Chillin' in a Villa

May is a wonderful month in England. Not only does the weather (hopefully) start to improve, we also get two - count 'em, two! - bank holidays! We had spent the first one in Paris with Bron and Andy, so we thought we'd do something a bit different for the second one and, well, go on a trip!

Unlike most of our last-minute jaunts, however, this one was planned waaaaay in advance. Back in October while we were visiting Melbourne, our friends Steve and Carolyn had mentioned they were planning a trip back to their homeland, England, to visit family and friends. Oh and they were thinking of renting a villa in Spain for a week, and would we be at all interested in joining them? Um, let's just think about that... ;)

We decided to join them for 4 days rather than the full week, although in hindsight this was a mistake as we had such a lovely, relaxing time we didn't want it to end. A villa holiday with a group of friends / family is the perfect way to chill out, especially in such a gorgeous setting:















Much of the time was spent eating, drinking and chatting on the terrace or by the pool, although we did make one day trip to the Alhambra near Granada. The 3-car road trip over the narrow, mountainous roads was fun, if a little too exhilarating for some, necessitating a short coffee break in a tiny Spanish town, where we seized the opportunity for a group shot:


The Alhambra is a Moorish palace constructed in the 14th century. It is a stunning place, set up high in hilly countryside and full of beautifully intricate Islamic architecture, surrounded by gardens that are perfect for strolling around in. We all enjoyed it very much.





































As you may have noticed, there was a certain small difference between this and our other holidays - the patter of tiny feet, as it were. Carolyn and Steve have an almost-two-year-old named Ella, and their friends Bob and Khin have two kids, Raoul and Sienna. So how did we cope with this toddler invasion, you might wonder? Did it cramp our child-free, city-dwelling, liberty-loving style? Well, this might answer your question:

Yes, we were both entirely smitten by little Ella Bella, and who could blame us - she is one very cool chick!

Watch Your Language

Right. There's a rumour going around that we're starting to sound a bit English these days - and perhaps even getting some London accents. Well, that is bang out of order, it's a load of cobblers and totally pants. Now we may have picked up a few expressions which just save time - like to get 'em in (to buy a round of drinks) or to describe something as mingin' (nasty/smelly/generally distasteful) - but that's only because we're well wicked and we like making sure everything is sorted. Innit.

O'course you can't just say'em like you're back Down Under, that'd be naff. It's very important (unless you wanna sound like a total nutter) to swallow your T's - so sorted becomes saw'ed, and total nutter actually comes out sounding like toe'ul nuh'uh. Lovely jubbly!

If you get too knackered wiv all your practicing, and can't be bovvered going to work, just take a duvet day, and go to work the next day well fit. Then when your workmate says "Alright?" as their daily greeting to you, you can safely reply "Blindin'!"

So in summary, have we picked up any English accents? Not bleedin' likely!

Lai'ers!

Mother + Country

Last month Johnny's mum paid us a visit, as part of well-deserved miniature World Tour. After a few days getting settled into London (Portobello Road was a favourite) we left the city behind, travelling by train through beautiful countryside before swapping into a hire car to take us deep into the Lake District. As you may remember, we are massive fans of this area, and as Mum had never visited before, we took the opportunity to get back there.

To avoid being too repetitive we tried staying somewhere new - on Bassenthwaite Lake, at the western end of the region.



















By complete and amazing coincidence, we happened to be within walking distance of our ANZAC friends Kristy and Dave, who work at the Pheasant Inn - a highly-recommended pub, by the way - we knew their pub would be nearby but we didn't think it would be that close! We ended up having a quiet pint there before taking Dave the barman's advice and having a nice traditional English evening meal of a curry, at the interesting nearby town of Cockermouth. The following day we took even more of Dave's advice and visited the Jennings Brewery, which was both interesting and quite intoxicating as the visit finished with 3 halves of the ale of your choice. Earlier in the week, Mum had seemed quite surprised how largely the pub figures in English life (admittedly we had gone "down the pub" 5 times in 4 days!) - but now she was right into it, even having a go at pulling a pint!


We then moved to Keswick, our favourite town in the district. Mum is a keen walker so we took plenty of strolls around the hills and lakes, taking particular pleasure in being so "amateur" compared to the people Mum calls "Red-socks" - the serious walkers with all the Gore-Tex, backpacks and special poles. She had a good point; we were doing the same walks as them, none of which was longer than 8 kilometres, but they were equipped like they were tackling Everest and we were in T-shirts. Oh well, whatever makes you happy!



After four days in the Lake District we returned to the Big Smoke refreshed and invigorated. A few days later we saw Mum off for the final leg of her world tour: Kyoto, Japan. Now there's somewhere we definitely can't get a cheap flight to!