of cold snowy weather and it finally started to settle. Kids had a great time.
Thankfully it all cleared up before we headed off to France for the end of term break.