london – The Vanninis' Manoeuvres

First couple of days

After getting back to Alex and Ian’s home in Bexleyheath, it wasn’t too long before Callum came home from school after being collected by Nana Chris & Grandad Barry. It was lovely to sit out in the sun and enjoy a good english cup of tea. I don’t know why but the tea always tastes better on this side of the world…..Yorkshire Tea of course, it can’t be anything else.

Sitting in the sun, so pleased to get the compression socks off and back to bare feet

The bag of goodies was opened and gifts given, news caught up on and more tea drunk. We both managed to stay awake until 7:30pm local time before we crashed into bed for a good long sleep. And sleep we did only waking for a couple of hours in the wee small hours before falling back into a deep sleep.

Blowing a kiss goodbye as Callum scooters off to school.

We spend our first full day catching up on life admin, you know, washing, unpacking, sorting out bits and pieces.

The following day, Friday 17th May, we were busy in the morning cooking up a big pot of chilli ready for a family gathering the next day, lots of washing and pottering about in the garden. We are on grandparent duty this afternoon at school as there is a school fundraiser which involved lots of bouncy, inflatable, apparatus.

Lots of excited kids with parents plus generators equals lots of noise!

Some people were well organised with picnics, rugs and chairs. Callum met up with his best friend Noah and they had great fun together.

Callum and Noah with their spoils at the end of the afternoon.

By the time we got home at 6pm, we were both exhausted, after all it’s only 48hrs since we landed and with body clocks not quite adjusted as yet, it is understandable.

And we are off!

It’s the last two days before we leave and the mind is racing, have we got everything? have we forgotten anything? what do we need to get done before we leave?

First things first, repack the bags and weigh them to make sure we are within the 30kgs bag allowance that we are allowed each. Roy and I have 25kgs of luggage between us, that’s pretty damn good for a five and half month trip, however there is a third bag which weighs nearly 15kgs which is full of requested goodies.

A couple of kilos worth of honey, probably a similar amount of chocolate, and then there is the 8 tins of reduced cream to go with the onion soup mix to make the quintessential KiwiDip!

Although we only have around 12.5kg of luggage each, it still does feel like we have far too much but at least we are way under our allowable limit.

Monday 13th May and it’s the day before we fly, the washing is done and up to date, everything else is tidied and checked. We have to go to the van as I’d forgotten a couple of things, the van is in at AD Motors in Takanini getting a tuneup, new spark plugs, air filters and goodness knows what else. Great news, we can pick the van up in the morning and get it across Auckland to Peter & Wendy’s before we fly out tomorrow night. That is such a huge relief that we can get it parked up safely for the duration. Talk about cutting things fine.

The rest of the day is spent doing “life admin” and trying to relax, I don’t know why I get myself all in a tizzy but I do, the mind is racing trying to mentally tick off lists and make sure we have everything we need. We don’t take cabin baggage apart from Roy’s backpack which mainly has his computers, meds and a change of clothes, and I just have my trusty handbag of the backpack variety containing the essentials including ipad, headphones et al which stows comfortably under the seat. I get really annoyed with people who have multiple bags that they want to stow in the overhead lockers…why?

We both have medical notes that not only state the medications we are travelling with but also that Roy has a stent and I have hip and knee replacements that will undoubtably set off the airport security alarms.

Tuesday 14th May is departure day, but first it’s a trip across Auckland to deliver the van to Pete. So long as we are back early afternoon we have plenty of time to get to the airport. We pick up the van from AD Motors in Takanini where they go through everything they have done. We try not to faint at the bill, but they have done a brilliant job, the motor purrs quietly and efficiently and now sips away at fuel rather than guzzle!

Have we said before how eternally grateful we are to have such wonderful friends as Wendy & Peter whom allow us to park our RV up at their place where we know it will be safe and sound. We cannot thank them enough for their friendship and kindness shown to us, we are forever grateful.

With the van delivered and parked up safely we head back across the city to Antony’s where we grab a bite to eat for lunch before having a shower and getting changed. The bags are packed with their final ephemera, locked, cable tied, and ready to go. Ants returns from work, we pack the car and head to the airport where we arrive early but whats this? New layout at the airport to try and confuse us, but it is all well signposted, Antony drops us off, we bade farewell and join the long queue formed at checkin. Many thanks to Antony for putting us up or should that be putting up with us for the last week, it made the run up to us leaving very easy.

Our bags are weighed, and yes we are well under our 60kg limit, the bags are labelled with wheelchair tags and sent on their way along the travelator. Roy gets his wheelchair assistance where we are taken straight away to departures, jump all the queues at security and go through xray where yes, I am taken aside and scanned again, knees, hips and bra I tell them!

All done, we are then taken past all the Duty Free Shops, no thanks, we don’t want alcohol, perfume or tech gear nor designer clothes or handbags. We are then transferred to a motorised golf trolley to take us to our gate, just as well too as it was miles away!

We settled in the seats at the gate lounge, charged up our devices, then I cadged a ride on one of the golf trolleys back to where I could buy a bite to eat and a drink, then a ride back to Roy who was waiting patiently.

It wasn’t too long to wait when they called all those who had wheelchair assistance, we were first on the plane, and quickly settled into our seats.

Looking out the window to an Air NZ plane, farewell Auckland, see you in October.

We have reasonable seats at the back row of the first section, we have no one behind us, just the bulkhead. We end up having the row of three seats to ourselves. And being of the vertically challenged variety, I could comfortably lie down curled up across two seats with my feet against the wall and get a bit of quality sleep. Roy can quite happily nod off sitting up, and yes I did get him to try and lie down but he found it too uncomfortable!

There no if and buts about it, it’s a damn long flight and after nearly 18 hrs we landed in Dubai.

We are met and taken straight through immigration and customs and then directly to our connecting flight. We only have just under two hours from landing to take off so it’s actually quite tight. Off on the last leg to Gatwick and at just over 7 1/2 hrs it’s not long now until we are back in old blighty.

Welcome to Dubai the sign in the sand says according to Google translate.

A quick trip through immigration, again jumping all the queues because Roy is in a wheelchair, collect our bags but what is this? You need a pound coin to get a luggage trolley, fortunately I do have some English coins in my purse but come on Gatwick, how many people arriving from the other side of the world have UK coins on them? Very shortsighted I would have thought.

It’s an emotional welcome from Alex who is waiting for us in arrivals, then a 40min ride home for a welcome cup of tea.

Now let the adventures begin.

Christmas 2023

It was a bit of a grumpy start to Christmas Day, yes those damn errant campers had us (and the Ranger) up until the early hours during the night of Christmas Eve, some people just should not be allowed to drink and then annoy other campers!! Then we were woken early in the morning by more of those same campers. Grrrr. Bernice with just a couple of hours sleep is not a happy chappy.

But the antithesis of this was the rest of our day. We left camp in the morning and headed off to have an “orphan parents” Christmas with Peter & Wendy as they too have a daughter in London. What an amazing day of chat, relaxation and laughter…oh and great food as well, just what we needed to reset.

Platters of nibbles were consumed throughout the morning, then Pete cooked up a huge pile of scallops, followed by prawns to start off the festivities.

This was just a one person portion of prawns! the same size portion was had of scallops!

Then it was onto the main course, a wonderfully glazed Ham had been cooked on the smoker/BBQ,

accompanied by lots of delicious salads, we ventured inside for the main event.

“A glass of bubbly Roy?” Pete is asking, whilst Wendy takes her seat

Dessert was had much later in the day which was a lovely way to end the festivities. Thank you so, so much to Peter & Wendy for having us for the day and for making us feel so much at home, we had a fab day.

The day ended in the early evening when we ventured back to camp ready for our video call to watch Callum open his presents from us. He was one very excited young man, as you can imagine, Christmas as a 4 and a half year old is magical.

And the London family….do you think Callum is excited?

Hope you all had a great day with friends and/or family and enjoyed a stress free time together. All the best for 2024.

Comings and goings

Monday morning and I was on the motorway heading down to Antony’s as the following day he was off on holiday and I had volunteered to take him to the airport. But first a couple of stops to get some gifts to add to Antony’s luggage before I was at his place. Then it was off out shopping with him to get new shoes and some warm clothes for him to pack.

The following morning we were off to the airport ready for him to check in but first he had to find which checkin area he needed to get to.

Finding where he had to go, next it was to join the queue for check in, he was flying with an American Airline which requires you to have a security check before you join the queue for check in and luggage drop off.

He’s in that queue somewhere, and this is over 4 hours before departure!!

It took him nearly an hour and a half to get through that process and he was probably the 10th in the lineup so goodness knows how long those at the end of the very, very, long line had to wait.

We went and had a drink and a bite to eat before he decided he might as well head though to departures. Have a great time in the UK with Alex, Ian and Callum and we will see you when you return early next year.

That’s him, mid photo, heading off on holiday

I was staying down at Antony’s place for another night as I had an appointment in town the next morning. But it was back to Shakespear Wednesday afternoon in time to greet Marilyn & David who were coming to stay on their return from the Far North.

Bernice, David and Roy in his hi vis vest ….dubbed the orange man by some!

We spent the next couple of days sharing meals, playing games and generally relaxing. The day that Marilyn & David arrived just so happened to be their 49th Wedding anniversary, so a bit of a celebration was had.

Marilyn was very good and remembered to take the odd photo or two, on the other hand I was my usual self, forgetting to take too many photos …if any!! we had to evict Marilyn & David for a day to the Self Contained parking area as a school had booked out the camp. We are allowed to remain in camp as we have Police clearance plus we are the camp hosts!! The school were only in for one night so the following day our guests returned.

We went “out for lunch”……to the SCC parking area

Back in camp and we made the most of their last night with us, another shared dinner before they left early the next day.

A couple of days later Wade & Lindsay came to visit for the morning, yeah you know I didn’t take any photos, but it’s always great to just pick up where we left off.

Antony arrived safe and well in London albeit very tired after a loooooong wait in LAX. He was having a great time from what we hear with trips out and about, shows to see, football matches to attend and plenty of other things to see and do. There’s nothing quite like a winter Christmas, we must plan another one!

Squirrels

This was a post created when we were in London that never quite made it, so here it is belatedly.

Squirrels eat nuts and live in trees right?

But there is another side to Squirrels. They are great rock climbers and would give any Olympic champion a run for their money.

Seen on my way back from a walk in the woods. Came to an intersection with a reasonable amount of traffic and saw this sight. It took me a few minutes to comprehend but here was a squirrel climbing a house wall, running along it and up and down as easily and rapidly as it liked. It was using the minor hand holds provided in the pebble dash coating on the wall. Apparently they will crawl into the roof space if they are looking for a warm dry environment, but this one was just having fun as there was no point of entry for it.

There again it is just as much fun eating monkey nuts in a tree watching all those strange humans walking past

The return journey

It was never going to be easy, saying goodbye, even though we know we will see them all again in February it’s still not a pleasant thing to do. After sorting, packing and organising ourselves it was time to leave, heavy sigh. Alex & Callum took us to Abbey Wood Station, where we said our hoorays whilst trying to keep it quick and upbeat, nice try, didn’t work!! Oh dear, I’ve set myself off again just writing this!!

We took the Elizabeth Line to Liverpool Street Station, drying the tears and composing ourselves along the way where we then had to transfer to the rail network to catch the train to Stanstead. Yes, we are flying out of Stanstead this time rather than Heathrow, I have no idea how it worked out this way but it did. Whilst in an elevator getting from one station to the other, we struck up a conversation with a young mum and toddler, we were OK until she asked if we had grandchildren…..poor thing, I think she was just as upset at my blubbering as I was. Again, I composed myself as we boarded the very crowded train to Stanstead, we just so happened to coincide our journey with early evening commuter hour.

At Stanstead, the bottleneck getting out of the station was just ridiculous as there are no electronic gates and with just three staff manually checking each and every ticket the queues were very long, just as well we have plenty of time before our flight.

Yes we are in the queue to check our luggage in not at a nightclub!!

We were through into the airport and next was time to check in our luggage. Having checked in with time to spare we headed off through security where yes, I set off all the alarms, so it was off with the shoes and into the full body scanner where it seems I have two artificial knees, one artificial hip and a bra!! From here it’s through all the duty free shops, and no, we do not stop to shop, but head through to the food outlets where we find somewhere to have dinner.

Indeed we did end up at Weatherspoons as none of the other fast food outlets appealed so Weatherspoons it was. We finished our meal and headed to the gate where we were soon boarding, the first leg is to Dubai, just a 6hr flight.

The flight was uneventful and we were soon landing in Dubai having had very little sleep apart from the odd cat nap. We were off the plane very quickly and loaded onto buses for a 20minute ride to the terminal. This airport is massive, I don’t recall the airport from our trip over but we must have docked at the terminal as we certainly didn’t have to catch any buses. It was off the bus and into the terminal to find our way to our gate but not before setting off alarms again going through immigration and customs, a quick check and yes, I still have two artificial knees, a hip and a bra! We don’t have any time to dilly dally as our next flight is boarding.

Off to walk, ride escalators, elevators and a train ride to our gate and straight to boarding, no time to stop not even for the loo. We were quickly boarded but then had to wait as two passengers hadn’t boarded and they were trying to locate their luggage to offload. After about 20minutes two young women sheepishly walked down the aisle and we were then on our way. Only 18hrs 50minutes to go! The flight seemed to take forever, I watched a movie or two before becoming bored with that, tried to sleep but to no avail, got restless legs, went to the loo a zillion times, exercised my legs and feet, all the while watching the flight path slowly inch forward. We arrived in Kuala Lumpur for a refuel stop where we have to stay on the plane (hurry up Emirates and bring back the A380’s so there’s none of this 90minute stop to refuel). A number of passengers alighted and we were then on our way again.

This leg of the flight seemed to last forever, as we crossed Australia from just north of Broome to Brisbane it seemed never ending, then the final 3hrs across the Tasman were really painfully slow then hooray I can see the Manukau Heads appear ahead out of the clouds.

We touched down at 12:23, taxied to the terminal before disembarking. It was a quick exit through immigration via the electronic kiosks, then off to collect our luggage which promptly came through. I must note here that no other flights were in sight so the airport was particularly quiet. Pick up a bit of Duty Free that we had paid for on our outward flight all those months previously, and yes it was a bargain! From there it was through customs where we had declared food (remember all that liquorice?), a quick tick from them before our bags are X-rayed then it was a pass from the sniffer dogs and by 1pm we were outside waiting for Antony to pick us up. That’s the quickest we have ever exited through an airport. And a big thank you to all the welcoming staff members from customs to immigration, your smiles and “welcome home” were really appreciated. And an even bigger thank you to Antony for picking us up and having us to stay, we really appreciate it.

Antony drove us to his home but not before a quick stop at the supermarket for some essentials; milk for the cuppa and some gingernut biscuits to go with the tea, as well as some Vogels bread to have with Vegemite. We were at Antony’s by 1.45pm where we quickly removed the shoes and compression socks (they become quite uncomfortable after two days of continuous wearing), unload the car of all the luggage, and have a welcome home cuppa. After catching up on news we both headed for the shower, then it was time to run a couple of errands but oops, our car isn’t going anywhere as it has a flat battery. We did get it going after jump starting it off Antony’s car but the following morning it was completely flat again. Oh well, a new battery it is.

I lasted until 5pm before succumbing to sleep, apparently Roy managed another hour or two but that meant we were both awake at 4am the following morning. Never mind, we spend the next couple of days getting ourselves reacclimatised before heading to the Bay of Plenty to be reunited with our home.

Although we miss our UK family desperately, it is nice to be home in Aotearoa.

The final weekend

After an epic dinner at Fallow the previous evening, we were having another dinner celebration but this time at home with Ian’s family as a farewell for us. We decided on a Spanish theme for the evening which was easily sorted with lots of tapas to start with followed by a prawn paella, a chicken potato and chorizo dish along with lots of sides. It was a great evening with everyone enjoying themselves.

To finish off the evening, I had devised a devilish “taskmaster-style” task for everyone which consisted of guess the icecream flavour. I had mixed vanilla icecream with a number of different flavours….the faces of the participants were priceless as they tasted and tried to guess what was in the ice cream. There were proper ice creams for the children and they helped me by being the wait staff for the task.

The flavours were: 1.Roast Pork, Yorkshire pudding & gravy 2. Chili con carne & rice 3. Christmas pudding. 4. Pasta, sauce and Parmesan 5. Strawberry & yoghurt. 6. Marmite & Crisps (aka chips in NZ). And yes, they were still talking to me at the end of the evening!!!

We can’t thank everyone enough for making us feel so comfortable and part of the family and particularly to Ian, Alex and Callum for putting up with this pair for the past 5 and half months. It goes without saying that we miss you all but we look forward to seeing you in February.

Fallow

It’s our last Friday night in the UK before we head home on Monday. I had read about a restaurant in London that sounded very, very interesting. Reviews were all raving about the ethos, innovation and creative food from this restaurant so we made a booking. Actually, Ian made the reservation, but more on that later.

We headed into central London by train and then walked through the bustling West End to find the restaurant. We had a bit of time to spare so we popped into a nearby pub for a drink before dinner.

Fallow describes itself as being Conscious Gastronomy. They try to minimise waste, use and cook dishes using product that would not normally be utilised in interesting ways.

What followed was an evening of wonderful plates of food to share along with excellent service.

We started with Corn ribs, Fallow Charcuterie, Mushroom parfait, Beef carpaccio, picked white crab, smoked beef ribs and some sourdough.

Clockwise from top left: Mushroom parfait, Corn Ribs, Carpaccio, Charcuterie

Of the starters I think my favourite would have had to be the mushroom parfait, the texture was silky smooth with intense flavour.

The smoked cod’s head is one of the signature dishes but we decided against getting it as we saw one being delivered to the next table and it was very large. Instead, we chose to have lots of small plates so we could all taste and share.

Clockwise form top left: Fallow deer, Middle white pork, Hashbrowns with leek purée (complements of the chef), whipped salmon belly. I forgot to take a picture of my own main which was the sirloin steak of dairy cow as well as a couple of sides of spring greens and boulangerie potatoes. Trust me, they were all fantastic.

After all that delicious food, we opted to order just two desserts and share them.

Dessert a chocolate mousse with mushroom and black truffle. It was heavenly and silky smooth. My personal favourite was the Chelsea tart made with whey that has been slowly caramelised over almost three days. Essentially, it’s a grown-up version of condensed milk, served with a milk icecream.

You will see that in the above picture there is a sparkler which was delivered along with our desserts and we were wished happy anniversary. Anniversary? Oh that’s right, says Ian when I booked they asked if it was a special occasion so I ticked the anniversary box!!! Well, it was our 40th earlier in the year and Ian & Alex are coming up to 10 years together, so we will take that as our anniversary celebrations.

After such a lovely dinner over a few hours it was a nice relaxed walk soaking up London City buzz through the West End past all the theatres which were now emptying audiences onto the already busy streets and back to the train station at Tottenham Court Road for the Elizabeth Line train back to Abbey Wood.

If you would like to know what had us all in fits of laughter in the taxi on the way home which resulted in the taxi driver opening all the windows, then ask Ian!

One very special meal shared with Alex & Ian, and each other of course, made for a fabulous way to end our holiday in the UK.

Foxes

The first time we came to London we were surprised to see a fox casually walking down the road, admittedly it was a quiet road. Since then we have seen them intermittently even in Alex and Ian’s back yard.

This time however we have seen many more, probably because we a living within 200 metres of a large wooded area Bostall Woods. Since arriving 6 June we have seen them quite frequently so here are a few pictures taken at the back of our house.

These first few are of a lone fox seen early morning around 12 June

Spots me through window but continues to prowl

This one was spotted on the neighbours back shed and was there for a good two hours just relaxing

The following two pictures and clip are from 27th of July.

They appear to be from the same litter just having fun at the our house

It’s time to play!

Normal transmission will resume shortly

Real time update: As you may have noticed I am about a month behind with blog posts…I am getting there albeit very slowly. I blame not enough hours in the day, doing lots, being easily distracted and then completely forgetting what I was doing previously.

However, things are happening in the real world. When we arrived in the UK back at the beginning of June; the Queen was celebrating her Golden Jubilee, Boris was, well, let’s just say that Boris was being Boris. Now just a few months later we can look back and see that we have had the death of the Queen and subsequent funeral, changes of Prime Minister/Leader of a Party, said party in turmoil with subsequent economic ramifications that affect everyone leading to the death of British Politics and it’s anyones guess as to when that funeral may be. We won’t mention Brexit but there are serious lessons to be learnt.

Meanwhile, we are winding up or is that down? ready to make our way back home before not before cramming in a few more experiences. I’m trying not to think about leaving too much, for many reasons; 1. I hate goodbyes 2. The packing 3. The looong flights ahead 4. the subsequent unpacking 5. the restocking and replenishing the fridge and cupboards, 6 sorting out Drs visits, 7. Organising any R&M required. But on the positive side we can look forward to Alex, Ian and Callum coming to visit in February and in between we will catch up with family and friends and go fishing to restock the freezer. We can also look forward to summer weather, fingers crossed.

Thank you so much to everyone who has made us feel so welcome and making this trip very memorable. We are already looking forward to the next visit!